Chapter 1162: Those who fool consumers will ultimately be overthrown

Soon, Lei Casar called a meeting of all directors and executives.

Dozens of people were sitting in the conference room, but no one spoke, and the entire room was enveloped in a heavy atmosphere.

Ray Casal gathered his emotions, braced himself and said loudly, 'The meeting is now in session!'

'As you can see, there are thousands of consumers protesting downstairs, the media around the area are already there, and there are definitely more media coming from other places.'

'The marketing department has just reported that protests have also broken out in other places in the US, although on a smaller scale, not just in Los Angeles.'

'The quality of E.T. has triggered consumer dissatisfaction, and as the company president, I have an unshirkable responsibility for this matter. I will report to the parent company later.'

'But the most important thing now is to minimise the adverse effects as much as possible. If you have any good ideas, please let me know as soon as possible...'

'President, I am in charge of the R&D department and have an unshirkable responsibility for this matter. I apologise to everyone here for the R&D department's causing the company to fall into crisis. I'm sorry!'

'I think the only way out of this crisis is to agree to the return of the 'E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial' game cartridge by consumers and dealers. However, other game cartridges and game consoles cannot be returned.'

The vice president in charge of the R&D department was the first to stand up, apologising sincerely to everyone before immediately expressing his opinion.

Vali Rex stood up second and said, 'Almost all major dealers have complained to us, either returning the goods or terminating the cooperation and joining the Tiangong Electronics Group. We have no choice.'

'Without these dealers, we lose our future. I also suggest agreeing to take back the 'E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial' game cartridges.'

'But we can't take back the game consoles. We have more than 8 million in stock, and the pressure is already very high.'

'I suggest that the company immediately apply for assistance from the parent company, which controls huge media resources. We can't let the word of mouth continue to get worse...'

'I agree that dealers and consumers should be allowed to return the game consoles, but we must minimise losses as much as possible. We should try to motivate the dealers and persuade consumers to exchange the game consoles for other cartridges or game consoles...'

...

One after the other, the senior executives and directors expressed their opinions.

Forty minutes later, the meeting drew to a close and the decisions were made.

First, it was agreed that consumers and dealers should be allowed to return the game consoles to calm the protests across the United States.

Second, the R&D department must mobilise all its resources to develop a high-quality game as soon as possible and bring it to market as soon as possible to win back consumers and dealers.

Third, public relations must be stepped up as soon as possible, and media assistance must be sought from the parent company to minimise the impact of public opinion as much as possible.

As the meeting was about to end, in order to boost the confidence of the company's top management, Ray Kassar looked composed and said aloud: 'The failure of a game is only temporary. As can be seen from the game "Pac-Man", consumers are very forgetful. We are the leader in the game industry. There are thousands of games on the Atari 2600 platform. Players cannot live without our game platform and will continue to buy our games. We must have confidence!'

After the meeting, Atari held a press conference in front of the company, with a very sincere attitude. First, they apologised; second, they were willing to let consumers return or exchange their products; and third, they made a statement to set a flag.

It was not until noon that the protest demonstrations finally subsided, and the thousands of protesters returned home.

The senior management of Atari let out a sigh of relief.

However, the instigator behind the scenes, Fok Kin-ning, would not let Atari have its way. He would not let this perfect opportunity slip through his fingers.

He immediately used the authority granted by the chairman to contact Peter Lynch of Polaris Capital and Yan Wenhan of Jiuding Newspaper to apply for all media resources to attack Atari.

So that evening, major evening newspapers, major local TV stations, and CNN News Network reported negatively on the demonstrations against Atari that had broken out across the United States.

The next morning, hundreds of national and local newspapers controlled by the Jiuding consortium also reported on the story, all without exception giving negative coverage to Atari based on the facts.

'Thousands of consumers gathered at Atari's headquarters in Los Angeles to protest the poor quality of the game based on the movie E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial.' - USA Today

'Atari's reputation has collapsed, and a series of games developed by Tiangong Electronics Group have triggered a sales boom.' - USA Today

'The contrast between the shocking promotional posters and the extremely basic nature of the products sent Atari Corporation over the edge.' - San Francisco Chronicle

'No matter how great an empire is, if it cheats and exploits its consumers unscrupulously, it will collapse.' - New York Daily News

'Shoddy production and quantity wins the day vs. striving for perfection and respecting the consumer. Which attitude should we consumers support?

The newspaper secretly controlled by the Jiuding consortium, while attacking Atari, would always bring up Tiangong Electronics Group as a positive contrast. This stark contrast made readers not only despise Atari after reading it, but also greatly increased the popularity of Tiangong Electronics Group. Many readers even directly purchased game consoles and game cartridges produced by Tiangong Electronics Group.

This purchase directly made them loyal fans of Tiangong Electronics Group.

In addition to the newspapers owned by the Jiuding consortium, media outlets that were in opposition to Warner Bros. Entertainment also ran negative stories.

However, these media outlets did not all cite Tiangong Electronics Group as a positive example.

Regardless, these media outlets were natural allies at this time.

For a while, these forces converged into a rolling flood, and Warner Bros. Entertainment's positive publicity was routed.

What were the consequences?

A total of nearly two million copies of Atari's E.T. game cartridge were bought by consumers.

Not to mention the seven million consumers who had been cheated by Atari's rubbish Pac-Man game before.

These consumers learned from the news that protests against Atari had broken out across the United States, and their anger and resentment were suddenly aroused, and they joined the ranks.

Countless consumers flocked to the game retail stores where they bought their game consoles and cassettes, demanding a refund.

And it wasn't just the 'E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial' game cassette that was returned, but also the Atari 2600, Atari 5200 and other game consoles, as well as shoddy and poorly made junk game cassettes such as 'Pac-Man'.

You have to know that the Atari game console was only used as a platform. Apart from the hundreds of rubbish games developed by Atari itself, there were also many rubbish games developed by third-party game companies based on the Atari game console.

Consumers didn't care whether it was developed by Atari or not.

Since Atari could return the rubbish game E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, there was no reason why other games couldn't be returned. There were quite a few people who held this idea and put it into practice.

For a time, game distributors across the United States were at their wits' end, facing aggressive consumers. Many distributors had no choice but to give in.

Some distributors who did not give in were met with chaos in their stores, and some people even forcibly took other game cartridges from the shelves after the distributors refused to accept the return.

Distributors who had suffered huge losses and endured so much pressure could only call the police and take out their anger on Atari.

If it weren't for Atari's large-scale release of shoddy games this year, and if it weren't for Atari's excessive false propaganda, which caused consumers to vent their grievances, why would they have to suffer such pain and losses?

Compared to Atari, dealers suddenly felt that Tiangong Electronics Group was practically a model among game companies.

I don't know how many dealers, after making up their minds to return Atari's goods this time, decided to suspend their cooperation with Atari and fully embrace Tiangong Electronics Group!