A video game football tournament was held, and the winner would get a year's worth of free drinks at the bar.
The idea came from the bar owner's son.
He wasn't just a dedicated gamer himself — he was also a big fan of esports, which he considered new, cool, and cutting-edge.
He never missed a StarCraft match online, always catching them the moment they aired.
And when Super Soccer Championship officially launched and he got to play it for the first time, he was instantly captivated.
So were many of the old regulars who came to the bar every day to drink.
These guys used to scoff at FIFA football games. They always felt those games lacked realism.
The crowd cheers in FIFA sounded stiff and fake, and the player animations weren't exactly smooth either.
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They were initially curious about this new form of entertainment, but quickly lost interest. It just wasn't enough to hold their attention.
But when Carson — the bar owner's son — offered to share his console in the bar so more people could try out this new game called Super Soccer Championship, everything changed. The old drinking buddies and even the local thugs no longer wanted to leave the bar.
And naturally, the bar's alcohol sales started soaring.
Even more surprising, the young delinquents — who normally caused trouble just for fun — suddenly became calm and well-behaved.
Thanks to video games, their energy and attention were completely drawn in. They forgot all about picking fights.
This made it obvious: these guys didn't really enjoy fighting — they were just bored out of their minds. With nothing better to do, they resorted to violence. But now, video games gave them a new outlet, suppressing (or more accurately, consuming) their desire to fight. All they could think about now was how to play more Super Soccer Championship.
"Today I, the Bayern Tiger, will destroy you, you weak little Barça chickens!"
Of course, they weren't always this docile.
That violent streak still came out now and then — especially when they lost.
They'd get furious, needing to vent, and sometimes ended up destroying things.
One guy actually did just that.
After losing a match, he got so pissed that he hurled the controller into the TV screen.
The screen promptly went black and started smoking. The controller shattered.
No one got to play for the rest of the day.
The guy who broke the equipment? He got beat up by an angry crowd — even a few normally mild-mannered patrons joined in for a few kicks.
That's how much the community valued the gaming setup.
Later, the bar owner didn't say much. He just bought a brand-new, bigger TV and a few spare controllers. Honestly, the damage was nothing compared to the chaos those same guys used to cause before.
After that, no one dared touch the equipment the wrong way.
Now everyone sat quietly in front of the screen and played, not stepping out of line.
It was around this time the young bartender had the idea to host an actual football game tournament using the console.
Of course, the main goal was to draw more attention and boost the bar's revenue.
But what they didn't expect was that the whole town — men, women, kids, and even the elderly who loved football — would show up.
Kids drank milk. Women enjoyed fruity wines. The men (and the old-timers) had excellent beer.
In no time, the bar's revenue hit an entirely new level.
For the townspeople, there was something truly special about watching their favorite teams — under their own control — win a match.
It felt like the team was theirs. Like they were the soul of the squad.
Thanks to how Super Soccer Championship polished every little detail, the game delivered unparalleled realism. No one who played it ever thought it was boring. That's the magic of Super Soccer Championship.
Naturally, the game's rapid sales boost thrilled Matsubashi Mi, who was stationed in Europe.
It marked a small but solid success. For weeks, when sales hadn't yet caught up to FIFA, she had remained calm. Even when bombarded by the competition's marketing, she stayed quiet and didn't respond.
But now, things had changed.
Football games were becoming the talk of the town across Europe. People were amazed that such an entertaining new format existed — one where you could control your own team, made up of real-life rosters. The sense of immersion was powerful.
Soon after, Matsubashi Mi began reinvesting the profits heavily into new promotions.
Sure, YOO had gone big with their FIFA marketing early on, boosting sales quickly.
But now, Gamestar Electronic Entertainment had a constant flow of cash coming in — money that could be poured back into advertising to grow their influence even further.
Bit by bit, Super Soccer Championship became the main buzz in conversations.
And it all happened gradually, under the radar. Unless you were a trained market analyst, you wouldn't even notice how the shift occurred.
As for Nagao, he was still caught up in the success of the past and hadn't yet realized what was happening.
By the time he did, it might already be too late.
Shortly after, Gamestar Electronic Entertainment released their second game for the European market: Counter-Strike.
This time, Counter-Strike wasn't just released for home consoles — it also launched on PC.
Just like in the U.S., personal computers were widely used in Europe.
And most of them were running on Morgan Group's DOS operating system.
Thanks to a strong partnership with Morgan Group, Counter-Strike was exceptionally well-optimized. You didn't need high-end hardware to run it smoothly.
With the BattleNet system, you could compete in real time against players from all over the world — quietly opening up a second front for Counter-Strike.
With the groundwork laid by Super Soccer Championship, Counter-Strike had a noticeably stronger first week.
By the end of launch week, Counter-Strike had sold 930,000 copies — 500,000 on console and 430,000 on PC.
That total debut week performance overtook YOO's own shooting game.
The multi-platform strategy was starting to show clear advantages.
And this time, Matsubashi Mi had far more resources than before.
Takayuki, the head of Gamestar, gave a sweeping order: all the money earned from European game sales would be handed directly to the European branch for management — in essence, giving Matsubashi Mi a blank check and saying, "Spend it however you like. If you run out, just ask me for more."