October 20th, Los Angeles Trade Fair.
Early in the morning, Lin Baicheng, Eric Davis, and their team met up with Phil Smith and the people from Phil Trading Company, and together they headed for the trade fair venue.
The Los Angeles Trade Fair had been held for many years and had grown into a massive, well-established event. Because it covered so many industries, tens of thousands of people attended every year — a true spectacle.
Among the crowd were event staff, company employees, international distributors, professionals from related industries, reporters, and, of course, the largest group — ordinary visitors.
Each industry had its own exhibition zone. Lin Baicheng and his team went straight to the video game section.
The video game industry was booming, so it occupied a fairly large area. However, Galaxy Games, as a small and relatively unknown company from Hong Kong, was given a much smaller booth. Lin had expected this, but when he saw it in person, he realized just how tiny it was.
Excluding the space needed for visitors to walk, their booth could only fit about ten arcade machines — any more, and it would be too cramped.
Lin had brought twenty machines each for Hong Kong Blocks and Pac-Man, but clearly, that was overkill. Only five of each would fit.
He asked Eric Davis to negotiate with the organizers for a larger booth, but they explained that all the spaces were already fully assigned and there was no room to move things around.
Lin had no choice but to accept it.
As a result, Galaxy Games was placed in one of the more remote corners of the game exhibition area.
Nearby, giants like Atari, Taito Corporation, Nintendo, and Sega had massive booths — especially Atari's, which was several times the size of Galaxy Games'.
But this was to be expected. At the time, Atari was the most famous game company in the world. Even if its market value wasn't the highest yet, its reputation was unmatched.
Lin couldn't help but envy those companies. Still, he believed that once Hong Kong Blocks and Pac-Man became global hits, Galaxy Games would no longer be a nameless startup. By next year, their booth would be just as large and impressive as those of the industry titans.
Nintendo, which had originally been a toy manufacturer, had recently entered the video game market under the leadership of Hiroshi Yamauchi. This year, Nintendo was showcasing several new arcade titles as well as their newest color TV game console, co-developed with Mitsubishi Electric — a home console featuring six versions of a simple tennis game. They were eager to see how it would perform at the fair.
Yamauchi himself attended in person to oversee the exhibition.
"Uncle Yamauchi!"
As he was giving instructions, Yamauchi turned at the familiar voice — it was Shigeru Miyamoto.
Surprised, Yamauchi recognized him at once. "Miyamoto! I remember you went to work for that Hong Kong company, Galaxy Games, didn't you? So your company's here as well?"
Although Galaxy Games had poached Miyamoto, Yamauchi hadn't thought much of it at the time and quickly forgot the company's name.
However, when Taito Corporation's Hong Kong Blocks became a massive hit in Japan, Nintendo investigated and discovered it was a Hong Kong-developed title that Taito had exclusive rights to distribute. Further digging revealed the developer was none other than Galaxy Games — and Yamauchi finally remembered it was the same company that had hired Miyamoto.
"Yes, Uncle Yamauchi," Miyamoto said politely. "Our booth is over there, though it's a bit small and far from the main area — we're still a young company."
"Every new company faces that stage," Yamauchi said knowingly. "Tell me, Miyamoto — did your company bring Hong Kong Blocks for the fair? Any other new titles?"
"Yes," Miyamoto nodded. "Besides Hong Kong Blocks, we're also showing a new game called Pac-Man. Our president personally led the development team. It's different from the usual black-and-white games — it's full of color, and the gameplay is very unique. I believe it'll be popular."
"A color arcade game?" Yamauchi's eyes widened slightly. "It seems we've had the same idea."
Nintendo's upcoming arcade machine was also going to feature color, but it hadn't been released yet — it looked like Galaxy Games had beaten them to it.
"Now you've made me curious," Yamauchi said with a slight smile. He genuinely wanted to see this colorful arcade game, though for now he couldn't leave his own booth.
After chatting a bit longer, Miyamoto excused himself and returned to Galaxy Games.
Lin Baicheng didn't ask what Miyamoto and Yamauchi talked about — instead, he instructed Miyamoto to stay at the booth and act as a skilled player, demonstrating Pac-Man to attract onlookers.
Having played the game countless times during development, Miyamoto was indeed an expert. His skilled demonstrations, alongside regular players, would show off the depth of the gameplay and help draw attention from the crowd.
After all, every curious visitor was a potential buyer — and every bit of attention counted.