The Legacy of Sega

Sega has been synonymies with video games for decades. Ever since the Sega Genesis hit the home market with it's revolutionary graphics and intense games, Sega has been part of our world and culture. During its prime Sega was Nintendo's number one rival in the 16 and 8 nit genera and the company has spawned such amazing hits like Sonic the Hedgehog, and played host to a number of teen oriented games like Zero Tolerance, and the acclaimed Mortal Combat series. Sega has been around for a much longer time, however, then most people realize. There roots extend back to the 1940's and success in World War II.

Sega is actually a combination of the words Service Games. There first machines were coin operated and based in Honolulu Hawaii. These machines were to provide service men stationed at military bases in the area entertainment and a sense of leisure during the days of World War II. After the war Sega moved to Tokyo Japan. Once registered across the ocean Sega industries noticed the popularity of their coin operated machines among the public and expanded.

Rosen enterprises was a company that exported art used in the coin operated machines used by Sega, and in 1965 the two companies merged to form Sega enterprises. Within a year of the merger the new company released a simulator game called "Periscope" that became a smash hit world wide.

1969 rolled around and Gulf Western bought out Sega enterprises, but Rosen was allowed to remain CEO of the Sega gaming division. Under his leadership Sega produced an array of arcade hits such as Frogger and Zaxxon. By 1982 Sega's revenues hit an all time high of 214 million dollars and in 1983 Sega released their first video game consul the SG-1000

Everything was going great for Sega and crew, until the video game crash that followed its short live success. In 1984 companies like Sega and Atari were losing money like crazy. In light of these unfortunate turn of events Gulf western sold the American portion of the company to famed pinball company Bally and its Japanese portion sold for 38 million dollars. The Japanese assets were purchased by none other then Rosen, and a group of investors including Hayao Nakayama. Nakayama became the new CEO of Sega and Rosen the head of its subsidiary in the United States.

Sega would change hands in the Japanese market again, being acquired by CSK but Rosen stayed a part of the company through all it's deals and transactions. In 1986 Sega of America was established to take advantage of a re-vamped gaming industry, following off the heels of Nintendo's success.

The first mascot of Sega was a character named Alex Kidd, a monkey like boy who appeared in a series of games developed by Sega for its "Master System" The games were very basic and had no continuing storyline from one to the next. The mechanics of each game would change drastically with each new installment, and thus drove many fans away. In 1991 with the release of the Sega Genesis a new character took over for Alex Kidd as the Sega mascot, the blue speed demon we all know and love to this day. Sonic the Hedgehog.

Sega went directly for the jugular of its major competitor Nintendo when the Genesis was released. Slogans like "Genesis does what Nintendon't" were a popular choice, but when Nintendo released it's new 16 bit consul system, the Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES) these slogans from Sega were now untrue. As a marketing strategy Sega focused on one thing, their mascot and his attitude. Sonic was fast, new, and cool, where as Mario was a chunky plumber who jumped on turtles.... Needless to say this strategy worked.

Sonic was the number one hit on the home based consul. The game play was smooth and easy to pick up. The environments were crisp and clear, and of course, Sonic had attitude. By 1993 Sega controlled over 65% of the gaming market, actually beating out the Nintendo in overall sales of games, consuls and accessories. Everything seemed to point to a definitive win for Sega in the consul wars, but as with any battle you can never count out the opposition.

In 1994 Nintendo dealt a crushing blow to Sega by releasing games such as Donkey Kong Country and Super Metroid, as well a new Zelda title. This along with Sega's multiple failures caused the percent tables to turn. Sega now only controlled 35% of the market.

Sega's blunders were not really mistakes, but rather they were too advanced for the time. Add-ons to the original consul included the Sega 32X and the Sega CD but these additions were poorly received by the public. In 1995 Sega released its next generation system the Sega Saturn, which used a 32 bit processor, preceding the Sony Playstation and Nintendo 64. However poor sales and a lack of popular titles lead to the demise of this system within 3 years. The only major success to come of the Sega Saturn was the Virtual Fighter series that has survived to this day.

Sega tried desperately one last time to regain a foothold in the gaming market. In 1999 the Sega Dreamcast was launched, it became the biggest selling consul system upon release until the Sony Playstation 2 was launched. Dreamcast was a major achievement for the company, but again, they lacked good solid titles, and the hardware was at times unreliable. The release of the Playstation 2 in 2000 put the final nail in Sega's consul dreams. In 200 Sega was renamed "Sega Corperation" and in 2001 the Dreamcast was discontinued ending Sega's run as a video game hardware manufacture.

Sega may be gone form the home based market, but they still thrive as a third party publisher. Games like Sonic survive today on every consul, form Xbox to Gamecube, and are being developed for the next generations consuls that are in our homes today. Soul Caliber has had 2 incarnations since its original release on the Dreamcast, and the Virtual Fighter series has a large fan base and following that is going no where.

Perhaps with more time to focus on games rather then hardware Sega will be producing a higher quality of games. So far this has been the case. Sega's success in the past present and future will always be a part of video gaming history, an amazing story of a company operating coin driven photo albums, to the Video gaming giant it is today!