http://www.japantoday.com/smartphone/view/arts-culture/fans-mourn-segas-exit-from-the-console-video-game-market

Inevitable, continually release garbage and end up tanking as a result.

[MOD EDIT: This article is highly speculative and may be based on a misinterpretation/mistranslation of statements from Sega executives.]

That sucks. The Yakuza games are really cool.

I'm going to fucking cry if I can't get a Hatsune Miku game on PS4. :(

I wouldn't mind the Miku games moving to mobile. Cytus with Vocaloid music? Sign me the fuck up!

Oh man...I really hope the current Project Diva 3DS game is still coming out.

@corevi: I just kind of really want them to port the arcade game to PS4 if nothing else. At 60fps it looks pretty goddamn great.

Hopefully they'll auction off their franchises to other companies. Shining Force, Phantasy Star, etc. Or just give them to Atlus, fuck.

Pretty sure this is about the downsizing of their American branch. There's no indication that Sega Japan won't continue supporting consoles.

@blacklagoon: This is definitely about Sega of Japan.

I dunno, this reads like a misinterpretation of Sega's intention to focus on mobile and PC games. They've been fairly public about the fact that this is designed to shore up profits, and shouldn't be taken as an indication that they're abandoning consoles completely.

Besides, it would make little sense to exit the console market entirely after they've had their first genuine critical success in years with Alien: Isolation, and as much as Sonic has fallen from grace those games still move more than enough copies to justify their continued existence. Colour me extremely skeptical.

I wonder what will happen to all their franchises. Hopefully they sell Sonic to someone else. Anyone but Nintendo would be nice. I don't want to see Sonic go exclusive.

The five Japanese people that play console games mourn the exit.

I'd be interested in a Naughty Dogs' take on Sonic.

Within days of me getting super into the Yakuza series they abandon console games entirely.

Yeah, that sounds about right. *siiiiiigh*

This better not affect Atlus in any way.

I dunno, that article seems to have very few clear statements and lot of speculation. And if you look at Yakuza for example, Yakuza 5 was the best selling entry in the franchises history (ignoring budget releases), so it makes absolutely no sense for Sega to drop it.

@conmulligan: Yep. It makes absolutely no sense whatsoever with a lot of their games doing pretty well. When you consider no other site is reporting on this its pretty clear there's something wrong with this article.

@crimsonavenger: Hopefully the set everything Sonic on fire so nobody can animate Sonics Shitty Friends ever again.

Yeah, back in the Playstation One days, I always thought Sega could have just painted Crash Bandicoot blue and called it a day. I've never played a 3D Sonic game, but the Crash's running into to the screen always seemed a better fit for Sonic than Mario's 3D exploration.

1. This doesn't affect Sonic and All-Stars Racing 3, right?
2. Let Team NInja go wild with the Virtua Fighter franchise. Or hell, just offer to sell it to them. Lord knows Sega isn't ever going to touch the fucking thing again.
3. What about Sonic and All-Stars Racing 3 though?
4. So I guess this means no Burning Rangers 2 then?
5. But seriously, stop fucking around, when are they releasing Sonic and All-Stars Racing 3?

Nevermind, guys. They'll change their mind when a mobile port of Super Hang-On sells gangbusters.

I like Sonic's friends. I hope they continue to be in every Sonic game in the future. I enjoy being able to play as Sonic's friends.

You know, some characters were actually good designs like Cream the Rabbit. It's just this weird fixation on humanizing animals and giving them human traits was the downfall of the series. At some point it became a harem of rodents for Sonic.

Yay that means i'm finally getting Virtua Fighter 6 on PC. Hell I'll even take Virtua Fighter 5 at this point.

@mosdef: Yeah I figured this just meant a greater focus on putting games on PC, I didn't see a mention of no more yakuza and sonic but maybe I missed that.

They exited the console market in 2001...do your research!

That's unfortunate. Sega just release Binary Domain 2 and alllllllll your problems will be solved......please?

Wait, what? I have minimal understanding of this so bear with me but does this affect stuff like Bayonetta and Atlus?...

If this means the end of Hatsune Miku on consoles...I'm happy.

Sega's been a dumpster fire of shit lately, anyway.

@conmulligan said:

Yeah, I'm with you on this one. I think whoever wrote the article is misconstruing a couple statements and then writing an entire (bad) article about them.

japantoday.com's website seems to just reprint articles from other sources in the same media network (and boy does japantoday.com have a plain-ass website). This looks to be a fuller version of the same article:

http://en.rocketnews24.com/2015/02/24/fans-mourn-segas-exit-from-the-console-video-game-market-fume-over-new-sega-games-name/

Even that article doesn't actually cite any particular statement about them leaving the console games market. It has a single line that reads "Statements from the conglomerate have stressed that this is an ongoing process, but one of the first steps seems to be Sega ditching the console video game business to focus on what it considers the areas of biggest growth, mobile and online PC games", which is literally the only part of the article that justifies the headline mentioning "Sega's exit from the console video game market." At not point do they ever elaborate on or share these "statements from the conglomerate". Other than that, all the article does is have a link back to an article from Feb. 4th about Sega overhauling its structure and business operations.

And then later in the article, there are quotes taken from random "Internet commenters" that make the whole article seem really amateur hour.

I think that entire article is bad journalism, and the writer is just wildly speculating that Sega is going to withdraw from doing console software development, even though they have enough moderately successful console titles that there is no way on Earth that is true. No other sites seem to be reporting on it, so I'm highly skeptical that there is any factual basis to OP's article.

PSO2, Project Diva f, Yakuza, and Alien are all recent games out of Sega that have been received moderately well and have all sold pretty well/made decent money. It doesn't matter because the article is clearly wrong anyways.

They're focusing on mobile/PC development, not leaving consoles. If they were "leaving", Persona 5 would be cancelled and Atlus sold off. It's a misinterpretation of what's actually going on. Successful console franchises like Sonic, Yakuza, and Atlus' stuff will continue to do what they do. Riskier projects like Binary Domain or Valkyria Chronicles are the kind of stuff that we will be seeing less of form Sega, given this focus.

Man the Genesis version of super hang on was the bomb. It was weird how much fun it was to-fuck goddamnit stupid toucan sign.

@babychoochoo: there was an all stars racing 2?

@ripelivejam: Transformed, it's really good. One of the playable racers is a Dreamcast controller/the car from Daytona/F14 Tomcat.

Hopefully I'm not the only one to think, "this thread headline is 15 years too late."

Also hopefully they'll continue to bring existing franchises to PC, but who knows what Sega's thinking at the moment.

I need another Sonic Racing. Those are some top-tier kart racers.

And dammit, Generations and Colors were excellent. Gimme more of that, man.

That guy from work who is waaaay into Sonic is gonna be super bummed when he hears about this.

I hope they still localize Yakuza 5 and that Atlus will be fine.

Also, just saying, they should just make another Sonic Generations. There's still plenty of cool/iconic levels for them to mine from old sonics. It even makes levels from the garbage sonics fun.

@autumn_thunder said:

I think everybody thought this thread was 15 years behind.

They're still making PC games so this doesn't affect me much.

On top of that Sega proper hasn't made a game I care at all about for almost two decades.

I wonder if this will affect their publishing branch (which I assume covers things like ATLAS). It would be strange if it did, though, right? I think ATLAS has been doing alright. At least... the rate at which they've put out games before suggested that anyway. And that RTS developer I forget the name of. I think they were doing alright for them, but that's PC anyway.

It's hard to tell, because this is Giant Bomb, but I want to believe Persona 5 will be a big deal. I mean... it's one of a handful of games that are the reason I'll have to get a PS4 at some point. I mean it should be a big deal. Persona 4 was better than any Final Fantasy game has been in over a decade.

Wait this means no more Sonic games? What a joke if you own Sonic IP and cannot profit on it. I knew Sega wasn't exactly handling the series well but this is just awesome level of incompetence.

Also wasn't Nintendo promised 3 exclusive Sonic games for WiiU? It got 2 bad games, shouldn't there be a third? :p

An interview from 4Gamer:

4Gamer:

Actually is there a possibility that the future of Sonic the Hedgehog is going to shift to smart phones/mobile?

Iizuka-san:

Currently we don't [have that plan and intention]. Now for this product only we selected the smart phone/mobile as a friendly platform for the users [of this game] because [the game is] F2P and therefore it was suitable for there. Personally I don't plan to stop Sonic for home video game consoles. Don't worry about them! And enjoy!

No big loss.

This is my interpretation too. With devs like CA and Relic under their wing, it makes perfect sense to increase their focus on the PC market. Even so, they have far too many franchises tied up in the console market to abandon it completely.

Aw man. I can't be the only one who read the title and thought it was an anachronistic joke about them abandoning their console? Now I'm bummed.

Sigh, maybe we'll finally get the Sonic The Hedgehog endless runner that has been the obvious next step for Sonic since endless runners were invented.

Edit: Apparently they made one, but it was polygonal not 2D. 2D seems like the obvious right choice, but I never played Sonic Dash, so I have no idea how it is.

As others have pointed out, I'm fairly certain that this isn't accurate and is based solely on misinterpretations and poor translations of statements from Sega executives.

I can't even remember that last Sega game I bought and that should say something.

AGAIN?