Sega Lays off 73 People

I don't see how it'll have any impact on Sonic games in any way.

 

A guy I talk to online who was animating at High Impact games for the past 5 years got laid off last week too. But luckily there are plenty jobs for the more talented 3D artists, so he's got a bunch of freelance work to tide him over. It's probably a similar thing with the Sega employees.

 

Less power to America, more power to Japan...

Even with all the facts I still can't help but believe most of the first page. America went their own direction with Sonic and I think Japan's just having a period about it.

 

Sonic games are made in Japan anyway. =/

 

SOA hasn't real power since the middle of the nineties, besides what gets brought in to the west or not. The only thing they ever did since then was force Shenmue II on Xbox, giving a finger to all of american Shenmue fans who owned a Dreamcast and stuck with it until the end. And all the trash deals that we've had since Dreamcast blew the fuse. There wasn't any game that had a good critic since then. No good deals to speak about either.

 

Sonic is more popular in America than Japan though.

I doubt they don't know that, I'm surprised they don't focus their American division on Sonic more because of that.

I thought both Shenmues were ported to the Xbox because the Dreamcast wasn't doing well either and the game couldn't run on any other system.

 

The best one was made with Americans!



:specialed:

 

Hm. This is something to be concerned about. If memory serves, this isn't the first time Sega's restructured their branches. Last time, many of their development studios got cut and absorbed within one another. Now it's different.

I can't help but wonder about their reasoning...

 

Nope, only Shenmue 2 was released on Xbox. To make up for all of the xbox fans who didnt have a dreamcast for shenmue 1, the second one came with a dvd movie telling the story of the first.

 

I thought all the classics had significant help from America.

 

SOA (Peter Moore)forced Shenmue II in the Xbox and everyone who was a fan before (and owed a Dreamcast by default) had to go and either import or buy an Xbox plus the game if they wanted to play. SOE let Shenmue II into the Dreamcast in Europe. It wasn't dubbed, but it was subbed, and it gave the fans something they wanted in the console they owned. There wouldn't be any money lost if SOA had done the same as SOE did, but MS had tthe rights in NA for the game. I don't think Moore being hired by Microsoft shortly after was a coincidence either.

Some desks are significant helps I suppose.

 

Thanks for clearing that up. I've always assumed it was because the DC was well received in Japan. I recently bought three Dreamcasts plus accessories and a few games for a fiver, so I'll be searching out the great games available.

 

Emphasis being on the present tense, of course. I'm only talking about the state of things as they stand now.

 

All I can say to that is: Hooray for stupid decisions. Now the entire branch of America looks terrible...

While we're on the subject of SEGA's different branches (I'll make a thread if this is too off-topic), Japan's Sonic canon was always very different from EU/NA's, but how did that come to pass anyway? I always thought the differences in west and east were some struggle within the different companies.

 

The differences between East and West were the result of a business decision by SEGA. At the time, they thought most people from one side of the world wouldn't have much contact with the other side. They allowed SoA to write their own story for Sonic to fit Western audiences, as he would have more appeal. It's nothing to do with any sort of struggle.

 

Someday, I hope Sega-Sammy will be bought by Nintendo. They know what to do with their games. Pokémon, Mario, Zelda... Always better.

 

Yeah, but they only regularly utilize a few specific franchises and spend the rest of their time encouraging hyper-casual minigame collections and developing pointless peripherals that serve no real purpose. Also, they're kind of stupid when it comes to hardware and I really just do not want to see Sonic or any of Sega's other awesome franchises restricted to the generation's worst console.

 

They aren't stupid with hardware. The GameCube was more powerful than every console of that generation except the Dreamcast. The NDS works well without being really fragile, Nintendo revolutionized hand-held games and they made a 3-D console work while only using cartridges, and some of those later games work well enough. (Graphics are inferior to the PS1, but they are playable.) They just dropped out of the gaming competition with the Wii because they were pobably sure Son and Microsoft were this generation's gaming giants in the console wars and the long-standing Nintendo vs SEGA generation died with the Dreamcast. They know they can make more money by selling to the general public instead of catering to real gamers, it's disgraceful, but that doesn't have anything to do with Nintendo's ability with consoles.

They don't advance because they don't have to. They're not battling SEGA anymore and while Sony and Microsoft continue to compete they'll stay underneath them both and thrive just fine.

But I agree with the rest, the Wii is a shitty console, but it's a good toy. I do think if they ever need to advance with the times they'll surprise everyone though.

 

Which generation is that? I'm pretty sure that the Xbox was the most powerful console of the sixth generation by far. In fact, the Dreamcast was the least powerful (although it was the first released).

 

The Dreamcast was the most powerful. It just wasn't optimized to fulfill it's highest potential.