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Developer Retrospective: A look back at the games of SEGA’s WOW Entertainment

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When SEGA WOW Month began, we took a look back at the games of SEGA’s Overworks. While Overworks existed for only a short span of time before merging with WOW Entertainment, this month has made it very clear that Skies of Arcadia made a major impact on SEGA fans. But what of WOW Entertainment? Unlike Overworks, WOW managed to release a large number of games spanning different genres on different pieces of hardware. From sequels to classic franchises like The House of the Dead and Columns, to new franchises like SEGA GT and arcade oddities like The Typing of the Dead, a collaboration with Namco, and a dog walking simulator. While WOW Entertainment can’t be pinned down to one iconic title, they more than made up for this with an amazing library of games!

Join us now for part two of our SEGA WOW retrospective, in which we take a look at the many games of WOW Entertainment.

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This is Saturn celebrates one year of SEGA Saturn reviews with SEGA Touring Car Championship

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It’s been one whole year of This is Saturn! To celebrate, Liam takes a look at SEGA Touring Car Championship, in the newest episode of This is Saturn; the Season One finale! 

AM Annex’s very own arcade racer for the Model 2 board and Saturn has been very much maligned throughout it’s stay in SEGA’s history, often criticised for supposedly lacking playability. But this is Liam’s show; and considering his love of the similarly maligned Gale Racer, is there something in Touring Car that can shine through likewise? Or is this one better left in the scrapheap?
Find out, in this episode of This is Saturn!

This is Saturn is a video series created by British teenager Liam ‘TrackerTD’ Ashcroft, aiming to give an alternative and in-depth look at the good, the bad, and the ugly of SEGA Saturn gaming, all whilst maintaining a somewhat strong accent.

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Hit Reset: Why Sonic 3D Blast deserves another chance

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Everyone tends to think that Sonic has been dead for an undisclosed amount of time, and generally seem to miss out on or dismiss a lot of interesting games along the way. One of the first games to start the march of “Sonic hasn’t been good since…” was Sonic 3D Blast. So, on this episode of Hit Reset, will take a look at why this game was not the beginning of all our problems, and why you may actually be missing out on something pretty cool.

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Skies of Arcadia is still one of the best RPGs ever made

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Nearly ten years ago, Skies of Arcadia completely changed the way I viewed video games. What I once saw as a passive medium, where I followed a trail of bread crumbs from point to point to see what the developers had in store for me, I now saw something greater.

Arcadia drew me into its world in a way no game has before or since with colorful characters, beautiful locales, and a sense of adventure that the game not only emphasizes, but cherishes. Even today, when I come back to the game after having experienced the likes of Oblivion, Mass Effect, and Skyrim, I still get a feeling of adventure that no other game seems able to provide in quite the same way. Naturally, there are some spoilers ahead, so if you’d prefer to go into this game ignorant, don’t read any further!

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The SEGA Five: Favorite Moments in Skies of Arcadia

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Hey everyone welcome to another episode of The Weekly Five, I’m your host George and today we will be talking about my favorite moment of Skies of Arcadia. The game originally came out in 2000 on the SEGA Dreamcast.

The game later got 2002 re-release in Japan and 2003 in the West on the Gamecube, which included better graphics, less random battles, extra content, and more. Regardless of what version of the game play, both are fantastic experiences. Some disliked the game due to its constant random battles but I think it more than makes it up with its charming characters, light hearted humor and sense of exploration.

Great games have great moments and Skies of Arcadia is full of them, so if I don’t mention a moment you loved, share it with us in the comment section. Let’s get this list started.

Warning: Spoilers ahead. 

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My Life with SEGA riddles us this in Batman Forever: The Arcade Game for SEGA Saturn

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After the misfire that was Batman Forever on SEGA Genesis/Mega Drive, Acclaim tried to make amends with this arcade beat-’em-up developed by Iguana Entertainment of Turok: Dinosaur Hunter fame. That’s right, no platforming nonsense or Mortal Kombat theatrics. Just good old-fashioned ass whoopin’ in black rubber…. Wow! That sounds about as wrong as nipples on the bat suit, doesn’t it?

In any case, I’m here to help you solve the greatest riddle of all. The mother of all riddles: “Is Batman Forever: The Arcade Game worth playing?”

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Review: 3D Fantasy Zone: Opa-Opa Bros (Nintendo 3DS)

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I’m going to be honest, when SEGA and M2 announced that 3D Fantasy Zone: Opa-Opa Bros was going to join wave 2 of their 3D Classics, I was sold. Fantasy Zone is just one of those games that doesn’t get enough appreciation in the West and having it release digitally will mean that more people get to enjoy this underrated classic. But how is the port? Well, let’s jump right into the review…

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SEGA Tunes: Alien Front Online’s Alien and Army themes

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SEGA’s WOW Entertainment has a very eclectic resume, featuring games like the simulation-style racer SEGA GT, the dating sim Candy Stripe, the mutants teaching typing game The Typing of the Dead (co-developed with Smilebit), and today’s Tuesday Tunes spotlighted title, the online aliens versus army game Alien Front Online.

Initially released worldwide to arcades as Alien Front, Alien Front Online was soon released to the Dreamcast. Despite being Japanese developed, Alien Front Online was made to strongly connect with Western audiences. The game was simple, featuring online combat with voice communication allowing players to take on opposing sides of an army versus aliens war. Unfortunately, the game’s release was poorly planned out as Alien Front Online was released to North America six months after SEGA made the announcement that they were discontinuing the Dreamcast. The game ended up not releasing to other territories, and to make matters worse, shortly after release SEGA shifted to a pay to play model for their online games. I recall renting Alien Front Online when it released, and even through the game was just a few weeks old, the online community was incredibly small.

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MAGFest 13 Interview: DJ Cutman talks to us about his new album “Spindash”

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At MAGFest, one of our colleagues Gunstar had a chance to talk with DJ Cutman about the new “Spindash” album, a 16-track remix tribute album to the Sonic series, recently put out through Cutman’s own label, Gamechops. We took the time to discuss song selection, how it helps both video game remix artists and Sega, and the goals of the label itself.

If you’d like to check out the album, you can check out the entire album through Gamechops’s youtube channel, and many other awesome video game remixes.

You can also pick up the album through Loudr or any other major music site.

Finally, you can check out the Gamechops website to see all the albums and remixes they’ve done, as well as find all their social media outlets.

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Swingin’ Report Show #75: Interview with Lisle Wilkerson – Shenmue II, Virtua Fighter and Crazy Taxi voice actress

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We celebrate 75 episodes in style on this week’s Swingin’ Report Show podcast! Joining us for an interview is Lisle Wilkerson, best known to SEGA fans for her voice work on Shenmue II, Virtua Fighter and Crazy Taxi. Learn what it’s like growing up in Japan and recording for some of SEGA’s greatest Dreamcast and arcade titles. Lisle also tells us about her correspondence work and her acting work on Sofia Coppola’s Lost in Translation with Bill Murray.

Then, George and Barry discuss the recent news of SEGA of America’s restructuring, dissecting SEGA Sammy’s official document to figure out what exactly we can expect in the future from SEGA. So what are you doing still reading this? We have a special guest and big SEGA news! Click play and enjoy our 75th show!

Don’t forget to follow Lisle Wilkerson on Twitter and Facebook!

[Download] [RSS] [iTunes] [Archive]

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SEGA Movie Dream Casts: From the House to the Streets

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How often have you played a SEGA game and asked yourself, “why isn’t this a movie?” Growing up with SEGA, I would ask that question constantly. To be completely honest, I’ve never stopped asking that question. Playing games like After Burner, Streets of Rage and Sonic The Hedgehog, I always felt they would make awesome movies. Well, that childhood dream may very well be coming true. Late last year, Variety reported that SEGA had hired former Break Media executive Evan Cholfin, collaborating with Stories International, to aid them in adapting some of their classic franchises into other forms of entertainment.

That’s right, SEGA fans! We’re talking about movies and television. The franchises mentioned include Golden Axe, Streets of Rage, Shinobi and Crazy Taxi. You know, just to name a few. This is something I’ve been fantasizing about since I was 10-years old. It’s surreal to think that it may finally come to pass.

Here’s a few SEGA properties I’d like to see on the big screen, and who I would like to see in the roles. Seeing as how I’m a director whore, I’ll even include my choice of filmmaker.

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Aboard Little Jack: How Skies Of Arcadia made an RPG fan out of me

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Arcadia01

Skies of Arcadia is a game that made a huge impact on me as a fan of SEGA and Role-Playing games. Before it, I had very little exposure to RPGs. I had seen Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest, but very rarely did I play them. The only one I actually played was Phantasy Star IV. While I enjoyed it, I was a bit too young to really be able to understand or get into it. I still had fond memories of playing it with my neighbor, and when I got older and had the chance to finally play it again, it became one of my favorite games of all time. It never would have happened without Skies of Arcadia.

At the time the game came out on the Dreamcast, I was around 10 years old. Old enough to start wrapping my head around more complex games. However, I didn’t have a Dreamcast at the time, only a Nintendo 64. My cousin had the Dreamcast though, and I was super close with him. He was like an older brother to me. He picked on me a bit, but he also showed me lots of cool stuff, even stuff I probably wasn’t supposed to see or play at my age yet. He was also a huge RPG fan, and had always tried to get me into them, but I never did get engrossed with them that much. Then, one weekend when he came to visit, he brought Skies of Arcadia. We spent an entire night playing it, and I don’t remember how long we played it for, but it was almost sunrise before we finally had to give into sleep.

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2-Man Scramble plays Batman Forever for the SEGA Genesis – Holy co-op, Batman!

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Andrew Rosa and Mickey Mac must team up to beat one of the worst movie-licensed video games ever produced; Batman Forever on SEGA Genesis/Mega Drive.

Before this foul-mouth duo can take fight the puzzling Riddler and maniacal Two-Face, they must first overcome a seemingly endless onslaught of jackasses like “Blood Fire”, “Anti-Freeze” and “Charlie”, as well as some tough platform jumping.

For an in-depth review, watch Andrew go it alone in My Life with SEGA.

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Developer Retrospective: A look back at the games of SEGA’s Overworks

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overworks

Last week when we kicked off Overworks and WOW Entertainment month, we took a look back at how SEGA organized their many internal development teams over the years. Among those teams were Overworks and WOW Entertainment, two separate teams that released games from 2000 through to 2004 when they were merged and became SEGA WOW. This week, we will be taking a look back at the games released by Overworks. While the Overworks softography is small, especially compared to giants like SEGA AM2, in the span of four years Overworks released some truly classic titles.

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Classic SEGA Ads: Take a peek above deck at these Japanese Skies of Arcadia commercials

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When it comes to Japanese games being localized for the West, I tend to like it when they stick as closely to the original release as possible. I like to hear the original Japanese dialogue, have the names of characters and locations retained, see the original cover art used, and I hate it when they change the game’s title (hey, I just noticed that Jet Grind Radio broke all of these rules!). Skies of Arcadia, however, is a rare exception. When it was revealed in the pages of The Official Sega Dreamcast Magazine that Eternal Arcadia was to be retitled Skies of Arcadia, I was not only okay with this, I actually much preferred it.

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