Recap / Matsushita Guangdong

Guangdong Recap:
Index | Suzuki's Guangdong | Yasuda Crisis | Sony's Guangdong | Matsushita's Guangdong | Fujitsu's Guangdong | Lam Haau-cyun's Flashbacks | Opium Trade War | Hitachi Coup | Hitachi's Guangdong | Flavor Events | General Oil Crisis and Guangdong Riots | Imperial Japanese Army's Guangdong

Whom exactly those meticulously crafted words were directed at, not even Matsushita knew. Perhaps it was Morita and Ibuka, along with the outsiders from Cheung Kong and Hitachi; or perhaps it was part of the Matsushita family that always refused to embrace him.

"I'm reminded of something from watching sumo the other day. When a favored wrestler suffers an upset, the first and easiest explanation is complacency. A lesson for all of us: if we take our own position for granted, without the quality or innovation to justify it, then someone else will take our place."

— Matsushita Kōnosuke

The Legislative Council has made its decision: Matsushita Masaharu will become the new Chief Executive. Matsushita initially smiles and rises to the podium to claim his throne before the weight of this development finally hits him. For a brief second, Matsushita thinks about the family legacy he carries and the faith that his father-in-law, Matsushita Kōnosuke, has in him. He'd never openly admit it, but Masaharu is afraid that he might disappoint Kōnosuke again.

Formerly known as Hirata Masaharu, he became a Matsushita when he married Kōnosuke's daughter in 1940 and became heir to the Matsushita Electric Company. The Matsushitas were eager to expand their operations in East Asia, following Japan's victory in the Second World War. Masaharu suggested the Guangdong Province for being the most populous and richest part of China, which Kōnosuke accepted and sent him to act as the company's Operational Head. Unfortunately, Masaharu's venture proved less than fortunate and the company struggled to make a profit, no matter how much effort Masaharu put forth. The company was given a true black eye when Sonus-Li Electronics Company (Sony) emerged on the scene with the first portable radio on the market, overshadowing Matsushita Electric's latest air conditioner.

Kōnosuke made his disappointment very clear in a board meeting and indirectly mentioned Masaharu's complacency for the latest embarrassment. Since then, Masaharu swore to never let the company and his family down again, pumping out more products that turned Matsushita Electric into a household name. Even so, Masaharu feels that Kōnosuke doesn't respect him and he believes that he can only attain it, if he subjugates Guangdong as the company's newest domain. It will not be an easy mission, but with Masaharu's steady hand and business acumen, it is certainly within his grasp.

Following the Yasuda Crisis, the economy will be an obvious place to work for Matsushita. Though the idea of a Japanese-dominated society will be preserved, reforms will be needed to keep the system well-oiled and perhaps throw a concession or two to the Chinese and Zhujin to keep them content:

• The deportations of village populations to the city will persist through "Mandatory Urbanization". The process may be encouraged by advertising urban life as easier, as well as passing the Urban Housing Ordinance to build houses for the new workers and modernize farming and factory equipment.
• Factory productivity is not yet reaching its full potential, so Matsushita will expand the factories and cities to cut down on waste. The Efficiency Investment Ordinance will secure the funds necessary for other corporations to achieve Matsushita's vision.
• To carry out his infrastructure projects in the most efficient manner, Matsushita will hire subcontractors from either Japanese or Zhujin graduates.
• Matsushita Electric's top position will be secured in an aggressive advertising campaign and claims on Guangdong's natural resources.

Fixing the malaises left by the Yasuda Crisis is a related and equally important goal on Matsushita's agenda:

• The first order of business is removing Yasuda's carcass by selling or keeping their dead assets. A large remainder of them must be bought from an auction that Matsushita can potentially manipulate. Maintaining control of the dead assets and using dirty tactics will make it more likely for Matsushita to get caught and suffer a hit to his reputation, but the reward for riskier bets will be even higher.
• A cleaner bankruptcy code is established through the Revised Insolvency Ordinance, either giving more autonomy to smaller entrepreneurs or letting the Big Five of the Legislative Council influence the insolvency legislation.
• Financial independence will be necessary in future cases similar to the Yasuda Crisis, achieved by cutting wasteful spending and raising taxes to balance the budget, as well as attract Zaibatsu investors to Guangdong.

On the socio-political side, the Legislative Council proves a major irritant to Matsushita's agenda, while the Chinese citizens rabble about the oppression faced by their own government. All of these must be addressed in some capacity, with Matsushita still on top, of course:

• The Legislative Council must be corralled. The corruption of the other companies must be stopped (optionally, not including Matsushita Electric itself) and appease the opposition with promises of moderate executives to cool Morita's ambitions or affirmation of the status quo. The Corruption investigation Ordinance will form a new commission to "independently" investigate the Legislative Council's corruption, either as an independent body or a tool to be used by Matsushita Electric.
• Matsushita can either crack down on loopholes used by the other companies to illegally exert more influence in the Legislative Council or let the companies self-regulate under the excuse of "exercising efficient government authority".
• To placate the Chinese, the media can be coerced into exaggerating the reforms promised by Matsushita and curry favor from them. The Limited Labor Standards Ordinance will be far more powerful than Suzuki's Revised Labor Standards Ordinance and grant the bare minimum of worker benefits. It can include a "Least We Can Offer" amendment to give minor privileges or an "Honest Pay" amendment giving extra pay for overtime.
• Ethnic tensions between the Japanese, the Zhujin, and the Chinese are eased by either reaffirming the exclusion of Chinese government workers or slightly opening the bureaucracy up to them as a means of appeasement. Both options lead up to the development of schools so that a "smart worker is a productive worker".
• Matsushita can appoint members of his own company to government positions to effectively turn Guangdong into Matsushita Electric's domain and even double-down on it by fusing the firm with the government.
• Feeling a loss of manpower from Guangdong's "suicide epidemic", Matsushita builds more suicide nets, closes openings in taller buildings, and banning drugs that could make suicide more likely. In the long-term, Matsushita will propose the Environmental Standards Ordinance to put limits on emissions and raise the quality of life for everyone.

The last concern of the Matsushita regime is the security situation. Too long has Guangdong been sullied by corruption and crime, propagated by the negligence of Suzuki. For Matsushita, it's time to clean up house:

• The corruption must be uprooted, targeting either the very top of the underworld or the minions they work through.
  • In the former route, a trap is laid for Stanley Ho and Yokoi Hideki, the ringleaders of the Triads and Yakuza, respectively. Through bribed informants or Kenpeitai raids, leads on their criminal behavior are identified and must be investigated further to build a case against them. Longer investigations increase the risk of being exposed, with Ho and Yokoi quickly covering up their tracks and making it impossible to continue the chase. However, they also provide more damning evidence of the Triads' smuggling and illegal casinos, and the Yakuza's money laundering. The stronger the evidence, the more favorable the confrontation will be for Matsushita, who brings up the case to Ho and Yokoi. If successfully intimidated, they will have no choice but to cut their corrupt activities.
  • The latter route is a much simpler case of creating more safeguards against corruption, such as anti-vice supervisors in the Police and expanded punishments for corruption.
• The neglected Police Force must be reformed and professionalized if Matsushita can keep the streets clean of crime. Better recruitment standards are set and a Special Branch is created to monitor the population of potential criminals, turning the Police into a legitimately threatening force.
• The Triads and the Yakuza are a noxious element that Matsushita must destroy, either by allying with one of them to destroy the other or by going it alone to annihilate both sides.

When all of these reforms are carried out with brutal efficiency, Matsushita stands tall and proud in the new order. He believes he has finally lived up to his adopted father's legacy and forged a kingdom that he would be proud of. However, the regime he builds is one clearly favored to the Japanese; Chinese citizens, like the Lee family, are still condemned to work and live in the impoverished slums, while other denizens like Lam Haau-cyun and Yoshiko Yasukawa can only watch these injustices be carried out. Small companies can hardly compete against the corporate titans still running around in Guangdong, such as the tragedy of Nintendo, where Yamauchi Hiroshi's vacuum cleaner fails to draw many consumers. The Zhujin and Chinese citizens are not content to be treated like second-class citizens, with the most rebellious among them forming the Guangdong Federation of Tradesmen and the Committee of Chinese Labor. Of more immediate concern, Matsushita's victory doesn't last long before the Oil Crisis hits.

In a situation not dissimilar to the Yasuda Crisis, the entire country falls into panic as the price of foods and other necessities skyrockets. Matsushita refuses to befall the same tragedy as Suzuki and formulates an immediate response. As Matsushita calls for calmness among the populace, he uses funds from Japan or emergency taxes to scrape whatever the government can and allocate it to whatever the Chief Executive deems most necessary to stabilize the situation. The most radical response is the Budget Freeze Order, which will limit future spending at the cost of handicapping the economy in the future. Matsushita Electric must also adapt to the depression, either scaling back on production levels or maintaining them in a risky bet that their consumers will still buy from them.

Even so, Matsushita cannot survive on his own and will need to call a favor from either Morita Akio or Ibuka Masaru. Matsushita may think that Morita is a bleeding heart and Ibuka is a narrow-minded fool, but the favors they can provide are too beneficial to deny. Whoever he favors, the Chief Executive will concede more influence to their companies and entice them with emergency grants or research and development grants, respectively. The cooperation will climax with the New Employment Standards Ordinance for Morita and the Economic Prioritization Ordinance for Ibuka; the former will grant better labor standards to appease the Chinese and the latter will bar Zhujin businesses to cut on competition towards Fujitsu and Matsushita Electric.

With the worst effects of the Oil Crisis warded, Matsushita can turn his attention to the social consequences of the catastrophe. All manners of people are trying to flee Guangdong for better prospects in Japan or the Republic of China. By using incentives and border patrols, Matsushita will stop the mass migration and bring order back to Guangdong, hopefully until the long-term consequences of the Oil Crisis wane. Unfortunately for Matsushita, these hopes are quickly dashed when workers rebel in a Hitachi factory and spark a mass movement of demonstrators in the Guangdong Riots.

Organized by the GFT and CCL, hundreds of thousands of rioters march down the street and threaten to tear down the Matsushita regime. The sons of the Lee family, Chun and Hei, join the movement. Seeing opportunity in the chaos, Yamauchi tries his luck again by starting a taxi service for safe transport in the streets, but that plan falls through when his CCL-affiliated drivers deny his terms. Underestimating their strength, the Chief Executive sends the Police to disperse them. Though some rioters like Hei are arrested, the attack only radicalizes the people's anger. Taken aback, Matsushita reconsiders his next move. To the rest of the Legislative Council's outrage, one possible response is to negotiate with the rioters and reluctantly give them some concessions in the hopes that they calm down. The Effective Oversight Ordinance will give Matsushita more power to act independently of the other corporations and appease the rioters' interests. Alternatively, Matsushita can adopt more vicious attacks against the riots, using the Emergency Powers Ordinance to vest more power in himself and use stricter surveillance and policing to break them apart.

Though the second response cools the Riots down, a third move is needed to put them down for good. Matsushita can continue the compromises with Morita's help, appeasing the moderates' simplest demands and releasing Hei and everyone who was imprisoned in the demonstrations. On the opposite end of the spectrum, Matsushita can employ Komai Kenichirō's help and unleash the Kenpeitai to suppress the Riots, with Chun joining his brother in prison and waiting to be released until the Riots are over. There is also a middle ground response from Matsushita, calling in one last favor from either Morita or Ibuka to starve out the rioters until they run out of steam and agree to a ceasefire heavily in favor of the government.

Should the tide be withstood, the exhausted protestors will disperse and return to the factories, while government workers start cleaning the streets as if nothing happened. Matsushita Electric has an equally quick recovery, flooding the markets with their products and proudly exclaiming their quality with a 'Made in Guangdong' stamp. Lam watches in bitter disappointment, knowing of his complicity in the Matsushita regime and history will only see him as a monster, but ultimately can't do anything to help himself besides remain subservient. Yoshiko shares the feeling, having been relocated to a Japanese neighborhood for her own safety and unable to continue documenting life for the downtrodden. Nintendo itself is barely standing at this point, but Yamauchi is determined to not close its doors just yet. Meanwhile, Chun and Hei return safely back to their family and there's a feeling of relief that no one perished in the Riots, but there is also a simultaneous glum that they will return to their lives of Japanese oppression. Hei is perhaps the most disillusioned of the Lees, surrendering his dream of becoming anything more than a factory worker. He even convinces his sister, Lee Wai, that this is the only way to support the family and makes her promise to study hard enough that she won't follow the same mediocrity of her older brothers.

In the upper echelons of the Legislative Council, Matsushita's response to the Oil Crisis and Guangdong Riots will determine his fate. If he gave too many favors to Morita or Ibuka, Matsushita will have ceded too much influence to them and his former partner will conduct a soft coup against him. Though Matsushita technically still rules Guangdong, he is ultimately subservient to his shadow master, who is now free to carry out their own ambitions. The situation depresses Matsushita, as he's cast aside and only used as a rubber stamp for whatever paper his superior sends his way. However, time eases the pain of Matsushita's failure, who comes to terms of his own fleetingness and even admits some fault for his failure. Even Kōnosuke sympathizes with the unwinnable situation that Masaharu was put in and still accepts him as family, inviting him to Osaka so he can serve the company in other ways.

However, maintaining a balance of influence between Morita and Ibuka will preserve the Chief Executive's autonomy and secure Guangdong's place as Matsushita Electric's latest domain. Here, Matsushita stands proudly as Guangdong's dictator and Kōnosuke's ascendant heir, who eagerly awaits what to do next in the coming decade. His only remaining concern are the growing tensions between China and Japan, with Matsushita unsure of how to manage the crisis and save his work in Guangdong. For the time being, Matsushita can bask in his glory and, even more cathartically, his adopted father calls him. Picking up the phone, Masaharu hears Kōnosuke's warm praise and respect that his heir has lived up to his legacy. In a rare moment of brevity at work, Kōnosuke proudly says "I'm proud of you, Masaharu." Flustered, Masaharu simply replies "Thank you, father."

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This route provides examples of:

• Actually Pretty Funny:
  • While the Lee family celebrates the Limited Labor Standards Ordinance's passage, Leong makes a raunchy joke that his wife scolds him for saying in front of Wai, but even she can't control her laugh at it.
  • Ibuka rejects Morita's idea to directly negotiate with the Guangdong rioters and instead wants the police to conduct harsher crackdowns. Normally, Morita would take offense at his hated rival's opposition, but the bored expression Ibuka delivers his comments with is enough for Morita to give an amused smile.
• Ain't Too Proud to Beg:
  • Still recovering from the Yasuda Crisis, Matsushita will appeal to Japan for a bailout, even if he has to beg for it.
  • During the Oil Crisis, Matsushita may plead for additional funding from Tokyo. Despite knowing that he'll receive minimal aid, he figures that he might as well take what he can get.
• A.K.A.-47: Matsushita's "Special Function Infantry Weapon" rifle is a direct copy of the 1965 AAI prototype for the Special Purpose Individual Weapon program, with the same saboted flechette ammunition and high-capacity drum magazine.
• Aggressive Negotiations: If Matsushita makes some concessions to the GFT during the status-quo path, a series of negotiations will occur between the two, which is notably tense with neither side willing to back down nor abandon the discussions. During the first meeting, Matsushita is the first to be angered at the GFT’s opening demands, which only results in both sides doubling down. Despite the hostility, the fact that neither side left suggests that some progress is being made in the eyes of Matsushita.
• Alcohol-Induced Idiocy: Subverted if Matsushita starts funneling more of the Council's money into his own company during the Oil Crisis. A Fujitsu and Hitachi executive drink at a bar together and loudly complain about Matsushita's decision, but they're careful to not get too drunk and spill anything more than that.
• All for Nothing: In the 1950's, Matsushita invested in radios, monochrome televisions, and refrigerators that he expected would impress everyone across the Sphere. Unfortunately for him, all of his hard work was overshadowed by Sony's release of the first portable radio, with the local newspaper only paying a cursory review for Matsushita's latest air conditioner. Even worse, Kōnosuke blamed Masaharu for the company's latest failure and began limiting contacts with his once adored son-in-law.
• And the Adventure Continues:
  • With Matsushita Electric on top in Japan, Masaharu and Kōnosuke look out from the Eagle's Nest and celebrate their success over the Zaibatsus. When Kōnosuke asks Masaharu what comes next, his son-in-law replies that they should think about going beyond the Sphere and asserting themselves across the globe.
  • After handling the Guangdong riots and retaining his autonomy, Matsushita reflects on how far he's come from Kōnosuke's disgraced heir and ponders on what he should do with his newfound power. More concerning, rumors of war between Japan and China are brewing, which may very well be Matsushita's undoing if he isn't careful. It's also mentioned that Chinese resistance is on the rise again, which may require Matsushita to bring out the dreaded Kenpeitai once more to preserve his high, but not invincible, throne.
• Antenna Adjusting: Matsushita's color televisions need to have their antennas fiddled with for the device to work. One particular Argentinian family struggles to turn on the television, with the youngest child getting slapped for speaking out of line and the mother glaring at her husband for spending their income on a device he's struggling with. However, to their surprise, the TV turns on and the children start cheering as their favorite wrestling show plays, giving the parents a break.
• Appeal to Worse Problems: Matsushita's negotiations with the rioters is also aided by his condemnation of their more extreme and violent members, fear mongering their illegal activities to make the status quo, and his regime by extension, seem preferable.
• Armor-Piercing Question: After Matsushita tries to reassure the workers during the Oil Crisis, he attends a press conference for other Japanese executives to ask him questions about how he's going to fulfill his promises, with one of them asking how he's going to fund the program and not fall into the same trap as Suzuki. This reminder of Suzuki catches Matsushita off-balance and makes him lose his composure for the first time in the conference.
• Auction: Snatching the abandoned properties and businesses left in the Yasuda Crisis' wake, Matsushita auctions off everything that he decides not to keep, either favoring the Guangdong companies to control the country's reconstruction or the Japanese companies to curry their favor.
• Audience Murmurs: Matsushita's opening speech as Chief Executive is only met with murmurs and lukewarm applause in response to the mundane corporate speech he gives. Nevertheless, Matsushita considers this to be a decent start and a demonstration of his new authority.
• The Bad Guy Wins: After successfully navigating the Guangdong riots and refusing to cede too much influence to either Morita or Ibuka, Matsushita stands tall and proud over Guangdong, finally achieving what Suzuki failed to do and molding a model colony where Matsushita Electric reigns supreme.
• Batman Gambit:
  • If Matsushita decides to conserve funds during the Oil Crisis, Morita publicly criticizes his neglect towards the masses in a women's magazine, the Kanton Fujin Koron. It's something that few, least of all Matsushita, would read, but Morita knows that his complaints in a more popular publication would easily be misconstrued as a personal attack and he's banking on Matsushita's wife reading his words and relaying the message to her husband.
  • Knowing that his rivals will take advantage of his company's weakness during the Oil Crisis, Matsushita tries outgambit them by convincing them to support him, feigning vulnerability and emboldening them to try puppeting him, while bearing the brunt of all the unpopular decisions he must make to address the Oil Crisis.
• Be Careful What You Wish For: When the owner of an Italian pizzeria buys a Matsushita air conditioner, he experiences a massive influx of customers during the middle of hot days. The increase is so significant that he struggles to keep up with the increased workload and contemplates hiring an additional cook.
• Big Damn Reunion:
  • Once released in Matsushita's reconciliation path, Hei runs all the way home and lovingly embraces his family while they nurse him back to health.
  • If Chun gets arrested in the riots, he realizes that his cellmate is Hei and the two brothers have a tearful reunion, at least grateful that they have each other, until they can return home.
• Bittersweet Ending: For Matsushita, in the endings where he becomes a puppet to Morita or Ibuka. By the end, Matsushita has sacrificed too much of his power to one of the aforementioned factions and become little more than their mouthpiece, ultimately failing to prove himself the rightful heir to Matsushita Electric. However, Matsushita eventually comes to terms with his fate and becomes far more spirited when he reemerges to the public eye, ultimately accepting some accountability for his mistakes. And, while he may not have earned Kōnosuke's respect, he still has his love, evidenced when he invites Masaharu to Osaka so he can help the company through other means.
• Black Market: With most of the security forces distracted by the Oil Crisis, a thriving black market develops across the Guangdong border, with Chinese nationalists smuggling weapons, pamphlets, and people to prepare for an eventual war of Chinese reunification. Inevitably, Matsushita will either need to address this with tighter security or neglect it.
• "Blackmail" Is Such an Ugly Word:
  • While offering a truce to pass the Urban Housing Ordinance, Komai merely requests a "monetary compensation" for his help. Matsushita is quick to snuff it out as a bribe in all but name.
  • Seeing the dangerous work conditions and lack of regulations in a factory, an inspector deems the whole situation illegal, but tells the owner he'll look the other way through a "charitable donation" to prove the factory's commitment to the workforce. Not wanting to see his operation shut down, the owner happily obliges with the bribe.
• Blatant Lies:
  • Yamauchi reads about Matsushita's ascension in a newspaper, with the Chief Executive promising cooperation and "united prosperity". Yamauchi isn't convinced at all and quickly points out that Matsushita is bound to maintain the oppressive status quo.
  • One sensational headline compares Matsushita to a cryptid for his so-called reformist attitude to combat injustices and "create a harmonious society".
  • If he maintains direct control over the newly established anti-corruption body, Matsushita will claim that it is for efficiency's sake and that the selected officials were painstakingly chosen, even though everyone knows that this is a ploy for him to wield greater influence in the Legislative Council.
  • During the Oil Crisis, Matsushita and Yokoi try to reassure the masses that they can balance the budget and maintain the same quality of government services, despite the obvious tax cuts they can engage in. Yokoi doesn't even try to put up a front that he's being genuine, looking bored out of his mind during the press conference.
  • If Matsushita rejects Morita's offer to personally negotiate with the Guangdong riots, he has his men print out an address to the protests, making all sorts of bland statements about how the peoples' voices have been heard and that the government is interested in a peaceful resolution. When Morita receives the paper and reads it, he correctly identifies all of it as a pack of lies.
  • The government tries to cool the masses after the Oil Crisis through calls of sharing the burden equally and together. Given the tax hikes and increased costs of publci services, most of the Chinese population knows that most of the suffering is really being displaced on to them and even Hei feels a strong feeling to fight back.
• Boring, but Practical:
  • Matsushita will improve Guangdong's insolvency laws to better handle future bankruptcies, a common-sense policy that doesn' stir much opposition from the Legislative Council, furthered by the amendments getting feedback from the business community at large.
  • When tackling corruption, Matsushita may choose not to directly target the most powerful corrupt players, but focus on minor officials in a ground-up approach, mitigating any damage to his legitimacy. Namely, he will focus on discouraging corruption, improving investigations for long-term improvement, setting up anti-vice supervisors in the police force, and monitoring low-level bureaucrats. It might not be a fast approach, but it is more practical than trying to monitor everyone.
• Bread and Circuses: If the gangs are hired to manage the Oil Crisis, they will be allowed to run casinos and bars to distract the populace, while the government works to address the calamity.
• Brutal Honesty: Yamauchi tries to get an investment from Matsushita by presenting his electronics to him, but the executives are unenthusiastic and, after a moment of awkward silence, do not hide the fact that his ideas are not exciting. When the executives coldly agree to invest in one product, Yamauchi contemplates if it was a good idea to move into electronics.
• Bystander Syndrome: After the Revised Insolvency Ordinance's passage, Lam sees a line of disheveled businessmen file for financial bailout, which makes him recall his own past hardships in Guangdong and lament that no one is acting up in the face of this injustice.
• Caught on Tape: The spread of Matsushita's tape recorders to Chile represents a significant change in its political culture, as every chaotic and fractured debate in the Chamber of Deputies can be recorded and broadcasted to the entire country. Many politicians dislike hearing their disagreements aired out on the radio, but the citizens love hearing the drama in Santiago.
• Choosing Neutrality: Matsushita can face the Guangdong riots without relying on any other faction in the Legislative Council, deciding to toe both sides of the aisle so that he can stand alone.
• Cliffhanger: Yamauchi's subplot ends with Nintendo in dire financial straits, after his vacuum cleaning and taxi endeavors flop. Yamauchi almost considers closing up shop and returning to the Home Isles, until he remembers his great-grandfather's struggles to get into the hanafuda card industry, inspiring him to not give up on Nintendo yet. He resolves to try again, leaving it unknown if he will ever achieve success in the next decade.
• Close to Home: Morita is still insecure about his past business failures and being run out of the Home Isles twenty years ago, which Matsushita exploits during their partnership and persuades him to sign an agreement to give him political support in exchange for financial assistance.
• Collateral Damage: Matsushita's takedown of the gangs results in a lot of innocent bystanders getting killed in the crossfire, with only brief condolences being offered in recompense. The POV woman barely escapes back home with her life during the shootout.
• Commonality Connection:
  • One thing that unites the various classes and peoples of Guangdong is a fascination with the supernatural, interrupting the mundanity and suffering of everyday life in Guangdong.
  • Incarcerated and surrounded by unfriendly prisoners, Hei tries to make friends with another cellmate who looks to be around the same age, forming a friendship based on their shared participation in the riots.
• Conditioned to Accept Horror: A local cleaner reflects on how many people have committed suicide in Guangdong and his job to remove their corpses. Much to his conflicting feelings, the cleaner has seen so many victims that he's barely affected by them anymore and largely working so he can get a paycheck.
• Confidence Building Scheme:
  • With the economy in free fall by the Oil Crisis, Matsushita tries to rebuild investor confidence and promote business activity in Guangdong. However, his speech is met with a mixed response and the investors fire a torrent of questions about his capabilities.
  • A more successful example may occur later in the Oil Crisis. if Matsushita appeals to the Legislative Council for support. Despite being visibly tired from all the work, he exudes a sense of energy and determination to face the Oil Crisis with a plan, raising everyone's morale and taking the first steps to economic recovery.
• Consolation Prize: To satiate their ambition, Matsushita gives the other Legislative Council members extra privileges as a concession to earn their cooperation.
• Cooperation Gambit: Much as he would like to exercise complete dominance over the Legislative Council, Matsushita recognizes that direct confrontation with the opposition will only strengthen their resistance, so he placates them with limited powers. When doing so, Matsushita may grant greater consideration towards the moderate faction surrounding Morita or empower the establishment that would sufficiently benefit his own position.
• Counter-Attack: Once the Riots break out, Matsushita tries to swiftly take them out and restore the status quo. Despite consolidating the police's strength and luring the protestors out from their defensive positions, the government's attack is met with an even stronger counterattack from the radicalized workers, forcing Matsushita to reconsider his strategy.
• Crappy Holidays: Even with the Limited Labor Standards Ordinance passing and Chun enjoying time off with his family, he can’t help but wonder about all the time passing that he could be working to provide for his family.
• Crapsaccharine World: Matsushita projects Guangdong as a prosperous and luxurious triumvirate of three "pearls", generating unimaginable profits in their factories and featuring an exciting casino industry. However, it's really only good for the Japanese tourists who visit and ignore the nightmarish work abuses and poverty that many Chinese residents face. Case in point, as Hei is walking home one night, he sees an advertisement featuring an ethnically diverse group of Asian children celebrating their pluralism, as well as a mural of happy Chinese workers captioned with the phrase "We work for everyone!", which would be enough to fool everyone except for those actually living in Guangdong.
• Crazy Enough to Work: Masaharu and Kōnosuke are reluctant to expand into Germany, thinking they'll find themselves unwelcomed and targeted by the country's nationalization policies. Contrary to their expectations, Matsushita Electric thrives, selling their air conditioners to every German household and spreading brand recognition in the country. By the end of the decade, Matsushita basks in the rapid sales among the upper-middle class, particularly from Germania, and is excited by his end-of-year bonus.
• Cutting Corners:
  • After expanding natural resource extraction in Guangdong, a representative from Mitsubishi Mining discusses possible revisions to the contract terms on the basis that the concessions to basic worker rights are too expensive and would be double the previously agreed upon investment. As such, Matsushita may agree to renegotiate the terms of the agreement and take away these few privileges out of corporate greed.
  • One of the projects he pursues is to fund public housing and the newly constructed apartments have a pleasant exterior, but a decrepit interior that wasn't shown in the schematics. The costs of the plan were simply too much and the construction team decided to start taking shortcuts, with Matsushita himself not really caring because it will be cheap.
  • While Morita wants the New Employment Standards Ordinance to be as powerful as possible, Ibuka whines about the costs needed to implement the law, wanting to snip the committees' jurisdiction so not too much money is invested in it.
  • To save more money during the Oil Crisis, Matsushita can streamline the assembly process and pump out more products, regardless of their lower quality.
  • Factory workers are allowed to loosen their labor standards and worker rights during the Oil Crisis, a move approved by Matsushita so he can win more political support and encourage Japanese investors to keep their money in Guangdong.
• Cynic–Idealist Duo: In response to the Ordinance for Effective Oversight, two Chinese men discuss the ramifications depending on whether it passed or not. If it passes, then Yingjie, the idealist of the duo, will be excited that the corporations are backing down and that the people are being listed, whereas Quan, the cynic of the duo, notes that the Japanese continue to rule the economy and a just appeasing the people. In the fail scenario, then Quan will gloat about having told Yingjie not to trust Matsushita and that real change can only occur through violence.
• Deadly Euphemism:
  • After giving some concessions to the rioters in the reconciliation path, Matsushita requests the dissidents to tone down their activities in return, giving some "subtle but noticeable" threats to get the message through.
  • If Matsushita tries to toe the line during the Guangdong riots, Nagano will inform the Chief Executive that Tokyo is displeased with his approach and says that they will do "Nothing. For now". Matsushita doesn't need a hint to know that the second part means a military coup. Not to mention Nagano's added "And make sure you handle this promptly" without adding the implied "or I will".
• Death or Glory Attack:
  • Matsushita may double down on his heavy intervention into the economy by allocating additional funds from the banks and enticing investors, which will risk more blowback.
  • The major corporations may be pressured into paying greater taxes so that Guangdong's budget can be stabilized, though this risks greater political repercussions for Matsushita in the Legislative Council.
  • During the investigation into Ho and/or Yokoi, Matsushita will need to dig deep into certain clues that might uncover more evidence needed to prosecute them. Gathering more evidence makes it more likely to confront and intimidate them into submission, but this also risks the investigation's cover being blown and prematurely stopped.
  • During the auction of Yasuda's remaining assets, Matsushita may slant the auction in his favor and keep more of their valuable properties. The further Matsushita goes with this, the greater the chance he has of the Legislative Council catching on to what he is doing and damaging his position politically. Get away with it, though, and the financial boon would be invaluable.
• Despair Event Horizon: When Matsushita scales back production and fires thousands of workers to mitigate the Oil Crisis, a Chinese man wanders the city in despair over losing his job and that he'll need to fight for scraps if he's going to survive in Guangdong.
• Developer's Foresight: On routes where Matsushita freezes everyone's wages, he will automatically bypass the focuses where he offers meager benefits for the Chinese citizens to stay in the cities and where he tries to convince Tokyo to send help against the Guangdong rioters by communicating his regime's profitability.
• Didn't Think This Through:
  • If Matsushita decreases spending on the police force to save money, the Chief of Police meets with Matsushita and furiously points out that his short-sighted decision had spread them too thin on the Chinese border and left them vulnerable to insurgents. Matsushita can optionally double down on his decision, believing that the Chief is just exaggerating.
  • Matsushita's advertising campaign can also promote the other Big Five so that he can maintain support in the Legislative Council, but he didn't foresee that it would backfire because Matsushita's products are now being outcompeted.
  • At one point during the Oil Crisis, Yokoi suggests that Matsushita should freeze everyone's wages to cut as much "unnecessary spending", but if this option is picked, this spells disaster as the police are left more vulnerable than ever and the dissidents become more powerful.
  • When his vacuum cleaning products fail, Yamauchi switches Nintendo's speciality to taxi services and thinks that they'd be in hot demand while the riots are ongoing and safe transportation is scarce. Unfortunately, he never considered how to hire the drivers, as many of them are affiliated with the CCL and will not work without higher wages and shorter hours.
• Difficult, but Awesome: Top-down anti-corruption measures will directly confront Ho and Yokoi, bending Guangdong's most powerful gangsters to the whims of Matsushita. However, it's also more risky than the bottom-up approach, as the gangsters will quickly cover their tracks if they catch onto Matsushita's game and thus render his efforts for nothing.
• Disastrous Demonstration: Subverted. Matsushita is nervous to demonstrate one of his air conditioners to Speer and the Gang of Four, once embargoes are lifted. He pitches the benefits of increased productivity in the workplace and has an engineer turn one of them on, prompting Speer to be silent for a moment and Schmidt to shrug before Speer smiles and calls the product a "lovely little thing".
• Divide and Conquer: Matsushita can combat the riots by negotiating with their more moderate members and denouncing the radicals, driving a wedge between them and making them easier to dismantle.
• Divided We Fall: If Matsushita starts employing spies and informants to dismantle the riot organizations, the dissidents will begin accusing each other of being a double agent and purge each other, destroying themselves so that Matsushita can come out on top.
• Dog-Kicking Excuse: Ordered by Matsushita to transfer the riot organizers to the local police, the Kenpeitai meet several officers to begin the exchange, but they are attacked by some rioters. The Kenpeitai agents use their submachine guns to cut down their assailants and, suspiciously, one of the prisoners is also shot dead. They try to claim he was running to justify the sudden coincidence.
• Don't Celebrate Just Yet: After finishing his fiscal tree, Matsushita expresses self-doubt about making Guangdong financially independent of Japan and, while he is relieved by the report showing the government's stellar revenue, he refuses to celebrate too much as he worries about the sustainability of the budget and the internal political threats he faces over it.
• Double Meaning: Matsushita is jubilant if Guangdong economically surpasses Manchuria. When praised by the media and asked what he envisions for the future, Matsushita answers "Prosperity", alluding to the economic prosperity for Guangdong aggrandizement of himself, the latter of which is cemented when he is praised by his father-in-law.
• Dynamic Entry: If Matsushita’s Emergency Powers Ordinance passes, then the police make such an entry where a family is listening to a radio broadcast about the passage of the ordinance, only to be interrupted by the explosions and marching of police on the street.
• Dystopia Is Hard: Matsushita's immediate response to the Guangdong riots is to unleash every security force he's got on them, hoping that they can swiftly and brutally crush the dissidents and everything can go back to normal. Unfortunately for him, this miscalculated move not only fails to end the crisis, but embolden the rioters, showing that Matsushita is going to have to get crafty if he wants to survive the ordeal, either through reconciliation or through more precise strikes at the protestors' vulnerabilities.
• Easily-Overheard Conversation: If Matsushita offers Li and Morita a truce, the Chief Executive will overhear a conversation between Li and Morita as they approach his office. Morita jokes about Matsushita's friends being done with him while Li points out that at least he is willing to talk to them and that this is a prime opportunity to sway the establishment in their favor. The animosity between Matsushita and the moderate executives is nothing new and they continue into the meeting to discuss points of mutual benefit.
• Elite Army: Matsushita reforms the national security by founding the Special Investigative and Enforcement Branch of the Guangdong Police Force, which Lam is transferred to.
• Emergency Authority: Matsushita's violent tactics to quash the rioters reaches its apex when he issues the Emergency Powers Ordinance, which will concentrate all power to the Chief Executive and give him permission to use whatever means necessary to end the chaos. Passing this ordinance is mandatory to take the "One Final Push" national focus and crush the riots with brutal prejudice.
• Empathic Environment:
  • When Yamauchi expresses disappointment in Matsushita and the continued status quo, the current weather is rainy. But, when Yamauchi thinks that he can get into the consumer electric market by appealing to Matsushita Electric, his hopes are raised and the rain appropriately lightens.
  • As Yokoi informs Matsushita that consumer spending is at an all-time low during the Oil Crisis, Matsushita begins to sweat profusely, just as it is raining outside.
  • If Matsushita scales back production to cope with the Oil Crisis and leaves thousands jobless, one worker notices the wet and smoggy weather on the same day he's been fired, matching the dour mood he's in.
  • When Matsushita is puppeted by either Morita or Ibuka, he will contemplate his fate on a suitably gloomy day, knowing he can do little to resist as it will destroy everything he has worked to create in the past decade.
• Empty Promise:
  • ** Matsushita can offer token support to the people who are forcibly relocated to the cities. Despite the high promises, the support is negligible and mostly for propagandistic purposes for the populace.
  • After Chun breaks the news of Hei's arrest during the riots, his distraught father makes Chun promise that he does not leave the house again, unable to even think that another one of his children could be taken away. Chun superficially agrees to the promise, but internally knows that he can't just stand idly in the face of a tyrannical regime that took his brother away.
• Endurance Duel: The riots boil down to a slog between the rioters and the police force, until the former run out of steam to continue. Part of Lam respects the persistence of the rioters for months of protest, but he and his fellow officers get tired of the constant fighting every day without an end in sight.
• Enemy Mine:
  • If Matsushita achieves more than 50 seats in the Legislative Complex, some of the other companies form informal truces to coordinate their schemes against Matsushita and draw power away from him.
  • Knowing that the Legislative Council will only stall with intense bickering, Matsushita can try to appease the "moderates" by inviting Morita and Li to a truce. Though the two Zhujin despise him, they reluctantly accept the offer because it's the best shot they have left to achieve their reforms.
  • Since the Guangdong police lack the manpower alone to take on the Yakuza or Triads, Tsuchida recommends that Matsushita ally with one of the gangs to eliminate the other, despite having no affection for either. Matsushita gives greater consideration to this when Ho and Yokoi approach him with a truce, even if this will tie the Chief Executive to one of them and risk empowering one over the other.
  • In the Oil Crisis, Matsushita will form a truce with either Morita or Ibuka, appeasing their interests in exchange for support and offering grants to either so they can weather the storm.
  • Towards the end of the Oil Crisis, Matsushita can lean into the hostile Legislative Council or the criminal underworld for support in stabilizing the situation, with the latter being affected by whether Matsushita allied with the Triads or Yakuza prior.
• Every Man Has His Price:
  • It's relatively easy for Matsushita to infiltrate the circles of corrupt officials by bribing their associates into ratting them out and Matsushita lampshades this option when tackling corruption. Matsushita reasons that it's all a matter of how much they'll be paid to squeal.
  • During a boardroom meeting with Matsushita Electric, many of the corporate representatives present are disinterested in pouring more money into Guangdong, especially since Matsushita's regime has recently been crippled by the Oil Crisis. However, once they discover a giant wad of cash on their seats, they immediately change their tune into curiosity.
  • In his aggressive response to the Guangdong Riots, the desperate and opportunistic of the rioters are targeted with bribes and coercions so they can become informants for the government.
• Evil Colonialist: In the 1949 flashback, many of the Matsushita Electric executives express their excitement of expanding their operations into China and exploiting the populace for their benefit, with Masaharu suggesting Guangdong as a starting point.
• Evil Debt Collector: For being in debt, a man gets viciously beaten up by thugs despite his protests that he will have the money by next week, leaving it ambiguous as to whether he is killed.
• Eviler than Thou:
  • By infiltrating their ranks through bribes or authorizing Kapital raids, one of Matsushita's overarching objectives is to uncover and punish the corrupt politicians and elites who have been undermining the government to enrich themselves.
  • By extension, Matsushita's anti-corruption campaign puts him at odds with Ho and Yokoi, the most powerful crime bosses in the Guangdong underworld. If successful, both crime lords will have to bow out to Matsushita and cut back on their criminal activities out of fear of retribution.
• Evil Versus Evil: Matsushita, a greedy businessman who's been working thousands of Chinese people to the bone, will inevitably need to confront and eliminate the Yakuza, a criminal gang who runs brutal protection rackets and has business in drug and human trafficking.
• Eviler than Thou: If Matsushita heeds too many of his suggestions during the Oil Crisis and Guangdong riots, Ibuka overthrows the Chief Executive and turns him into his puppet, giving him the golden opportunity to shape the country to his own vision.
• Eye Take: Setting his sights on mining Guangdong's natural resources, Matsushita's eyes widen in shock when he learns that the investment would be even greater than the country's reserves. It might be enough for Matsushita to renegotiate the contract's terms and cut down on worker's benefits to save more money.
• Face Your Fears: If embargoes are lifted in Bormann's Germany, a woman will feel intimidated by one of Matsushita's washing machines, despite having encouraged her husband to buy one, and worries that she'll accidentally shrink the clothing with one wrong button. However, she faces her fears before her husband comes back home and, by reading the manual, learns how to use the machine. This eventually translates into buying and embracing more Matsushita products that save her time and give her a chance to pursue other interests.
• Fair-Weather Friend: Seeing Guangdong engulfed in riots, Tokyo pulls most of their support for Matsushita's regime to avoid spending money on what they perceive to be a lost cause. In Matsushita's confrontation with the rioters, he may try to get Tokyo back on his side by showing off Guangdong's profitability, in spite of the ongoing violence.
• Fingore:
  • If the Efficiency Investment Ordinance doesn't pass, one of Chun's colleagues gets his hand caught in a machine, mutilating most of his fingers.
  • To assess the value of his assets with the recent insolvency laws, a police officer amputates the finger of a suspect to take his ring, ignoring his cries that it's the last memory he has of his loved one.
  • If the New Labor Standards Ordinance doesn't pass, one industrial worker gets his hand caught in a machine gear, mutilating it and requiring his hand's amputation. It's a sad reminder to everyone else that Guangdong is a corporate experiment meant to churn out as much profit as possible, leaving everyone else to suffer for it.
• Firing Day: If Matsushita scales back production to save money during the Oil Crisis, many workers will be laid off in the process.
• For Your Own Good: Matsushita can publicly justify the urban resettlement as a generous move that will improve the refugees' chances of social mobility.
• Forced from Their Home:
  • To resolve the housing shortage, Matsushita authorizes the destruction of various apartments so that businesses can build homes for their own laborers, vacating the former residents who lived there. In one event, a demolition team is ordered to destroy a skyscraper and arrive before all the residents even get the news, forcing them to pack up and leave on the spot.
  • Matsushita also engages in mandatory urbanization, which forcibly relocates the rural communities to urban areas so they can serve as factory laborers. Matsushita knows that this will be an unpopular policy, but deems the opinion of rural people to be irrelevant.
• Foreshadowing:
  • While Matsushita is in the middle of handling the Oil Crisis, Morita hands him a dozen or so newspapers about how relations between Japan and China are at an all-time low, an ominous sign for the rest of the Sphere. Matsushita ignores the potential threat for the time being, but it all foreshadows the incoming Great Asian War in the next decade, which is hinted to be a major problem that Guangdong and Matsushita will need to face.
  • In the last event of the Oil Crisis, Wai reflects on how things have returned to normal, and that the Chinese are still oppressed, but she holds out hope that a sense of anger is brewing amongst the populace and that all of Guangdong will rise up one day. This event foreshadows the Guangdong riots which break out not long after.
• Forgotten Fallen Friend: During one of Matsushita's authorized Kenpeitai raids on corrupt officials, a vice president from Cheung Kong hears many of his colleagues get arrested, kicking and screaming along the way. When the situation is over, the vice president nonchalantly forgets the whole incident, only thinking he'll have to make new friends with the replacements.
• Getting the Boot: If given a short stay in jail for his participation in the riots, Hei is released when a burly police officer grabs him by his collar and literally throws him outside.
• Godzilla Threshold:
  • Matsushita can create a completely independent government agency meant to weed out political corruption, which could be used as a powerful tool in the Legislative Council, but could easily backfire on Matsushita himself if they ever decide to interfere with his business.
  • Freezing the budget is an extremely risky move that could easily backfire, but Matsushita may go through with it and handle the consequences later, if it means addressing the Oil Crisis.
  • Unable to handle the Oil Crisis by himself, Matsushita allies himself with either Morita or Ibuka to buy more support in the Legislative Council, risking the expansion of their power enough to eclipse his own authority, but increasing his chances of weathering the storm.
  • Much as he fears what they'll do when they are unleashed, Matsushita can allow the Kwantung army to intimidate the Guangdong rioters into submission.
• Going for the Big Scoop: Yoshiko tries to report on the Guangdong riots by going to the frontlines herself, even trying to get an interview with Lam while he's working and being interrupted by someone throwing a petrol bomb nearby. Despite the danger, Yoshiko doesn't give up and her articles gain enough fame for her to be invited to parties and earn the congratulations of Japanese businessmen for exposing an "on the ground perspective".
• Golden Mean Fallacy:
  • At some point, Matsushita will need to slash welfare spending, with the Legislative Council obviously favoring the most severe cuts and the Chinese wanting the smallest cuts. There is a compromise option of doing a moderate cut, but this risks angering both sides of the argument.
  • Matsushita can try calming the Guangdong Riots by balancing the interests of both protestors and corporations, but this risks angering both sides with his moderate approach.
• Good Feels Good: If the Urban Housing Ordinance passes then, Matsushita and Morita inspect some of the newly constructed apartments. Whilst Matsushita isn’t enthusiastic and only presents himself for the media, Morita is much more enthusiastic about the high-quality living spaces provided to some of the common workers.
• Gratuitous Latin: Once the riots end, Yoshiko relocates to a Japanese neighborhood and continuing to print the same gossip as a journalist called “Tempora Mutantur (?)”, a Latin expression meaning “times are changing” being put up to question as the status quo is entrenched.
• Happiness Is Mandatory: Matsushita blames the epidemic of worker suicides on the use of narcotics and depressants they use to cope with their situation, making them prone to suicidal tendencies. In the aptly named "Be Happy" national focus, Matsushita bans all of these pharmaceutical drugs to "cure" their depression and enforce their satisfaction with the currently exploitative social hierarchy. This is combined with a hybrid marketing and public health campaign from the government and Matsushita Electric promoting efforts of increasing working health, efficiency, and addressing quality of life problems.
• The Hedonist: The first investigation into the Yakuza reveals that many of their members like to frequent red-light districts to indulge in sex and drugs. However, a second investigation reveals that they are not just there for pleasure; it's also a discreet place for them to conduct their criminal business.
• "Hell, Yes!" Moment: By the end of his economic tree, Matsushita works his way through a large selection of financial reports from Guangdong's major corporations and is quietly gleeful at the growth experienced and how he managed to put Guangdong back on the path of profitability after the Yasuda Crisis.
• Heroic BSoD: When Chun tells his mother that Hei got arrested in the Guangdong riots, she almost collapses out of sheer despair and does nothing but quietly sob.
• History Repeats:
  • As Lam is transferred to the Special Investigative and Enforcement branch (or the "Specials"), he sees all sorts of officers carrying supplies and checking manifests, reminding him of what happened to the police during the riots of the Yasuda Crisis.
  • Almost everyone recognizes the Oil Crisis and its ramifications as a repeat of the Yasuda Crisis, with businesses closing shop, the Japanese fleeing to save as much as they can, the Chinese suffering even more poverty, and the Zhujin struggling to stay afloat. Matsushita, for his part, refuses to take this crisis lightly and go down in history as another Suzuki.
  • Parallels to the Yasuda Crisis are drawn once again by Lam to the Guangdong riots, whose violence is witnessed firsthand by him.
• Holding in Laughter: During a direct confrontation with Ho over his smuggling business, he has the gall to call himself a "humble businessman". Matsushita can barely stifle his laughter at that.
• Hope Spot:
  • A local tries to revisit his father's closed-down restaurant for nostalgia's sake and the possibility that he can reopen it. Unfortunately, when he gets there, he learns that the restaurant was seized by the government and destroyed into a pile of bricks, devastating the man.
  • Matsushita Electric agrees to invest in Yamauchi's simple vacuum cleaner. After over a year of hard work, Yamauchi is proud of what he's done and believes that this will be the groundbreaking product that will turn Nintendo into a world-famous company. This hope proves too optimistic, as Nintendo cannot compete with the massive corporations and their appliances are criticized for poor quality and terrible assembly, forcing Yamauchi to return to the drawing board and barely eke out a living in the brutal corporate world.
  • As ten cops surround a man wildly and dangerously swinging a knife in a crowd, one police officer tries talking down the suspect and calms him through friendly conversation. Just as the suspect looks like he'll stand down, the upstart police lieutenant, who hates having his authority undermined, restarts the hostile exchange and scares the suspect into raising his knife again. This leads to an awful predicament of the suspect fleeing and forcing the police to shoot wildly into a crowd to hit their target, something which makes the first officer guilty of.
  • Still trying to dig Nintendo out of the dirt, Yamauchi realizes that his company can enter the taxi business and make a fortune in the relatively non-competitive transportation industry. Unfortunately, he comes up with this idea just as the Guangdong riots are starting, meaning this idea will have to wait until the streets are safe again to traverse through.
• Horrible Housing: With a massive influx of people moved into the cities, Matsushita resolves the homeless crisis by cutting back on housing regulations and constructing more subpar homes. He reasons that unsafe housing is better than no housing.
• Hypocrite:
  • Much to his dismay, Lee Leong can't afford much compassion to the new arrivals deported to Guangdong by Matsushita, if they aren't afforded even some scant welfare to ease their situation. He warns his family that they can't be trusted and could be threatening, despite the fact that the Lees were in their same position years ago.
  • The government can vote against budget cuts and force the smaller factory owners to fire their own work force, while they don't have to sacrifice anything and can keep their wealth. A Zhujin factory owner angrily calls out the hypocrisy in an interview with Yoshiko and how the Guangdong government will never apply the same standard to themselves.
  • The companies on the Legislative Council get furious whenever Matsushita raises taxes against them, but they have no problem if these burdens are enforced on the Chinese workers.
  • A Fujitsu and Hitachi executive complain about Matsushita taking the Legislative Council's money to fund his own company's products, but if they were members of the Council, they'd have no problem arguing that their own company should do exactly what Matsushita is doing.
• I Choose to Stay: After years of living in Guangdong, Yoshiko refuses to join the Japanese graduates who are awaiting a ship to the Home Isles, choosing Guangdong as her new home and only staying connected to her old home country by tutoring other graduates who will be heading back to Japan.
• I Need a Freaking Drink:
  • At his wit's end with the Guangdong riots, Matsushita rushes into his office to drink his bottle of sake.
  • In spite of potentially retaining control of Guangdong after the riots, Matsushita's triumph is undercut by news of growing tensions between China and Japan, which the Chief Executive copes with by drinking sake.
• I Work Alone:
  • Contemplating as to whether to give subcontracts to Sony or Fujitsu in exchange for support on the Urban Housing Ordinance, Matsushita may decide against it. After seeing the various Sony and Fujitsu skyscrapers across Guangzhou, Matsushita wonders what his legacy will be and suspects how his opponents won't repay the generosity, motivating his decision to break from them.
  • Matsushita can reject the notion of working with either the Triads or Yakuza to eliminate the other, having faith that he can handle the problem on his own.
  • Despite the threat posed by the Oil Crisis, Matsushita may pridefully refuse to beg for aid from Tokyo, facing the problem alone and declaring an emergency tax increase to support the budget.
  • Near the end of the Oil Crisis, Matsushita can make a bold statement by refusing to ally with anyone in the Legislative Council or the Yakuza, deciding that he will choose his own future and prove to his father-in-law that he is worthy of inheriting Matsushita Electric on his own merit.
• Ignored Epiphany: A corrupt Mexican bureaucrat in Sonora uses his contacts in the shipping industry to acquire a Matsushita air conditioner. He feels a brief amount of pity, knowing that all the people outside his window can't have such a luxury, but then dismisses it by claiming that, if they want such a luxury, then they should work for him and enjoy the air conditioning as a reward.
• Implied Death Threat:
  • When a construction crew arrives to tear down an apartment, per Matsushita's orders, they warn the two remaining residents to leave "for the sake of [their] safety". Seeing the crew arm dynamite around the walls, the residents wisely obey.
  • If Matsushita proves Yokoi's criminal nature and confronts him about it, he warns Yokoi to start pulling out of the black market, casually saying that he feels "threatened" and will call the police in a way that could lead to "unfortunate misunderstandings".
• In the End, You Are on Your Own: Ibuka makes it clear to Matsushita that he'll have to face the Oil Crisis on his own and, should he fail, his days as Chief Executive are numbered.
• In Spite of a Nail: No matter who ends up in control of Guangdong, whether Matsushita himself or one of his puppet leaders, Hei will never be able to live up to his full potential and resign to becoming a factory worker. The only marginal difference between his fates is whether he advises Wai to seize an opportunity from either Cheung Kong or Fujitsu, depending on who outplayed Matsushita.
• Innocently Insensitive: As Matsushita curses the lack of progress by reconciling with the rioters, Morita offhandedly suggests he take a "more direct" approach. Just as Matsushita's brow furrows at the implication of him being inactive, Morita quickly saves himself by elaboration, stating that he should directly meet with the riots' leaders.
• Insistent Terminology: To save money during the Oil Crisis, Matsushita can streamline the manufacturing process by getting rid of superfluous components and reducing the materials used to save on manufacturing costs and reduce potential quality defects. Despite this, Matsushita insists that it's not "cutting corners", but "making sure our customers can afford our products".
• Irony:
  • America's Pacific coast and Southwest are the country's most Japanophobic regions, yet they end up being some of the most avid consumers of Matsushita's air conditioners, due to their quality at combating the heat. For extra irony, the region's proliferation has been heavily facilitated by the military-industrial complex and, now, Matsushita is turning the so-called "guns of the Western imperialists" against them. Matsushita takes great pride in his success.
  • After abhorring Suzuki many years ago, Matsushita can potentially end up being a similarly hated leader if he's puppeted by Morita or Ibuka, where he has no one to command and no hope of winning future glory.
• It Began with a Twist of Fate: In Bormann's Germany, the purchase of a Matsushita washing machine leads a German woman to embrace more products from the company and give herself more free time. She uses this chance to learn about the wider world, such as listening and taking notes on the radio news. Over time, she realizes that the society she lives in is incredibly patriarchal and stifles opportunities for women like her, culminating in the formation of the Southwest Ulm Women's Rights Association to openly discuss these issues.
• It Has Only Just Begun: Despite surviving all the tribulations of the past decade and expressing satisfaction with his accomplishments, Matsushita concludes that his work is still not yet over, especially with war brewing between Japan and China.
• It's All About Me:
  • Matsushita’s initial reaction to the riots is to rant about how much effort he put into getting to where he is and rage against the protestors for daring to oppose him.
  • In a high-class party held during the Oil Crisis, Yoshiko meets a middle-aged woman, who comments on her hope that the depression will end just as okay as it did in the Yasuda Crisis. Immediately after, she adds "For us, I mean." This comment makes Yoshiko internally scowl in disgust towards her lack of sympathy for anyone not Japanese.
• It's Probably Nothing:
  • As Yamauchi thinks about starting a taxi service and orders a fleet of yellow cabs, he notices a protest outside. Unaware of the greater context, he initially dismisses it as a distraction and ignores its sign of worse things to come in the Guangdong Riots.
  • When Matsushita loosens the Kenpeitai's leash to handle the riots, an old man tries walking back home in the middle of the night before hearing something behind him. Seeing nothing when he turns around, the old man writes it off as something in his mind, but when he pulls out his lighter, he sees a face next to him before Kenpeitai agents kidnap and arrest him.
• Karma Houdini: If the Corruption Investigation Ordinance fails to pass, Lam and the police will be powerless to investigate a Kōshu factory that has been using defective parts to build the city's streetcar system, getting away with their scam of a service. To hammer in the point, Lam hears of a recent accident caused by such defects, resulting in the deaths of four adults and one child, yet still nothing can be done against the factory.
• Kick Them While They Are Down: After deposing and puppeting Matsushita, Ibuka mockingly apologizes for speaking over him in a meeting and cruelly says straight to his face that he has no power left in Guangdong. It's even more uncalled for when the alternative scenario of Morita puppeting Matsushita just has the former ignore the disgraced Chief Executive.
• Lack of Empathy:
  • As part of his alliance with Ibuka and the corporate interests during the Oil Crisis, Matsushita gives Fujitsu more research and development grants at the expense of other people's requests. The supervisor delivering the news to them is hardly sympathetic to their plight and merely tells them it's "politics".
  • Even when faced with the Guangdong riots, the Legislative Council refuses to entertain any possibility of giving them concessions and alleviating the horrid living conditions they've been subjected to for years. If Matsushita announces his intention to reconcile with them, the Council goes ballistic, accusing him of selling out to the rioters' demands and expressing zero accountability for driving the rioters to violence in the first place.
  • Even if Matsushita allies with Morita during the Oil Crisis, he sees his partner's demands relating to public charity as nuisances or laughable, but has no choice but to accept them.
• Lesser of Two Evils: Much as he dislikes Komai, Matsushita's emergency authority path reaches out to him and requests his aid to put down the riots in exchange for not submitting to any of their demands. As far as Matsushita is concerned, he needs to end the crisis as quickly as possible and only Komai has the means to do so.
  Better the devil you know.
• Let No Crisis Go to Waste:
  • After the Yasuda Crisis, the Matsushita regime quickly seizes the assets of their dead firms for themselves.
  • Seeing the chaos of the riots, Yamauchi believes he'll get his big break by offering taxi services. Everyone needs a safe transportation service and, if he can hire armed taxi drivers, Nintendo could carve a niche for itself.
  • Morita and Ibuka use the chaos of the Oil Crisis and the Guangdong Riots to try puppeting Matsushita, as he is busy managing the situation and bearing the brunt of his unpopular decisions.
• Living Is More than Surviving: Seeing the unofficial segregation of Zhujin and Japanese officers, Lam thinks about how unfair his life is, but reasons that he can tolerate it because the Japanese pay his wages and that's all he needs to survive. However, upon second thought, Lam thinks to himself what kind of life that is, if survival is the only thing he's hoping for.
• Loan Shark: Inverted. Matsushita specifically makes investment deals from banks who are more equitable than Guangdong's previous partners in the Japanese government. They are still beholden to their loans, but at least they won't feel as much pressure.
• Long Game:
  • Matsushita wants to have the government subsumed by his men and leave Guangdong to be run by his company, but he may refrain from his sudden integration and bide his time because the other companies will react negatively to this extreme power move and a slower measure would be more effective.
  • To rebuild confidence in Guangdong's economy, Matsushita will directly intervene to secure investments and stabilize the budget, which will draw some negative PR in the short-term, but stabilize the budget in the long-term.
  • Despite the reduced demand during the Oil Crisis, Matsushita may maintain production levels and operate on a loss so that there won't be any long-term damage on the company's productivity and protect their innovative momentum.
  • Matsushita pours more investments into his regime during the Oil Crisis in the hopes that his returns will be sevenfold and facilitate an economic revitalization.
• Long Last Look: A visiting Japanese businessman takes a long last look while on the ferry back to Japan, reflecting on the fond memories and experiences he had in Guangdong. He appreciates the scale and efficiency of wealth being produced under Matsushita's discretion, even at the expense of the native Chinese laborers.
• Loophole Abuse:
  • Matsushita is well-aware of the corporations exploiting legal loopholes to avoid worker protections, in which he may clamp down on these abuses through fines and embargoes to protect worker productivity and his own authority.
  • There are no laws separating the corporations and the state, which Matsushita can exploit to appoint members of his company into bureaucratic positions and effectively merging the government into Matsushita Electric.
  • Heeding Morita's advice during the Oil Crisis, Matsushita can legislate and pass the New Labor Standards Ordinance to address the peoples' plight, but most people already know that the government isn't actually going to enforce this law and thus can avoid more protection laws through a legal loophole.
• Lowered Recruiting Standards: As the police force is being cleaned out, recruitment is expanded to hire more officers, despite not being very skilled due to the lowered standards. Tellingly, Lam remembers that basic mathematic skills were required to join the police, yet many of the new recruits don't fulfill this criteria.
• Luckily, My Shield Will Protect Me: While Matsushita tries to end the riots through compromise, Lam and the rest of the police can only use their riot shields to defend themselves and stay in formation against the protestors.
• Made in Country X: After surviving the Guangdong riots, Matsushita Electric begins exporting their products globally with a label proudly declaring "Made in Guangdong". With this mark, consumers can expect a cheap, highly reliable product that is lauded for its durability and convenience.
• Make an Example of Them:
  • If Matsushita goes after the most corrupt elites, he will make a public demonstration of punishing the worst offenders and replacing them with his own men to show what happens to those who ignore his laws.
  • Rather than directly attacking the ringleaders of Guangdong's corrupt circles, Matsushita can opt to authorize Kenpeitai raids and punish those who commit their crimes in the open, which will implicitly send a message to the others that their days are numbered.
• Meaningful Name: Kōnosuke's office is nicknamed the "Eagle's Nest" because it's where he works and surveys his corporate empire.
• Meaningful Rename: Similar to OTL, Matsushita Electric adopts the name of Panasonic, if the trade embargo is lifted and they can sell products into the United States and OFN. Not wanting to fall victim to anti-Japanese sentiment with their current name, Panasonic is suggested by an executive to blend in with the American markets. The name itself contains "pan", meaning "all", and "sonic" meaning "sound". This strategy, combined with their pricing and outreach campaign, pays off and they start competing with General Electrics in the electronics market.
• Meet the New Boss: Discussed in Yamauchi's reaction to Matsushita's appointment, where he thinks that the new Chief Executive is just a continuation of the existing political structure.
• The Migration:
  • Matsushita adopts a policy of "Mandatory Urbanization" where swathes of civilians are forced in to urban areas, inflating the workforce and increasing the potential economouc output.
  • Losing their jobs in the Oil Crisis, hundreds of Chinese civilians head to the train station and set their next destination for the Republic of China.
• Mirthless Laughter: If Matsushita grants additional funding to small businesses during the Oil Crisis, Lam will react to the news with a bitter laugh, knowing that such measures could have saved his business in the 1940s.
• The Mole: Moles within the Yakuza can be employed by Matsushita to bring the gang down, even if this is a risky move, since the Yakuza are also members in his regime.
• Mood Whiplash: If the Urban Housing Ordinance fails to pass, one family stays in their decrepit tenement, but they still eat dinner together and appreciate each other's company. Then, the whole creaking building collapses from decades of neglect, abruptly killing everyone inside.
• Mundane Luxury: One family eats scraps of meager food from cheap ceramic bowls, but they are very gracious about having the money to afford a basic necessity, which some people can't even lay claim to in Guangdong.
• My God, What Have I Done?: Seeing the status quo return after the Guangdong riots, Lam reflects on what he had gained from helping Matsushita put down the protests, realizing that he has nothing and solemnly grounding out his cigarette at the thought.
• Naïve Newcomer: When new recruits are brought into the police force, Lam thinks about how fresh they look, unaware of the pain and regret they will face in the coming years, much like he was at their age.
• Near-Death Experience:A quarter of Lam's subordinates get wiped out during an attack by the Yakuza in Matsushita's path due to an underfunded and understaffed police force. Lam himself only misses a brick to the head by a few inches and the memory of this attack leaves Lam dreadful, even though a superior tells him he shouldn't worry about the fates of those below him.
• Necessarily Evil: Matsushita doesn't like bribery, but he may authorize this measure to surveil and weed out the most corrupt elites plaguing Guangdong.
• Neutral No Longer: Much as he hates their cause, Matsushita can try appeasing the rioters while keeping the corporations happy. He will feign listening to the protestors' concerns and give them some minor concessions, before changing his tune and increasing suppressive measures to satisfy the Legislative Council and Japan, especially so that the latter doesn't directly intervene. Matsushita can try sticking to this middle ground, but he'll eventually have to find a settlement that leans in favor of either the rioters or corporations, the former endorsed by Morita and the latter supported by Ibuka and the corporate faction of the Council.
• Never My Fault:
  • With the Corruption Investigation Ordinance passed, Lam can arrest a scrupulous contractor who's been selling defective machinery and causing all sorts of work accidents, but the contractor has no remorse for what he's done. Instead, he tries to shift blame on his manufacturer and claims that he's just the middle-man.
  • If the Environmental Standards Ordinance fails, a Fujitsu representative is interviewed by Yoshiko on their waste disposal and how it is increasing respiratory illnesses in the nearby communities, where he deflects all accountability on Fujitsu and instead blames smoking cigarettes for the epidemic.
• New Era Speech: By the end of the Oil Crisis, Matsushita boldly states how his company led Guangdong into a new age of prosperity. All the other companies in the Legislative Council complain about his arrogance, but Matsushita remains confident about his fortunes.
• No Good Deed Goes Unpunished: During the Specials' raid on an apartment for dissidents, Lam recommends to his lieutenant that they wait for the local police to correctly identify who is guilty. If this option is picked, dozens are saved from being unfairly persecuted, but this act of good judgment by Lam goes unrecognized by the tenants, who still see him as a traitorous collaborator.
• Oh, Crap!: Matsushita confronts a senior Japanese officer with extensive documentation of his corruption, which makes him panic over what Matsushita will do with him, knowing that everyone in the same position had lost their jobs. Matsushita can either give an early retirement or resort to harsh reparations.
• Only Sane Man: Invoked by Matsushita during the Oil Crisis, who presents himself as the most reasonable executive compared to Morita's bleeding heart, Ibuka's naive idolization of meritocracy and technology, and Komai's pride. Matsushita goes on a massive campaign to present his company and products as the best hope the people have.
• O.O.C. Is Serious Business: Once Ho is confronted with evidence of his smuggling business, his normally suave demeanor cracks for a brief second when his face twitches. If successfully intimidated, Ho has no choice but to surrender in a rare moment of vulnerability and promise to address the issue. If not, he tells Matsushita that he's sorely mistaken with his accusations and darkly warns that this will not go unanswered.
• Overworked Sleep: If the Limited Labor Standards Ordinance doesn't pass, Chun finds his father passed out just a few feet away from the door, exhausted from his job and still aching. Chun himself frequently returns home to collapse into bed exhausted from a day’s work, only thinking about the work and money needed for the next day.
• Paper Destruction of Anger: On his first day in office, Matsushita sees a letter from Ibuka between his reports, but he puts it in the shredder without even opening it, knowing that Ibuka will just reiterate it when they meet in person.
• Paper Tiger: One of Ibuka's suggestions to mitigate the Oil Crisis is to toss out subsidies that eat up a quarter of the national budget and divest the funds into incentives for the Japanese. So long as they are kept happy, Matsushita can give an impression that the economy is better than it actually is, while repairing it at the same time.
• Pay Evil unto Evil: If Matsushita authorizes more brutal responses to the riots through the Kenpeitai, the CCL becomes even more emboldened by the government's response, with many starting to advocate kidnappings, bombings, and assassinations to get their way.
• Pet the Dog: In spite of his impatience and doubt over their capabilities, Lam's lieutenant in the Specials can heed his Constable's advice to wait for the local police before raiding an apartment so that the dissidents can be properly identified.
• The Phoenix: Matsushita compares Guangdong to a phoenix, which was shot down during the Yasuda Crisis, but will revive to new heights under his guidance.
• Plausible Deniability: To inflate the "contingency funds" he could use to address the Oil Crisis, Matsushita alters the budget to increase the number, while slashing funds for other projects. Matsushita is smart enough to cover his tracks by taking random amounts of money from each project, making it harder to spot the pattern and giving him enough ambiguity to deny the strategy at play.
• Pragmatic Villainy:
  • Matsushita can provide assistance to the overpopulation crisis in Guangdong's cities and provide more living space, albeit only to appease the masses and discourage an uprising.
  • To an urban migration from the rural communities, Matsushita can offer token relocation benefits while providing false promises of freedom in the city.
  • Since mandatory urbanization reduces the number of farmers, Matsushita allows the remaining farmers to take up the land of those relocated and sponsors some modernization and mechanization programs for them. The generosity is all a play to keep Guangdong's rural sector alive, while he's more focused on modernizing the factories.
  • Though it's mostly intended to carry out his urbanization plans, Matsushita can help the people living in the city outskirts by giving more living space and mitigating the overpopulation.
  • Matsushita can heed Morita's advice and use the Efficiency Investment Ordinance to provide slightly safer work tools for the laborers.
  • While he would normally hire Japanese subcontractors out of blatant ethnic favoritism, Matsushita can opt to hire Zhujin instead because they would be more appealing to the local Chinese and buy more popular support for himself, as well as improve the equality of his research equipment and facilities.
  • Despite his favoritism for the Japanese, he may slightly open up the civil service to the Chinese due to a lack of manpower and to placate social tensions, but still restrict them to junior positions. In his focus description, Matsushita calls this the "greed of the lowly", demonstrating that this kindness isn't genuine at all.
  • Knowing that the Legislative Council has their eyes on him and that it would set a bad precedent for Fujitsu and Sony to follow, Matsushita may give up Yasuda's assets to be fairly sold on the auction than take them for himself.
  • While Matsushita may not have any problems with Japanese dominance in Guangdong, he does seek financial independence from them, given how catastrophic that proved during the Yasuda Crisis.
  • Matsushita will expand education opportunities so that he can foster future entrepreneurs and technology and manufacturing businesses, along with improving productivity.
  • Despite the benefits that could come from appointing Matsushita businessmen into the bureaucracy and merging the government into the company, he may decide against this to avoid any outrage from the Legislative Council.
  • Though several government programs will be cut under his watch, Matsushita doesn't go too far in this direction because he doesn't want to upset the working class and undermine his position, especially when he's going to be raising taxes to balance the budget.
  • The loopholes exploited by the corporations may be ignored by Matsushita so that he doesn't become too unpopular in the Legislative Council, even doubling down by legislating corporate self-regulation without government interference.
  • Not to the same extent as Morita, but Matsushita can enforce some legislations on workers' rights, albeit only because the corporations' ignorance of these rules are capping their productivity, not because of any moral qualms. Notably, the alternative is for Matsushita to turn a blind eye to their abuses so he won't soil the corporations' loyalty, demonstrating how little he actually cares for the workers they exploit.
  • The idea of work reform is entertained by Matsushita in the Limited Labor Standards Ordinance, either offering the bare minimum amount of privileges or giving the opportunity for more pay through more work hours. In both cases, Matsushita hopes that these will be enough to placate the workers without directly confronting the gross exploitation they face. In many ways, it's a stronger version of Suzuki's RLSO, complete with the similarly pragmatic reasons.
  • Matsushita is concerned about the lack of education and the epidemic of suicides among the Chinese, but largely because it harms the bottom line and skilled workers are needed to run an efficient economy. Most tellingly, Matsushita passes the Environmental Standards Ordinance because a toxic environment leads to unhealthy and unproductive workers, not because it's morally awful.
  • Heeding Morita's advice, Matsushita can authorize a program of limited funding for small firms and, despite his claims to the contrary, it's purely motivated to keep the economy up during the Oil Crisis and not out of any genuine kindness. Relatedly, he can pass the Consumer Goods Control Amendment to control prices and let the Chinese citizens afford food so that they won't turn to protests.
  • If Matsushita starts selling his air conditioners, specifically adapted to the tropical climate, in China, he is informed that millions of Chinese citizens are not happy that these products are reserved for the warlords. Matsushita is quick to correct the situation and let them purchase his air conditioners, recognizing the potential consumer base of millions for not only air conditioners, but the spare parts and maintenance needed for them.
  • Matsushita can reassure workers during the Oil Crisis by protecting their welfare payments, buying some time away from an open revolt.
  • Overwhelmed by the Oil Crisis, Matsushita can turn to Morita for his help and humor his suggestions for more rights to the Chinese and the Zhujin, so long as he can get his support in the Legislative Council and survive the ordeal. This culminates in the passage of the New Employment Standards Ordinance, which will grant marginally better labor standards.
  • One of Matsushita's responses to the Guangdong riots is to reconcile with them and offer minor concessions to placate their anger, albeit only because brutal suppression didn't work the first time and more precise attacks might only radicalize them further. In exchange for them turning down the violence, Matsushita will grant them concessions and even publicly criticize (if not denounce) the police's actions, to the chagrin of the Legislative Council and major businesses. With enough effort, negotiations with the GFT and/or CCL can begin, with the government following through on its promises.
  • In his route to violently crush the Guangdong rioters, Matsushita expresses hesitance to expand emergency authority to Tsuchida, though largely because it could make the police a rival to his power.
  • After authorizing Komai and the Kenpeitai to suppress the rioters, Matsushita feels discomfort when they prepare to interrogate the riot organizers. Not because he fears for the captives' safety, but because he sees it as an encroachment on his authority and wants the job taken care of by the local police instead.
• Precedent Excuse: If Matsushita doesn't expand the civil service to the Chinese and Zhujin, he will justify it by claiming that the status quo has worked well enough to not be worth unsettling.
• Precision F-Strike: If the confrontation with Ho goes south, Matsushita is left in shock and quiet for several moments after the interaction, with the next word he utters being a simple "Fuck".
• Prisoner's Work: In Matsushita's assertive response, those arrested during the riots are forced to make license plates and motor engines during their stay in prison. Hei doesn't think it's so bad, especially considering how light of a punishment it is for protesting.
• Private Military Contractors: Under Matsushita's discretion, private security firms are brought by the Big Five to protect their assets.
• Propaganda Machine:
  • To cement his company's dominance and stimulate spending within the economy, Matsushita starts a massive advertising campaign across the nation, encouraging the people to buy more products from Matsushita Electric and, optionally, the rest of the Big Five.
  • In the wake of Matsushita's environmental laws, Fujitsu starts a new propaganda campaign about their own recent environmental initiatives and exaggerating how eco-friendly they are.
  • Matsushita can lean into existing sales networks to promote his company's existing products during the Oil Crisis, attempting to drive demand up.
• Propaganda Piece: Matsushita coerces the media into promoting stories of government legislation that betters working conditions and expresses his supposed benevolence.
• Public Secret Message: A third successful investigation into Yokoi reveals that his men have been using code words and phrases to communicate their criminal activities with each other, with secret meanings that only they understand, but are repeated enough for detectives to find them suspicious as a potential lead.
• The Purge:
  • When Matsushita balances Guangdong's budget, citing the failures of Suzuki's deficit spending, he will make cuts to government programs deemed "wasteful", with a particular focus on programs meant to assist the working class.
  • Reforming the Guangdong Police Force will mean firing those deemed ineffectual, while everyone else will receive extensive retraining. This can go further if Matsushita raises personnel standards and punishments for failure.
• Pyrrhic Victory: Matsushita can successfully balance Guangdong's budget without Japanese support and signal a recovery from the depressing Yasuda Crisis. However, while Tokyo may no longer be a problem, Matsushita is left with an underlying suspicion that the other factions will start conspiring against him, as well as a feeling of dissatisfaction that more must be done to guarantee Guangdong's future.
• Rage Breaking Point: Matsushita can try to negotiate with the Guangdong rioters by hearing out their moderates in the GFT, but the talks don't go so swimmingly, with each demand frustrating the Chief Executive more and more. He finally reaches his breaking point when they demand for Komai's prosecution, leading him to throw the telephone at a wall and break it out of sheer rage.
• Reassigned to Antarctica: The Iberian bureaucrats working in Tangier hate their station, being forced to work under the scorching heat in a worn-down office with cracks. Fortunately for them, the arrival of some of Matsushita's air conditioners gives them a second wind and makes the heat more bearable.
• Repeating Ad: An advertisement campaign, focused solely on Matsushita Electric, will bombard the people with promotions of their own products, annoying those who just want to move on.
• Repressive, but Efficient: If Matsushita’s efforts to reform the Guangdong Police Force are successful and a power intelligence network is created, the police become just as capable as the Kenpeitai in defending the corporate, exploitative status quo.
• Sadistic Choice:
  • Nearing bankruptcy in the Oil Crisis, the Casio office in Kōshu is left to either shut down the business for good or sign Matsushita's contract and be leashed to his vaguely defined "rationalizations". Out of desperation and pressure, the owner agrees to Matsushita's terms.
  • While on patrol, Lam sees a young Chinese man get beaten by a mob of gangsters who hate his union membership. Confronted with this injustice, Lam is torn over intervening and rescuing the man or sticking to his orders and avoiding the wrath of his superiors. To his dismay, Lam picks the latter.
• Science Is Good: In-universe, Matsushita talks about how important innovation is, promising to spare nothing in the assessment of inefficient equipment and funding of research facilities.
• Second-Face Smoke: After Yokoi brings up the idea of freezing wages during the Oil Crisis, he gets pushback from Morita and Tsuchida. He responds by claiming that they have to avoid scaring investors away from Guangdong before blowing a ring of smoke into Morita and Tscuhida’s faces.
• Selective Enforcement:
  • Cracking down on corruption across all Legislative Council companies, Matsushita may turn a blind eye to the corruption from his own members to save costs and keep their loyalty. His decisions here will affect his ability to pass the Corruption Investigation Ordinance.
  • Matsushita may not prosecute the corrupt Japanese officers of the GPF out of his own prejudices and to uphold Japanese dominance in the police.
  • When Ibuka and Komai discuss the terms of the Limited Labor Standards Ordinance, Matsushita has the option of granting exemptions for Hitachi and Fujitsu, as per their requests.
• Scylla and Charybdis: Even if he keeps his independence, Matsushita can still lose his power in the upcoming Great Asian War. Under normal circumstances, siding with China would be unthinkable, but siding with Japan would upset the Chinese and Zhujin majority. In the end, Matsushita feels trapped between two terrible choices for his position.
• Shoot the Messenger:
  • Subverted in Matsushita's decision to destroy either the Triads or the Yakuza. Several of Matsushita's representatives are afraid to meet the Yakuza because they could easily be killed as messengers who will not be missed, but, fortunately, this never happens during their exchange and they're relieved to still be alive with their findings.
  • If Matsushita tries to make friends in the Yakuza during the Oil Crisis, the representative of his company is sweating bullets over what the Yakuza will do if they are displeased, imagining that he'd become a corpse floating down the Pearl River with a bullet in his head.
• Silence of Sadness: A restaurant owner notices how glum his business becomes in the Oil Crisis, with fewer faces showing up and the past banter now replaced with dreary silence from the customers.
• Sinister Surveillance:
  • Seeing the neighborhoods as a source for dissent, Matsushita creates the "Special Branch" to spy and subvert any possible insurrection that would dare challenge his hegemony.
  • If reconciliation is used to resolve the Guangdong riots, Matsushita can cut back on this through the Privacy Acts, prohibiting corporate surveillance and potentially including legal punishments to give the law some bite. That said, the Privacy Acts also include exemptions for government surveillance relating to national security, so Matsushita is still consolidating a monopoly over surveillance.
  • On the other hand, in Matsushita's violent response to the riots, he sinks even further into these tactics, developing advanced security cameras that are far more resistant to damage and can be set up in every wall and street of Guangdong to make sure nothing escapes his gaze.
• Skyscraper Messages: During the Guangdong Riots, protestors drape the skyscrapers with banners to spread their message. If Matsushita’s Emergency Powers Ordinance does not pass the Legislative Council, then a group will climb a Matsushita skyscraper and unfurl a large banner reading “IF THERE IS NO EMERGENCY, THE GOVERNMENT HAS NOTHING TO FEAR.”
• Sleep Deprivation: Yamauchi spends countless nights without sleep so that he can draft a vacuum cleaner blueprint and propose it for a Matsushita investment, confident that his effort will be rewarded and start Nintendo's journey to becoming a household name.
• Slippery Slope Fallacy: When the Limited Labor Standards Ordinance reaches the Legislative Council, Ibuka and Komai try appealing to Matsushita that they should be exempt from the rules because the government's regulation of the economy might only get worse and spell economic ruin for the country.
• Smash the Symbol: When Yamauchi's vacuum cleaner flops and production is halted, Yamauchi crushes the piece of paper that started this venture and literally tosses it into the bin.
• Smoking Gun: Downplayed, if Matsushita has successfully investigated Ho twice and uncovered a safe house for one of their smuggling routes into China. While it's not exactly a smoking gun, Matsushita considers it to be very close one that strongly implicates Ho in the smuggling business. If successfully investigated for a third, and final, time, a straight example of a smoking gun is uncovered through Ho directly ordering ¥100,000 to be smuggled from Nanjing to Makao.
• Spotting the Thread: As Matsushita is puppeted, Yoshiko notices that he's stopped giving important announcements and now makes appearance to unimportant bureaucrats who wouldn't be worth the Chief Executive's time. From these hints, Yoshiko realizes that someone is secretly controlling him behind closed doors.
• Spy Speak: A third investigation into the Yakuza reveals that they have been using code words to conduct their illegal businesses.
• Status Quo Is God:
  • Even if Matsushita passes the Limited Labor Standards Ordinance, most Chinese citizens are still left in the slums, suffering from poverty and only seeing marginal improvements in their jobs. From Chun's perspective, he's still tired from a long day's work and still stuck in the corporate hellhole of Guangdong, not in the village where his family used to live.
  • Subverted in Matsushita's optional Oil Crisis response by maintaining current production levels. Despite the government's best attempts to preserve the status quo, the people can't ignore the increased levels of bankruptcy and cynicism in the wake of the Oil Crisis, with one restaurateur noticing fewer faces showing up in his establishment and a new atmosphere of dour silence instead of playful banter.
  • In a rather extreme example, almost nothing changes in Matsushita's Guangdong, in spite of the devastating impacts of the Oil Crisis. The Japanese are still on top and the Chinese are still languishing in the slums, frustrating Wai and making her wish that the Japanese could just leave Guangdong. Not even the Guangdong riots are enough to shake the status quo, with Lam and Yoshiko noting the lack of change in the aftermath and the workers slowly returning to the factories and their monotonous routines.
    Life no longer gets better or worse. It simply moves on.
• Stealth Insult:
  • If Matsushita declares his devotion to maintain the status quo, one of his councilors toasts him and declares his loyalty to the Chief Executive's productive tenure. Matsushita picks up on the subtle messaging; the moment Matsushita is of no further use to them, he'll be tossed out just as quickly as Suzuki.
  • During the Oil Crisis, Yoshiko visits a high society soiree in Kōshu, where a middle-aged guest comments on her "youthful solitude" among the married couples. Yoshiko picks up on the subtle insult, but ignores it.
• Stepford Smiler: With more advertisements of Matsushita Electric products being played during the Oil Crisis, a salesman for the company puts on a fake smile to attract customers, despite being sick of hearing the same commercials all day and working a 996 schedule to meet the quota.
• Suddenly Significant City: Matsushita and Yokoi plan to extensively develop Shenzhen, Shantou and Maoming, seeing great potential for growth by drawing more of the rural population and turning them into urban laborers
• Superficial Solution: To tackle the suicide epidemic, Matsushita constructs more safety nets, authorizes renovations to remove openings from tall buildings, and bans pharmaceutical drugs that supposedly give people suicidal tendencies, all without addressing the deep social inequity that drives this problem in the first place.
• Suspiciously Specific Tense: As the Guangdong riots begin to recede to the poorer districts, the Japanese elite start to refer to them in the past tense, which Yoshiko considers to be a sign of everything starting to return to normal.
• Tactical Withdrawal: Outgunned in the open, many of the rioters retreat to narrow urban areas, using the architecture to their defense. If they are to be cracked down, they must be lured out.
• Take This Job and Shove It: Subverted. A worker on the Trans-Amazonian Highway near Manaus plans to quit his job due to the backbreaking work and scorching Amazonian heat. However, when he goes on break in the work tent, he finds many of his colleagues huddled around a Matsushita air conditioner, which is one of the best sensations the worker has ever felt. It's refreshing enough that he reconsiders quitting his job, since he could never be afford an air conditioner on his own.
• Telegraph Gag STOP: Once the riots have subsided, a telegram is given by Guangdong reporting its successes, and that businesses and factories are reopening. However, said message has random "STOP" words peppered throughout.
• Tempting Fate:
  • Finishing the economic tree will have Matsushita celebrate Guangdong's economic growth, a sentiment that will be cut short by the Oil Crisis.
  • At the end of his main tree, Matsushita gives another corporate speech about the prosperity of Guangdong, believing that only he could have reached these heights and that the Matsushita legacy has been carried on through himself. However, his moment of celebration will be short-lived before the Oil Crisis hits.
  • After the worst of the Oil Crisis passes and bankruptcies decline, one Japanese citizen thinks that normalcy has returned to Guangdong and that matters could have been a lot worse. Then, the Guangdong riots break out.
  • Hei is reluctant to join the Guangdong riots, but Chun convinces him to stay by promising to leave at the first sign of trouble. These words come back to haunt Chun when Hei gets caught by the police and arrested.
• There's No Place Like Home: After being arrested for participating in the Guangdong riots, Hei's anger at Chun for roping him into the conflict subsides and he spends the rest of the event chain wishing that he could come back home. When he's released in Matsushita's compromise path, the first thing he does is run back to his household, into the loving arms of his family.
• This Cannot Be!: Distraught upon being puppeted by Sony or Fujitsu, Matsushita cannot bear the thought of facing his family with shame and wonders what he could have done differently to prevent his downfall.
• Throw the Dog a Bone: If Matsushita's air conditioners are sold to Turkey, a Turkish soldier, who regularly patrols the scorching hot Syrian desert, finds his job to be a little easier with a single air conditioner installed at a base. While confined to a single room, the cool air gives him a chance to relax before repeating his patrols the next day.
• Title Drop: Of the update Guangdong was added in, "Silicon Dreams". If Matsushita’s Emergency Powers Ordinance fails to pass, then the subsequent event will discuss how the widespread riots cannot be hidden by propaganda and cheerful music, representing “a larger deterioration of Matsushita’s Silicon Dreams.”
• Token Minority: Even if Matsushita opens up the bureaucracy, the Chinese and Zhujin citizens who are promoted are treated as nothing more than ornaments that present a façade of reform whilst not providing any actual threat to Japanese bureaucratic dominance.
• Too Desperate to Be Picky: A Fujitsu-leaning Efficiency Investment Ordinance will offer seminars to teach the Chinese laborers about the various machines used in their factories. Chun hates the Japanese elite and knows that he doesn't need to be taught something he's handled for years, but he still accepts the offer in the hopes that he can be promoted to supervisor with the course.
• Took a Level in Cynic: The staff of the Guangdong Government Complex become more somber if Matsushita endorses cuts to personnel budgets resulting in less staff, no replacements, and no bonuses despite the same amount of work remaining. Yoshiko’s guide doesn’t even hide his, contempt in front of a passing manager.
• Tranquil Fury: With an anti-corruption committee by his leash, Matsushita can threaten one of his major rivals for a favor in exchange for avoiding investigation into their dirt. No matter who he picks, the exchange between the two executives is terse and laced with passive-aggressiveness, barely hiding their contempt and anger at each other. Most notably, Komai hides his dissatisfaction the best, never wavering in his smile and commenting on the weather, while still voicing his displeasure during the negotiations.
• The Unsmile:
  • If Matsushita heeds Ibuka's advice to protect Japanese stockholders in the Oil Crisis, the two meet with Takashima and Guangdong's Japanese community, who express their gratitude for their "generosity". All the while, Matsushita and Ibuka have joyless, frozen smiles plastered over their faces, expressing false humility and barely hiding their contempt for each other.
  • When approached by Matsushita for an alliance during the Oil Crisis, Ibuka notes that he'll accept if the Chief Executive can target Sony and Cheung Kong for him, smiling widely when his terms are accepted. For Matsushita, however, this smile just makes him even more concerned.
  • Takashima's reaction to the Guangdong riots and Matsushita's explanations for them is nothing but an unmoving, polite smile, which unnerves the Chief Executive. He never drops the expression throughout the exchange, even when he ominously warns Matsushita to not disappoint his superiors in Tokyo.
• Victory by Endurance: As reported by Yoshiko, the flame of the Guangdong riots begins to peter out after several months of protestors marching on the streets, with both sides no longer really wanting to continue the conflict, but not tired enough to just go home. It all comes down to Matsushita holding out until the rioters give up, either by appeasing some of their demands and slowly chipping away at their strength. In the meantime, Matsushita just needs to focus on keeping the Legislative Council's confidence in him.
• Victory Through Intimidation: In the negotiation path to the Guangdong Riots, Matsushita ensures that the police's presence is still felt on the streets to assert his control, even if they aren't directly fighting any rioters.
• Video Game Cruelty Potential:
  • During Matsushita's mandatory urbanization campaign, he may refuse to offer any support to the rural communities who have just been relocated to their new environment.
  • If the local police's help is rejected, against the wishes of Lam, the Specials will raid an apartment and arrest anyone who has even the slightest suspicion of being against Matsushita, regardless of actual proof. Lam sympathizes with those who have been unjustly prosecuted, knowing that it will be difficult for them to prove their innocence in the byzantine justice system.
  • While fixing the cities, Matsushita can ignore the plights of the suburbs, deeming them unimportant and dedicating his funds to the city centers instead.
  • Even though they're the ones most likely to be affected by them, Matsushita may deny any consideration for the smaller businesses in his insolvency laws, giving a greater voice to the major corporations for the sake of "efficiency".
  • Despite having the option to do so, Matsushita may not grant relief to either the small businesses or the major corporations during the Oil Crisis so that he can conserve government funds.
  • To mitigate the Oil Crisis, Matsushita can slash welfare to preserve the confidence of his Japanese investors, even if countless more people will suffer as a result.
  • To the approval of the Legislative Council and Japanese government, Matsushita can recover from his initial failed attack by launching more devastating, precise strikes against the Guangdong rioters. Once negotiations are completely tossed out the window, Matsushita makes a final push to crush the rioters, where their leaders are captured or executed to break their followers' morale, and the remaining disarrayed movements are violently dismantled.
• Video Game Cruelty Punishment: If Matsushita cheats too much in the Yasuda auction, the Legislative Council is more likely to catch wind of his trickery, calling out his corruption and destroying much of the good faith in Matsushita Electric.
• Villain Has a Point:
  • After the Environmental Standard Ordinance's passage, Yoshiko interviews a Fujitsu representative on the new pollution tax and his company's refusal to pay it. During the exchange, the representative points out that the law is being used to heavily scrutinize Fujitsu, while letting Sony and Matsushita Electric off the hook for similar offenses, showing that this law is more so used as a political weapon than a genuine moral stance. Not even Yoshiko can defend that legal double standard.
  • If Matsushita adopts a tighter grip over the corporations, he sets a new expectation for them to pay revenue to the state, lest they face regulation or government inspection for their insolence. Given their history of circumventing the rules and leaving the country's reserves to drain for their own selfish gain, Matsushita has a point.
  • Matsushita rightfully wails against the unimaginable corruption that plagues the Legislative Council and the police force, in which he can start a massive anti-corruption campaign to increase moderation and amplify the legal punishments.
• Villainous Breakdown:
  • Faced with indisputable evidence of his criminality by Matsushita, Yokoi will lose all composure and go on a long-winded rant about how absurd the accusations are, claim that he's being persecuted by the government, and threaten to call up his lawyer.
  • On the flip side, if Yokoi is unimpressed with the evidence presented and leaves, Matsushita goes ballistic inside his office and screams frustrated obscenities for a solid minute.
• Visual Pun: The focus "Polish Each Pearl" talks about Matsushita's plan to specialize Kōshu into an industrial center, Honkon into bureaucracy and finances, and Makao into a business resort with luxury casinos and hotels. The accompanying icon features a glove and can literally polishing the "pearls" representing each city.
• Waking Up Elsewhere: If Matsushita violently crushes the riots, Chun gets tackled by a police officer, knocking him out. The next time he wakes up in the back of a blacked-out police van with other protestors on their way to prison.
• Wants a Prize for Basic Decency: To keep the Chinese citizens from leaving the city and their impoverished lives after the Oil Crisis, Matsushita tries to offer the bare minimum amount of incentives for them to stay, including vouchers for healthcare and a pension to temporarily stay out of work. Most are so insulted by these terms that they just become even more angry at the government than anything else.
• Watching the Sunset: If Matsushita maintains his independence, he will look out over a hazy sunset and the skyscrapers being constructed, reminiscing over his successes and his role in them, promising to be by his father-in-law’s side by end of it all. A similar event plays later on as he watches the construction of new skyscrapers and factories marking all new leaps in efficiency.
• We ARE Struggling Together: The government's response to the Guangdong riots is partially crippled by the fierce arguments within Matsushita's cabinet over what to do, which sometimes veers into verbal abuse.
• What Is This Feeling?: Contrary to his parents' wishes, Chun returns to the Guangdong riots and joins the CCL. When he and the rest of his compatriots are arrested in Matsushita's crackdown path, Chun tries to remain defiant and confident in the CCL's assured victory, but he can't suppress a discomforting feeling he hasn't felt in a long time: fear.
• Who's Laughing Now?: Pleased by the rapid expansion of his company into the United States, Matsushita smugly thinks himself special for cracking into the OFN's heartland, thinking how everyone used to think he'd amount to nothing and that he's proved their doubts wrong.
• Wide-Eyed Idealist: At least one immigrant buys Matsushita's potential campaign to advertise Guangdong life as prosperous and flashy. He excitedly hopes that his family has moved into a better life away from the countryside, a hope that Lee Mei considers foolish and misplaced.
• You Are a Credit to Your Race: When a Chinese man is promoted, his Japanese superiors try to talk to him. However, many of their questions and compliments carry unintentional racist undertones, like whether a certain stereotype is true or telling him that he speaks Japanese well for a Chinese person. It doesn't help either that they barely acknowledge the work he's doing.
• Your Approval Fills Me with Shame: As Matsushita clears out the police force of its most inefficient officers, one of Lam's superiors tells him to not worry about his now-fired colleagues and what will happen to them, complimenting him as one of the best in the force. However, this gives no comfort to a downtrodden Lam.

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