Posts Tagged Sonic

Well now if this don't get the goat NOTHING will. First - before I print this interview I made a LOOOOOOOOONG rant about this, the PS2 launch and Sega at the Mobius Forum. I urge everyone to read it because I'm not sure (after reading Tristan's news reply) if I understand the full impact of this myself as its pretty danged big. So I _REALLY_ want people to read and reply and sorta get me straight if I'm wrong on some facts, as well as getting input from others on this.... The post is located here and opens in a new window.

Note: Please excuse the "cute" theme on the Mofo right now. ^_^ We're sort of in the middle of a sanity lapse.

Now for the story that I'm sure you ALL want to read - Sega goes Multi Platform verbatim from Reuters...

TOKYO (Reuters) - Struggling Japanese game console maker Sega Enterprises Ltd forecast on Friday a fourth straight net loss, and unveiled ambitious plans to shift into software provision to move back into the black.

The projection of a consolidated net loss of 22.1 billion yen ($204.2 million) for the business year to the end of next March was revised from an earlier estimate of a 1.5 billion yen net profit.

Sega attributed the loss largely to an 18.5 billion yen loss from its recent decision to cut the overseas sales price of its mainstay Dreamcast (news - web sites) game console to combat a competitive threat from rival Sony Corp, which launched its snazzy PlayStation 2 console in the U.S. on Thursday.

"We might have had good demand without the price cut but we wanted to achieve cumulative total sales of 10 million units by March," Hideki Sato, who will become chief operating officer (COO) on November 1, told a news conference.

Analysts expect even fiercer competition next year when Nintendo (news - web sites) Co Ltd and Microsoft Corp launch new consoles.

Sega tried to calm concerns by announcing a far-reaching new business strategy, including a future plan to provide its game software to rival makers' consoles.

We are already in talks with a few foreign firms", Sato said when asked about licensees. He declined to give details.

That transformation into a software provider from a hardware maker marked a drastic, and welcome, policy shift, analysts said.

Sega declined to specify for which rival game consoles it plans to make software, and emphasized it would not withdraw from the Dreamcast hardware business.

"We applaud the company's decision to shift its focus to providing content and away from the loss-making home game hardware business even though it isn't pulling completely out of hardware,' said Nomura Securities analyst Yuta Sakuai.

"The fourth straight annual net loss is a blow to Sega, but it now has a better chance of returning to profit next year".

Hefty Loss

Sega, the world's third-largest maker of home video game players, said it sees group sales of 320 billion yen for this business year against an initial estimate of 336 billion yen.

It slashed the price of Dreamcast to $149 from $199 in the United States on August 31, before the PlayStation 2 debut, followed by a reduction in Europe in September to 149 pounds from 199 pounds to solidify its footing before Sony's launch.

"The loss has been expected since the console price cuts, because the company had been making a 1,000 yen loss per machine even before the price reduction," Nomura's Sakurai said.

The news came just before the Tokyo stock market closed and Sega shares ended down 31 yen or 3.68 percent at 811 yen.

In the business year ended last March 31, Sega posted a net loss of 42.88 billion yen. Its president resigned to take responsibility.

For April-September, Sega sold 1.06 million Dreamcast consoles, boosting cumulative sales to 5.87 million.

It aims to sell 2.1 million Dreamcast consoles in North America in the six months to next March, 770,000 units in Europe and 730,000 in Japan to try to achieve its post-launch target of 10 million by next March.

CSK Corp, which holds a 17.2 percent stake in Sega, also revised down its estimate, forecasting a group net loss of 11 billion yen, against its previous forecast of a net profit of 300 million yen.

Drastic Move

Sega's new business strategy includes a plan to seek to license the Dreamcast design technology to manufacturers of personal computers, audio-visual equipment and cellular phones to increase compatible PCs and other devices.

"The company is heading in the right direction by trying to boost loyalty income through its attractive software library," Deutsche Securities analyst Takashi Oya said.

But I am not convinced the company can make a decent profit from licensing the Dreamcast technology.''

Nomura's Sakurai said Sega's partial move away from making game boxes would help rival game makers Sony and Nintendo Co Ltd as well as U.S. Software giant Microsoft Corp, which plans to enter the market next year with its Xbox machine.

"Sega's decision will be positive for rivals, meaning less competition in the hardware business and offering a possible new strong partner to provide games."

If this means what I think it means - then Sega may not be making any new hardware, but then again - I'm not sure if I read the article right. O_O I urge and ask everyone to GO HERE, read my rant, and then please post on it. I'd like to get the facts straight on just what this means and whether its as good or bad (a double edged sword) as I think it is. Claricication and input please.

Not exactly Sonic news per se, but a heartfelt congratulations to a VERY deserving Sonic fan. :)

Posted yesterday on the Sonic Powerzone Mailing List, well known and respected Sonic fanfiction author and reviewer Dan Drazen made this announcement:

I've mentioned in the past that I've been doing some non-Sonic-related writing, specifically a novel about the boyhood of the prophet Samuel. Well, last April, a couple of book editors from the Review and Herald Publishing Association (the flagship publisher for the Seventh-day Adventist church) were here on campus interviewing people with manuscripts or works-in-progress. I made an appointment to meet with them about my book, which I was still in the process of whipping into shape. They were interested and wanted me to commit to sending them a rough draft by the end of August with a final draft before the end of the year. I readily agreed.

Long story short: the Book Committee met yesterday and Approved it!

Too bad Archie isn't looking for new writers, as the fact that I'm going to be published (though not as a comic book writer) may finally give me the "standing" to even have my work considered by them for the comic. Though you never know, what with Mike Gallagher's having jumped ship. But OTOH it means that I can start applying myself to Sonic fanfic again. I'll keep the lists informed.

BTW, the book itself probably won't be PHYSICALLY published until the Fall of 2001.

Dan Drazen

A hearty congratulations to Mr. Drazen on his endeavor! ^__^ And for those of you asking - YES I do have the Dan Drazen interview, its sitting on my hard drive right now and I swear I've reread it twice, but I've either been too lazy or too swamped with social and school-related things to pull it up. You can slap me with a trout and call me mean names later. ^^ I'll try my DARNDEST to sit still and get it up this weekend. PROMISE. :)

The link to it's already on the Sonic Adventure homepage, unfortunately it doesn't work yet. Check out under "Community", "Chao Gardens", then the third option, "Chao Fun Room". There's a new banner over "Evaluate Your Chao", for the Black Market, "Trade Emblems for Special Chao". ^_^ Unfortunately, it doesn't work quite correctly yet. Unlike what it currently says, you DO need to use Game Save Data, not Chao Data (Go to the Game Select screen after you select your VMU, hold "Y" and press "A", it should take five seconds (if it happens really quickly, you need to clear space on that VMU, but the upload file isn't too large, 11 blocks max), and then make a Ring Sound.) Then go to the place mentioned above, select that VMU, and it'll let you in... sort of. See, it's still in debugging, and doesn't quite work right (it kicks you to the same selection screen the Emblem Attack does, and with almost any selection it complains the page didn't set the "World Ranking" cookie to your DC webbrowser, a shame.) But obviously, this is a pretty big clue it's coming soon. Too bad with the Sonic Adventure hacking projects, the hardcore audience has seen most of the "Special" Chao, but this'll allow them to be more mainstream and easier to access, I suppose. ^_^

Attn Kulock: The post has been edited and corrected :) Thank you. - WB

Source: The Moogle Cavern

I know it's probably not my place to post here, but since we're all Sonic fans, and don't exactly take kindly to the PS2 too much, I've decided to plea for help here. If any of the editors deem this fit to delete, they are welcome too.

I am developing an Anti-PS2 site. This site, while having a biased name, will not say biased words. It will only speak the truth of what plauges the PS2. The site is being created to inform the people of how Sony is trying to con their way in using the PS2.

But, such a site is without proper hosting. Or proper staff. I hope to have the site up and running by Thursday, to counter-act the PS2 launch party. If I cannot find a host, I will seek hosting at good ol' GO Network.

I ask of you all, does anyone reading this have a fast, reliable server, with either PHP or CGI (both?) support, willing to add an Anti-PS2 site? Wether it's Emulation Zone, SegaSonic.net, SegaZone, Gamefan, whatever, does anyone have any space to offer?

Also, as I mentioned, I need a staff. While I don't want to start taking applications yet, I'm going to anyways. And, while I do know a small bit of CGI and PHP, it'd be real nice to have someone who knew that. If you think you're qualified to either write articles, moderate a forum, or code me some CGI/PHP programs (news updater script most likely, but that would be about it I guess, except for something that automatically posted articles, too), give me an email at Blazehgehg@aol.com. All article writers must have excellent grammar and spelling, and must be good at writing long, factual based articles.

Thank you for your time.

With respect to Mr. Maldon, I thnik I can explain this. I had tried to report this before, but the information I was given was well, wrong. I got a lot of beef for it and was finally told the truth. To put it short, Sega is working on merging with other companies, Microsoft included. This is a good move for them, for it can make them a more formidable competitor against some overhyped, extremely pricy game systems (havefunwatchingDVDscausethegamesSUCK). In addition, some of the groups that Sega used to own, Sonic Team being the most prominent, have become independant studios, producing software for other platforms and no longer limited to Sega alone. Sonic could not only appear on the Xbox, but possibly the Gamecube as well. In short, this is not bad news, rather, it is GOOD news. Sega is no longer a minor company taking up table scraps (Let's not forget the Sega CD and 32X), but a tough cookie. And while Sony rubs it's miserly withered old hand thinking of ways to destroy that which is Sega, We have new allies in microsoft (Owned by a man who unfortunately I think is equally evil) and possibly Nintendo. I HOPE I got my facts right this time.

Could Sega's 10-year mascot make an apperance on the new X-Box or perhaps in the next version of Windows?

Hi. I know Ive already shamelessly plugged the Amy Rose Fan Club but then it was taken down. Now it is back up. If you are an Amy fan, pop over to the Amy Rose Fan Club and join! Theres even a mailing list there.
Amy Rose Fan Club

The mysterious Sega movie has been confirmed, and it ain't Sonic. Rather, it will be on Sega's "House of the Dead" series. Here's some facts from Dark Horizons.

House of the Dead: Mindfire Entertainment, the company behind "Free Enterprise" and "The Specials" has just inked a deal with Sega to do a feature based on its "The House of the Dead" arcade and video game. You may recall a while ago that Jesse Dylan was attached to possibly direct the project but then it had sinced fizzled with no word for almost a year on what had happened to it. Now with the very similar "Resident Evil" project finally moving out of development hell, so has this zombie computer game-turned-movie project. The film's producer Daniel Kletzky says "Unlike previous attempts to adapt video games, we intend for 'The House of the Dead' to be a very hip, cutting edge film with state-of-the-art special effects and a great, contemporary soundtrack that will satisfy fans of the game as well as all moviegoers who love supernatural thrillers". There's also a big Internet presence planned with footage from the set, streaming prequel sequence videos, and "other interactive features". Shooting is expected to begin in February with an aim to release it around Fall 2001. Thanks to 'Agent M'

Source: Dark Horizons

Japan gets all the cool stuff. ^__^

Sega of Japan’s 4X Memory Unit will be packed in with a "special edition" of Phantasy Star Online. Today we bring you news of Sonic Team including even more with the global online title. At Sega of Japan's retail conference in Tokyo today, Sonic Team's Yuji Naka revealed that Phantasy Star Online will come packed with a demo version of Sonic Adventure 2! O_O This extra will be in both the special edition and regular version of PSO, and will feature opening moments from the game as well as some movie files. Currently, Sega of America is unsure if the demo will be released stateside.

According to all the latest charts, Phantasy Star Online will be hitting the Japanese market on Dec. 21.

Samba De Amigo is now in stores! And both DC.IGN.COM and the newly brought back Gamefan.com have reviewed the game, and both have given the game a high 9.5/10 rating! check them out.

Gamefan Review

DreamcastIGN Review