Very beneficial that Sega had the foresight to provide English info about all of these places, just for someone to read years after they'd all closed. Sega World Ito Yokado Obihiro, opened February 1989 - the first ever Sega World? Sega World Ito Yokado Toyohashi - another very early Sega World, another with an emphasis on appeal to families with children, and another in a Ito Yokado shopping centre Hi-Tech Sega Matsuyama Hi-Tech Land Sega Shibuya has been open since 1978 - oldest Sega game centre still in existence? Hi-Tech Sega Hiroshima Star Base Space Pilot Zym (with custom Space Harriers) Age's Kumamoto Sega World and Star Ship Fantasy Square seems to have became Sega World Alpark at some point - Luck 50's, a 50s inspired casino, was originally in the same location There's also more on Sega Cineset Tempozan and O2 Park Sega World in the scans, info on several joint management venues which I'm not sure constitute as Sega venues in all cases, plus "Kid-Para" seems to have been a thing Sega did for a brief amount of time. (not only that, there's a whole load of info on the "En-Joint" concept itself + the earlier medium-scale attractions that I need to loosely translate at some point too. And that's putting aside everything else in the other scans)
I must have missed the link https://segaretro.org/File:SegaEnJoint_JP_Flyer.pdf https://segaretro.org/File:SegaCompanyProfile_JP_Flyer.pdf Their PDFs aren't very good, and seem to have some sort of wonky OCR thing that's messing up the images. These ones are better - reference away!
Frustratingly, Sega does still seem to hold quite a few photos of their old centres stashed away somewhere (and these appear to have been uncovered during the relocation of their headquarters, so they likely still exist): Nice to know there's at least some sort of a record of it within the company though - it's easier for this kind of stuff to get binned than some of the other things we know they've lost.
https://archive.org/details/img-0017-new/IMG_0017_NEW.jpg This popped up on archive.org overnight - judging from other uploads, it might give a clue as to who designed it.
Some photos of Tokyo up there now as well On the same theme I'm on the lookout for any scans available at all of Japanese interior design magazine "Shotenkenchiku" - at least two of their issues had features on Joypolis venues (Kyoto and Fukuoka), and I wouldn't be surprised if they covered more venues, including Sega Worlds. edit: Ikebukuro GiGO, Trocadero, and Yokohama too
"Sannomiya Sanx" wasn't sorted into any branding, so fixed that. Unfortunately it seems to be closing at the end of March. Shame - really isn't many unusual ones like this around now, and it looks like a particularly long-standing venue.
This seems to have some info on the early 90s game centres Sega were opening in Japan - haven't given the whole video a proper watch yet
This thread is a goldmine of good research. You two are incredible. Thank you for continuing to fill in these blanks.
Some footage circa 1992 got uploaded to YouTube yesterday: The title seems to indicate this was in Yamanashi Prefecture - surely wherever it was in there could be narrowed down by the surroundings?
Sega World Yamanakako I started typing "Sega World Yama.." to see if a "Sega World Yamanashi" existed, and the first result just happened to be this Sega World. I'd say "I thought it looked familiar" but that would be me admitting I've spent too much time over the years with this subject
Assuming the uploader's correct, the footage being dated to 1992 (and late 92, by the looks of the Christmas décor) makes a few aspects interesting - for one, Tails is there in the sign just weeks after Sonic 2 was released, but there's also some Astro City cabinets on the upper floor before their 1993 release. Unless this is just more proof of Sega shipping out their cabs to their own centres early, could this be some early footage of them on test?
I wouldn't want to say for sure, but given most of those cabinets are from 1991 or 1992, it's probably a new build. In fact the oldest game I could see in that footage was Flash Point from 1989... though given it's in an Astro City cabinet... yeah. Speaking of which, we might have the date wrong for Astro City - the flyer says 1993, but it might have been launched before the flyer.
Sega World Yamanakako didn't open until July 1993, so that video is just mislabeled. How do I know that? I spent a bit of time researching Sega and Lake Yamanaka before... (edit: I tried to find the original source but I don't think I saved it - it was probably from searching a Japanese newspaper database from the time or something. I did make a specific note that Sega World Yamanakako opened July 14, 1993, though). Probably unknown trivia: Lake Yamanaka, where that video was filmed, was the home to Sega's company resort (保養所 'hoyoujo' - resort is not actually the best word, but fits better than 'rest home'). In Japan, many companies have (or had - probably bigger in the bubble era) resorts that employees can use for vacation. You have to make a reservation and you still have to pay, but it's heavily discounted from what you'd pay elsewhere. Sega's was also used for company orientations, seminars, and workshops. The Lake Yamanaka area is not too far from Tokyo and it's right next to Mt. Fuji (as seen in that video) and there are a ton of touristy things to do there. You can see some pictures of Sega's Lake Yamanaka resort here: https://hamazo.exblog.jp/3757139/ Those were taken in 2005 - I'm not sure if Sega still owned it then, but probably. I've tried to find it on Google maps but the building might not exist anymore. Nowadays, Sega Sammy's resort is located in Izu Kougen. You can see some pictures of it here: https://ameblo.jp/sexy-saito/entry-11077911209.html
Sega World Meisei, Beijing I'm trying to find leads on Sega's arcade presence in China but getting very little from before the Players Arena + Joypolis parks were established - there were at least two Sega Worlds as well though.
https://twitter.com/natuge/status/703876430791192576 (Sega) Ages Jiyugaoka (AGES 自由が丘), which might be Club Sega Jiyugaoka, or something different. I care a bit more than usual about this one - apparently it stocked older games and had a "Retro" aesthetic. Also depending on its age, it could be the first use of "Sega Ages" in Japan. The other one in this tweet is Sega World Cospal, the biggest game center in Japan in 1991/1992. They knocked the building down last year.
The Ages Kumamoto venue that was in the En-Joint scans could predate it Maybe it's just the poor translations but I don't detect anything about the other one having anything old, besides its interior design - I doubt Sega were ahead of the retro gaming trend at that time. Although it's certainly now a thing at the third Akihabara location.
Three Sega World arcades in comparatively remote locations that we still don't know much about besides the coins - "E-Zone Sega World" (Singapore), "Gift Gate Sega World" (Philippines), and "SS-Mega World Sega" (Indonesia): the Indonesian one had a good Virtua Fighter 3 player, Philippines seems to have had something to do with Gift Gate stores, and "E-Zone Sega World" is particularly intriguing since they apparently intended to upgrade it to become an indoor theme park in March 1996
