Memorial service for fictional Like A Dragon characters, named “Like a Dragon: The Men Who Perished Exhibition”, being held in Japan

Any fan of the Like A Dragon (Formally “Yakuza”) series will know that these games’ stories have never sugarcoated the mortality of its entire cast. Many characters, some loved and some loathed, have met grim fates in virtually every game ever released bearing the names Like A Dragon and Yakuza. Now, Sega, in collaboration with Parco shopping centers, is giving fans in Japan the chance to pay their respects to many of these characters with the Like a Dragon: The Men Who Perished Exhibition, a series of funeral events for every character in this series that has died up to this point.

At three separate events planned for Tokyo, Nagoya, and Sapporo in the next two months, you can attend traditional Japanese funeral services for these characters to offer flowers and prayers and to purchase exclusive merchandise. Some merch you can purchase fits right in with a funeral service, like incense sticks, mini-headstones, and handkerchiefs. Others are more fun, typical merch, like t-shirts, handbags, bookmarks, and acrylic standees. You can also use your smartphone to see images of the deceased characters with AR on site.

The first exhibition will be in the Parco center in Ikebukuro, Tokyo from December 30th, 2023 to January 13th, 2024. Next is the Nagoya Parco from January 20th to February 4th. Finally, there’s the Sapporo Parco from February 16th to February 25th. If you happen to be in Japan during January or February 2024, be sure to stop by one of these sites to pay your respects to your favorite Like A Dragon characters.

That’s the most important info out of the way. Now check in after the break for details that include spoilers for the Like A Dragon series. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.  

SEGA Filed Four Trademarks Of Classic Titles – Including Altered Beast, Kid Chameleon, and Eternal Champions

UPDATE: To follow up with this article, SEGA has filed eight more trademarks of their classic IPs which includes Alex Kidd, After Burner, Crazy Taxi, House of the Dead, Outrun, Shinobi, Streets of Rage, and Super Monkey Ball. We’ll keep you all updated when more news arrive!

Following up with the recent announcement during the Game Awards, SEGA has filed four trademarks of their classic IPs which includes Jet Set Radio (which was recently announced at the Game Awards), and three more titles such as Altered Beast, Kid Chameleon, and Eternal Champions.

With these trademarks being filed publicly, we might see more games in development from SEGA down the line or it could be something completely different from what we could expect. Until then, we will keep you all posted if there are any official announcements regarding these titles. Let us know what you all think of this news in the comments below!

Jet Set Radio and Crazy Taxi sequels likely Super Game releases based on SEGA website updates

Based on revised recruitment pages, posted on ResetEra by SEGAbits community members Dooble and Suzuki Yu, it appears that the upcoming Jet Set Radio and Crazy Taxi games revealed at the Game Awards will fall under SEGA’s Super Game initiative. SEGA’s division 3 is the online division, which through interviews has been said to focus on the Super Game releases. Jet Set Radio’s staff was moved from division 4, the mobile division, to division 3. Division 3 has been confirmed through interviews to be focused on GaaS (Games as a Service) and currently handles Phantasy Star Online 2. This would mean that both titles are likely to be online and potentially online only, much like PSO2. They would also be high budget triple-A releases.

This would align with SEGA’s decision to send announcement postcards to Twitch streamers, who are more likely to give GaaS titles attention, rather than fan sites like SEGAbits who are more aligned with traditional games and account for a majority of the Crazy Taxi and Jet Set Radio fanbase.

SEGA News Bits Live: New SEGA Games Announced + Trailer Breakdown

SEGA revealed five games currently in production from classic franchises, and on this SEGA News Bits Live your boy Barry “Yo yo!” the Nomad breaks down the trailer and details new information from SEGA on this initiative!

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Power Surge: SEGA Announces Five Brand New Games for Classic SEGA Titles; Now In Development

SEGA’s announcement at the Game Awards was a major treat for many SEGA fans as the iconic gaming company revealed five brand new games in a mind blowing trailer featuring their library of classic SEGA IPs such as Jet Set Radio, Streets of Rage, Golden Axe, Shinobi, Crazy Taxi and many more to come!

Currently the games are in development and we can hope to see more information in the near future. You can follow updates by signing up on SEGA’s Next Level website.

This is a big day for every SEGA fan who remembers the company’s iconic franchises and now we can experience these games again in a brand new era. Which game are you guys excited for, let us know in the comments below.

The Creative Assembly will focus more on offline real-time strategy games following cancellation of Hyenas

After having ceased production on Hyenas in September, SEGA says developer The Creative Assembly will shift focus back to doing what they do best: real-time strategy games. SEGA CFO and Koichi Fukazawa stated:

To put it simply, Creative Assembly was good at offline games in the RTS genre, but they took on the challenge of developing Hyenas, an online game in the FPS genre. However, although the game itself was good, we decided to cancel the development of Hyenas because we did not think it would reach a quality that would satisfy our users when we considered whether we could really operate this as a competitive online game for a long period of time.

SEGA Announces Virtua Fighter 3tb Online for Arcades in Japan

SEGA announced Virtua Fighter 3tb Online for arcades in Japan during the Amusement Expo in Tokyo Big Sight event before beginning the “APM3” exhibition match event for Virtua Fighter esports. The game will have similar features seen in Virtua Fighter esports (Virtua Fighter 5 Ultimate Showdown in US & EU) such as national matches, in-store matches, password competition with friends, ability to use Aime cards to save progress, and change from original and arrange BGM.

Newly uncovered Sonic the Hedgehog (SatAM) concept art gives us an early look at a robotic Dr. Robotnik

Way back in 1991, when Sonic the Hedgehog burst onto the scene in his debut game, the title made such an impact in the west that TV networks and animation studios scrambled to create an animated series starring the blue blur. With Sonic came his cast of video game co-stars however at the time Sonic’s stable of characters was quite small. Outside of the little animal friends and badniks, we had Sonic, Eggman (localized as Doctor Robotnik) and eventually, in 1992, Tails. The first animated series to get the green light was what fans affectionately call “Sonic SatAM” or just “SatAM” as the series aired weekly on ABC Saturday mornings. This series retained Sonic, Tails and Robotnik, but also expanded the cast to include the Freedom Fighters as well as a lackey for Robotnik named Snively.

SEGA News Bits Live: Sonic Dream Team Revealed

I had the strangest dream. Sonic and friends went on an adventure inside my iPhone and… oh wait, it’s real! Sonic Dream Team was announced and on SEGA News Bits Live, Barry takes a look at all the details revealed about the Apple Arcade exclusive game.

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Marza Animation releases Halloween animated short “Ghost Tale”, a Sonic Unleashed: Night of the Werehog sequel

SEGA’s animation studio, Marza Animation Planet, has been teasing something relating to the ghost girl and her two ghostly admirers throughout the year and we finally know what that is!

As a Halloween treat, Marza Animation Planet released “Ghost Tale”, an animated short featuring the ghosts from 2008’s “Sonic Unleashed: Night of the Werehog” animated short. While Sonic does not feature, there is a visual of the werehog on a poster in the background. It’s great seeing these fan favorite characters return, and here’s hoping the appear in more animated shorts or other media in the future!

G FUEL unveils Amy Rose Strawberry Shortcake energy drink powder and collectible shaker!

Energy drink company G FUEL has unveiled their latest Sonic the Hedgehog drink flavor, this time celebrating Amy Rose who turns 30 years old this year with her 1993 debut in Sonic CD. The drink is pink, obviously, and the flavor is strawberry shortcake. You can pick it up as an individual powder canister or a collector’s box with a canister and a pink shaker featuring Amy’s name and likeness! If you’d like to show SEGAbits some support, use promo code “SEGABITS” to save 20% on your purchase. The product is expected to ship in November, perfect timing for Thanksgiving dinner!

The Creative Assembly suffers layoffs and Hyenas gets cancelled

This certainly is not The Creative Assembly’s finest hour. Their all new multiplayer shooter (And the subject of one of my first written articles here on SegaBits) Hyenas has been unceremoniously cancelled in a brief recent SegaSammy financial report. Citing “lower profitability in the European region”, the decision was made from on high to axe Hyenas, along with several unannounced titles being developed there. As if to throw salt on the wound, Hyenas’s UK-based developer The Creative Assembly, known for Alien Isolation and the Total War series, is also suffering layoffs. All this comes according to a report from Eurogamer, which you can read here. The above message was also taken from the official Hyenas Twitter page.

This comes as a shock as Hyenas was just demoed at Gamescom only last month and in a recent closed PC beta just this month, along with a few all new trailers getting released. The developers even seemed rather enthusiastic about the game’s reception, in spite of any challenges with development, as referenced in an interview Eurogamer did with representatives of Creative Assembly at that very same Gamescom event. It truly goes to show that you can never be too certain what will happen behind closed doors in the world of game development. I can only hope the staff being let go have little trouble finding new jobs and supporting themselves and their families.

Are you sad to see Hyenas canned? I know I am, especially cause I never even got to participate in any of the betas. Maybe any of you who did can tell us about your experiences in the comments below? I’d especially appreciate it.

Several Sega Forever mobile games unceremoniously delisted + End of Service announcement

Remember Sega Forever, and how that started out in 2017 as Sega Europe’s initiative to bring classic Sega games to mobile app stores as free, ad-supported games? Well, Sega Forever is now “Sega For-never,” as more than half of the games released through Sega Forever have now been delisted from the Apple App Store and Google Play Store without so much as an official announcement. On top of that, the games now display an “End of Service” message like the one shown above saying that the games will remain playable, but will lose their online features, which amounted to save states being stored online, leaderboards, and offering you the option to pay $1.99 USD to play without ads. It also has a “More Info” button to show you where else the games available through Sega Forever can be played, but it only currently leads to Sega’s home page. (The above message comes from the Space Harrier II Classic app. I have not been able to confirm if the non-Genesis games display a message like this.)

Check in past the break to see what the remaining games are, as well as some more unsettling news…