Degeki Online has put up a big preview for SEGA’s upcoming crossover A Certain Magical Virtual-On which confirms Kuroko Shirai and Misaki Shokuhou as new characters. It also goes into detail about the in-game system including the new ‘Transition action’ and control styles that will be introduced in this title.
Hit the jump to learn more about these new A Certain Magical Virtual-On systems.
Various Sonic fans on Twitter have discovered a new iOS (and possibly Android) Sonic the Hedgehog game titled Sonic Forces: Speed Battle. According to the App Store listing, the game has players racing against other players from around the world in real-time four-player races. Weapons play a role in the game, and playable characters include Sonic, Tails, Knuckles, Amy, Shadow, Vector and more. From the look of things, the game is very much an online multiplayer version of Sonic Dash set in Sonic Forces locations. Eagle eyed fans might notice that a Sky Sanctuary looking stage appears in the mobile game, perhaps meaning we will see the stage return in Sonic Forces?
After the break, check out the app store description and screenshots.
Readers of our site probably know that we are huge fans of the work of Darren Wall and Read-Only Memory, who was behind the excellent “Mega Drive/Genesis: Collected Works” book. Now, Darren and Read-Only Memory are returning to the world of SEGA books with “Sega Dreamcast: Collected Works”, a new book described as an “illustrated history of the cult games console, produced in collaboration with Sega”. The project is being funded by Kickstarter, and is already 30% funded with a £68,000 goal at the time of this article being posted. Given the project just launched today, that is impressive!
The campaign offers up several tiers, from the book itself to special slipcovers featuring Jet Set Radio, Shenmue and Phantasy Star Online logos. Already sold out are early bird editions at a reduced price and a Naoto Ohshima signed edition. There is also a Kickstarter exclusive Shenmue bookmark available for all backers. The campaign page has a LOT of information, from what the book will contain to who you can expect to be interviewed. Rather than copy and paste all that here, we urge you to check out the campaign page for yourself and consider supporting the project.
The good people over at Gamasutra ran an article covering the ‘rise of the Nindies’, talking to developers that have been porting indie developed games to NIntendo’s Switch platform. One of the developers featured in the article is LizardCube, the developer of Wonder Boy: The Dragon’s Trap, which released on PlayStation 4, Xbox One, PC, and of course Nintendo Switch earlier this year. While the article talks about more than sales, the interesting bit was that Wonder Boy: The Dragon’s Trap has sold more on the Nintendo Switch than PlayStation 4, Xbox One and PC combined!
“more copies of Wonder Boy on the Switch than the three other platforms we released on combined.” – Omar Cornut from Lizardcube
While they didn’t get into specifics on how much Wonder Boy: The Dragon’s Trap has sold on console platforms, according to Steamspy the game has only 8,141 owners which isn’t great at all. I really do think that the game deserves way more sales than that. As for ‘The Rise of Nindies‘ on the Nintendo Switch platform, I feel that a lot of these sales could be attributed to the fact that the Nintendo Switch platform is new at the moment, the real test in sales will come after the platform gets more Nintendo related titles. I surely hope that the momentum keeps it, I feel that the Nintendo Switch is the best platform to play these great indie games! What are your thoughts on this news?
We just reported a previous rumor that Vanquish and Bayonetta is getting a double pack release for the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One, but it seems that Shenmue I & II HD might be joining the rumor party as it has also been leaked by multiple retailers. The double pack has been leaked by Alza (same one that leaked the Bayonetta and Vanquish ones), Heureka, GetGame, and MadeGamer! Earlier this year, it was rumored that Shenmue I & II HD where suppose to be coming out by the end of the year, according to Rice Digital, then we had the CEO of Just Add Water say that these ports have been in works earlier this year. We had so much information about these ports being possible that we even did a whole video on it.
It would make sense considering that SEGA Europe has stated in the past that Shenmue I & II HD have had their full attention and then right after they registered Shenmue Remaster related domains. I will say this is highly probable. What is your opinion? Will you pick up Shenmue I & II HD on PlayStation 4 or Xbox One? Are you excited to dip back into the world of Shenmue?
[Via: Dualshockers]
Seems SEGA and Platinum aren’t quite done putting these games out. According to an incidental result on Alza, a UK-based online electronics store, both Vanquish and Bayonetta are set to launch on PS4 and Xbox One later this year. Not only are they getting a second re-release, but they’ll be stuffed into one very jam-packed double feature. The current “expected” release sits at November this year for Europe, with no further details on North American or Asian territory releases, or a release date. Assuming this is a genuine mistake on Alza’s part and these are real, it’s safe to say SEGA will be having some very good stocking stuffers this year.
On 9/9/1999 the SEGA Dreamcast released in North America, and now 18 years later we’re still talking about it. On this SEGA News Bits, we celebrate the birthday of SEGA’s final home console by recommending the best exclusives, looking at the indie games released in 2017 and looking ahead to what indie games are coming in 2018 and beyond!
If you enjoy our SEGA News Bits segments and want to support us: Give us a sub and give this video a like so it shows up on more like minded fans YouTube recommendations. You know, how that YouTube algorithm is.
SEGA has launched their Tokyo Game Show 2017 website, showing off what games will be playable, only shown in video and which games will have press conferences. Not all SEGA games at Tokyo Game Show 2017 will be playable, sadly. So, lets get to it and see what we will see more of later this month.
Translation is a bit iffy, but it seems that the stage shows will be streamed online from what I gather. We shall keep you updated on that via our twitter and on this blog. We will be having a writer at Tokyo Game Show, so expect a SEGA News Bits video and write up discussing some of these playable games.
Game developers are rarely able to showcase their efforts in video game preservation. Publisher and developer regulations may prohibit this material be preserved for future generations to learn and understand from to avoid competition and protect resources. In a rare opportunity developers may uncover unreleased materials they held in their personal collection. Some recent examples include prototypes of games such as the Super Nintendo version of Rayman discovered by series creator Michel Ancel or Twelve Tales Conker 64 dug up from Rare’s archives. Recently Traveller’s Tales founder, Jon Burton, has pulled out pitch videos and prototypes of his company’s earlier efforts on his YouTube channel GameHut. The most recent videos at the time of this writing the first known prototype of Sonic R for SEGA Saturn shown off to SEGA as well as prototype footage of Mickey Mania 2 running on Mega Drive hardware.
As you might have seen on the interewebs, people weren’t too keen with SEGA’s decision to put Denuvo DRM in Sonic Mania for PC. I think the biggest insult for people was SEGA not mentioning the unpopular DRM on their store page (later updated), only having people purchase the game before finding out Denuvo was included. While I understand that companies are scared of their games being massively pirated, especially a title like Sonic Mania which is only a mere 300mb in size, they got to understand that there isn’t a DRM in the world that will keep pirates out long term. For example, Tekken 7‘s Denuvo DRM was cracked in just four days.
People are hoping that now that pirates have cracked Sonic Mania‘s Denuvo DRM, that SEGA will remove it just due to its unpopularity and the fact that its not solving the issue it was implemented to solve. This is something that RiME developer, Tequila Works did when their game’s DRM was cracked. While I personally wouldn’t even know if the game had Denuvo DRM or not without the internet telling me, especially now with the offline fix, its just a bad PR move to include it in your game and hope its removed sooner than later. In the last eight days of release, Sonic Mania on PC still hasn’t reached 100k sold on Steam. Its getting close. But to ask you guys, do you guys think Sonic Mania’s Denuvo DRM actually helped the game’s sales in the last 8 days or hurt it? Let me know in the comments below.
You can basically ignore the post below this about a possible SEGA crossover game, like the teaser posted earlier today lead me to believe. Weekly Fmatisu has revealed that the game it was actually teasing is Dx2 Shin Megami Tensei: Liberation for smartphones. The game will be developed by SEGA which will have two conflicting organizations with the Liberators and Acolytes.
I guess the SEGA in the title of the teaser meant that SEGA was developing a mobile game for a Atlus franchise? While Dx2 Shin Megami Tensei: Liberation might appeal to Japanese audience, I really wished this was something more console or even PC related. What do you guys think? Was Dx2 Shin Megami Tensei: Liberation the type of game you’d want to play?
[Source: Gematsu]
[It has been revealed that the teaser was actually for Dx2 Shin Megami Tensei: Liberation mobile game. Yay?]
SEGA Japan has launched a website teasing users about a possible SEGA crossover game. So far the media has been calling the project SEGA x ????, letting users try to figure out what the other company or brand they are crossing over with. One thing, is that it looks like a very anime brand. Recently SEGA has recently announced Virtual-On x A Magical Card Index crossover game, maybe this is more of a crossover with other Bunko Dengeki properties. One of the only clues is the silhouettes and that the teaser site’s url has it filed under ‘rpng‘. Who knows if the four question marks are a clue, I doubt it. Hard to know what the figures are considering they seem varied, all seeing pretty unique anime styled characters.
At this point it can be anything, what with stuff like Fist of the North Star coming out of left field. One thing is for sure, SEGA is setting up to have some surprises come Tokyo Game Show later this month. Who else is excited to see what this game is? What do you think it is? Let us know in the comments.
Watermelon Games’ SEGA Genesis/Mega Drive beat ’em up game, PAPRIUM has been delayed. Originally it was suppose to come out this September, but this morning Watermelon Games has confirmed that it won’t be coming out until early 2018. Users have also noted that pre-orders for PAPRIUM have been taken down, according to the publisher’s blog, its due to having issues with PayPal, who are withholding their funds.
If you want to know more about PAPRIUM, check out our SEGA News Bits video, giving you a look at all the pre-order details. Sure you can’t pre-order it right now, but it has quite a bit of information about the game itself as well. We will keep you guys posted whenever PAPRIUM‘s pre-orders go live once more.
It seems that SEGA is planning something to do with darts and their iconic IP ‘House of the Dead’, but instead of dealing with houses it seems this one will have darts. According to Go Nintendo, SEGA has filed the trademark for Darts of the Dead. The House of the Dead franchises has had its fair share of spin-offs including Typing of the Dead , Pinball of the Dead, and House of the Dead EX. They also noted that the trademark was done only for the English name, but that isn’t out of the ordinary for the franchise.
If SEGA could make a typing game based on the franchise, I would assume something like a dart game, with a score system based on your accuracy would be doable. Though thinking of the name, Darts of the Dead, seems a bit silly. What are your thoughts on SEGA filing the trademark for Darts of the Dead? Should SEGA just do another main title or are you interested in a spin-off?
Sonic Mania has a ton of Easter Eggs. A ton! But a obscure one was found by Sonic Retro’s own Neo Hazard, who figured out that using the Sonic 3 & Knuckles stage select code when playing Hydrocity, you will unlock a voice sample within the stage from popular Youtuber VideoGameDunkey when hitting the boosters. Check the video above for an example.
How to unlock: When you find a hook in Hydrocity, input the Sonic 3 & Knuckles level select code: Left, Left, Left, Right, Right, Right, Up, Up, Up. You will hear a ring sound, now just find one of those hand booster creepy things and hear Dunkey in all his Sonic Mania glory.
I wonder if SEGA higher ups knew that Sonic Mania would be using a Youtuber’s voice sample and if they actually cleared this with Dunkey man himself. He did gush over how great Sonic Mania was, so maybe he’ll be cool with it. What are your thoughts on Sonic Mania having Easter Eggs evolving YouTubers?