Sega

[CimminyCricket]

Do you think that Sega will ever be able to put a good system out again? I mean, after the genesis and Saturn (not so much Saturn but because it had Nights I put it up there), Everything sucked. The game gear. The dream cast. And their games for the most part. Do you think that they'll be able to completely revive Sonic? Do you think they can dig themselves out of the ditch that they're in?

I wish they could but don't think they can.

[Roto13]

What are you even talking about? The Saturn suffered from a similar problem that the N64 did. Difficult to develop for so most of the decent games were 1st party. The Dreamcast was frigging amazing. The Game Gear, yeah, that kind of sucked.

Since Sonic Adventure 2 there hasn't been a good 3D Sonic game besides the new Sonic game for Wii. (I haven't played it, but I've heard it's good.) The Sonic Advance games were good and Sonic Rush is great. There's no need to "revive" Sonic since he's not dead.

As a 3rd party developer, they're doing fine thanks. Sonic games still sell, and they're responsible for hits like Shenmue and Phantasy Star.

There's really no problem here.

[XxSephirothxX]

The Genesis was a great system, for sure--it was just up against a better one. The Saturn was a mess. Sega really botched that one. The hardware was far too difficult to develop for, and the much easier and cheaper PS1 just blew it away. Same goes for the Gamegear, really. It was too expensive and too big and just not competition for the Gameboy. The Dreamcast was a marvelous system, but they again botched the release, and the looming menace of the PS2 killed off a lot of anticipation and sales for it, especially in Japan.

And I think Roto's wrong about them doing fine. After merging with Sammy (Sammy, right?) a few years ago, they've really gone downhill. :skull::skull::skull::skull:ty games, for the most part, and there's no sign of them pulling out of the rut. There's the ocassional gem like Virtua Fighter 5, but when they keep pumping out one :skull::skull::skull::skull:ty Sonic game after another, and come up with subpar new franchises, I have to wonder if there's much hope left.

[Dreddz]

The Dreamcast was a marvelous system, but they again botched the release, and the looming menace of the PS2 killed off a lot of anticipation and sales for it, especially in Japan..

Actually, the one thing they did right with the Dreamcast was the release.

Sega have no trouble making a good console, but one that would sell is another story.

[Yamaneko]

I don't think the market could handle four major consoles and since each console manufacturer is doing alright by some standard, I doubt Sega is even considering entering the console race any time soon. Or ever.

[XxSephirothxX]

I saw a special once about how they launch of the Dreamcast launch really did poorly in Japan, but that Sega of America worked really hard to make the North American launch a success, which it was. But when Sony announced the release of the PS2 in Japan a year ahead of time, the promise of the DVD capacity and added power really hurt sales of the system badly.

EDIT: To Dreddz

[Maxico]

And I think Roto's wrong about them doing fine. After merging with Sammy (Sammy, right?) a few years ago, they've really gone downhill. :skull::skull::skull::skull:ty games, for the most part, and there's no sign of them pulling out of the rut. There's the ocassional gem like Virtua Fighter 5, but when they keep pumping out one :skull::skull::skull::skull:ty Sonic game after another, and come up with subpar new franchises, I have to wonder if there's much hope left.

The critical between Sonic and Virtua fighter is that one of them was developed by Sonic Team and the other by AM2.

AM2 are currently, by far, the greatest asset Sega have. Even with Yu Suzuki's reduced role. They've been pretty much pumping out consistantly great arcade style games for the entire lifespan of Sega.

Sonic Team, however, havn't made a decent game since NiGHTS.


The Sonic Advance games were good and Sonic Rush is great.

Sonic Advance 3, almost got it right. None of them are really on par with the original games though.


I don't think the market could handle four major consoles and since each console manufacturer is doing alright by some standard, I doubt Sega is even considering entering the console race any time soon. Or ever.

I was under the impression that Sega's current role was to place itself as one of the top 3 publishers. Where they go from there is up for interpretation, however if there was a massive surge in popularity and the market was right, I could definatly see them trying again.

[Madame Adequate]

The Genesis was a great system, for sure--it was just up against a better one. The Saturn was a mess. Sega really botched that one. The hardware was far too difficult to develop for, and the much easier and cheaper PS1 just blew it away. Same goes for the Gamegear, really. It was too expensive and too big and just not competition for the Gameboy. The Dreamcast was a marvelous system, but they again botched the release, and the looming menace of the PS2 killed off a lot of anticipation and sales for it, especially in Japan.

Another major problem with the Saturn was that it was released not long after the equally expensive 32X, which kind of made them look bad. Aside from anything else they could have ended up competing with themselves, which would clearly be a bad idea unless you have complete market dominance to begin with.

But yeah, there were some bad calls, and there was some bad luck. I would pay such sums of money to have seen Nintendo become a game publisher only, and keep SEGA in the console business. :(

[Markus. D]

I don't really think any system could outdo the ones out/coming out these days.


I still like the games Sega make though :3!

[Breine]

It'd be nice to see Sega on the console market again, put I honestly don't think it's possible, and I highly doubt they're even thinking about making a console again. As far as I'm concerned they're doing fine as game developers for other consoles, which I'm sure they're pretty satisfied with at the moment.

[JKTrix]

Traditionally, game companies make their profits off of game sales right? Sell their console for a measurable loss, but get people to buy lots of games and they'll eventually profit.

Sega, right now, just dropped the 'money losing' console altogether, and went straight to the 'profit from the games' angle. Sega is/was one of the larger companies who could afford to make consoles years ago, but the PS2 disaster has changed the situation. Instead of making bad Sonic games on a system not-a-lot-of-people have/will buy, just make bad Sonic games for every system with a spark.

Perhaps they will earn enough to come back one day, but as it stands now the competition is incredibly fierce. Sony and especially Microsoft are huge companies. If their systems lose tons of money, they have additional resources to reinforce it. If Nintendo went for an expensive system this time around and it failed miserably, they would be in pretty dire straits too--though they have the Gameboy legacy and now the DS to fall back on. Sega has no such cushion.

I think I'd rather see them continue to support other consoles, instead of them trying to come back with another one. I would seriously have a hard time convincing myself to get a new Sega console when I already have 4 others, even if it were the only way I could play Shenmue 3 and Virtua Fighter 6. The market is full.

[escobert]

I don't think Sega will ever come out with another system. Didn't they pretty much say this when they announced they would be only making games?

[Roto13]

I don't think Sega will ever come out with another system. Didn't they pretty much say this when they announced they would be only making games?

Yeah, but that doesn't mean they have to stick by that. :P

I agree that it probably won't happen, though.

[Slothy]

I highly doubt it will happen any time soon, if they ever decide to go that route again. Ever since the Dreamcast failed, they've had a hell of a hard time making a game that doesn't suck. There's the rare exception nowadays like VF5, but overall I think their reputation has fallen so far that they don't stand a chance of convincing anyone to buy a system with their logo on it. Would you really buy a game console from a company that can't make a decent game even when all of their resources are devoted solely to that purpose?

[Maxico]

Ever since the Dreamcast failed, they've had a hell of a hard time making a game that doesn't suck. There's the rare exception nowadays like VF5...

Not a "rare exception"

I hate having to repeat myself.

Basically, inside Sega there are several internal "AM" development teams. Each teams do their own things and are fairly unrelated to each other.
Although all but one of these entities have since changed their name. For example, AM8 became "Sonic Team", AM7 became "Overworks", AM6 became "Smilebit" and so on.

AM2 has kept it's original name throughout it's entire life and with "Sonic Team" is one of Sega's biggest developing divisions.

Now looking at recent games by AM2:
Virtua Fighter 5/4, Afteburner Climax, Outrun 2006/Outrun 2, Shenmue 1/2

Are all gems.

Although they may not be the fastest developers, I really can't remember the last bad game they've made.
Infact, pretty much all of Sega's good, post-dreamcast games can be attributed to AM2, and possibly Smilebit.

[Slothy]

Ever since the Dreamcast failed, they've had a hell of a hard time making a game that doesn't suck. There's the rare exception nowadays like VF5...

Not a "rare exception"

I hate having to repeat myself.

Basically, inside Sega there are several internal "AM" development teams. Each teams do their own things and are fairly unrelated to each other.
Although all but one of these entities have since changed their name. For example, AM8 became "Sonic Team", AM7 became "Overworks", AM6 became "Smilebit" and so on.

AM2 has kept it's original name throughout it's entire life and with "Sonic Team" is one of Sega's biggest developing divisions.

Now looking at recent games by AM2:
Virtua Fighter 5/4, Afteburner Climax, Outrun 2006/Outrun 2, Shenmue 1/2

Are all gems.

Although they may not be the fastest developers, I really can't remember the last bad game they've made.
Infact, pretty much all of Sega's good, post-dreamcast games can be attributed to AM2, and possibly Smilebit.

Considering the number of games Sega as a whole has put out since the end of the Dreamcast, I would call those rare exceptions. I'll point out that I haven't played After Burner Climax (on account of it being an arcade game, and arcades going heading the way of the dodo, particularly in this part of the world), and haven't played those recent Outrun games.

I'm well aware that AM2 is responsible for pretty much their only good games in recent years, but they're few and far between. In the meantime, we have Sega feeding us utter crap like the recent Sonic and Shinobi games. In fact, their ability to ruin some of their classic franchises as of late has me hoping they don't revive a number of older franchises until they can get their act together.

[Maxico]

Words

Rare, yes.
But not exceptions.

Also, missing out on Outrun 2 is totally your loss.

Playing a 4 player linked cabinet with friends is a really cool experiance.