These SEGA Classic Arcade LEGO sets need your support to become reality

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Above is a proposed LEGO Idea by creator SpacySmoke and if you want these to become reality you have to support the idea (which means creating an account at LEGO website). The project has about a year left to get 10,000 SEGA fans to support it and right now its hovering a little over 600 people supporting this awesome idea.

The set that is being proposed comes with a Space Harrier, Out Run and Thunder Blade LEGO arcade replicas. But that isn’t all, it also comes with a male, female and Yu Suzuki themed LEGO persons.

Want to support it? Click here. Want to see more information including screenshots, hit the jump.

SEGA-AM2 is developing a arcade game based on Kantai Collection

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If you never heard of Kantai Collection (or KanColle as the fans say), its a free-to-play browser game created by Kadokawa Games and is actually a card collecting game. The browser game has over 2.5 million regisitered users and the franchise has been spreading to other media like manga (more than one series), anime series and even a licensed tabletop role-playing game.

The franchise is rising to popularity fast, with the browser game only launching in 2013. SEGA of course wants in on the action, seeing how highly successful other ventures like Hatsune Miku (Which AM2 developed the arcade version of this game) have been for the company.

Personally would rather have SEGA-AM2 announce a new internal IP, instead of doing a license game (especially a card game). But you never know what the future has in store…

Classic SEGA Ads: Tiger Electronics puts the “L” in Virtua Fighter

If you thought Virtua Fighter in arcades and on the SEGA Saturn was as real as it could get, Tiger Electronics asks you to think again! Released in 1995, Tiger’s R-Zone (not to be confused with Pizza Hut’s P’Zone) was a portable headset and attached controller that promised a virtual reality experience, but ended up just delivering a headache. Unlike other Tiger Electronic LCD games, R-Zone took cartridges.

Each cartridge contained a transparent LCD display, projecting the game onto a mirrored surface placed just inches from the players eye. As was the norm for VR at the time, red was the color of choice. Leeching off of popular franchises to survive, the R-Zone featured Men in Black, Jurassic Park, Batman, Star Wars, and SEGA’s own Virtua Fighter. Don’t let the ad above deceive you, despite being right in your face, R-Zone’s Virtua Fighter was as far from virtual Virtua Fighter as one could get. Wait… did that kid say “brain chop”?!?

Rent A Hero English translation finally released

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SEGA AM2’s Action RPG, Rent A Hero, has been fully translated to English and released by the hard working of hackers from Rom Hacking Dot Net. Pretty much finishing what Edison Translation Group left off with only one section of the game translated.

Now gamers can finally get their hands on Rent A Hero from start to finish in English language for the first time ever.

Rent A Hero focuses on a teenager named Taro who has recently moved to Aero City along with his family and receives a armored suit. When he wears the suit, he becomes Rent A Hero, a hero for hire keeping the world at peace and payed for his heroic deeds.

For screenshots of Rent A Hero in English. Click the jump below!

Tuesday Tunes: Cutting corners while listening to Hang-On’s soundtrack

SEGA-AM2 could really thank most of its success to how popular the game Hang-On was in 1985. This game really opened up for all those other popular SEGA-AM2 peusdo 3D scaler games that we all love today like Space Harrier, Out-Run, Afterburner, and many more.

The track above is called ‘Theme of Love’ and love is probably what kids in the mid-eighties felt when they played this game for the first time. Every time I hear any music from a early SEGA-AM2 games it just fills me with nostalgia and Hang-On‘s Theme of Love does it the best. It just does everything right and is an excellent piece of music.

After Burner II: From SEGA arcade classic to SEGA 3D Classics

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After Burner is just one of those franchises by SEGA that took American arcade goers by storm due to the sheer speed of the game, the eye catching cabinet, and its highly detailed (for the time) graphics. I truly believe that After Burner is just one of those arcade games that don’t get enough credit by gamers today, so jump into your F-14 Tomcat and blast through our After Burner retrospective. You never know, you might learn something!

Tuesday Tunes: A look at SEGA AM2’s underrated Sword of Vermilion OST

Before SEGA AM2 brought Shenmue to Dreamcast owners everywhere, they created a Japanese RPG in the late 80’s for the SEGA Genesis/Mega Drive. That title would help SEGA-AM2 dip their feet into the console market, that first game was Sword of Vermilion. The game was a early Genesis/Mega Drive title and was one of the spotlight games in SEGA’s timeless “Nintendon’t: advertisement campaign.

While Sword of Vermilion was ambitious for its time, it wasn’t really known as a great game and possibly one of the lesser known games by the publisher. But regardless of that status, the soundtrack for this game is actually great. Composed by Hiroshi Kawaguchi (After Burner, Out Run, and more) and Yasuhiro Takagi (Virtua Racing, F355 Challenge and more), both composers who where literally at the top of their game during this time period.

The Weekly Five: How SEGA-AM2 changed video gaming

Welcome to our new video series The Weekly Five, a top five list covering a wide range of SEGA topics. We are celebrating The Year of Developers over at SEGAbits.com, that means that each month throughout the year we will be covering notable notable SEGA developers. This month is all about a developer that is close to my heart, SEGA-AM2. What better way to kick off the new series than to discuss five ways SEGA-AM2 changed video gaming.

Tuesday Tunes: Bust down the door and jam to Virtua Cop’s OST

SEGA AM2 has a huge library of developed games, but nothing is more shocking at how much they change genres and still delivered a game that would defy that same genre. For example, Virtua Cop which in my opinion is one of the best light gun shooters around.

Nothing has a bigger impact on you than the first stage’s music. Its the song that draws the player into the game and Virtua Cop succeeds with its Stage 1 Theme: “Arms Black Market”, giving you that feeling that you and a buddy really are taking down this black market gun rig.