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The Sad Story of Sega's Many Mistakes

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the glad-sonic-made-it-out-alive dept.

Via Press the Buttons, an interesting interview at the Sega-16 site with former Sega president Tom Kalinske. The company's former head burns bridges by laying blame for failures in the company, discussing the ways in which the Japanese office tried to run things, and revealing some of the phenomenally bad ideas the company somehow managed to overcome. From the article: "He was selling the Genesis with Altered Beast as the pack-in [instead of Sonic], and he was selling it at $189.99. There was also very little software activity going on in the U.S., and he hadn't built the company up (gotten permission to hire or didn't have the budget to), so there was no progress being made. If you remember, Sega sold the 8-bit machine - the Master System - prior to that against Nintendo, and it managed to get a 2% share of the market."

7 of 119 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Marketing, Marketing, Marketing, Marketing by trix7117 · · Score: 2, Informative
    Even Apple's "switch" ads didn't produce any perceptible benefit for the company.
    Offtopic, I know, but I see a lot of posts about the Apple "switch" ads and how they are stupid or don't have any benefit for Apple. I don't know about anyone else but almost every non-geek I talk to that has seen them loves them. I personally know several people (friends' parents, my mother-in-law) who have even gone into the Apple store and played with a Mac because the commercials got their attention. My in-laws are now planning on purchasing an iMac as their next computer instead of a PC after their visit to the Apple store. I personally find them kind of dumb, but they definitely are being noticed (my mom and all of her friends routinely mention how much they love them) and are drawing in customers. I'm not trying to say that everyone I know is switching to a Mac because of Apple's great ads, but it is making people think about buying a Mac instead of a PC.
  2. Ridiculing Brand X != Sales by The+tECHIDNA · · Score: 3, Informative
    Kalinske, FTFA: "I have some ideas on that.. One of them is: you've got to advertise against Nintendo, you know, make fun of them. Ridicule Nintendo and make kids think that the NES is absolutely the uncoolest machine to own."

    Two words on why this could be an incredibly bad idea in practice: Johnny Turbo (also Wikified for your pleasure).

    It can work somewhat well (witness the Game Gear vs. Game Boy battles and the infamous "Fly Plaything, Fly" commercial for NiGHTS) when done correctly, but as both commercials show, the "ridicule 'em" method will get you a first down, but not a touchdown; or in the case of NEC's (TG-16) Johnny Turbo, an ejection.

    As an aside, again Kalinske, FTFA: "If you remember, Sega sold the 8-bit machine - the Master System - prior to that against Nintendo, and it managed to get a 2% share of the market."

    Well, it certainly didn't help that the distribution network was provided by Tonka Corporation (yes, the "toy construction truck" Tonka). Heck, my After Burner SMS cart storage box says on the back:

    Disributed by Tonka(TM) Corporation 6000 Clearwater Drive Minnetonka, MN 55543 Sega: From Tonka AFTER BURNER, A FOUR MEGA CARTRIDGE and SEGA are trademarks of Sega Enterprises, Ltd., a CSK Group Company. ©1988 Tonka Corp. All Rights Reserved.

    I'm glad Sega learned their lesson eventually WRT the Genesis/MegaDrive, but it's too bad the cart didn't come with a free Caterpillar Dump truck...

  3. Re:Altered Beast rocks! by Rude+Turnip · · Score: 2, Informative

    Even as a kid I found Final Fight a little disturbing, at least the arcade version. The more you beat up the female baddies, the more you were rewarded with titilation in the form of their shirts lifting up and cleavage coming out from underneath.

    --
    Bill Clinton: Pimp we can believe in. - The Shirt!!!
  4. Bundled Games by Skayde · · Score: 3, Informative

    "He was selling the Genesis with Altered Beast as the pack-in [instead of Sonic]" Well, it's not like Katz would have had a choice at the time. Altered Beast was indeed the bundled game for the Genesis at release, but Sonic wasn't even out then; it was released in June of 1991, and it replaced Altered Beast as the bundled game around that time as well.

  5. Great Interview by Mdentari · · Score: 2, Informative

    Finally some answers or at least a different view of the inner workings of the once mighty Sega. The N64 event alone was enough to blow my mind. Incredible stuff.

    --
    Morality, filters both ways.
  6. Master System Market Share by row1 · · Score: 3, Informative

    The Master System was big in Brazil (even up to the 2000's). They even had a Master System VI, including a wirless version and even a port of Street Fighter II. The Master System (II) was also quite big here in New Zealand, I only knew 1 person with a NES (I don't know where they got it from I even seen a NES for sale). Wonder Boy III rocked!!!

    --
    http://row1.info
  7. Re:Marketing, Marketing, Marketing, Marketing by Akaihiryuu · · Score: 3, Informative

    The SNES is superior to the Genesis in some ways, but it depends on which component you're talking about. The m68k in the Genesis was FAR FAR FAR superior to the 65816, it's a night-and-day difference, there isn't even any competition there. However, the SNES did have far superior video and audio co-processors...it's the other way there, the Genesis's video and audio processors couldn't touch the SNES's. So once again it's a tossup...the Genesis had a far superior main CPU, the SNES had far superior co-processors. It all depends on what you're doing and what kind of game it is. I've seen Genesis games that do Mode-7 style rotation/scling, but they have to do it entirely in software (unlike the SNES where it was done in hardware on the video processor). The Genesis CAN do more in software because of the stronger CPU, but it can't match a lot of the background and rotation/scaling effects the SNES can do. However, this was really only advantageous in RPG's, which don't have a whole lot happening on screen (usually). Once you get a lot happening on the screen, the limitations of the SNES's CPU come into play and you get a lot of slowdown. Look at a game like Chrono Trigger...there really isn't that much going on on the screen at once, but it has a lot of nice background effects. Super Metroid was an exception...but you do get a lot of slowdown when there's a lot going on (drop a power bomb in a room full of enemies to see). The Genesis had a fairly weak video processor in comparison...fewer colors, no hardware rotation/scaling abilities. The sound processor was weak too, it used a pretty much standard Z80 for sound and didn't have any hardware effects. The SNES's sound processor on the other hand was quite advanced. It could do 8 channels, plus it had lots of hardware effects (like surround and echo). It used a format similar to MOD files, but it did it entirely in hardware. It was night and day compared to Genesis sound, blew it away. Amazingly enough, the SPC sound processor in the SNES was designed by Sony! I almost couldn't believe it...they made one of the best console sound processors for Nintendo, but they can't make a decent sound processor for their own systems to save their life.