Ah, it’s Friday. Let’s check the news. Wonder if we’ll see a Sonic 4 trailer today… wait. What the fuck is this?! Pardon my language, but some breaking news!
SEGA Sammy announced today that it will carry out “structural reform” of consumer business. SEGA Sammy also said it will “streamline” video game operations in the west to “create a smaller company positioned for sustained profitability”. Part of this streamlining will include cutting the number of SEGA games produced and canceling some titles already in development.
The statement read as follows:
The Sega consumer business is expected to post operating loss due to the challenging economic climate and significant changes in the home video game software market environment in the US and Europe.
It is essential to streamline [our] organisation in the field of home video game software, while shifting to a structure that corresponds to a change in environment, including strengthening development in the field of digital content.
We decided to narrow down sales titles to strong IPs such as Sonic the Hedgehog, Football Manager, Total War and Aliens which are expected to continue posting solid earnings. In accordance with this, we are cancelling the development of some game software titles.
SEGA will still post profits of £152m for the 12 months ending March 2012. However, it will see a one-off “extraordinary loss” of £54m. This money will be spent on cutting back and restructuring. No word on what games are being cancelled or just who will be laid-off. Is this the end of crazy unique SEGA games? Or are the more risky games being relegated to digital services, and only the big IPs will get disc releases? Freak out in the comments section.
Update: According to IGN, with information said to come from sources within SEGA, all non-franchise titles will be dropped:
Earlier today, four franchises were overtly announced as being safe: Sonic, Football Manager, Total War, and Aliens. Our sources have revealed that any currently announced game that isn’t included on that list will not be published by SEGA, leaving a decent amount of the publisher’s upcoming publishing roster in jeopardy.
What does this mean for upcoming games like Rhythm Thief? At this point, it’s anybody’s guess. The source goes onto report that North America’s QA team has been axed entirely, with staff cuts also being made in the following departments: marketing, social, design, and development.
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They are already small in USA and Europe. WTF!? They are smaller than ever in Japan too. On the other hand, Bandai Namco (Sega’s evil twin) is releasing new games like a crazy and selling very well.
I suppose that Binary Domain is one of the reasons that Sega decided to do that. This game flopped, right?
But I’m OK and satisfied with them! Max Anarchy and Virtua Fighter 5 are coming to consoles, so I’m completely happy! Also, Sonic 4 EP 2 looks good.
That project with Sega, Bandai Namco and Capcom also interests me.
For the rest, I’m buying other companies games since Sega is not releasing too much games anymore… they can supply my needs.
Hopefully they don’t cancel Anarchy Reigns or any other announced title. I hate when games get canned, but I’d prefer they can games that we don’t know about rather than games we’ve been anticipating.
Oh well, we can kiss Yakuza 5 goodbye 🙁
It *might* mean localized Japanese titles will be tougher to bring over, but SEGA will still be developing big IPs like Yakuza. I think all this has been in the works for a while. SEGA of America has been exclusively digital for a while, and I think this worked so they want to extend it to SEGA of Europe. Only big IPs like Total War and Football Manager will continue. We’ll probably see less new western developed IPs, but then again when have we last had a good one of those?
Ya I do prefer the Japanese SEGA titles myself. I’m not TOO fussed about new IPs right now, we’ve already had 2 this year (Binary Domain and Rhythm Thief), I just hope Sega of Japan doesn’t keep their games only to themselves >_<
They are keeping the games here because selling outside Japan is making them losing money due to the dollar/yen instability.
And I dislike Nagoshi gaining more power inside Sega. People should not know, but the truth is that he is always focused on the japanese market. He also hates old Sega IPs. Sega America and Europe were our last hope for reviving old and classic Sega IPs.
I really dont know anymore what to expect from Sega. I hate sports games, and Total War series is not even famous here.
I hope at least to see Bayonetta 2, but looks like the project was canned… -_-
Too much Miku’s games and cheap games (like Samurai & Dragons, etc…).
Let Yu Suzuki make another high budget game again!! ;p
Well that’s pretty sad news.
A key reason for the loss I think is that they are simply not making any really big selling games in their biggest market, Japan. I think the comparisons to other Japanese publishers performance like Namco, Capcom are good, it demonstrates the weakness in SEGA’s strategy in my opinion. They need to have the Japanese market on lockdown and the worldwide sales will come.
Well, I dislike the way Nagoshi does some things, but this is his primaly target: the japanese market. He always says that.
Sadly, Sega is not selling well anywhere… the owner of Sega, Satomi Hajime, also considered to close down Sega’s domestic games department last year (via rumors).
As much I love the quality and fun games Nagoshi-san produces, I think ultimately his games are too ‘niche’ even for the Japanese market. I mean Binary Domain, a Japanese third person shooter isn’t going to go down well anywhere, it epitomizes just some of the bad decisions being made over at SEGA HQ right now. I think SEGA just really need to re-asses their position in the Japanese market because it is deteriorating fast and Namco, Nintendo are only happy to take up the market share. I truly believe once they can make the Monster Hunters, One piece sellers in Japan the worldwide sales will naturally follow.
This day has come.. True Gaming is fading…
So if their plan is to focus on the big-time IPs…WHY DON’T THEY FOCUS ON THE BIG-TIME IPs.
What I mean is, get their good games on every system. There should be a true Aliens: Colonial Marines port on 3DS and Vita and Sonic Generations on Vita.
And there should be a Genesis collection on 3DS. Do you know in the 8 years since the DS came out, the only Genesis games to come out for the system are the Sonic games? Does Sega hate money??
And they really blew it w/ Shinobi on 3DS. If you’re going retro, don’t have computerized graphics. Hand drawn sprites! People don’t like modern games as much as retro ones. That’s the whole point of bringing them back!
Years of bad marketing finally catching up with them? I don’t know what to say. They release titles and don’t market them in the West, what do they expect to happen?
Sega games at least chart in Japan.
Exactly, and the reason for that is Marketing.
I hear countless stories in Binary Domain multiplayer from the players on how THEY NEVER HEARD OF THE GAME and just bought it based on the demo.
Effective marketing is what propelled the genesis era and the laws haven’t changed. Sega is still the cutting edge/arthouse it has always been as far as game design goes, but they have pretty much given up on marketing in the west. TV commercials do wonders for game awareness.
Awareness + well develop game = $$
I can only imagine what a TV spot for Vanquish would have done.
behold what they did for japan:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AzkA7RNNNwI
Interesting how it is SEGA’s Western arm that is being restructured whilst SEGA Japan seems to be getting off without a scratch, despite obviously making the bigger financial failures in terms of video games.
Seems SEGA are going back to their “Japanese Audience comes first” strategy, rather then put marketing behind their games.
Fair enough, they need to trim the fat in America and Europe, but why not trim Japan’s offices too? I think SEGA need to look at the whole picture before settling on cutting in places that are finally showing improvements.
£55 million is a lot of money but from my understanding, it’s debt is one off like Sony’s was, right?
I think they could of set some targets so that they do not lose money for next year, such as not releasing games at the same time as the biggest franchises, their brand alone won’t sway people into buying their games instead. The SEGA AGES online set up is a great start into getting that profit margin up, and if they put marketing behind their games as well, then they may make even more from the marketing it deserves.
Sorry for the rant, just slightly annoyed on how SEGA are operating this small loss they are taking (even if it’s Sammy that’s calling the shots).
So… after seeing the update, no Anarchy Reigns?
I don’t know what it means. Sadly, it may very well be legit….IGN indeed does (or did, at one point or another) have contacts within Sega of America (including some of their former journalists who moved over there, like Craig Harris.)
Yeah, Id really hate to see Anarchy Reigns and Rythem Theif canned or shifted to other publishers. Id think they put so much into them as it is, that it would be stupid to drop them now. Goddamn, its 2001 all over again!
Nintendo would likely (hopefully) pick up Rhythm Thief, they’re already publishing it in Europe. As far as Anarchy Reigns, I have no idea who would pick that up.
I really hope this isn’t revealed to be true. All that we love about Sega would pretty much be destroyed.
Actually Nintendo’s distributing it in Europe, not publishing. Although, I wonder if this had anything to do with the delay for it in North America?
Im scared , for a company who got me into gaming the first place , i didnt think it be as bad as it is but canned games and huge lay offs :/, whats happening to sega 🙁 , how could it gotten this bad , people on ign and cvg are disgusting people wish sega would go under and crumble , all these kids dont know what sega brought to the gaming world .. I hope nothing drastic else happens next couple of days ..
I hate saying this. I really do, but if Sega isn’t prepared to put in the marketing work, they should just pull out of development in the west altogether.
A strong focus on the japanese market could re-solidify their position there. Instead of wasting resources on “westernized” japanese games (Binary Domain), they should blitz the japanese market and leave localization efforts to other publishers like atlus (which they’ve arranged a new deal with).
I play sega because of their aesthetics and gameplay philosophy and am prepared to play japanese only to sustain it.
I think it’s time we all face it. The sega we love will never be appreciated in the west.
Rumours are spreading that SEGA of American may be forced to shut down, if losses persist. Even if it may just be a rumour, such a situation doesn’t seem all that distant from reality. I
Rumours are spreading that SEGA of American may be forced to shut down, if losses persist. Even if it may just be a rumour, such a situation doesn’t seem all that distant from reality.
Face facts people, SEGA are DEAD, they are not the same great company they once were, they are not the Great Empire it once was any more, I was the biggest SEGA fan around and still am in a way, but they’ve never really been successful at anything, and even the the small amount of times they have, it has never lasted, they have had skilled talent once but just about every time it has never took off and some other company has copied SEGA and made it a massive success, exmple – Namco’s Tekken started as a straight rip off of SEGA’s Virtua Fighter and ended up becoming much more successful, maybe not as good as Virtua Fighter, but it was far far more successful and Namco is often given the credit for what was really SEGA’s work i.e pioneering the first ever proper polygonal 3D fighter.
That is just one of many many examples where SEGA’s own work is copied and all credit goes elsewhere and SEGA gets a lot less credit for it than it should.
I hate to say it really was the start of the end of SEGA when they went 3rd Party and left the Dreamcast, to which they’ve still never recovered from, can you believe there are still deluded idiots out there that keep thinking SEGA will ever get back into producing their own home consoles again? How? 10 years after their last home console and where has it got them? They are now facing a crises almost as bad as 2001/2, this is the biggest they’ve fallen since then, and the best they done since was in 2005/6 where they had strong earnings for the first time in ages and things were finally starting to look up for SEGA, but since then it’s fallen bit by bit and they are still the same bad decision makers they always seem to have been, this looks like the end of Shenmue I&II HD ever coming out, never even mind Shenmue III, it’s completely out of the question now, what an absolute failure, as a current third party, the least they should be is as good as Capcom or Namco, but they can’t even seem to be that, SEGA was only really ever good when it had it’s home console hardware division, it’s rarely been as good ever since, I mean the most successful game they’ve ever produced was Sonic the Hedgehog 2 on the Sega Mega Drive (Genesis in US territories) in 1992 with over 6 million copies sold as of June 2006, have they ever even once been remotely close to that since? lol
The past will never be the same as the future… But that does not mean you cannot enjoy the present and presently I still enjoy SEGA games a great deal more than any other game developer.
Plus as an old school arcade boy, I still play a large amount of their excellent titles.
Just a reminder that this isn’t exactly unprecedented, Sega of America experienced layoffs just a couple years ago for similar reasons. It’s unfortunate that Sega continues to make cuts to them, especially in the areas of marketing, which is that LAST area that needs to be cut. If anything it should be bolstered. If games are not selling in this territory, cutting the publisher even smaller just doesn’t seem like the solution; the solution should be making it so that games sell.
With the exception of their acquisitions in Europe, Sega has not developed strong new IP since Sonic and bad marketing is a huge reason why…and Sonic, a platformer, is part of a fast-dying genre. It’s depressing.
Platformers are dying? Rayman, Mario, Donkey Kong, Spyro, LittleBigPlanet and Crash, let alone Sonic, says otherwise. There are probably a significant amount I have forgotten but platformers are not a fast dying genre, you would have a point 5 or 6 years ago, but they have quickly regained their popularity.
Sales-wise yeah, platformers are dying. Rayman is the perfect example of a recent casualty of a dying genre; people were not willing to pay $60 for it.
Mario will always be big, as will DK, but platformer new IP are almost non-existant and Sonic Generations already being $40 isn’t saying much about its success…
There are reasons why Rayman Origins did not sell as well as it could, this was due to other factors, such as the fact it started life as an XBLA/PSN title, then being changed into a retail title. As for people unwilling to fork $60 over it, there was a lot of casualities over the Christmas period, Zelda and Uncharted were two other games, it does not mean they are dying franchise but there has been extreme competition in the market. It had absolutely nothing to do with the fact it is a platformer. As for total sales, Ubisoft are happy with the profitibility so far and are hoping for long term sales.
I could also go further of course, Epic Mickey, Kirby, Wario etc and then there are titles such as de Blob that were a hit but the sequel unfortunately did not become a big seller. And you cannot brush under Mario and Donkey Kong as I could effectively say the same about first person shooters, outside of Battlefield and Call of Duty what else is there? Obviously a dying genre as Bulletstorm, Resistence and Rage were all failures.
As for a lack of new IPs, this is a problem with the industry in general, not just platformers.
Finally, of course Sonic Generations is low in price, Mass Effect 3 has also hit $47 and that happens to be the biggest game release so far this year. Price reduction occurs quite quickly unlike ever before in this industry. And Sonic Generations has sold in the excess of 1.6 million as of December 31st 2011, hardly something to scoff at. Implying it is not successful due to the price of the title is foolhardy.
“Zelda and Uncharted were two other games, it does not mean they are dying franchise but there has been extreme competition in the market.”
Hm? Skyward Sword was the fastest-selling Zelda game in the franchise’s history, I certainly wouldn’t call that a casualty; game’s done very well for itself.
Anyway, Mickey, Kirby, Mario, etc. are all franchises selling on brand-name alone. They also are selling to a rather young demographic. Platformers (and I love them, so don’t take this as a platformer-bashing post) sell by the nature of their cute characters and bright colors to kids but generally speaking, unlike the 16 and 32-bit era, platformers generally aren’t played as much among the older demographic.
“It had absolutely nothing to do with the fact it is a platformer.”
I disagree with that, I think a lot of people think of platformers as childish. I’m not one of those people but I’m definitely the only person I know who still looks forward to and plays Sonic games…
“Finally, of course Sonic Generations is low in price, Mass Effect 3 has also hit $47 and that happens to be the biggest game release so far this year. ”
Mass Effect 3 is still officially priced at $60. I’m not talking about retailers doing promotions, I’m talking about official changes in the MSRP. Sonic Generations is officially a $40 game at this point. The reason? It’s a platformer on the PS3/360, systems with older demographics who generally don’t play platformers. That’s also why Sonic Unleashed sold the best on the Wii and why I was skeptical about Sega’s decision to not develop a Wii version of Generations.
“Hm? Skyward Sword was the fastest-selling Zelda game in the franchise’s history, I certainly wouldn’t call that a casualty; game’s done very well for itself”
Skyward Sword was only the fastest selling Zelda in America. In Europe and Japan it’s sales left much to be desired. So indeed, it is a casualty.
“Anyway, Mickey, Kirby, Mario, etc. are all franchises selling on brand-name alone. They also are selling to a rather young demographic. Platformers (and I love them, so don’t take this as a platformer-bashing post) sell by the nature of their cute characters and bright colors to kids but generally speaking, unlike the 16 and 32-bit era, platformers generally aren’t played as much among the older demographic”
You can say the same thing about any genre now though in regards to an established series? And what is wrong with selling to a younger demograph? Platformers were not played as much by the older demograph back then either, the only exception was Sonic due to SEGA’s clever marketing then and Mario.
As for saying those platformers are selling on brand name alone, that is dead wrong. They are selling on quality of the games itself.
“I disagree with that, I think a lot of people think of platformers as childish. I’m not one of those people but I’m definitely the only person I know who still looks forward to and plays Sonic games…”
Sonic is a damaged brand, Mario and Donkey Kong are not. And a large amount of people are always looking forward to them because they can trust the quality control of those titles. But where is this evidence that platformers are seen as childesh games? There was a large amount of people who called Nintendo in general childesh, but sales paint a very different picture.
“Mass Effect 3 is still officially priced at $60. I’m not talking about retailers doing promotions, I’m talking about official changes in the MSRP. Sonic Generations is officially a $40 game at this point. The reason? It’s a platformer on the PS3/360, systems with older demographics who generally don’t play platformers. That’s also why Sonic Unleashed sold the best on the Wii and why I was skeptical about Sega’s decision to not develop a Wii version of Generations.”
The fact is though, you can get Mass Effect 3 from any retailer for less than that price. And in the same amount of time, you could get it for $40 itself. Call of Duty: MW3 and Zelda are at $40 itself in America, must mean they are failures too and that adventure games and first person shooters is what caused the decrease in price.
Sonic Generations has stayed in the charts longer in Europe than Sonic Colours did, the fact they are selling at a similar pace indicates to me they have been vindicated on the decision to develop the game for the HD twins.
As always though, the biggest series in gaming is Mario and that happens to be a platformer and still a large amount of sales are being given to platformers.
“Skyward Sword was only the fastest selling Zelda in America. In Europe and Japan it’s sales left much to be desired. So indeed, it is a casualty.”
Hm…..it did better in Japan than Twilight Princess, I believe? Japan hasn’t been crazy about console Zelda games in quite some time.
“As for saying those platformers are selling on brand name alone, that is dead wrong. They are selling on quality of the games itself.”
To put it in perspective, a mini-game fest like Mario and Sonic at the Olympics handily outsells all regular Sonic games, and many Mario ones as well, such as the Galaxy series. Even Mario’s still-successful platformers are outsold by his kart racing games.
“The fact is though, you can get Mass Effect 3 from any retailer for less than that price. And in the same amount of time, you could get it for $40 itself. Call of Duty: MW3 and Zelda are at $40 itself in America, must mean they are failures too and that adventure games and first person shooters is what caused the decrease in price.”
Dude…they’re not though, lol. In America Black Ops isn’t even at $40 yet…letalone MW3. I can go into 5 different retailers right now and these games will still be full price, I don’t know where your info comes from. Amazon? Amazon.com runs sales on games all the time; they are an absolutely *MASSIVE* retailer who can afford to do that, they do NOT represent the standard pricing of video games in America, and certainly not the success/failure of a game…MW3 continues to chart every month on the NPD, for example, 4 months after its release.
Skyward Sword continues to be $50 in America, and likely won’t drop in price for quite some time.
Anyway my point is, the days when platformers like Crash Bandicoot, Spyro the Dragon, Mario, Sonic, Gex, Klonoa, Banjo Kazooie, Rayman 2, Ape Escape, etc. etc. etc. all flooded the market within a relatively close time and all managed to be commercially successful are lonnnnnnnnnnnng gone, dude. Platformers today seem to appeal either to retro gamers (hence the move back to 2D) and to kids. There’s still an audience for them but it’s no longer the dominant force in the industry it once was.
Even before Sonic was a “damaged brand” no Sonic release managed to outsell, what was it, the 6 million+ that Sonic the Hedgehog 2 sold? None even came close to that, and platformers getting those numbers nowadays just does not happen, with the ONLY exception being Mario. (Edit: maybe Sonic Heroes came close, but that was with the help of 3 platforms and I still don’t think it topped Sonic 2.)
Dude, nSEGA, what the hell is up with your pricing logic? If I can hop on Amazon right now and buy Black Ops for $38 or less, Modern Warfare 3 for $40 or less then yes, Aki is 100% correct. These games are $40 or less. Why does Amazon not count for you? Okay, let’s hop on over to Gamestop. Another hot spot where people pick up games. Oh look, MW3 is $40 new, Black Ops is $35 used and $50 new. And despite that $50, I’m certain shooter fans could care less if they pick it up for $35.
So yeah, Gamestop and Amazon, two of the biggest hot spots for game buying, have both titles for $40 or less. Thus, the games are under $40.
“Hm…..it did better in Japan than Twilight Princess, I believe? Japan hasn’t been crazy about console Zelda games in quite some time”
It did half of what it did in Japan. But again, it sold less in the same period in Europe than Twilight Princess did and Ocarina of Time, it was a casuality of 2012.
“To put it in perspective, a mini-game fest like Mario and Sonic at the Olympics handily outsells all regular Sonic games, and many Mario ones as well, such as the Galaxy series. Even Mario’s still-successful platformers are outsold by his kart racing games”
Okay? I am not sure what you are getting at here. If it outsells the regular titles in the series then that must mean that the platformer are selling on the fact they are platformers, where do all these extra people come from to purchase those games?
I would also say those are packin titles, which unrealistically increases their sales numbers. Wii Play has a large amount of sold to users, does that mean Wii ____ brand is bigger than Call of Duty?
“Dude…they’re not though, lol. In America Black Ops isn’t even at $40 yet…letalone MW3. I can go into 5 different retailers right now and these games will still be full price, I don’t know where your info comes from. Amazon? Amazon.com runs sales on games all the time; they are an absolutely *MASSIVE* retailer who can afford to do that, they do NOT represent the standard pricing of video games in America, and certainly not the success/failure of a game…MW3 continues to chart every month on the NPD, for example, 4 months after its release. ”
Amazon is America’s biggest online retailer, so yes, they do represent a large chunk of what the standard pricing is in America. Gamestop also has it listed at $40 and look, so does Walmart for $40! So three of America’s biggest retailers have listed CoD: MW3 as $40, according to you this must mean the games are failures? Of course not.
If SEGA feels they want Sonic to continue to sell at a lowered price, something they have done even with Sonic Heroes which was one of the most successful games last generation and most successful platformer too, it should not be seen as an indication a game is a failure. If a game was a failure than they would stop developing that series altogether.
“Anyway my point is, the days when platformers like Crash Bandicoot, Spyro the Dragon, Mario, Sonic, Gex, Klonoa, Banjo Kazooie, Rayman 2, Ape Escape, etc. etc. etc. all flooded the market within a relatively close time and all managed to be commercially successful are lonnnnnnnnnnnng gone, dude. Platformers today seem to appeal either to retro gamers (hence the move back to 2D) and to kids. There’s still an audience for them but it’s no longer the dominant force in the industry it once was. ”
Of course they are not the big player in the industry, however to call them dying is hyperbole when I have just listed a number of highly successful platformers. 2 of those franchises you have mentioned have just had one of it’s best years I should remind you.
And platformers have never sold to an older demograph, so I do not see what you are getting out, children have always been the biggest market for series like Spyro, Sonic and Mario.
“Even before Sonic was a “damaged brand” no Sonic release managed to outsell, what was it, the 6 million+ that Sonic the Hedgehog 2 sold? None even came close to that, and platformers getting those numbers nowadays just does not happen, with the ONLY exception being Mario. (Edit: maybe Sonic Heroes came close, but that was with the help of 3 platforms and I still don’t think it topped Sonic 2.)”
This is why I have such a hard time debating with you, you seem to overlook important factors when arguing your points.
The Mega Drive had a 35 million userbase and Sonic the Hedgehog 2 was a packin, it managed to do 6 million easily due to that factor. Sonic Adventure and Adventure 2 did 2 million on a sub 10 million userbase (And Adventure was also another packin title that upped its numbers)
As for platformers not doing those numbers anymore, only three series ever managed 5+ plus, that was Crash, Sonic and Mario. Crash and Sonic’s quality control went to the wayside and Mario is better than prior to that point (Again, outside factors that contribute)
As I said, saying platformers are dying six years ago you would have a point, at the current moment you are incorrect.
SEGA has just announced they are making a digital service called ‘SEGA Dreamload’, which is like EA’s digital online console service with all EA range of exclusive titles.
I got the article from the ‘SEGA Addicts’ site, where they claim to have two official statements direct from SEGA’s official announcement.
^It’s April Fool’s Day.
Yes that’s what some people thought at first, but they’ve not denied it yet which they would have done already if it really was just an April Fools joke, and it does fit in with SEGA’s recent announcement.
Some one on the comments of Sega Addicts has even said that he thought it was an April Fools then he got up the next morning saying he knows it’s not now.
Well it has been announced but it was a reverse April Fools day, the Sega Addicts site’s April Fools day was that they came out after the announcement and claimed that the official announcement was the April Fools day.
“Dude, nSEGA, what the hell is up with your pricing logic? If I can hop on Amazon right now and buy Black Ops for $38 or less, Modern Warfare 3 for $40 or less then yes, Aki is 100% correct. These games are $40 or less. Why does Amazon not count for you? Okay, let’s hop on over to Gamestop. Another hot spot where people pick up games. Oh look, MW3 is $40 new, Black Ops is $35 used and $50 new. And despite that $50, I’m certain shooter fans could care less if they pick it up for $35. ”
So if I open up a retailer right now, and I decide to sell Xenoblade for $10, that means that Xenoblade flopped and its official price is now $10?
No, man. Every game has a price suggested by the manufacturer. Called a MSRP. Sega dictates the price, retailers can either abide by it (as most do) or they can offer limited promotions and sell it for lower. Sonic Generations’ MSRP was officially lowered to $30; you can not find the game for more expensive than $30, that is the MSRP and that is its official new price as dictated by the publisher. Unless Mass Effect 3 flops on the sales charts, EA will not be adjusting its MSRP anytime soon.
I didn’t say the sites “don’t count,” I said that simply going to an online retailer to check a game’s price is not indicative of its MSRP; online retailers put items on sale all the time. If Sonic Generations was continuing to fly off the shelves, Sega would not have adjusted the MSRP to a lower value. What an individual retailer chooses to charge for a popular game like MW3 has nothing to do with what we’re discussing, which is publishers lowering the price of their games after only a couple months to increase demand for them.
So Sonic Generation’s was a flop then? It doesn’t seem so long ago people were all hyped for it and when it comes out, it suddenly doesn’t get the sales needed, this isn’t going to give a good message for Sega because this Sonic game was actually developed quite well and continues the quality of Sonic Colours.
Speaking of which, does anybody even know what SEGA’a market share is these days? Nobody seems to post anything up about it.
I mean, what is SEGA’s global market share? how well are they doing financially in general despite this new restructure?
What is their market share in each territory?
Sonic Generations sold 1.6 million worldwide, which isn’t a flop, but it’s definitely not the type of number that can continue to keep Sega profitable all by itself.
As far as market share and financials, Aki usually posts that stuff.
So 1.6 million is quite bad then, especially for a Sonic game and a company that is supposed to be as big as SEGA is.
That’s nothing like what Sonic games used to sell.
1.6 million is a good figure, not the best but Sonic is a long time seller. Keep in mind that is during a month and a half of sales. Comparing Sonic Generations to Sonic Colours, Colours did 1.8 million between Nov – Dec 2010, then a further 500k between Jan – Mar 2011. With the exception of Sonic 1, 2 and Sonic Heroes, all other Sonic games sold less than 3 million units.
As I pointed out, there was a lot of games release during Christmas 2011 and Sonic was not the only title to see less than expected sales, both Zelda and Uncharted also suffered.
As for SEGA’s global market share, 6th in America, 7th in Japan and probably around 6th – 8th in Europe. Outside of Nintendo and Sony, SEGA is the most “successful” third party if we go in global positioning. The problem however is that the strength of the yen plus failures of certain titles has pushed their hands I suppose.
SEGA Sammy has $2 billion in the bank though and the arcade segment is the strongest of SEGA’s side of the business, around $70 – $100 million profit a year. Whilst Sammy’s two segments produce around $300 million. This is being done to put SEGA’s American business to be put in order.