Should Sega buy SNKP's holdings ?

[fernandeath]

There's a chinese company negociating to acquire SNKP's holdings
( Source: http://dreamcancel.com/2015/04/04/rumor-snk-playmore-acquired-by-chinese-company/ )
So, my question is: if SNKP is for sale, shouldn't Sega interfere this and try to incorporate SNKP to their property ?

[George]

I wish I could say: "Yes, do it", but in the other side of things is that SEGA is sitting on a ton of great IPs and hasn't figured out how to capitalize on them yet. Its 2015 and M2's awesome ports are barely getting day one announcements with the Japanese counterparts.

I think SEGA has a long way to go into trusting themselves and I dunno if they will manage SNK correctly. How much are these IPs even worth to SEGA?

[Draikin]

I think SEGA has a long way to go into trusting themselves and I dunno if they will manage SNK correctly. How much are these IPs even worth to SEGA?

I'd say it depends on whether or not SNK could operate somewhat independently from Sega like Atlus can. The acquisition of Atlus seems to have been a good move by Sega, since both Atlus Japan and Atlus USA have really reinforced Sega-Sammy's game output. I think Sega recognized that Atlus had a good team, both in the US and Japan, and that's probably why they're letting Atlus do their own thing. The same goes for Creative Assembly. If Sega has done one thing right over the past years, it's acquiring stable development studios and letting them retain their own identity within the company.

SNK isn't Atlus though. They certainly have classic IPs, but none of them have the potential that the Persona franchise has.

[George]

I don't know much about SNK's profits, but from what I read Atlus has always been pretty profitable as its being managed rather well, but for what I see SNK Playmore hasn't really had much revenue (it being down in 2013 for what I see at a quick glance).

It would suggest that the brand needs to be fixed and that would mean more investment from SEGA into IPs that I think aren't as popular as SEGA's own.

[fernandeath]

I don't know much about SNK's profits, but from what I read Atlus has always been pretty profitable as its being managed rather well, but for what I see SNK Playmore hasn't really had much revenue (it being down in 2013 for what I see at a quick glance).

It would suggest that the brand needs to be fixed and that would mean more investment from SEGA into IPs that I think aren't as popular as SEGA's own.

SNKP had some financial gain in 2014 ( http://dreamcancel.com/2014/11/09/snk-playmore-turns-a-profit/ )

- Metal Sluf Defense (a 'free' mobile game) did some decent business
- Metal Slug 3's port on Steam sold almost half milion copies ( http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2015/03/steam-gauge-measuring-the-most-popular-steam-games-of-2014/3/ )


Their latests releases were for mobile devices, an area Sega is also working on
Atlus published the latest KoF game for consoles 3 years ago and it did some decent business as well

[MadeManG74]

Sega is busy enough ignoring and ruining their own franchises without having to branch out and ruin/ignore other publisher's franchises as well.


Real Talk: The franchises aren't 'huge' but KoF carries a lot of weight in China and Japan, which are big markets. There's potential there, but I don't think Sega is in a position to make the most of it.

[fernandeath]

KoF is also big here in LATAM
although we are not a big market

[George]

The issue is that Metal Slug 3 on steam was on sale for 50 cents, one of the reasons it sold so many copies.