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Celebrating 20 years of the amazing world of Panzer Dragoon

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Although few gamers nowadays have heard of it, the original Panzer Dragoon trilogy has an almost legendary status among Sega fans, particularly among those that owned a Sega Saturn. What was it, though, that made the Panzer Dragoon games so special? There were many things that the Panzer Dragoon games did right at the time. The game’s 3D graphics were amongst the best seen on the system at the time, and the first two games raised the bar for the on-rail shooter genre. Similarly, Panzer Dragoon Saga’s story, voice acting and battle system were ahead of their time.

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The Creative Assembly working on new “multi-platform AAA blockbuster”

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It seems SEGA’s British developer has had a new project in the works as a recent job posting has revealed that the team is looking to hire a new staff member. Due to the nature of the prospective job asking for experience in “Experience of development on XB1, PS4 and PC platforms”, we can rule out this being some sort of Total War title (Indeed with Attila having just released and with Total War: Warhammer on the horizon, it seems the PC division already has it’s hands full) and might indicate a ditching of the last generation platforms Playstation 3 and Xbox 360. Could this be a sequel to Alien: Isolation? Very likely considering the sales of the title exceeded over 1.7 million as of December 31st 2014 and is in fact, launch aligned, the most successful Alien title SEGA has published in the third party era.

Furthermore the job posting is for “online/multiplayer programmer” which I’m sure is going to raise a few eyebrows for those hoping for an Alien: Isolation sequel with worries SEGA may introduce more prominent gunplay. It is worth noting however that Alien: Isolation began it’s life as a mulitplayer title where one player took the role of the Alien while the others had to hide from the “perfect organism” Considering the success of Alien: Isolation and the awards garnered, I would imagine SEGA would be reluctant to fiddle around with the formula. Personally speaking, Alien: Isolation was my Game of the Year and I’m very much interested in either a sequel or a new IP from the Creative Assembly’s console team.

Source: PC Gamer

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SEGA unleashes Hatsune Miku Project Mirai DX trailer

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Today is Hatsune Miku day so SEGA of Japan has released a trailer for their upcoming title, Hatsune Miku Project Mirai DX on the Nintendo 3DS. Project Mirai DX is suppose to be a re-release of the 2nd game in the series which is enhanced and will be the first 3DS Hatsune Miku game to be release in North America and Europe.

Unlike Hatsune Miku Project Diva games on arcades and Sony handhelds, Project Mirai features chibi versions of the main character cast which is unique to the 3DS platform.

You will be able to pick the game up for yourself in May 26th in North America and May 29th in Europe.

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SEGA announces its publishing Stella Glow on the Nintendo 3DS

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SEGA has agreed to publish Imageepoch’s newest game called Stella Glow. This isn’t the first time SEGA and Imageepoch worked together, they teamed up previously to create Sands of Destruction (2008) and 7th Dragon series (2009).

Stella Glow was suppose to be an important title for Imageepoch due to marking the studio’s 10th year anniversary, but also because it was suppose to be their first self published title. Rumor has it that Imageepoch hasn’t been doing great financially and that this move might be SEGA helping them release the game while the company prepares for the worst.

Stella Glow is an SRPG for the Nintendo 3DS platform and so far has only been announced for Japanese release. The game is set to hit Japanese stores on June 4th. You can read more about it on Famitsu. You can also check out the newly launched SEGA product site here.

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Total War series sells 11 million within the last 6 years

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SEGA has announced their critical acclaimed series Total War has managed to sell 11 million units between the previous 5 installments (Empire, Napoleon, Shogun 2, Rome II and Attila) and a further 18 million units of DLC sold. What’s interesting to note is due to the fact that Attila is so new, it is almost assuredly that the majority of the 11 million sales is actually made up of 4 titles, showcasing just how popular the series is. Furthermore SEGA revealed that the first week sales in the UK for the latest Total War title, Attila, were 21,680 units with 81% of the sales coming from digital.

Speaking to MVC, Total War brand director Rob Bartholomew said;

“Since the release of Total War: Napoleon in 2010, we’ve built a great tradition of standalone follow-ups to our major titles, and it’s great to see Attila so well-received by fans and critics.

Globally we’re seeing this title reach double the sales of Napoleon in its first week and, as Creative Assembly’s home market, it’s heartening to see the UK taking its fair share of that success. With over a million people playing Total War each month now, it turns out there’s plenty of gamers who just want to watch the world burn. Who knew?”

Total War‘s impressive 1 million active users a month is surely another indication why SEGA, along with it’s life consuming Football Manager series, has been focusing so much on PC. As they continue to curve up a strong position in the PC market and with both Total War: Warhammer and Total War: Arena on the horizon, this series will prove to be a key pillar for the SEGA’s growth and prosperity.

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Unboxing a brand new SEGA Menacer from 1992

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You don’t find boxed hardware from the early 90s all that often, and when you do they usually sell for an arm and a leg. Thankfully, last week I found a boxed SEGA Menacer light gun from 1992 still sealed with baggies and all for a cool $40. I really wanted to free it from its packaging as soon as I got home, but I abstained until I had the time to do a proper unboxing. Check out what a boxed Menacer looks like and join me as we play a few of the bundled games!

Some background on the Menacer: Revealed to the public at 1992’s CES in Chicago, the Menacer was SEGA’s answer to the Nintendo’s Super Scope. The Menacer project was spearheaded by SEGA producer Mac Senour, who worked on the light gun and the bundled six-game pack. Notable to Toejam & Earl fans, one of the six games was a mini-game from Greg Johnson and Mark Voorsanger. Other SEGA licenses were proposed, but ultimately abandoned in favor of shooting mini-games. You can learn more about the Toejam & Earl mini-game in our recent interview with Greg Johnson.

While SEGA did not release additional first-party Menacer titles, there is a small library of games compatible with the light gun. Most notably, T2: The Arcade Game, both Mad Dog McCree games, and Corpse Killer. Call me a SEGA fanboy, but I much prefer the look and feel of the Menacer to Nintendo’s Super Scope.

Like this video? Subscribe to the SEGAbits YouTube channel.

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Swingin’ Report Show #77: Interview with Greg Johnson, co-creator of Toejam and Earl

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Toejam and Earl: Back in the Groove is a Kickstarter campaign from Greg Johnson, video game designer and co-founder of ToeJam & Earl Productions. On this week’s Swingin’ Report Show podcast, Greg joins us to talk about how he plans to bring the funky aliens back in a new game, and how he and Mark Voorsanger pitched and developed the original three games of the series for SEGA.

Learn how Toejam and Earl made the transition from Greg’s subconscious to video games, what it was like working with SEGA throughout the 90s, his thoughts on the sequels Panic on Funkotron and Mission to Earth, and how Toejam and Earl: Back in the Groove is set to reimagine and build upon the famous first game. If you’re a game developer, or simply want to know more about how games are made, this episode is a must listen!

Show your support for Greg and his team, check out the Toejam and Earl: Back in the Groove Kickstarter today!

[Download] [RSS] [iTunes] [Archive]

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Today’s Persona 4: Dancing All Night trailer shows off new character Kanami Mashita

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After showing Rise Kujikawa and Yu Narukami, Atlus shows off the new character Kanami Mashita from Persona 4: Dancing All Night in this week’s character trailer which was once again translated by bobrossfreak. She wears puffy pants and introduces herself as a cow, which is probably all you’ll ever need to know about her. The trailer follows a similar format as previous trailers with dialogue, animated cutscenes and gameplay being shown off, with an added quick and weird fanservice shot.

Atlus also revealed some DLC that will be included in the Japanese “Crazy Value Pack”. It’ll include costume DLC including Gekkoukan school outfits from Persona 3 and the outfits the characters wore in the epilogue of Persona 4 Golden. Also included is the credits song from Persona 4 called “Never More”.

In other Persona news, Gematsu translated a recent lengthy interview about both upcoming Persona games: Dancing All Night and Persona 5, which can be read here.

 

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Valkyria Chronicles sold over 200,000 copies on Steam

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Ars Technica put together a list of the most popular games of 2014 (meaning 2015 sales don’t count), ranking games that had the most owners and how many hours the games got played. As you know, SEGA released Valkyria Chronicles, a 6 year old Playstation 3 game on Steam last year. How did it perform?

According to the post Valkyria Chronicles ranked just above Telltales Games’ Game of Thrones series with 210,299 owners and almost 2 million hours played by fans. That is pretty incredible if you ask me and further proves that Japanese games do have a place on PC services like Steam.

Even though Valkyria Chronicles was an older port, it sold comparable to SEGA’s new Alien: Isolation game which had 329,649 owners on steam and over 3 million hours played.

I think the biggest success for SEGA digitally in 2014 was (by no surprise) Football Manager 2015 which had over 850,000 owners on the service and fans have logged in over 130 million hours into it (in little under two months!).

Seeing as Valkyria Chronicles‘ PC success has shocked even SEGA, what older console games do you think will do well on Steam? 

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The Chaotix are playable in Sonic Runners today

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For a limited time only, the Chaotix are available to play in Sonic Runners starting today. The Chaotix campaign will last from 3/5 to 3/15 They increase ring bonuses by 75%. Vector is a power type, Espio is the speed type and Charmy of course, is the flight type.

Only thing is, I haven’t figured out how to play as them. I finished my latest mission as Sonic and Tails, but the Chaotix don’t seem to be available anywhere (although, since it’s not technically 6 AM in the U.S. as of this posting, thy just might not be available yet). There’s still no set release date for the U.S. version yet, but we will inform you the moment it’s known so stay tuned!

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2-Man Scramble put the dynamic duo to the test in Batman Forever: The Arcade Game for the SEGA Saturn

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After having suffered through the 16-bit catastrophe that was Batman Forever on SEGA Genesis, A.J. and Mickey must tackle the 32-bit arcade translation, Batman Forever: The Arcade Game for SEGA Saturn. No riddles, no more platform hopping; just plain ass-beating!

Want a more in-depth review of this surprisingly enjoyable brawler? Check out My Life with SEGA: Batman Forever: The Arcade Game!

Like this video? Subscribe to the SEGAbits YouTube channel.

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Alien: Isolation pre-release footage released, features unused third person view

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Games change during development, even change after media journalists have gotten a good look at the game. Creative Assembly’s Alien: Isolation is no different. The footage above shows what could have been Alien: Isolation before they changed it to first person prospective.

Personally think they did the right move making it first person due to the nature of using melee combat and I hate using melee combat in 3rd person shooters (see: Gears of War, Binary Domain and Uncharted series).

So what do you think?

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Official Nintendo listing reveals 3D OutRun release date

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Nintendo 3DS owners looking to add to their SEGA 3D Classics library needn’t wait long, as Nintendo’s official site lists 3D OutRun for a March 12th release! Priced at $5.99, the game includes all of the original’s content, two new songs and 60 fps gameplay. Check out the full description below:

3D Out Run™ is the critically acclaimed 1986 driving game designed by Yu Suzuki, re-mastered and enhanced for the Nintendo 3DS™ hand-held system. 3D Out Run includes all of Out Run’s original content, alongside two new songs and runs at 60 frames per second, which is twice the speed of the original version. The game features a built in Stage Select option that allows players to save and resume progress mid-game, has adjustable difficulty settings, and includes unlockable car customization options. Additionally, players are able to choose from a number of real-life arcade cabinets wherein everything from the appearance to the environmental sounds of the specific cabinet are recreated, providing a true and authentic arcade experience.

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A look at Yakuza Zero’s 80’s hits! Collection

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The 80’s where a great time for Japan and it just happens that Yakuza Zero will celebrate this time in history and that means it has to have all the popular tunes released during that time period. It has to be, as they say, authentic. After the jump we have the cover for the Yakuza Zero album called ‘Yakuza Zero: 80’s Hits! Collection‘, which has twelve tracks various 80’s artist (two in-house exclusive tracks).

Now you are sitting there and wondering what popular music in Japan sounded like in the 80’s, well don’t worry we got you covered! Hit the jump and each track has a link to their respective music video. Turn up the volume and enjoy.

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Game Freak and SEGA tease something for March 11th

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The Twitter account of RPG Site tweeted that they had received a postcard from SEGA and Game Freak teasing that they’ll seemingly reveal a new game on March 11th. Nothing is known about it aside from its cartoony look.

Game Freak is most well known for being the studio behind the Pokémon games, but you may also know them for making Pulseman for the Mega Drive. This is the first time SEGA has collaborated with the developer since the release of that game.

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