AH Challenge: Sega Thrives

MrHola

Banned
Long time Sega fanboy here. Is there a way that Sega, instead of ending up as a third party developer, still remains a console developer? One possible POD is that Nintendo keeps it’s deal with Sony, leading to a Nintendo PlayStation. Remember, people don’t like add-ons (Sega CD, 32X) and the Nintedo PlayStation more or less follows the same path as the Sega CD in OTL. Sega, judging from the poor sales of the PlayStation decides not to develop the 32X or the Sega CD, instead they completely focus on the Sega Saturn.

Result, the Sega Saturn is way easier to progrma for and becomes a bigger succes. “Mature” titles such as Resident Evil (the Saturn port was quite good and had some notable advantages over the Playstation original) or Metal Gear Solid go to the Saturn. Any thoughts?
 

Sachyriel

Banned
Sega allies with Bungie, as Apple is soon bought out by Microsoft, who is scared of a Sony/Nintendo Market grab. With the Sega-Bungie team releasing Halo, the world goes crazy for it.

Then, with the Advent of a new Sonic-pinball-style game, where you and a few other friends play as Sonic-Pinball, Monkey Ball, 343 Guilty Spark and other round things, the market really opens up. Sega Net is soon rivalling the internet for the amount of games being played (save for online games).

And, then deathknell, is Ultra Destruction. Every character the Sega Team can get it's hands on for the release of the Sega Cloud. The Sega Cloud must be on the internet, as there it gets the 'cloud-computer' effect, making it faster, more players in a game, extra content, etc. Without a connection, it is an ok game player, but the shares go through the roof for this ultra-exclusive gamer platform.

And, then, the old Westwood team gets in on the action, with a few defectors from Blizzard, and they make Halo Wars, the RTS Halo. And then comes Gears of War, which is a smash hit. Starcraft 2 and C&C3 are Sega Cloud-only.

The next thing (PS4 vs. ?) will come next if the thread stays alive.
 
Sega allies with Bungie, as Apple is soon bought out by Microsoft, who is scared of a Sony/Nintendo Market grab. With the Sega-Bungie team releasing Halo, the world goes crazy for it.

Sega had vast amounts of debt—they wouldn't be able to afford Bungie nor would Sega (with a dozen development teams at the top of their game in the Dreamcast era) care to buy them.

Microsoft had no interest in buying Apple—not least because it would remove the only remotely viable contender to Windows which would piss off the Department of Justice even more.
 

Sachyriel

Banned
Sega and Bungie work together due to Apple having a 'gamers' alliance with microsoft, to bring in Gamers away from nintendo/sony/sega/atari. They make it cross-platform (like Xbox-Vista today), and Sega needs a good gaming team, like Bungie, who made things like Myst, Marathon, Halo, ONI...
 
Sega and Bungie work together due to Apple having a 'gamers' alliance with microsoft, to bring in Gamers away from nintendo/sony/sega/atari. They make it cross-platform (like Xbox-Vista today), and Sega needs a good gaming team, like Bungie, who made things like Myst, Marathon, Halo, ONI...

Why? Sega has ten quality development teams putting out the best games they ever put out before and after the Dreamcast era, plus Visual Concepts is matching EA in sports games. (Phantasy Star Online, Chu-Chu Rocket, Sonic Adventure, Crazy Taxi, Super Monkey Ball, Skies of Arcadia, Space Channel 5, and so forth.)

(And, uh, by 1999 Atari has been out of the hardware business for half a decade with the failure of the Atari Jaguar.)

Bungie is running low on money to get Halo out the door (ONI was rushed IOTL because they needed the cash) and that meant they got bought by Microsoft. If Bungie secures Sega as a publisher that means Halo gets rushed out early in '00 and probably doesn't make much of an impact. Sega isn't going to buy Bungie and so—like ONI—Halo would get rushed out if they became Bungie's publisher. (Bungie didn't make Myst, by the way, you're probably thinking of Myth.)

As for Apple—Steve Jobs is not a fan of gaming. Apple simply wouldn't get involved.


Look, by the time the Dreamcast launched it was simply too late for Sega to succeed in the hardware business. They were too broke, and Sony's position was too strong.

You have to go back to the Saturn at least if you want Sega to last longer in the hardware business.
 
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