Sonic's Making A Comeback...Shenmue, Not So Much

SEGAbits is a good website that I should read more often.  Anyway, this is worth mentioning.  Sega held an event called "Sonic Boom" at a club right up the road from E3.  Sonic fans gathered to wear funny hats, play Sonic Generations demos, drink Sonic-related beverages and cupcakes, meet Yuji Naka and Takashi Iizuka, and check out the Crush 40 concert.  This is some guy's account from SEGAbits.  Also, here's some screenshots from the Sega America blog.

To tell you the truth, as stupid as this event seemed, it sounded like a good time...  I'm starting to feel good for Sonic fans again.  Go get 'em, guys.  EDIT: Might wanna read part 2 of Sonic Boom here.

Also, Sonic on the cover of Nintendo Power.  SEGAbits, mind if I steal your bandwidth?  Thanks!

There's something weird about seeing old-school Sonic on the (rather plain) cover of Nintendo Power...but it just means that SONIC'S MAKING A COMEBACK, BABY!!!  Move over Mario, move over Link, move over Samus, move over Pikachu...

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Alllllrriiiggghhhtttt...enough with that, here's more SEGAbits for you.  This is an article.  Mike Hayes, the President and CEO of Sega West (Europe & America), was talking about Shenmue at a CVG interview (nice of the man to spend time with the people...). 

“Trust me,” he continued, “We hear loud and clear about Shenmue, and we’re not going to close our ears to it."



“To be fair to us we’ve done Sonic 4, Afterburner, Golden Axe and Shinobi on 3DS. We do listen. It’s not like we’ve got our fingers in our ears, we take that very seriously and value the small but vocal people. Sonic 4 was the perfect example that we’re listening to those guys. Generations is too – and that will show when people get to see it for themselves.”

Me and a lot of other people always cheer on Sega in hopes that it'll influence them.  And it is GOOD that we have a CEO who will point out Game X, Game Y, Game Z and say, "Look, we're trying."  Good!  Talk is cheap, but better to have talk than to be blissfully ignorant to the fans!

EDIT: Just realized this is the same Mike Hayes that said we'd get 18-24 Dreamcast ports by 2012.  So that's not good although that was a long time ago so MAYBE we'll overlook this.

Then this is what the article writer goes on to say:

But rebooting a series is only half the battle Mike, it’s all well and good to say ‘hey look we gave you Golden Axe and Sonic 4’ but the simple fact is that if you are going to reboot a series it has, I repeat has to be done with care… If you’re going to just hand out your classics to unproven, bulls*** American developers that usually work on license titles (like the Shinobi reboot) then I’m not sure any Sega fan will be thanking you for that!

Well, not very flattering of (some) American devs, but he's right.  You only get ONE chance (maybe two, like OutRun 2 or Sega Rally) at a remake/port.  For instance, a developer can't come out with, say, a new Jet Set Radio game which sucks (or at least has moderate yet inexcusable flaws) and then say, "Oops, we screwed up, let's remake the game from scratch again."  You might be able to release patches or DLC to salvage it but devs just can't mull over the same idea for too long without losing everyone's interest (and thus profits).

I’m more than happy to see Shenmue continue like most old Sega IPs. In fact I would be extremely excited, it is my favourite series of all time! But if it was farmed out to some developer I’ve never heard of, heck if it came from ANY developer besides AM2 then Mike, frankly I don’t want it…

Does anyone trust anything besides AM2?  Anyway, I highly doubt they'll trust Shenmue 3 with anyone other than Yu Suzuki and AM2.  I don't think Sega will go that low and give it to some chump studio...

But that's all well and good, it's common sense, etc.  Legendary game series deserve top-notch care...

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And going through these stories makes me feel good.  I'm going to say this and it may shock a few of you: I'm a little more optimistic about Sega these days thanks to both the company and the fans.  Well, they're not perfect (Binary Domain, Dreamcast ports, etc.)  , but they're not screwing around as much these days.  We're fortunate cause we have home ports of Crazy Taxi, Sega Rally 3, and OutRun 2.  We've also got Daytona 1 & 2 plus Scud Race on emulators.  We got Sega & Sonic All-Stars Racing.  Sonic games are getting better.  Massive amounts of new Daytona 2 media.  You know what I'm talking about.  WE CAN DO IT, SEGA!!!

Quickie Links And Stuff For Everyone (Daytona/OR2, Nagoshi, Inafune, Goldeneye, Split/Second)

First off, I heard that OutRun Online Arcade was pulled from the Playstation UK Store because of the Ferrari license has expired which sounds stupid.  Why keep the 360 version but not the PS3 version (although I'd rather have one version instead of none).  So maybe it's not Sony's fault per se but it's still ridiculous.  I talked about this previously.

Now it's time for some informative links:

Daytona USA to OutRun2 Conversion Project - This one's actually quite old, but still worth looking at if you haven't.  Guy takes an old Daytona USA cabinet then tries to re-wire the Xbox into it for OR2.  He actually does this with two old cabinets so that he can get some link play going on, very neat.  It has plenty of pictures for you to look at.  The Model2 boards are fried so he actually can't play Daytona on it anymore...and this was before the Nebula Model2 emulator became popular so he was out of luck if he ever wanted to play Daytona on it.  But still if you want to check out what's going on inside of an arcade cabinet, be my guest.

More Split/Second DLC - This is the second DLC available for the game thus far.  Really, how's this game's popularity base faring to warrant all this?  Hey, I wonder what's going on with Blur, if it's still alive and kicking...

Also, I would like to bring up this point, talking about Split/Second, Blur, Burnout, you name it.  If I don't support these games, does that make me a bad person?  It's all about driving cars right, a passion for racing (even if it's laden with OCD aspects like big explosions, etc.) ?  The racing genre is in big trouble--I've touched on this for al ong time.  If these games that the devs bank on fail, then odds are you won't see much of anything to proceed it.  So basically, it's Split/Second or nothing.  The only way to get a new good Sega racer is to help these American racing games make headway for new stuff.  Is that how it works?  Buy more racing games to get even newer racing games?

No really, I already talked about Blur and Split/Second before, and they're just not doing it for me.  I'll end it there.

Crazy Taxi Port Will Be Wide-Screen - I think I may have mentioned this already.  True widescreen and no chopped graphics.  So it'll be of a finer quality than we expect.

Goldeneye Wii Will Have Preset Weapon Setups - Anyway, isn't this some "golden" news, haha.  I've talked about Goldeneye quite a bit before.  Regenerating health, aiming down sights, basically just a huge disconnect from the original, a Call of Duty mod more than anything.  Well, from watching this lengthy gameplay video, you don't run around and pick up weapons, you spawn with ones you like.  Really?  Is this catering to the noob element out there who's too lazy to run and pick up his own resources, like "waahh I got killed by the big gun, not fair this game is cheap"?  There's no guarantee this is 100% true because the devs are throwing in "modifiers" which allow you to do stuff like prevent camping and turn off radar, but really, I'm not anticipating much of anything to go my way at this point.

Other than that, it sounds like the guys were "having fun," which I guess means that people will be waiting in line to buy this!  Yeah, Goldeneye's back, baby!!

Sonic Redesigned To Appeal To Nintendo Fans - Coming from the mouth of Takashi Iizuka of Sonic Team (the same guy who said Sonic Colors will be the best Sonics ever), Sonic is now more appealing to Mario fans.  Sad that Sega has to bend over for Nintendo (see SSB: Brawl, etc.) and not the other way around.  Hey, this may be a good Sonic game, but it's sad Sega couldn't do it themselves without having to change the nature of their product...it's just sad that we've reached this point already...

Toshihiro Nagoshi Does Yakuza 2 Promo With Porn Star (2006) - I didn't know about this until now, but it's not really that surprising.  Here comes Nagoshi-San, looking all skinny and weird, smoking a cigarette, and here comes Nana Natsume, a popular Japanese porn star (dressed modestly here, don't get your "hopes" up).  I really don't know what's going on here, it just makes Nagoshi look stupider.  And when you see Nagoshi on TV, he looks really, really brown.  So let's see--chronic smoker, drinker, hangs out in tanning booths and with porn stars, I don't know what to say.

To illustrate the point, here's an old pic of Nagoshi back in his Daytona days:

And here's him now (as of 2006, about an 8 year difference):

What the--

Dead Rising 2 Psychopath DLC Gives You The Competitive Edge - Cause Lord knows that cheat codes are a thing of the past--just charge money for them and call it a day.  Besides, it's not like this game's THAT HARD anyway as long as you level up and use some common sense.

Keiji Inafune Hates His Job - The Megaman/Dead Rising producer already incited commentary by talking about how much Japanese games suck.  Well now he hates his job and wants to retire, maybe joking of course.  He could join Platinum Games just like his Capcom brethren and make some Bayonetta/Vanquish games.  Well, it's kind of unsettling for an aspiring game dev--not only do I have that slim chance of making the Daytona game, but I'll also hate every step of the way too...  And yes, I still have to open up a can on DR2 so you just wait Mr. Inafune.

And that's the end of this post.

Outrun And Sega Rally Under Attack? (More Yakuza, Sonic)

This is a good bit of investigative reporting by my buddy isamu on the ORA board.  I'm repeating this just for any readers not from that board...

OutRun Online Arcade is available on the Xbox 360 in any country.  On the PS3 however, it's only available in the UK store.  Well it turns out that he and many others have scoured the UK store to find the game removed altogether.  So basically OutRun 2 is not on the PS3 anymore.  What???

This isn't the first time that a downloadable game has been removed from an online store.  Paperboy, Root Beer Tapper, and other Midway classics have been sucked under (Midway went bankrupt).  Same thing with Yaris which was free BTW (it was a promo game).  You can redownload them again ONLY if you purchased it previously.  Presumably, the game is still on the server but it's not for sale for some reason which makes no sense because you're missing out on the opportunity to earn money...

I think we should all play OutRun Online Arcade on the Xbox 360 in memory.  Just cause we need to do SOMETHING and give Sumo Digital props for making the game more available to a larger crowd (although it wasn't a big seller).  People, you had no excuse to try out the demo cause it's right there in front of you...

To make things worse, Sega Rally Revo has been pulled from the PSN store too.  Yes, I know that Revo isn't considered a powerhouse Sega title, but it's still one of Sega's babies.  So that's two Sega racers gone.  I'm not 100% sure this is true, but I'll let you know if something comes up.

Why would something like this happen all of a sudden?  Does Sega want out?  Does Sony hate Sega?  Is this a stupid mistake?  The last thing we need is every trace of Sega goodness to go away...look out for the future...

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And then add this just because I saw it.  This is entirely in Japan.  New Pokemon game on DS and new Sega Yakuza (under some weird name) game on the PSP.  FIGHT!  Pokemon outsells Yakuza 5 to 1 despite the fact that PB/W has been out for a week already.  This is from Sept. 20 to 26.  All in all not surprising.  Why is Sega making all these PSP games, much less ones that'll never come out in America anyway?  Who knows, who cares.  Congrats on coming in second I guess, Sega has a reason to hold their heads high now.

01. Pokemon Black / White (DS) - 829,000 / 3,386,000

02. Kurohyou: Ryu ga Gotoku Shinshou (PSP) - 174,000 / NEW

http://kotaku.com/5652709/pokemon-black--white-show-the-yakuza-whos-the-boss-in-japan

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And one more thing cause I'm teeming with information.  We're talking about the new Sonic games.  Sonic 4: Episode 1 is coming out in mid-October so that's pretty good.  I'm pretty sure it'll be 1200 MSP but I can't prove it.  Made by Dimps, it's a downloadable title.  Yes, Sonic's gonna be GOOD AGAIN!!  And what's best is that it's just the first episode which means more Sonic titles to come!



Looks like Sonic's moving slower in this one, apparently to improve the controls.  The way he runs looks funny, like his foot movement is potato-shaped or something.  Oh yeah, and I know Sonic 1 had Starlight, Sonic 2 had Casino Night, and Sonic 3 had Carnival Night, but this looks like another Casino level...there's enough of those already, but whatever, that's ok, I like that...  Also, didn't I see a boss battle on Green Hill zone with Eggman and the ball thing?  I think it's good to "revisit" old Sonic classics, but come on, make something semi-original.  Who knows, it may be good.

http://forums.sega.com/showpost.php?p=6228418&postcount=215 - Sonic 4: Episode 2 is currently not in development yet.

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Sonic Colours (yes, I like the British spelling) is coming out mid-November and Takashi Iizuka of Sonic Team says...:

This is a similar title to Sonic Adventure 2 Battle, but the similarity comes from the concept – keeping the tempo very fluid.  A similar concept applies here. Is it the best since then? We always strive to make the best Sonic game yet. It’s at least on a par with Sonic Adventure Battle 2 [sic], and I’m confident it is one of the best Sonic games ever.

http://www.tssznews.com/2010/09/22/iizuka-says-sonic-colors-one-of-the-best-sonic-games-ever/

I've been looking up some info on this Iizuka guy and he's been working on most every Sonic Team game since Sonic 3...  So looking at the footage of Sonic Colours, this looks just like Sonic: Unleashed except without the nighttime Werehog stages.  If it turns out like Sonic Adventure 2 (which I thought was great but remember, not EVERYONE liked it), then it will be alright.  I'm not too stoked though.  Also, it's just gonna be on the Wii and DS which sucks too--no Xbox 360 or PS3 love.