One day passed.
Then two.
Three days went by, and still, no arcade owner had contacted Galaxy Games Company to purchase their machines.
Factory director Liu Yihui had been reaching out to some of the arcade owners, but all the replies were the same — "We'll wait and see."
Lin Baicheng, however, wasn't disappointed by this. In fact, he was secretly pleased. After all, three days had gone by, and half of the one-week refund period had already passed — yet no arcade owner had called the company asking to return a machine.
That meant the worst-case scenario — no one playing the game at all — hadn't happened. There must be people playing it and helping arcade owners make some money. Otherwise, if almost no one played for three days straight and the owners couldn't even cover the electricity costs, they would've returned the machines immediately to get their money back.
No refunds — that was good news for Galaxy Games.
On the fourth day, Lin Baicheng sent ten employees to different arcades around Hong Kong to observe how many people were playing Hong Kong Blocks.
The results were encouraging. Each employee spent about three to four hours in an arcade, and during that time, Hong Kong Blocks earned roughly 20 Hong Kong dollars per machine. That meant the game could bring in around 50 dollars per day.
Since each arcade machine cost only about 5,000 Hong Kong dollars, that meant it could earn back its cost in roughly 100 days — not counting electricity and other expenses.
In this era, arcade games had a very long lifespan. The market wasn't as huge as it would be in the future, game varieties were few, and entertainment options were limited. So a fun game could enjoy a three-year golden period and stay profitable for at least five years.
Just imagine — a game that could recoup its cost in 100 days and last for years. Its prospects were incredible.
Lin Baicheng could do the math, and the arcade owners could too — even better than him. The reason they weren't rushing to place more orders was simple: they wanted to see whether the current popularity was just a temporary craze.
Based on the survey results, Lin concluded that the chance of returns was low and that more purchases were likely coming soon. So he told Liu Yihui to confidently contact the material suppliers.
This time, Lin placed an order for materials to produce 500 more machines, reducing the average cost per unit by 100 Hong Kong dollars. That may not seem like much, but multiplied by 500 units, it was 50,000 dollars in savings.
The total cost for 500 arcade units was 1.35 million Hong Kong dollars — far more than Lin currently had. Fortunately, he only needed to pay 30% upfront, another 30% within a month, and the final 40% within three months.
To cover that first 30%, Lin even used the money he'd just earned from selling 50 machines — otherwise, he wouldn't have had enough to pay.
He dared to take that step only because his confidence in Hong Kong Blocks was grounded in solid data, not blind optimism.
During the rest of the one-week refund period, arcade owners finally began ordering new machines. The total wasn't large — just under 20 units — but it was a very good start.
That made Lin Baicheng quite happy. From nearly 70 machines, he was already earning over 100,000 Hong Kong dollars. More importantly, this was just the beginning — he was confident sales would only grow from here.
When the refund period ended, not a single arcade chose to return their machines. Lin celebrated by hiring a cook who specialized in banquet dishes to prepare a feast at the factory — big fish and meat everywhere.
If he'd earned more money, he would've taken everyone to a hotel for the celebration instead.
Within the next week alone, Galaxy Games sold 300 arcade machines.
Selling 300 machines in just one week completely exceeded Lin's expectations. Thankfully, he had already purchased materials for 500 units and had his workers assemble them in advance, so he could deliver on time and collect payment immediately.
Still, Lin found it surprising. Hong Kong only had about 40 arcade shops in total — how could they buy that many machines? The market shouldn't be that big.
Then Liu Yihui explained — some arcade owners also had branches in Macau and Taiwan. They weren't just buying for their Hong Kong stores; they were shipping the extra machines there.
Macau was small, with fewer people and weaker economy, but Taiwan was different — around 20 million people, almost on par with Hong Kong economically, and a market about four times larger. The potential for arcade sales there was huge.
With 300 units sold and money in hand, Lin instructed Liu to order materials for another 1,000 machines and hire 20 more workers to boost production capacity.
Of course, a few troublesome incidents happened along the way, but thanks to Lin's foresight, he had hired ten security guards — all retired soldiers, tough and reliable. That ensured deliveries and payments went smoothly.
After all, many arcade owners in Hong Kong had ties to the triads. Without a bit of muscle, doing business with them wasn't easy.
Fortunately, Lin ran a legitimate business, and no one dared cause real trouble — just minor scuffles here and there. No one was foolish enough to send hundreds of men to fight, because if things got serious, even Lin's ten ex-soldiers might not be able to hold them off.
With Hong Kong sales running smoothly, Lin began setting his sights overseas.
He didn't go himself — instead, he sent several employees abroad, each carrying ten machines to the United States and Japan. They were to meet up with the company's two local employees there, who had now become full-time staff.
Lin's instructions were clear: once the machines arrived, first try to approach the largest game distributors in each country. If that didn't work, go store-to-store and sell them directly — whatever it took to break into the market.
As for pricing, the overseas price was set at $1,500 USD per unit — about HK$6,000 after taxes, slightly higher than the domestic price, but still reasonable compared to local arcade machine prices.
In Macau and Taiwan, however, the price stayed the same as in Hong Kong — HK$5,000 per unit — because, as Lin put it, "we're all part of the same country."