Are we playing Games or Reading Business Week
Dave "BlackFox"
Dakich@aol.comHere's an ed that was originally a posting I made at Eclipse Gaming. It includes a response by "WES" and my response to him. Hope you guys like it!
First Post (ME):
Seems like 50% of the Saturn owners (and also a lot of non-saturn owners) on the net are to busy complaining about Sega's management and are really missing the point of Video games. I myself have been disappointed by some of the moves of Sega but I'm not going to let that fog my outlook on the big picture.
VIDEO GAMES ARE SUPPOSE TO BE FUN! I bet that the happiest Saturn owners are the ones that don't go on the Internet or read a whole lot of game magazines. They just go to the store and look at the games buy them and that's it. They don't bitch that Sony's getting this game or that game and Sega's not. If you want to get so worked up at all the hype of the "activities of the companies" then you might as well read business week. Remember: If you want information, you must be prepared FOR information.
The most important thing for Sega to do is bring out games and promote the Saturn. Sure, they may not be doing a lot of advertisement now but is Sony? Is Nintendo? (Granted, they probably need less ads). Besides, the main reason the Saturn is not doing as well in the US is really the fault of the Customers for not buying it. Sega is not god and they're not prefect. They have to think of things to do; they'll try it; it might work or it might not. That 3 free games offer was great! It worked! The buy 2 get 1 free sort of worked. The coupons they sent everyone sort of worked. Now they're going to do a Netlink offer with 2 free games. I sure planning to get one now. In short, don't under estimate Sega. They will put effort into selling the Saturn so cut them a little slack.
Just remember the whole purpose of a "game".
-laters
BlackFox
---------------------------------
Response (Wes):
No, we haven't forgotten the purpose of a "game", and that's the whole reason for most of the complaining. Sega's not giving us the games it already has waiting for us in Japan and they act like they could care less. If it weren't for all the great import-only software I've gotten, I'd me much more dissatisfied with my Saturn. Sure, there's a Rally and VF every now and then, but you can't play them all the time. So when Sega of America tells us that games like Three Dirty Dwarves, Bug!, and Rise 2 etc... are what we want, I want to puke. Even Sega's own classic games (Sega Ages) must be brought out by a third party who recognizes how great those games were. Speaking of that 3rd party, Working Designs/Spaz, it's just like Nintendo blowing off Square- they the greatest 3rd party games for their system, they don't work with them to keep them happy, next thing you know Square is over in Playstation land and creates the biggest game of all time for it. Ok, maybe they're not THAT great, but who else is bringing us the great games from lands afar? Not Sega, except maybe once every 6 months- far, far too seldomly. If we never see games like THUNDERFORCE 5 on these shores, you know right there that it's all over, and S.O.A. is D.O.A.
If I could read Japanese, I'd be in 7th heaven!
-Wes
------------------
response(ME):
Well, my point was that we should enjoy what we got and not spoil our enjoyment with the politics of the video game industry. After all, who loves politics? (don't answer that :)
But you got some good points, however there are some mistakes in what your saying.
Sega of America is already bringing out games that we do want from Japan, they're just not bringing "every" game that we want. Shining the HA, Last Bronx, Panzer Dragon RPG are a few examples. But you'd have to agree that Sega of America as well as ANY company does not have the money as well as the resources to bring out every single worthy game from Japan to the states. Now, SOA has to really think about their translations and decide what will sell and what will sit on the shelves. Fortunately, there are other companies to help pick up the slack. Unfortunately, those companies are dropping like flies. (speaking of which write to WD and SOA, bug them, in a nice way, until everything's...cool). Now, you'd have to admit that some games that YOU like or I like may not sell too well to the 2 million American Saturn owners out there. Remember, a hit game has to sell at least 100,000 units which is very hard to do. (Esp. for the Saturn since it has a lower user base than PSX). Some games are no brainers- i.e.= Fighters MegaMix, and SOA knows that they will sell. Now others are slightly harder to consider like the Phantasy Star Collection. Now, I would buy a collected PS series disk in a sec, but I do realizes that the PS series has only a cult following here in the US. If nothing new is added to the disk, some fans will not buy it because they already have all the games or they feel that they already played it and want to save their money for something new. Of course their are some people who will buy it just for PS 1 since they probably never played it. Then there are people who will buy it because their PS carts have dead batteries or they just hard core PS fans. As you can see, it's a gamble and most people know that SOA lost a lot of respect because they gambled, i.e. 32X. Another thing we have to note is that a lot of U.S. gamers has very limited taste. The top genres in the States are Sports, Fighters, and RPG's and 3D is all a lot of average gamers look for. It's risky to bring out a game without "next-generation" 3D fx eye candy. Blame that on the casual gamer. Is Thunderforce 5 really going to sell here in the States where shooters are a dying breed? In might, it might not. I'd buy it but others won't. It's always a gamble. (but I really hope it does hit the States, write to WD)
SOA could care less? How do you know this? Did you talk to them personally? Their President perhaps? They're just a big company and everyone knows that it's hard to contact a big company. I think it's a little unfair to say that they "care less" with position we're in. Does Sony care more? Does Nintendo? Priority #1 of a Company in making money. I doubt Sony really cares more than say Nintendo. You might be right Wes, but how do you know?
Three Dirty Dwarves, Bug!, and Rise 2. These games are american made and NOT made by SOA. The first two are by SegaSoft which is part owned by Sega true, but they are generally a separate company. Rise 2 is came out on the PSX (and others I think?). Is that SOA's fault? Is it Sony's fault that their are a whole lot of average games on the PSX? Is it Nintendo's fault that War Gods was released? ....well, maybe, but remember, even if Dirty Dwarves was not released it wouldn't have meant that a better Japanese game would have came out instead. In fact, some of the best games for the Saturn were from Sega themselves.
I think WD got Sega Ages more because of their good relationship with SOJ and not because SOA didn't want to translate it. Besides, this would free up resources for SOA. And Nintendo didn't blow off Square, they tried to work things out but it just didn't happen. I might be more correct to say that Square Blew off Nintendo. Remember, it was Square that didn't want to use carts or the 64DD (or is that DD64?). (side off the subject note: I think the only reason the PSX is now ahead in Japan is mostly because of FF7) If Square really wanted too, they could have made a great game on the N64 and the Saturn for that matter. They just didn't want to and I also bet they just wanted to make more sales, since Sony had the largest worldwide user-base.
SOA is DOA? I think not. Anyone who says this is in my opinion just a little too cynical which is probably caused by the stress of liking a underdog system. Don't listen to the "mean" PSX owners or the "mean" N64 owners (note that I'm refiring to the mean ones and not everyone). Market reports are usually worth as much as I can throw them. Remember that report that said that the Saturn would have about 5% of the market and the M2 would have like about 20% (can't recall too well) about two years ago. Well it looks like they didn't use their 10 free minutes on the Psychic help line. well 20% is a lot better than 5% and what's a M2?