Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed hits shelves early, and new details emerge…

… but we aren’t going to write what they are! Why spoil the surprise? Instead, we’ll leave it up to readers if they want to head on over to the original Gamefaqs post where the spoilers began, or check out our forums where we’re discussing the new bits of information in spoiler tags. Until SEGA or Sumo Digital share things officially, we won’t be posting blurry photos of television screens or descriptions of the new tracks in news posts. Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed releases officially later this week!

First 4 Figures teases Shadow the Hedgehog statue

First 4 Figures are at it again, teasing another of their Sonic the Hedgehog statues. This time, the company are adding Shadow to their line of modern era statues, which began with Sonic the Hedgehog. The Sonic statue as well as the Shadow statue have yet to release. Both are available for pre-order, with Sonic slated for a Q1 2013 release, and Shadow slated for an unspecified date. First 4 Figures, however, has revealed the pre-order date, which begins November 11th. Personally, I find these statues to be incredibly cool but far outside my price range. It’s a shame First 4 Figures never expanded their awesome, and affordable, classic Sonic vinyl figures. Still, those who have been collecting all of these statues as well as the Shadow fans out there should be very happy to hear the news.

Sonic the Fighters Achievements Revealed

The achievements for the HD rerelease of Sonic the Fighters have been revealed, and they seem rather easy to attain. I’m sure plenty of folks would get all the achievements within minutes. There are a total of 12 achievements to earn, and all together are worth 400 gamerscore points. I wish there was a Super Sonic achievement to make it a bit more challenging. Hit the jump to see the achievements.

Review: Sonic Adventure 2 (XBLA/PSN)

SEGA’s rerelease of Jet Set Radio was, in my opinion, excellent. After the so-so Dreamcast Collection rereleases, the first game of the SEGA Heritage Collection was a breath of fresh air. HD visuals, widescreen support and SEGA trying their best to retain as much of the original game as they could. My hope was that this trend would continue with the next two Heritage titles. Does Sonic Adventure 2, a game that is considered one of Sonic’s best 3D outings, carry on the SEGA Heritage quality or is it a step back? Read on to find out!

SEGA Five: A Salute to the SEGA All-Stars Part 4

I can’t believe that four weeks have passed since we began this salute to the SEGA All-Stars appearing in Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed! Part 1, Part 2 and Part 3 can be viewed at those handy links. If you’re all caught up with us, let me introduce you to our five All-Stars for this week: Ulala of Space Channel 5, Shadow of Shadow the Hedgehog (oh, and some franchise called Sonic the Hedgehog), Sonic’s not-quite girlfriend Amy Rose, Aiai’s wife MeeMee and our flagman of the game Ristar.

New Sonic All Stars Racing Transformed trailer shows off the Wii U’s features

This morning, Sega put up another trailer for Sonic and All Stars Racing Transformed. This time, the focus is on all the features of the Wii U version. Features shown include 5 player split-screen, 10 player online, rear view and weapon view cameras, optional tilt control and more. If the video is indicative of the Wii U version, it’s looking pretty smooth. Now you know why this is the version I’m picking up with my launch Wii U.

And you too can pick Sonic and All Stars Racing Transformed on Wii U, 360 or PS3 when it races into stores November 18th.

32X month – My Life With SEGA kicks things off with a hardware review and T-Mek

Apologies for the day delay. Blame Hurricane Sandy, the Nintendo Wii U and Mitt Romney. In any case, here is your weekly dose of My Life With SEGA. This week, A.J. starts off 32X month by doing a very special hardware review, followed by a classic episode in which A.J. takes on T-Mek for the, you guessed it, 32X.

Oh yeah, ladies and germs; I’m reviewing the 32X. Not just a game, but the hardware itself. 18 years ago this month, Sega unleashed their 32-bit peripheral upon the American public. While it’s earnings were initially strong, it soon crashed harder than the Hindenburg….

How? Why? Well, here’s my take.

After the break: T-Mek!

Pier Solar HD project hits Kickstarter, Dreamcast named as one of the platforms

We’ve written about the indie SEGA Genesis game Pier Solar a number of times, and here we are writing about it again. WaterMelon Co., the team behind the original game, are taking to Kickstarter in hopes of funding an HD version of the game for a number of platforms including the SEGA Dreamcast. Other platforms include Xbox 360, PC, Mac and Linux. As you can see above, and at their Kickstarter page, the game is making a big graphical leap! If fully funded, the project appears to have an estimated completion date of December 2013. All the details concerning the project can be found over at their Kickstarter page, but after the break check out the SEGA related bits.

Cool art print: The Genesis and SNES as giant fighting robots

The internet is never short of crazy fan made SEGA goodies. From Daniel Dussault comes an awesome piece of fan art which depicts the 90’s console war as two console-inspired robots in battle. The piece originated at the Fangamer VERSUS Attract Mode Art Show during PAX Prime 2012. Now, SEGA (or Nintendo) fans fans can own their very own print of the piece by hitting up the Fangamer site. The print is $20 and measures 24″ x 16″. Hit up the link for more images of the print and make sure to share it with your friends!

Thanks to SEGAbits reader and forum member Randroid for the heads up!

Sega posts Employment Ad related to the Virtua Fighter series. Is something special coming up?

Just two days late posting this great news but other than that, Sega of Japan posted a Job Ad for 3 part time positions to work with AM2 and on the Virtua Fighter series. The job description includes assisting with production, organizing/creating events, and working on the VF.net mobile website. They are also looking for fans of the VF series. The deadline for the ad ends on December 7th and the job begins on Febuary 1, 2013. Could AM2 be working on a new Virtua Fighter anniversary title, Fighting Vipers, or VF6? Either way, I’m excited about it. Our forum members are even talking about it right now.

Retro Review: Sakura Taisen


Sakura Taisen (Sakura Wars) is a Strategy RPG adventure series that features a unique sim-based story system developed by AM7 Team Shinobi (Overworks) from SEGA along with Red Entertainment. The series first began in 1996 for the Sega Saturn and spawned several sequels, including OVA adaptations, TV anime series, a movie, and other merchandises. While the game was a successful Sega IP in Japan, it never had a release in the West until the release of the fifth game, which was released and published by NIS America. However, the series has had a cult following within the Sega & anime community fan base with english releases of anime videos. Want to know what I think about the game and how awesome it is? Read on to find out.

Yakuza 1 & 2 HD places 3rd in Japanese debut

It appears that the PS3 debut of Yakuzas 1 and 2 didn’t fare too badly. Not the first time that either game has been given the re-release treatment, this latest edition bundles them together and sports a resolution update along with new difficulty options; it was evidently enough to achieve third place and sales of 58,138. It goes without saying that no Western release is currently planned.

First place belonged to Namco Bandai’s latest Tales game, Tales of Xillia 2, with 364,439 sold. Second place meanwhile was occupied by another HD-enhanced port; this one none other than Clover Studios’ incredible action/adventure game, Okami, which sold 68,644 copies.

Hit the jump for the full Japanese weekly charts courtesy of CvG, even if just to see the 3DS’ continuing domination of all other hardware in its homeland.

The Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed achievement icons are full of SEGA fan service!

While we’ve known of the Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed achievement names and conditions for quite some time, we haven’t really seen all the icons for the achievements until today. From the looks of it, the icons double as license stickers. So complete an achievement, and you unlock a circular sticker to slap on your in-game license. While some achievement icons feature non-SEGA images like a photo camera and a gold star, other are incredibly cool! Like, for example, the star of the Dreamcast cult classic Segagaga and even the logo of a popular Dreamcast racing game. After the break, check out all the icons!

Fan translation for Valkyria Chronicles III underway

Right now a few hardcore Valkyria Chronicles fans are translating the 3rd entry of the franchise, Valkyria Chronicles III. The game was released last year in Japan on PSP and since the PSP is basically dead outside of Japan, we can stop hoping for SEGA to bring it over. But don’t fear, seems that the translation is going good.The team is working on a patch for the regular edition and also the Extra Edition.

Apparently lots of the main text has already been translated and the placing of the text on screen has been tested. The main issue right now is the character limits on the main menus. So how will it work? How can you patch the game? Sadly you will need to have custom firmware installed on your PSP. If you want to keep your PSP legit, you might want to hold off on hacking it since the team is working on a softmod that will only require a special firmware installed on your memory card.

If you want to check out updates on the project, head over to their official blog.

 

SEGA Tunes: Daytona USA “Let’s Go Away -H. version”

In this month’s Tuesday Tune, we’re going to upload some familiar Sega racing tunes to our readers as Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed will be hitting our local game stores in two weeks. To fill your racing mood for November, the first Sega tune will be the remix “Let’s Go Away -H. version” sung by none other than Takenobu Mitsuyoshi, composer for Sega Corporation who is known for his awesome musical scores on several Sega titles since 1990 such as Virtua Fighter & Shenmue. Mitsuyoshi-san uploaded this video to promote the rerelease of Daytona USA for digital platforms. One thing that has been bugging me for a while, why hasn’t Sumo have this awesome man to sing a theme song for Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed? That would fill the mood for me to race players online. How about you guys?