Chapter 32: What Happened Last Night?
The testing room was equipped with dozens of high-end computers and various latest-model game consoles, where some employees were testing games currently under development.
The "Heritage Hall," meanwhile, housed almost every classic game console and cartridge, from the Atari 2600 to the latest PS3 and Xbox 360.
"Oh! My! God!" Raj was so excited he almost fainted when he saw the entire wall of classic games. "Look! An unopened gold cartridge of The Legend of Zelda! And the first limited edition of Final Fantasy VII! This... this is basically the Smithsonian! The Smithsonian of gaming!"
Leonard also stared obsessively at the games that carried his childhood and teenage memories, murmuring, "Can I just live here?"
Even Penny recognized a few games she'd played at friends' houses when she was little, feeling a sense of nostalgia.
The assistant smiled and allowed them to try out a few small-scale casual games that the company hadn't yet released in the testing room, which made Leonard and Raj even more excited.
Sheldon, meanwhile, became deeply interested in a server running complex physics simulations and began asking the engineer nearby, "Can this machine run Crysis at maximum settings smoothly?"
When David found them with Sam Chen about two hours later, he saw several "big kids" still immersed in excitement, their eyes sparkling.
Raj was gesticulating wildly, describing an innovative game he'd just played to Penny, Leonard was still admiring the classic consoles, and Sheldon was holding his phone, having taken no fewer than twenty photos of a Nintendo Entertainment System.
"Looks like you had fun," David said with a smile as he walked over.
"David! This is incredible!" Leonard seemed very excited, then asked, "Did you solve your problem?"
Before David could answer, Sam Chen clapped David on the shoulder, a relieved expression on his face, and said to everyone, "Solved! The phantom latency issue our team had been investigating for ages without a clue—David came over, looked at the logs for half an hour, listened to us describe the phenomenon, and pinpointed the root cause. It was a minute timing conflict between the client's interpolation algorithm and the server's rollback validation under extreme network packet jitter! We modified the synchronization logic according to his idea, tested it hundreds of times, and the problem never recurred! This guy's brain is literally designed for solving complex system problems!"
Leonard, Raj, and Penny all looked at David in surprise, wondering when David had evolved from a gaming master into a game development expert.
Sheldon nodded thoughtfully. "Timing conflict... very interesting, this is similar to the common 'split-brain' problem in distributed systems, but its manifestation in a real-time gaming environment is more subtle."
Sam enthusiastically said, "Come on, I'll buy you guys dinner—there's a great pizza place nearby."
So, the group, under the friendly gazes of the Polaris employees, left this gaming development sanctuary that had stirred Leonard, Raj, and Sheldon's hearts.
On the way back, they were still excitedly discussing what they'd seen and heard, the air filled with satisfaction from this "pilgrimage."
The next day, in the Caltech campus cafeteria, David, Leonard, Raj, Sheldon, and Howard, who finally appeared, met up.
As soon as they met, Raj couldn't wait to tell Howard about his Polaris Interactive experience yesterday, with extremely exaggerated tones and rich gestures. "You can't imagine! That place! It's like NASA's gaming division mixed with the entertainment palace of the gods of Olympus!"
Leonard also excitedly added, "And that motion capture room! They used a smashed watermelon to simulate the sound effects and physics of a zombie's head exploding! So brilliant!"
Although Sheldon tried keeping his tone steady, his speech rate was noticeably faster than usual, and the content was full of details. "I personally saw a well-preserved original NES, and confirmed that the art design on the Stardust Saga version 1.02 poster corrected an icon error from the initial release. Also, their heritage hall even has photocopies of the original design documents for System Shock 2! Although they're just copies, they might have handwritten notes about cut content from back then!"
David smiled as he listened to them describe it, one after another, as if it wasn't a game company but some alien technology base.
After everyone calmed down, Leonard remembered to ask Howard, "By the way, Howard, how was your time with Christie, the 'Omaha Hurricane,' yesterday? When we came back from Polaris last night, we saw you and Christie were no longer at Penny's apartment. Did you... spend the night together? Where'd you stay? Your place?"
Immediately, everyone's eyes focused on Howard.
However, contrary to the expected smugness, Howard's expression was like he'd just eaten a whole lemon—sour, with obvious regret and dejection.
He hung his head and said weakly, "Christie? She's... probably on a plane back to Nebraska by now."
"What?!"
"Gone back to Nebraska?"
"What happened?"
Everyone immediately sensed something unusual, their curiosity piqued.
Raj even leaned in and pressed, "What happened? Did your 'Wolowitz charm' fail this time?"
Howard irritably ran his hand through his hair. "Don't even mention it! If only I'd known... if only I'd known I should've gone to Polaris with you yesterday! That would've been the smart choice!"
"What exactly happened?" Leonard pressed. "Weren't you... totally clicking, like gasoline and a match?"
Howard opened his mouth, as if to say something, but found it difficult to speak, finally just waving his hand in annoyance. "Nothing to say! Bottom line... I screwed up!"
The more he acted this way, the more curious his friends became. Leonard's eyes darted around, and he said, "Even if you don't tell us, Howard, if Penny just calls Christie and asks, we'll still find out what happened yesterday."
Howard immediately panicked. He knew that Penny and Christie were "family," after all, and she really might call to ask.
Then his embarrassing story, told from Christie's perspective, might be even more unbearable.
"Alright! Alright! You bunch of gossip-hungry vultures!" Howard reluctantly compromised, but he made a condition. "But I have one demand! David!" He looked at David. "You must! You absolutely must! Also take me to visit Polaris Interactive! As compensation for me telling this... unfortunate tale!"
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