Fundraiser started to rescue and preserve hundreds of Sega 3DS and DS game prototypes before August 2025

Video game preservation organizations Obscure Gamers and Video Game Preservation Museum are in the midst of a public fundraiser to help them bring in £61K to rescue some 300 prototypes and showroom demos of classic Sega games on Nintendo DS and 3DS from becoming e-waste. This includes never-before-seen early builds of memorable DS/3DS Sega classics such as Sonic Colors DS, Sonic Generations 3DS, some Mario & Sonic Olympics games, and even a DS build of Project R, better known as Rhythm Thief & The Emperor’s Treasure, which would release on Nintendo 3DS instead of DS in 2012.

Sadly, even with multiple fundraisers set up to pool money, they have not made it far reaching their goal by now, and they must raise the necessary funds before the start of August 2025. Otherwise, they may not have another chance to rescue all this precious Sega history before it returns to the e-waste bins they were pulled from. There’s still plenty of time as of this writing, so it’s too soon to give up now. We encourage you to give whatever money you can spare to help with this noble preservation effort. Obscure Gamers have promised that your money can be refunded in August at your request if the fundraiser fails, so you at least have nothing to lose if they lose, other than tons of important information on the development of these games that could be documented online for all to see, as well as the digital rom files themselves for you to try out.

Links to the various fundraisers, as well as a list of every game prototype hanging in the balance, will be below the break here.

SEGA Tunes: Rhythm Thief Month, “Claire de Luna”

Welcome to the first installment of a month long Tuesday Tunes Feature: Rhythm Thief Month! It’s been years since we’ve had a new SEGA rhythm game, so Tuesday Tunes is going to mark the occasion with over a month’s worth of the game’s awesome soundtrack!

Featuring this weak is the game’s official music video for the game’s J-pop theme, “Claire de Luna” by Japanese singer/song writer miwa. While not representative of the game’s in-game tracks, which features a wide range of genres, it’s a pretty awesome J-pop track accompanied by a well put together selection of animated scenes from the game’s numerous animated cut scenes.

Rhythm Thief looks like it will be a very special game, something I hope all of our readers will pick up, especially in light of SEGA’s recent troubles. The game has a spectacular track. This is going to be a very fun month! Two more tracks including the Rhythm Thief Main Theme and It’s Show Time are below the fold.

SEGA to have upcoming games playable at Jump Festa


SEGA will have the majority of their handheld titles (and one arcade title) playable at Jump Festa. Check out the list of playable titles.

  • Samurai & Dragons (Vita)
  • Shining Blade (PSP)
  • Rhythm Thief R (3DS)
  • Hatsune Miku and Future Stars Project Mirai (3DS)
  • Hatsune Miku Project Diva Arcade (Arcade)
By the time that the show starts, Puyo Puyo will already be out (comes out 12/15). As for Project Diva Arcade, this one is already out  in game centers. Everything else is a 2012 title.
So what do you get for playing unreleased games? Free swag. Isn’t that awesome? If you live in Japan, the event will start on December 17th and end on the 18th at the Makuhari Messe outside of Tokyo.