Sega Consolidation

[Johnny Nighttrain]

Sega may have a good chance at a comeback.

NEVER. WARNING, FANBOY IN DENIAL.

[GameHED]

Most mainstreamers will probably just see the sega brand as 1 big company and ignore who is developing what. Sonic Advance for example wasn't even handled by sega. And most people criticising ports of VF3 on dc forget that it wasn't arcade perfect because sega didn't put the same people from the arcade game behind the DC port.(even if dc could easily handle it if given proper attention) And what about capcom helping nintendo to port gba games? (like Zelda) I don't think people will notice and will just go by franchise and hype.

[SonofdonCD]

Again, how is this screwing up?!?!?

This plan has only just started, so it's WAAAAAY too early to judge.

Plus, if I'm remembering corrctly, despite their blunder with the NFL2K3/ Madden fiasco, they actually are profitable for the first time in five years.

I think they'll get it done in time, but not overnight.

[Mr_Furious]

Who said they're screwing up. I only stated that it'll take time to find out if they did, in fact, screw the pooch by their re-org. I'm just voicing my gut reaction to the new Sega and their focus. I will be more than happy if I am wrong.

[GameHED]

NEVER. WARNING, FANBOY IN DENIAL.

Lol, take a chill pill bro. The only reason sega make the news is because they are important and influential enough to make a big difference in which console people support. (So glad they didn't jump aboard the ps2 so eagerly accept for experimentation purposes and to port old games that were already made. ) No need to be scared.

Personally, like rare, (who are kinda symbolic of quality to all the nintendo fanboys) it's not so much how much they make on games that is important, but whether they can pimp thier games properly to the brainwshed masses long enough to get them interested. (sony had to trick people with ps2 awesome bloated specs to win the propaganda war, so it's all about deception) In the past, sega were victims of clever marketing tactics and poor managment. But the games were great on dc.

Things change buddy, just accept it. lol Nintendo now have to pretend they are more mature than they were, sony have to accept thier market share will be threatened now that there are 2 competitors all prepared to attack at the same time (ps1 came from nowhere meaning sega and nintendo weren't ready) and MS are no longer considered too geeky to be in the console gaming market (as many people wrongly thought it would mean buggy games and clunky pc style games for the system only) I think people are slowly realising the hype of system launches is part of the whole deception and this is why you are seeing sony losses.

People tend to live in the past and think it can last forever never expecting massive changes that will effect them, but it can happen every console gen. Now nintendo's handheld market will be interesting to watch, because they have a big monopoly here and it's only a matter of time before some other company offers a better alternative to the GBA at a decent enough price. (the key being in prices of gba games being too high)

[SonofdonCD]

Who said they're screwing up. I only stated that it'll take time to find out if they did, in fact, screw the pooch by their re-org. I'm just voicing my gut reaction to the new Sega and their focus. I will be more than happy if I am wrong.

I wasn't referring to you, but the many posters proclaiming (practically wishing) doom upon Sega before your post.

I guess it's really in vogue, especially since they haven't done anything spectactular lately. But there really isn't enough here to say either way. At least it sounds good on paper. Here's to hoping they can pull off the "Quirky Mainstream Game".

[Captain Canuck]

Eh? This is only bad for the crazy Sega fans like me. I don't know why everyone else is complaining. They're just trying to copy everyone elses success. Sega has always been labelled the jack of all trades, but master of none. If they wan't to concentrate on stuff to dominate a genre than it's fine by be. When VC sports went nuts, the phantasy Star, Shining force fans bitched. They said Sega sucks now just because they were going a different direction with their games. Then if Sega does something else, the fans of the other genres bitch. I don't see what's so wrong with concentrating on certain type of games for money. I love Sega the way it is, but I think that this is the way to go. Square lives off strictly RPGs, while the whole purpose of polyphony is strictly GT, and Kojima's team is purely cinematic. Let's just see if Sega can have the same success this way.

Here's my guess on these strange terms.

Mainstream = guns, blood, T & A, and sports. Stuff like GTA/Max payne and movie licenses. Look at the top 10 selling games every month is NA and you'll see the matrix or rainbow six or something.

Cinematic/movie scenes - Simple. RPG's and games based on atmosphere. Like MGS2, ZOE2, FF, and stuff like that.

casual - The middle ground

hardcore - VF, VOOT, F355, any other true sim. All those games are pretty hardcore I would say. VF didn't get popular here till part 4.

sports - VC isn't nearly as big as EA sports. They can barely handle NBA2k and NFL2k every year. If they want to make golf, boxing, skiing, volleyball, or whatever, they could use some help.

This could be good. All the teams are pretty versatile and diverse with their talents, so I don't think what team goes where will really matter. Until now, VC was the only Sega team structured this way. VC is getting damn good at sports games. They already make better sports games than anyone else. This could work.

I wasn't referring to you, but the many posters proclaiming (practically wishing) doom upon Sega before your post.

I guess it's really in vogue, especially since they haven't done anything spectactular lately. But there really isn't enough here to say either way. At least it sounds good on paper. Here's to hoping they can pull off the "Quirky Mainstream Game".

This is exactly what I am talking about. People saying that Sega hasn't done anything spectacular lately because they keep on switching genres with every game. If you were a hockey fan, NHL2k3 is about as spectacular in gameplay as you can get. Same goes for VF4EVO for fighting games. Those games weren't released that long ago.

[Tyler_Durden]

Mainstream = guns, blood, T & A, and sports. Stuff like GTA/Max payne and movie licenses. Look at the top 10 selling games every month is NA and you'll see the matrix or rainbow six or something.

Worst prediction ever. Yeah, the developers of stuff like Sonic the Hedgehog and Rez are going to run off and develop a GTA clone. Use your fucking head.

[GameHED]

Real Mainstream can mean anything from mascot platformers like Crash or J+D, to blood and guts kill sims like MGS, splinter cell and all that.
Mainstream = franchises well known by lots of people that have a formula for success by recognition alone due to high demand for more of the game. (eg the sims, Mario, Zelda etc)

The wieght of the franchises' success determines its likelihood that it will appear over and over again much to the dismay of those who want to move on. Eg Tomb Raider sequels, RE Sequels, FF sequels and Madden updates where the games improve in small increments as opposed to retain fresh new ideas in respect to the amount of games that are out.

The mind-numbed old fans have it in thier mind to declare themselves more hardcore since they were there before the game became successful (like a dedicated fan's attitude to a little-known underground music band who is dissapointed they've milked the attention from the masses; as a result marketing the idea to everyone, for profit instead of just carried on as usual when they were more true to themselves regardless of the money. The media is the enemy!).

Casual fans probably don't care and just evalute the game based on friends recommendations since they don't play as much so I consider these as being people who haven't had a chance to inform themselves enough to make up thier own mind yet.

[Videodrone]

i think HeadHunter 2 is the closest you are going to get to "blood and guts"...it's not Sega's style to go with the trend...