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Rumor: Leaked Image shows Arcade1Up’s upcoming SEGA AM2 Fighting Games

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Over on Reddit, a user named Smashingtime98, released a leaked image of Arcade1up’s upcoming arcade cabinet of games which features five SEGA AM2 fighting games. The list of games included is Virtua Fighter, Virtua Fighter Remix, Virtua Fighter 2, Fighting Vipers and Sonic the Fighters.

While the arcade cabinet is not officially confirmed by Arcade1up, we will keep an eye out for more details when it’s available. In the meantime, Arcade1up is also working on arcade cabinet featuring Golden Axe Revenge of Death Adder and more AM1 classics to be released soon.

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Galloping Ghost Arcade in Brookfield, Illinois Debuts Incredibly Rare SEGA R360 Arcade Machine – Only Publicly Playable Machine in America

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I’ve covered the Galloping Ghost Arcade in Brookfield, Illinois a bit here on SEGAbits. Mainly because it is just a short drive away from the SEGAbits Midwest HQ (or SEGAbits Building 2 as I will now refer to it as). The arcade opened in August 2010, and has since expanded to fill an entire block of storefront property in the Chicagoland suburb. In the past, the arcade has debuted countless SEGA classics and hidden treasures including Space Harrier, Air Bike Cop, Star Wars Arcade and Ribbit.

As the arcade nears 800 games and hits its 10 year anniversary, arcade owner Doc Mack has long wanted to celebrate the milestone by debuting the ultra rare and expensive SEGA R360. The process to obtain one has been in the works for a while, with Doc even reaching out to SEGAbits for help in finding somebody willing to part with one. Thankfully, it looks like Doc’s efforts paid off as now, for the first time in decades, a functioning SEGA R360 machine is publicly playable in America!

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SEGA’s Aaron Webber Accepts Role at SEGA of Japan as Director of Strategy, Studio & Community Relations

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Aaron Webber, longtime friend to the site and a legend among Sonic and SEGA fans, has had a long career with SEGA of America. Joining SEGA in 2008, Aaron worked as a Game Master for Phantasy Star Universe, an Assistant Community Manager and then as Associate Brand Manager before a brief departure from the company in 2014. Then, in 2015, Aaron returned to act as PR & Social Media Manager and then Senior Social Media Manager for the Sonic the Hedgehog brand. It was during this period that Sonic saw a social media EXPLOSION with national attention on how he and his team handled the brand’s social media accounts.

Now, Aaron has accepted a role with SEGA of Japan as Director of Strategy, Studio & Community Relations. While not much has been said of Aaron’s day to day responsibilities, he has said “besides Sonic, this means I get to support a lot of great SEGA teams – first up is PSO2 which just launched on Steam!”

We here at SEGAbits congratulate Aaron and wish him luck on his new role at SEGA’s Japan offices.

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SEGA Akihabara Arcade, Building 2, Closing Permanently on August 30

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Earlier this month it was announced that SEGA Building 2, a Japanese SEGA arcade in Akihabara, will be closing its doors for good on August 30. While no official reason has been given, some speculate that SEGA are competing with themselves as the 1st, 3rd, 4th and recently opened 5th SEGA arcades in the area draw much more foot traffic thanks to being near stations and busy roads. It has also been said that Building 2 is cramped and is difficult to navigate.

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SEGA Technical Institute’s Canceled 16-Bit Game ‘Astropede’ Revealed for the First Time

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SEGA Technical Institute had a short life at SEGA with the team being responsible for games like Kid Chameleon, Sonic the Hedgehog 2, Sonic Spinball, and a lot of canceled project. Some of these we know about, one that we didn’t know about has made it online for the first time ever. This canceled game was called “Astropede’ and was shared by artist Craig Stitt on the Facebook group ‘SEGA Retro Gamers’

“The only surviving video of ‘Astropede’, a game I pitched and went into production at SEGA (STI) circa 1994. Unfortunately after 14 months it was shelved after being starved to death by a lack of resources. The character had a train of pods with various power ups that would be pulled behind him. If hit, the pods would fly apart similar to Sonic and his rings. (my original intent was to have it be part of the Sonic universe) Somewhere I have a playable prototype… I just have to find it and hope it can be made to work!“

We have some assets that Craig has shared, including this concept art that really makes it seem like a ‘Sonic type’ game (hit the break to see that!), the animation loop on top of the page and he even found a protoype of the game… will he share it online tho?

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Craig Stitt shares his ‘Boomer the Turtle’ designs that were cut from Sonic the Hedgehog 2

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Craig Stitt has been posting a lot of old video game content on the SEGA Retro Gamers Facebook group, if you don’t know Craig Stitt worked at SEGA Technical Insitute on Sonic the Hedgehog 2, Kid Chameleon, Sonic Spinball, Spyro the Dragon and many more games. He was also one of the artist at SEGA Technical Institute that was part of the competition to create Sonic’s buddy, for the sequel, which we all know was won by a Fox we all know as Tails. But did you know that Craig Stitt designed “Boomer” or as the document called him “Boomy” as competition for the orange fox?

“For Sonic 2 we needed a buddy / player two for Sonic. This little guy was my submission. He would have been tough with the shell, but vunerable, needing Sonic’s help, if he got flipped on his back. He would have helped out Sonic by being able to ‘fly’ if Sonic pushed him up to speed. Then Sonic would jump up and ride on his back over lava, spikes etc etc.” – Craig Stitt

When we did notes for the SEGA Talk Sonic the Hedgehog 2 podcast, we talked about “I wonder what Boomer would have looked like” and I love that Craig Stitt posted these documents so I can rest easy. So what you think of Boomer the Turtle?

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SEGA Talk Podcast #50: Sonic The Hedgehog 2 (1992)

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On this, our milestone 50th episode of SEGA Talk, George and Barry look back on the development, release and legacy of Sonic The Hedgehog 2 for the SEGA Genesis/Mega Drive. We cover the game’s unique creation in America, the debut of Miles “Tails” Prower and the comics and cartoon adaptations that took place following the game’s release.

Support us on Patreon! Get early access, tell us what games to cover, and have your SEGA memories read at the end and more!

[iTunes – Stitcher – YouTube – Play Music – RSS – Download]

If you want to give us feedback, suggest a topic for the next podcast or want to ask a question for us to answer on the next episode you can add  them as a comment below or send theme directly to our email. Make sure you use subject line ‘SEGA Talk’ and as always, thanks for listening!

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Did You Know: Sonic the Hedgehog Sneezes When Danger is Near!

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Just as we shared the news that Yakuza’s Kazuma Kiryu is a virgin, comes another bombshell about a favorite SEGA character. Did you know that Sonic the Hedgehog sneezes when danger is near?

The obscure Sonic fact came up when we posted a couple of weird Sonic the Hedgehog 2 pins on Twitter, one of which appears to have Sonic sneezing on Tails’ butt. We received a reply from @RanenWise who said “It was an early Sonic thing (that’s kinda mentioned now..at times?) that he’d sneeze when danger was approaching. I mainly remember it being in Sonic CD’s intro.”

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SEGA’s President & Chief Publishing Officer Kenji Matsubara resigns

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It seems that SEGA’s President and Chief Publishing Officer from SEGA has resigned this week as it was revealed via a short press release from SEGA-Sammy. The reason for his departure was listed as “personal reasons”, whatever that means. Matsubara held a few roles at SEGA like initially working as CTO for SEGA Network division before he was appointed COO of SEGA Games in 2017. He was named President and Chief Publishing Officer only four months ago, on April 2020 and has already resigned. Not a great look.

Before this Kenji Matsubara worked as CEO for Tecmo Koei and Zynga Japan, so he will most likely find work easy enough after leaving SEGA. What is your thoughts on the sudden departure of Kenji Matsubara?

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Phantasy Star Online 2 launches on Steam on August 5th

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Phantasy Star Online 2 has been available in North America for several months, but only for Xbox One and Windows 10 PC. All that changes on August 5th when Phantasy Star Online 2 releases to Steam for PC. Along with the date announcement came a slew of special rewards which allow you to wear costumes and decorations from Half-Life, Team Fortress and Portal. This isn’t the first time SEGA and Valve joined forces, as fans might remember when Renegade Ops and Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed crossed paths with Valve franchises.

Read more about the Steam rewards at the PSO2 website, and in the meantime mark your calendars for August 5th!

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Yuji Naka and Naoto Ohshima present BALAN WONDERWORLD, a new platformer published by Square Enix

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While we’re quite late in covering this, I did think it was necessary to news the reveal of Yuji Naka and Naoto Ohshima’s project at Square Enix seeing as we had an article about Naka’s Square Enix project last year. BALAN WONDERWORLD is an entirely new 3D action-platformer with hints of NiGHTS into Dreams and classic Squaresoft art styles. As described in the video above, the game features a costume system (of which there are over 80) which gives the player various actions. Different costumes will allow the player to solve the game’s puzzles and progress through the stages.

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figmaPLUS SEGA Consoles collection now available for pre-order – tiny accessories for your Figma action figures!

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If you’re unfamiliar with Figma, Figma is a Japanese action figure line produced by Max Factory and distributed by Good Smile Company. Various anime, movies, video games and even the occasional celebrity have Figma figures, what what’s so cool about them is that they are all the same scale, are super articulated and can mix and match accessories. The figmaPLUS line focuses on accessories and playsets, and of interest to SEGA fans is the figmaPLUS SEGA Consoles collection, which is now available for pre-order!

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Koei Tecmo’s financials suggest Persona 5 Scramble: The Phantom Strikers is coming west

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You know one thing that companies don’t mess around about, that’s their money. According to the latest Koei Tecmo’s financials presentation, it was listed that Persona 5 Scramble: The Phantom Strikers would be coming to North America and Europe for PlayStation 4 and Nintendo Switch. The issue? No release window announced.

While Persona 5 Scramble: The Phantom Strikers was published by Atlus in Japan, it was developed by Koei Tecmo’s studio Omega Force.

Would be interesting to see if Koei Tecmo or Atlus publishes this title.

[Via: Gematsu]

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SEGA Talk Podcast #49: Gunstar Super Heroes (2005)

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On this episode, we return to a Treasure classic with a look back at the Gunstar Heroes sequel Gunstar Super Heroes! Being our first Game Boy Advance game on the show, we also share our thoughts on Nintendo’s handheld, including the best games and our preferred models. As for Gunstar Super Heroes, we dive into the game’s development, how it compares to the original, and discuss the many elements of SEGA fan service that did and DIDN’T appear in the final product.

Support us on Patreon! Get early access, tell us what games to cover, and have your SEGA memories read at the end and more!

[iTunes – Stitcher – YouTube – Play Music – RSS – Download]

If you want to give us feedback, suggest a topic for the next podcast or want to ask a question for us to answer on the next episode you can add  them as a comment below or send theme directly to our email. Make sure you use subject line ‘SEGA Talk’ and as always, thanks for listening!

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