Tighter Integration May be Necessary for Survival
Though much of the gaming industry seems to be recession proof, there are still pockets of companies who have been hit hard, and according to Edge, Sega may surprisingly be one of those companies.
Their report confirms that the company is looking to restructure management and its practices. The hope is that the shakeup will more tightly knit the bright Sega minds between America, Europe, and Japan.
Confirming the information was Sega’s Takayuki Gawagoe, who noted that many of Sega’s big recent offerings haven’t performed as well as hoped, and that American critics seem to be more harsh on the company than their European counterparts.
Gawagoe believes the gaming industry and Sega especially is experiencing a downturn. It may be; between recent reports from NPD that say the industry lost 17% of March revenue year to year, and a drop from February to March in all three console sales–with the Wii bearing the brunt of the losses–there’s new evidence that consumers may be holding back. Further, Sega’s attempts to break into a more mature Wii audience in particular have not yet been successful.
What does this mean for you? The reorganization should not be on as grand a scale as in 2001, when Sega dropped Dreamcast support and focused its attention to multiplatform software development. But the company will be developing new IPs, as well as taking a hard look at old ones–including Sonic–and they will determine the best way to execute both in the context of maximizing its profit potential.
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what does this mean???
It means we’re pretty close to having no more Sonic.
WHAT!? I thought SEGA was on the way to the top! I thought it went really well for them now. Just look at how many great games they have. The conduit, MadWorld and the Sonicgames are getting better then ever! When I go to the video game shop i see SEGA games everywhere! It’s SONIC SONIC SONIC everywhere! ypu can’t go anywhere and don’t see Sonic! And if you look closely at a lot of games its from SEGA!
How can this be!? And not now when it’s getting better! I can see how SEGA is climbing up to the top! I know that they will be there again some day! And I was very suprised now! This is unbeliveble! Why now when it goes better for SEGA!?
Nah, this doesn’t mean Sonic’s end. But SEGA will be more careful now with what they release and make sure they are nice and not rushed. *sigh* 1983… =/
Thats good. SEGA is on the right way and if they think a bit about what people will say about what they are releasing, they can probebly make a really good Sonic game. Better then what we have seen so far.
Or maybe the opposit will happend. I don’t know…
They are losing money, so they are going to try and make their development studios more focused. SEGA has done this plenty of times; the company is not going to die or anything.
@ RaveToTheGrave
That or the perfect Sonic.
I guess the perfect Sonic will come. Or maybe not perfect… It’s very hard to do something perfect. But I guess SEGA have learned from all tof their mistakes now and they are ready to do it right.
It’s not Sonics end. Sonic is their mascot, they can’t just take a NEW mascot, that would be stupid and comfusing.
Sonic end is coming that day when SEGA “dies”. But I don’t hope so, I play many kinds of games but Sonic is absolutely my favorite and it would feel “silence” without him. He’s a part of my life now. But don’t think Sonic IS my life, cus he isn’t.
They should make a more classic Sonic games that everyone would like and then make more of these at the same time they do other stuff like werehog or something like that. And then we have both. That would be nice and Sonic will be on the top again. I want SU2 with werehog. They can improve the werehog. It can come out something good out of everything if you’re doing it right. Maybe more fun platforming, more speed and less fights with werehog. And maybe a werehoming attack or something. The werehog can use it on small animies in the air for exampel. Woow, long massage I’m going to stop talking now.
Wheee!
alright guys you know what this means time to go to sega now some can go to japan like myself and others will go to sega usa maybe i will settle for there since. yeh and with my drawing and animation skills we are going to need two more people for this anventure once we join sega we tell them are ideas for games so sega can’t go byby saynore hola now the two other users must have good will to fight alright now……………………………..hahahah good old cartman
I’d blame the recession for the recent downturn. But this should be good. Fire the morons within Sega who are in there SOLELY for the purpose to kill the Sonic franchise.
ok people i know that sega of america has good games but now its time to end the other nintendo i have good idea for sonic games and other ones thier should be sonic chronicles 2 sonic unleashed 2 sonic adventure 3 sonic and mario battle of the earth sonic and spyro lengend of storm the lengend of sonic devil evil mage untiment collection silver the hedgehog xes voub quest of herose shadow and the secret rings.That i was thinking for new sega games.
Make some actually good Sonic games, and more people might buy them, especially since it’s a popular franchise.
Crap like Unleashed and Black Knight just isn’t going to cut it, and I’m glad they aren’t ripping people off as well as they hoped.
They just need to take Sonic back to his roots. Pull a friggin’ Megaman 9. Seriously, 16 bit styled games aren’t that hard to make these days. If they could pump those out, it could be better than the stuff we’re getting these days. And it doesn’t have to be 16 bit sprites, either. Just take Sonic back to what made him good at the very beginning instead of all these new ideas that nobody even asked for.
Oddly, I’d probably be kind of happy if Sega went out of Business. I mean…think about it, someone would buy the rights for Sonic (and maybe some other franchises) from Sega, and Nintendo seems to like Sonic now, so they could possibly buy it…But that’s only a dream.
Restructuring? Can’t be that bad, right?
THE END IS NIGH!!!!!!!!!!!! REPENT, REPENT. Its the apocolypse!!!!
nah its not that bad, i havent bought a sega game in years, so im not too worried
I really dont see what the big deal is about gimmicks. every game uses them and taking Sonic back to his roots wont help anything
@DoctorEggman
Why back to his roots? Why not just get the roots and let it blossom into something beautiful?
Going back to roots is the easy way out. I want them to pull all the stops so they can make a game that helps defines the series without pulling a Megaman.
Hehe, Like I said, “Either Sega is going to get Sonic right, or get bought out by someone who can.”
This is business people, no big deal. Sega isn’t going anywwere they’re a computer giant, if the promblem is major they’l pull through. Just because there’s a 17% drop doesn’t mean Nintendo or some other competitior is going to buy out Sonic, or some other drastic action is going to take place. Of course as people have said before this may be a good thing because they may be put double the effort into the polish on future games.
As soon as M&S is released things will perk up too, if its sells as well as it’s summer counterpart that is)
We BETTER get a perfect Sonic game. I hope this gives them some persuasion to get their stuff together and give us a top quality product, not like Unleashed, but BETTER than Unleashed, meaning no werehog gameplay. All the reviewers hated the werehog, but mostly praised the speed levels. Stick with those and there ya go.
Why is ‘the sky always falling’ with us Sonic fans? Nothing Sega ever does will mean the end of Sonic. Even if they SOMEHOW went under, Nintendo, if no one else, would pick up Sonic in a heartbeat. I’m rather surprised by this though, since my Wii is a Sega system. I have two Nintendo games (6 if you count VC/WiiWare), one Capcom game, and the overwhelming majority are Sega games.
Wait so there will be no more Sonic ?
your joking right
IT’s because Sega keeps thinking quanity over QUALITY.
That’s why Sonic has been failing so hard recently.
GOOD
sega and there crapy storybook games now
and wtf r they saying!?
“there trying to break in a more mature wii audience”
A TALKING SWORD
mature???
BIG NO NO
Your right its very sad but they are losing a lot of money but they feel that if they can relate to the teens they will buy it more
us teen buy more video games then children
so if they put a sonic game with sword then
then they think that we will say
(oh look sonic with a sword lets buy it )
but they don’t under stand that sonic just not good for those things
Is this because of the werehog?