SEGA Japan has been going crazy porting over Game Gear and other classics under their ‘3D Sega Classics’ brand on the 3DS eShop. But so far there hasn’t been any announcements for any Wii U ports.
Seems that Wii U owners can stop wondering because the question has been answered by Yosuke Okunari, a producer at SEGA. He stated that there are no plans on SEGA supporting the Wii U Virtual Console. You can read his tweet after the jump.
SEGAbits made its very first convention appearance this year at TooManyGames in Oaks, PA. In addition to walking the convention floor, Barry the Nomad, Patrick aka Kori-Maru (Website of the Dead), David the Lurker (Sonic Retro) and A.J. Rosa (My Life with SEGA) held a panel discussing the life and death of SEGA’s swan song, the Dreamcast. The same panel also included a presentation from Sonic Retro, covering the history of Sonic the Hedgehog 2‘s Hidden Palace Zone – with rarely seen footage of Sonic 2‘s release and early efforts to remake the lost zone. We also met with several fellow SEGA fans, gave away a pile of rare SEGA swag, and did we mention the panel was standing room only? SEGAbits Does.
Also featured in this video is a convention walkthrough with the crew, and a one-on-one bout between Patrick and A.J.
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Its hard to believe that games actually go through a certification process before you buy said product. I want to know who approved games like Sonic the Hedgehog 2006, but that isn’t what we are here to talk about. It seems Pier Solar HD has hit another bump in the road when they missed their certification from Microsoft.
“Microsoft already evaluated Pier Solar as well but we failed some internal requirements on the certification and we’re correcting them for the next submission. This also impacts Wii U and PlayStation(s) submissions since we want to send it as clean as possible so that we don’t get another failed certification. Luckily, the process doesn’t take as long as we thought, so the perspectives to getting a release date gets better. As soon as we’re certified on all platforms we’ll announce the date and put it on the street.”
Solar Pier HD is headed to Linux, Mac, Windows, Ouya, Playstation 3, Playstation 4, Wii U, and of course the Dreamcast. It seems only consoles will be affected by the delay.
This week on The SEGA Five we will be looking at our most nostalgic Sonic the Hedgehog video game moments as part of our Sonic the Hedgehog 23rd Birthday coverage. Like always, if you guys want to share your nostalgic moments do so in the comments! Now on to the list!
Had a chance to chat with the developers behind the upcoming indie Dreamcast title Elysian Shadows. Lots of exclusive bits of information dropped including characters that will be in the game, differences between versions and much more. If you have been wanting to know more about this game, this is definitely the podcast to listen to. Don’t forget that August 1st will be the start of the Kickstarter! With Elysian Shadows hitting the Dreamcast before any other platform, its easy to continue saying “It’s still thinking”.
We already posted about how Elysian Shadows is being published (Dreamcast version) by the wonderful guys over at Watermelon Games. That isn’t all it seems, the team recently got private investors so some of the developers can work full time on the game.
The Kickstarter will still be happening on August 1st. Have a question for the team? We will be having the developers on the Swingin’ Report Show tomorrow, so drop any questions you might have.
We are just ending our After Burner week with this new entry to our Round Table series where people on staff talk about a specific topic. This week we will be talking about our fond and not-so-fond memories with the After Burner franchise. Like always, if you guys want to tell us about your beloved memories with this AM2 gem, we would love to here them in the comment section below. Fire!
In an era where most home gaming consoles were couldn’t produce anything more than simple 8-bit sprites, video game companies did have to occasionally get a little…creative with their marketing. This goes double for Tiger, whose LCD games were about as immersive as…well I don’t think there is anything less immersive then a Tiger LCD game. So naturally, Tiger encouraged the kids of the eighties to imagine their own arcade experience! After all, who needs stereo surround sound, fluid super scaling graphics and a full motion cabinet when you have the power of you mind?! This kid certainly doesn’t. He even brought his own flight helmet!
To be fair though, throwing a kid into a jet fighter was a pretty common way to market the game. SEGA took it a step further with their Master System commercial. This kid didn’t just imagine flying through some hazy clouds, he imagined a whole damn plane! The kid from Suburban Commando, which we highlighted earlier this week, even took it a step further by completely changing the setting of the game, complete with some new enemies.
If there’s anything I miss about games from the 8 and 16 bit era, it’s how vague their stories and characters were. Sure, I love having deep, interesting characters and engaging stories in my games, but an unfortunate side effect of this is that we can’t let our imaginations run wild about the nature of the game’s world and characters anymore. Oh well, I guess we’ll always have the imaginary jets of our childhoods at least, right?
If you guys haven’t heard, Watermelon Games will be publishing the physical copy of the 16-bit inspired RPG Elysian Shadows on Dreamcast. In my opinion this is was a great move, since Pier Solar got great reception due to its attention to detail when it comes to packaging.
When we interviewed Watermelon Video Games President Tulio Goncalves he told us that the goal of Pier Solar and the Great Architects was to feel like a SEGA Mega Drive/Genesis RPG. Elysian Shadows is different in the sense that its influenced by SNES titles at the time such as Chrono Trigger, Secret of Mana, and the ever popular Final Fantasy series.
It will be interesting to play both side by side on our Dreamcast when both titles are finally released. I love 16-bit RPGs and don’t discriminate, the more quality Dreamcast titles the better. Check out more information on the game here.
The game will also be releasing digitally on PC, Mac, Linux, iOS, Android, and Ouya.
Over at the Sonic Stadium message boards, fans got to talking about a rarely seen Sonic Adventure LCD game from Tiger Electronics released in 2000. The game, which resembles a tiny arcade cabinet, is unique in that is isn’t simply one of those low end Tiger handhelds. Instead, it is closer to the Game.com, which while still pretty low end, is capable of presenting multiple stages, enemies, and bosses. The Sonic Adventure LCD game was released as part of Tiger’s “Arcade Games” series which featured four other Dreamcast games: Q-Bert, NFL Blitz 2000, Ready 2 Rumble Boxing, and Hydro Thunder. In total, Sonic Adventure features seven stages: Emerald Coast, Windy Valley, Ice Cap, Speed Highway, Red Mountain, Sky Deck, and Final Egg. Some of the bosses include Chaos 0, Egg Hornet, and the Egg Viper. While a very rare game to find, thanks to Sonic Stadium forum member iDEATH, we now have a look at this rare game from Sonic’s Dreamcast days!
Did you know Out Run 3D had new songs added to it? The songs where composed by Manabu Namiki and Chibi-Tech for the the Nintendo 3DS port. Now you can digitally buy those songs and the rest of the songs from the series in this three-volume collection they released the other day.
Not a bad soundtrack to have for long road trips!
If you guys enjoyed our Jet Set Radio week long celebration, you probably have been itching for an excuse to paint the streets of Tokyo-to once again. Don’t fear, Jet Set Radio HD is part of Steam’s week long sales. The game is being discounted by 50%, costing you only $2.49.
On related PC sales news, Humble Bundle store is having their spring sale on PC titles and part of that sale includes the ‘Sonic Hit Collections‘, which is priced at $7.49 and comes with the following 17 Sonic the Hedgehog games:
Now that Jet Set Radio week is in full effect, let’s talk about our contest. We will be giving away Jet Set Radio hoodies and Japanese soundtracks via our twitter account. Make sure you follow and retweet the tweet below to enter.
Enter to win a #JetSetRadio hoodie or soundtrack from @SEGA! Follow @SEGAbits and RT this image to Tag Twitter! pic.twitter.com/qEb8ldTJDx
— SEGAbits (@SEGAbits) April 29, 2014
The week isn’t over, we will also be streaming Jet Set Radio via our Twitch channel this Thursday at 5:30pm PST/8:30pm EST. Tune in, before Captain Onishima tries to shut down the stream!
Castle of Illusion is an HD ‘remake’ of the popular SEGA Genesis title Castle of Illusion starring Mickey Mouse and if you haven’t picked this title up, you will soon be able to play it for free. US Playstation Plus subscribers will be able to download and play the game for free as long as they continue to pay for the service.
If you download the game before April 28th, you will also get a copy of the SEGA Genesis/Mega Drive version for free as well (which used to be a pre-order bonus). The game will be added to Sony’s ‘Instant Collection’, meaning it will be free to download for a long time.
Ryuta Ueda leaves SEGA after 19 years of service. While at SEGA he contributed to some masterpieces including being the chief graphic designer for Jet Set Radio, enemy art designer for Panzer Dragoon Orta and he also worked on the Yakuza series.
Ryuta Ueda shared the news via his Twitter account this morning and as you know, he is going to be missed; the art design behind the Jet Set Radio series was totally ‘Next Level’.
EDIT: According to Hideki Naganuma, Ueda left SEGA on March 31st.
So, what is your favorite game that Ryuta Ueda worked on?