SEGA reveals company downsizing and relocation

[Alukard]

Sega should just go down and sell their first party IP's already.

[Selphea]

Japan as a whole seems to have lost its way after the consoles and portables at the turn of the millennium gave way to the Androids and Steams of today. It's not just Sega that's bleeding, even Sony and Nintendo are too.

IMO Digital and PC are the right direction to take, so this had to be done. PSO2 shouldn't be affected since it's on the good side of the balance sheet.

Also, good move getting out of San Fran. I'd imagine rentals would be insane.

And PSO2 on Steam would be very nice.

[MadDemon64]

Not really, SOA already seems low on money, it's not very likely that they could hire the staff and machine requried to run PSO2 on a international scale, most likely, they are looking for a distributer, like what happened with the SEA and Taiwan version.

And they have quite a selection, though personally my money is on either Trion or PWE.

[landman]

Today's report does not only mention SOA downsizing (which was already announced more than half a year ago), the Japan offices are also asking people to voluntarily retire (they want to reduce about 120 people, I doubt SOA is formed by a third of that amount), and arcade productions are being reduced as well (bye bye Virtua Fighter 6?)

http://www.segasammy.co.jp/english/

On the bright side of those doomsday news, Dengeky Bunko Fighting Climax will be released west... hooraaay?...

[Akaimizu]

I was actually surprised they still had enough employees in SOA to actually downsize. I thought they had like 1-5 left before this one.

[Gardios]

And they have quite a selection, though personally my money is on either Trion or PWE.

I'm sure SEGA could make enough money just by offering alpha access for 150 bucks.

[untrustful]

The sega of today isn't the same as the sega of yesteryears. This was bound to happen.

[HIT0SHI]

focus on digital and PC

Yes!We indeed need more PC games, even it's a console game ports as long it's nicely ported.

*crosses fingers for VANQUISH PC port*

I already embraced the digital versions of games. I would love to see ports for PC.

[Dark Emerald EXE]

My chilldhood!!!!!! (I had nintendo too but had genesis 1st)

[Chimeria]

And they have yet to realize they could probalby recoup their loses if they just released PSO2.

Heck they probably could have avoided this had they just released it as promised when they promised.

I think they're smart for not doing an NA release. PSO2 is a game built off nostalgia that doesn't really have the same impact as it's predecessor. And with it being F2P with a cash shop, gatcha items and a lack of inovative updates...It probably wouldn't last long. Plus I can already hear a lot of people complaining about it not really being F2P because you sort of need premium to get the full effect of the game.

Plus, even though the US player-base isn't that big, most of us who wanted to play it have already made a home in the JP version due to AIDA and her team. And it's very accessible. Sega may be dumb when it comes to certain things but I'm sure they know that a translation exists and many of us are using it. And with the company in the position that it's in, why hire a translation team, voice actors, etc. when half of it's already been done for free?

In my opinion, Sega would stay afloat if they pumped out good Sonic titles the way Nintendo does Mario games. You all realize that there has NEVER been a terrible Mario game? Even Mario and Sonic Olympics or whatever it was called got passable scores...And "Mario is Missing" doesn't count. We don't speak of that game.
Seriously though, Sonic Boom probably was the iceburg to Sega's Titanic. I don't know what the problem is but Sega just can't seem to get the blue blur right.