About some time ago Sega made a public announcement on Game Awards regarding the revival of many of their classic IPs, including games like Jet Set Radio, Streets of Rage, Shinobi, and Golden Axe. Days later it was leaked registration names for many other older IPs, like Alex Kidd and Kid Chameleon. This sudden wave of game revivals coincides with Sega's strange talks regarding Sonic Frontiers performance and the drive to make Sonic games even better. All Sonic Team devs allegedly received a 30% pay bonus after the release of Sonic Frontiers, and the studio is growing with new people being hired. Sonic Team's japanese office was also renovated recently, with the japanese Sega social media doings tours on the new office. And then the Sonic Symphony.
I think a lot of people in the gaming community are now aware of SegaSammy's business thank's to Moon Channel's video on the topic, and how they leverage Sega's game IPs (such as Sonic) as PR scapegoats, keeping their gambling business hidden from the public. The truth is, Sega is dead, and has been since Sammy acquired them around 2005. The game division of the company is a small fragment of SegaSammy. Over the years Sega lost many talented game devs and studios, either due to death, retirement, or they left to work somewhere else. The studios and devs Sega has left are mostly product of merges and purchases, such as Rovio (Angry Birds and mobile games), and Atlus (Persona). Yes I know Yakuza/Like a Dragon is very popular, but compared to other japanese game studios, Sega doesn't make a lot of money. Which makes me think it is so weird how out of nowhere Sega has been trying to revitalize their image, reviving older IPs, and possibly reestablish more internal game studios.
Sega of America & Europe recently welcomed their new CEO, Shuji Utsumi, someone who played a hand at the launch of the Dreamcast, and was a "major player" in the Sega Super Game project and one of the people behind the announcement of Sega revivals at the Game Awards. Now Sega has been in talks to reestablish their arcade market in Japan after closing their arcade centers years ago. I know Sega would never return to the console market, they don't have the resources for that anymore. But I still wonder, why? Because SegaSammy doesn't need that, they get a lot of money from pachinko. Is this all being made to just generate good PR for Sega? Is it just a smoke screen to cover something else (like SoA's Union busting efforts)?
I think SegaSammy might be preparing long term for some kind of shift in the market. What if the next big thing is Videogame Movies and Theme Parks? Increasing the appeal of Sega's IPs for movies and theme park. Nintendo has been doing that lately. Expanding from games to general entertainment.
Increasing the appeal and value of the Sega brand to make the company more valuable to anyone who wants to purchase it. Merges are the name of the game nowdays, with infinite growth being objetive of greedy CEOs, merging with other companies is a way to keep that façade of continuous growth. Of course, in the case of Sega, anyone willing to buy it would have to buy SegaSammy as well.
I heard Japan has been cracking on pachinko machines a lot harder lately, and SegaSammy's plan on getting the global market hooked on their gambling machines (with a test trial during the 2020 Olympics) didn't go so well.
Or, in a future where streaming and subscrition is the way to access videogames, Sega would like to have some of the most valuable game IPs. Microsoft has their Game Pass, Apple is in their first place with Apple Arcade, and now Netflix is entering the game market with Netflix Games. Apple has to have paid Sega a nice money to have Sega Hardlight to develop Sonic Dream Team, and now Netflix announced their own Sonic Mania mobile port.
That's a lot of rambling, but I would like to discuss this topic with someone else. I still find these moves by Sega all weird, considering SegaSammy's history of not caring much about games.
I think a lot of people in the gaming community are now aware of SegaSammy's business thank's to Moon Channel's video on the topic, and how they leverage Sega's game IPs (such as Sonic) as PR scapegoats, keeping their gambling business hidden from the public. The truth is, Sega is dead, and has been since Sammy acquired them around 2005. The game division of the company is a small fragment of SegaSammy. Over the years Sega lost many talented game devs and studios, either due to death, retirement, or they left to work somewhere else. The studios and devs Sega has left are mostly product of merges and purchases, such as Rovio (Angry Birds and mobile games), and Atlus (Persona). Yes I know Yakuza/Like a Dragon is very popular, but compared to other japanese game studios, Sega doesn't make a lot of money. Which makes me think it is so weird how out of nowhere Sega has been trying to revitalize their image, reviving older IPs, and possibly reestablish more internal game studios.
Sega of America & Europe recently welcomed their new CEO, Shuji Utsumi, someone who played a hand at the launch of the Dreamcast, and was a "major player" in the Sega Super Game project and one of the people behind the announcement of Sega revivals at the Game Awards. Now Sega has been in talks to reestablish their arcade market in Japan after closing their arcade centers years ago. I know Sega would never return to the console market, they don't have the resources for that anymore. But I still wonder, why? Because SegaSammy doesn't need that, they get a lot of money from pachinko. Is this all being made to just generate good PR for Sega? Is it just a smoke screen to cover something else (like SoA's Union busting efforts)?
I think SegaSammy might be preparing long term for some kind of shift in the market. What if the next big thing is Videogame Movies and Theme Parks? Increasing the appeal of Sega's IPs for movies and theme park. Nintendo has been doing that lately. Expanding from games to general entertainment.
Increasing the appeal and value of the Sega brand to make the company more valuable to anyone who wants to purchase it. Merges are the name of the game nowdays, with infinite growth being objetive of greedy CEOs, merging with other companies is a way to keep that façade of continuous growth. Of course, in the case of Sega, anyone willing to buy it would have to buy SegaSammy as well.
I heard Japan has been cracking on pachinko machines a lot harder lately, and SegaSammy's plan on getting the global market hooked on their gambling machines (with a test trial during the 2020 Olympics) didn't go so well.
Or, in a future where streaming and subscrition is the way to access videogames, Sega would like to have some of the most valuable game IPs. Microsoft has their Game Pass, Apple is in their first place with Apple Arcade, and now Netflix is entering the game market with Netflix Games. Apple has to have paid Sega a nice money to have Sega Hardlight to develop Sonic Dream Team, and now Netflix announced their own Sonic Mania mobile port.
That's a lot of rambling, but I would like to discuss this topic with someone else. I still find these moves by Sega all weird, considering SegaSammy's history of not caring much about games.
