For years, a urban legend has circulated in the United States, telling of a moonless night when twenty container trucks departed from a secret warehouse in Atari, Texas, transporting a shipment of mysterious cargo to the city of Alamogordo, New Mexico. There, in a desert expanse, they buried the devil's treasure deep beneath the earth.
This is a well-known urban legend in America, a story many Americans heard as children. However, what Atari buried remained unknown. It wasn't until many years later, because of this very devil's treasure, that Atari met its demise, and this childhood memory vanished forever.
Such urban legends are akin to China's "Bus No. 11 in the Imperial Capital" or the last subway train at 2 AM – widely known, yet no one truly grasps the truth. It wasn't until 2014 that this mystery was finally unraveled.
However, in this world, in the year 2004, this mystery was set to be revealed ahead of schedule.
The trigger was the Easter egg previously discovered in Iron Man. Initially, Iron Man was shown playing an Atari game on a Tianxing 5 phone within the armed organization's base.
Later in the film, during a particular scene, before Iron Man and his secretary… well, before that, Iron Man was again using his Tianxing 5 phone, and his phone received a message.
However, the released footage did not directly show the content of this text message. It only featured a shot taken at an angle from the side, revealing the message's content.
Furthermore, the entire shot lasted only about two seconds, making it absolutely impossible for a normal person to discern what the text message said.
Yet, there are always those in this world who are not normal, or perhaps just incredibly bored.
In the second week of the movie's release, an excited user posted on Atari's website, claiming to have found the exact location of the legendary devil's treasure.
Specifically, while watching the movie, he had glimpsed the text message and immediately recognized the name of Alamogordo city within it.
Alamogordo is a rather unremarkable city in the United States, with a level of recognition comparable to Tongliao at best. Yet, its appearance in an Iron Man text message was quite extraordinary.
More importantly, he had watched the entire movie and found no plot points related to this city. In other words, there was no discernible reason for the city to appear in the message.
This sparked intense interest in the bored viewer. He began searching for information about Alamogordo online and soon discovered the urban legend.
Then, he realized he might have also seen the word "devil" in the message. At that point, the entire narrative clicked into place.
A technically inclined individual, also bored, managed to obtain a pirated copy of the movie. He then extracted dozens of frames from it and, frame by frame, applied various techniques such as warping, synthesizing, shifting perspectives, and enlarging to the blurry text. Finally, he succeeded in rendering the text clearly readable.
The text read: "Boss, it's confirmed. Atari's devil's treasure is buried in Area 23 of the Alamogordo landfill."
This tech enthusiast then excitedly posted his discovery online.
It wasn't that he didn't want to find the legendary devil's treasure himself. The reality was that the location was within a public landfill.
The environmental conditions there are beyond description. More critically, it was not something an ordinary person could excavate. If he dared to dig up even a handful of soil in that landfill, he would be in prison the next second. This required more support to push forward the excavation work collectively.
Therefore, he straightforwardly shared the matter, along with a detailed account of his discovery process, which itself was quite remarkable.
Upon its release online, the post immediately generated immense discussion.
While some were excited about the unveiling of this truth, many were curious whether this Easter egg featured in the movie was real or fake.
Soon, the onlookers were divided into two factions. One side argued that the entire matter was fabricated. After all, this was not an official announcement but a movie Easter egg, a fictional text message within a fictional story. It was highly probable that the production team was simply joking, and it couldn't possibly be true.
However, others insisted it was real, citing their research into Marvel Studios behind the film. They discovered that the owner was Jiangnan Group, and Jiangnan Group, in conjunction with US Priority, had jointly acquired Atari. Therefore, it was entirely possible that the movie contained a truth about Atari's urban legend.
The two factions then engaged in heated debates online, quickly spreading from forums to Weibo, and then throughout the entire internet. Traditional media, always eager for a story, also joined the fray.
After all, they too had grown up with such urban legends and were very curious about the truth behind them.
Moreover, these media outlets keenly realized that if they could find a way to excavate the landfill, unearth the devil's treasure, and broadcast the event live, the advertising revenue would skyrocket!
Thus, the media became even more enthusiastic than the onlookers. Within days, related news had the entire United States buzzing with excitement. There was nothing that could capture people's curiosity more than news of a treasure hunt. Many individuals and organizations announced plans to excavate the landfill.
Suddenly, the entire United States was focused on the issue of a landfill, which could be considered quite miraculous.
Because these Easter eggs originated from *Iron Man*, many viewers who were not initially interested in Iron Man, but were drawn in by the urban legend news, began to flock to cinemas to watch *Iron Man*, wanting to see the Easter egg scene mentioned in the news.
Of course, it wasn't that a large number of people would specifically go to the cinema just to see an Easter egg. Rather, it was that many people who went to the cinema, unsure of what to watch, would unconsciously choose *Iron Man*.
It's like this: if you ask a girl out on a date, you've finished dinner, and it's only around 7:00 PM. If you immediately suggest going back to your place, you'll definitely get a roll of her eyes and a very awkward situation.
However, if you suggest watching a movie, the girl will certainly not refuse. And during the movie, you can hold hands, touch legs, let the estrogen and testosterone mingle. By the time you leave the cinema, it's already 9:00 or 10:00 PM. At this point, suggesting going back to your place to rest doesn't seem so abrupt, does it?
For the film industry, the most valued demographic is not the fan base, but the general audience.
The so-called general audience refers to those who don't have a specific demand for a particular movie. They go to the cinema merely for various social reasons and need to choose one film from those currently showing.
Therefore, how to stand out among the many films being released simultaneously and become the primary choice for all general audiences is the key to capturing this demographic.
Generally, this is achieved through elements like big stars, large productions, and special effects blockbusters. *Iron Man* naturally possesses all of these.
And now, with the addition of a mysterious Easter egg attribute, it has become even more invincible.
Thus, in the third week of the legend's fermentation, although it didn't surpass the box office peak of the second week, it still achieved a weekly box office of over 60 million dollars.
And remarkably, in the fourth week, the weekly box office was even higher than the third week, reaching over 82 million US dollars, nearly matching the second week's box office. This was the result of the news buzz and full-blown eruption.
The outcome was the major news of *Iron Man*'s opening month's North American box office exceeding 300 million dollars. This major news, in turn, led more audiences who didn't know much about Iron Man, driven by curiosity, to want to know what kind of movie it was, and thus they walked into the cinema. Consequently, in the fifth week, a period when traditional data shows weekly box office revenue dropping to a quarter of the opening week's, it still achieved 60 million dollars in weekly box office. Breaking 500 million dollars in North American box office was essentially a foregone conclusion, and exceeding 700 million dollars in global box office would also not be an issue, perhaps even 800 to 900 million dollars.
If it were to exceed 800 million dollars, it would surpass *Spider-Man 2* and become the tenth highest-grossing film on the global box office rankings.
However, the possibility of becoming the highest-grossing film of 2004 was slim, as the overall champion for the year was *Shrek 2*, with a total box office of 920 million dollars.
Based on *Iron Man*'s current performance, exceeding 900 million dollars in global box office was unlikely. But the achievements so far were enough to draw the attention of all Hollywood companies, let alone the fact that the film was backed by a Chinese capital investment company. Many filmmakers even began to cry "wolf is coming."
While *Iron Man* gained an additional over 100 million dollars in box office due to an unexpected Easter egg, and this figure was still rising, on the other hand, Atari, which was being cautiously monitored, began to gain traction.
Atari, which had been somewhat dormant, surprisingly experienced a resurgence due to this Easter egg. Many reporters began trying to find Atari employees for interviews, inquiring about what was inside the desert landfill, but they were only met with mysterious smiles.
It was at this time that Atari suddenly announced a piece of news: the 00 Game mobile phone store, a joint venture between Atari and 00 Games, had officially launched online.
For the Tianxing 4 and Tianxing 5 phones, users could directly download via data cable from their computers to install the 00 Mobile Game Hall on their phones. Then, by connecting to a PC, or via Wi-Fi, or directly using the 2G data signal network, they could download all of Atari's games, numbering over a thousand, through the 00 Mobile Game Hall.
Concurrently, Atari also announced that after a dormancy of a full 20 years, they were releasing a brand new game called: Angry Birds.