Original Content

DLC of Christmas Past: A Tree in Station Square

by

If you caught our latest podcast, you may have heard the moment when AAUK said that he begged for the special Christmas DLC to be included in the XBLA/PSN rerelease of Sonic Adventure. Sadly, it was not, so the only way to experience an early example of DLC is to boot up your Dreamcast with a copy of Sonic Adventure and the Christmas data on your VMU.

The file was originally available for download from December 17th to the 28th in 1999, and when players entered Station Square they were greeted by two Christmas trees complete with Sonic and Chao decorations. If you touched the tree, the music would change to the acapella version of “Dreams Dreams” from Christmas NiGHTS. The best place to get the VMU file and more is at Blue Swirl, where you can burn an application allowing you to use hundreds of VMU files. Enjoy!

1 Comment

Five Great Santas in SEGA History

by

Consider this a SEGAbits exclusive: Santa is real! Yes, as it turns out the annual gift giver is the real deal. All those Santas we see at malls? They’re just the middle men. They’re the guys that report to the real Santa. How about all those variations we see of Santa in the media? This is a marketing effort on the real Santa’s part to keep his image alive. Proof of this exists everywhere, but today I thought I’d highlight five notable Santas in SEGA history. After the break, we reveal our Claus.

Continue Reading ➜

3 Comments

The Weekly Five: SEGAbits Holiday Gift Guide

by

‘Twas two weeks before Christmas and all through the site, SEGA fans deserved presents, whether naughty or nice.

Okay, “site” and “nice” don’t rhyme. But you get where I’m going with this. The holidays (Christmas specifically, let’s not beat around the bush) are approaching, and you need ideas for what to give the SEGA fan in your life. If you don’t have a SEGA fan in your life, chances are YOU’RE the SEGA fan in your life. So what follows are five unique gift ideas for the holiday Christmas season.

Continue Reading ➜

2 Comments

Let’s Go to the “Sonic Generation” Art Show in Philadelphia!

by

When Gagaman of SEGA Memories wrote about the “Sonic Generation” fan art show in Philadelphia, PA, I knew I had to make the long trek to check it out. Grabbing my old near-broken digital camera (my new one is being repaired), I headed out into the tepid weather and braved the 9 minute subway ride to the Brave New Worlds comic book shop. The show, which is actually rather small despite the spiffy website, features various renditions of Sonic, Tails and Eggman from a variety of artists. Located in the outer lobby of Brave New Worlds, the gallery takes up what usually would have been a blank wall.

Click here for photos and more!

2 Comments

Yu Suzuki Interview – Toulouse Game Show 2011 (Must Watch!)

by

Yu Suzuki attended the Toulouse Game Show 2011 and here is an absolutely fantastic interview with Yu Suzuki from the event, possibly the best I’ve ever seen! Yu Suzuki is maybe the most iconic person to have ever worked at Sega, Suzuki is the man behind some of Segas most beloved classics such as OutRun, After Burner, Space Harrier, Hang-On, Daytona USA, Virtua Fighter and of course the ill-fated Shenmue saga.

In this interview by videoxoc.com Yu Suzuki answers some of the most important questions any Sega or Shenmue fan cold pose and they are met with some great replies from Suzuki.

Hit the jump for highlights:

Continue Reading ➜

11 Comments

Five of the Weirdest and/or Worst SEGA Accessories

by

SEGA is awesome, there is no doubt about that, but they’re not infallible. Back in the hardware days, SEGA made their fair share of mistakes. I won’t name off the 32X and SEGA CD like a lot of gaming sites do, because to be honest, as an owner of both systems I have to say they have some really great titles. I’ll even defend accessories that only exist for the sake of a few games. Just because the Dreamcast fishing controller is rarely used, due to the limited library of fishing games, does not make it a bad accessory. It’s just highly specialized, and when put to use it is very effective. Same goes for the Samba de Amigo maracas and Virtual-On’s twin sticks. But there are SEGA accessories and add-ons out there that were failures, or were simply too weird to take seriously. This week we’ll take a look at five of these hiccups in SEGA’s history.

Continue Reading ➜

8 Comments

Sonic’s Road to Redemption: Part 2, Picking Up the Pieces

by

In February 2007, Sonic the Hedgehog was still fresh in the memories of Sonic fans. Yet they already had a new game to play in the form of the Wii exclusive Sonic and the Secret Rings. Secret Rings was a radically different kind of Sonic game, featuring on-rails play and a heavy emphasis on motion controls.  Secret Rings had been championed the previous year by journalists as a Sonic game that was actually good, that took a radically different approach to the formula to solve the franchise’s problems. What gamers actually got was a mixed bag of great and poor design decisions that was still a huge step up from Sonic 06, and would start Sonic on his slow, winding road to recovery.

Continue Reading ➜

5 Comments

SEGA Five: Why I’m Glad to be a SEGA Fan

by

Here in America, we just finished celebrating Thanksgiving and went through hell with Black Friday. Now I’m sitting here putting together a list of why I’m glad to be a SEGA fan this year. It seems that SEGA hardly gets the credit they deserve for some of the things they do, but when they do something wrong everyone notices. So why am I a SEGA fan?

Continue Reading ➜

10 Comments

Sonic’s Road to Redemption: 2006, the Fall

by

This six part series looks at the disaster that was Sonic’s 15th anniversary, and how the series slowly redeemed itself over the following five years, culminating Sonic’s next anniversary title, Sonic Generations.

It’s a little hard to believe that it’s already been five years since Sonic the Hedgehog or “Sonic 06” as it’s called by fans, made its debut. It feels like only yesterday that this infamous train wreck of a game was released and utterly destroyed what little credibility the character had left in gaming. Of course, by 2006 bad Sonic games were nothing new for anybody. Even in his halcyon days Sonic still churned out stinkers, like the infamously not 3D Sonic 3D Blast, and the utterly horrible (and largely forgotten) Sonic Jam for the Game.com. Heck, the franchise had churned out a whopper of a stinker just a year before in the form of Shadow the Hedgehog, the first Sonic game from Sonic Team to average in the 4s on Game Rankings. Even so, Sonic 2006 represented something new for the franchise: it was the first main entry considered utterly deplorable by both critics and fans alike. Sure, Sonic has had his “controversial” games. Sonic Heroes sparked some massive debates on the SEGA forums back in the day and the Sonic Adventure series had its share of dissenters in the press that grew ever more vocal as they were re-released on other platforms. None of them have received the amount of vitriol and did the same amount of damage to the franchise that Sonic 2006 was able to do with its released.

Continue Reading ➜

28 Comments

The Weekly Five: Sonic’s Next Adventure

by

While Sonic Generations is just over a week old, fans from all corners of the interwebs have started to discuss what’s next for the hedgehog. I would say it’s a bit too soon to start speculation on the next game, but even series producer Iizuka has started hinting towards the future. So with Generations considered completed and released, let’s look towards 2012 and beyond, and just what we might expect from the next Sonic game!

Continue Reading ➜

20 Comments

Preview: Shinobi 3D

by

 

This was the same demo available at E3. As such, there are certain things I don’t cover in this preview. For the full picture, check out our E3 preview!

Back at E3 I previewed Shinobi 3D for the first time. I loved what I got to play, but my time with the game was limited. At last month’s New York Comic Con I was able to give the game another go, so I’d like to talk more about it.

Continue Reading ➜

1 Comment

What’s Wrong with Binary Domain’s Box Art?

by

Since the reveal of Binary Domain’s box art, I’ve been thinking about just what is it that makes it so… ineffective. I hesitate to use the word “bad”, as artistry clearly went into producing the cover. However, I think the reason for the cover’s failing is that not a lot of thought went into it. Sure they threw a lot into the scene, but perhaps they threw in too much? I’ve been working in the graphic design industry for five years now, so I thought I’d put some of my professional experience to practice and pick apart Binary Domain’s cover art problems, and perhaps find a better solution. Is it worth the time picking apart the game’s cover? Of course it is! As a new IP, the only thing the game has going for it is SEGA’s name when it comes to appearing on a shelf. First impressions are key for a new franchise, and sadly Binary Domain is not making a good first impression.

Continue Reading ➜

5 Comments

Arts & Crafts: Make your own Sonic Generations Genesis box!

by

Back in late 2010 I put together a nifty Sonic the Hedgehog 4 mock Genesis box complete with cover art, a cartridge sticker and a fake instruction manual. The project was a mini labor of love for both retro Genesis box designs and my favorite SEGA franchise. Today, as Sonic Generations releases, I’m happy to present another Genesis box design, this time for Sonic Generations. I figured, as the series focuses on both modern and classic, it would be fitting to provide a classic version of the game case. As the actual Generations cases for 360 and PS3 tout 3D support, I thought I’d throw Master System fans a bone and added the “SegaScope 3-D” logo to the case.

Let’s get started! Click here for files and printing instructions!

2 Comments

SEGA Sammy Holding’s post half year results

by

SEGA Sammy posted their half year results for the period ending September 30th 2011. A difficult period saw that the publisher declined in both revenue and profit, numerous reasons from the natural disaster that struck Japan earlier this year that still holds ramification for the publisher today, to the weak global economy that is affecting consumer sales. In these tough times, read on to find out how the group managed.

Continue Reading ➜

1 Comment