I hate to take this a bit off topic, but do you guys think sega will make a comeback? Or has the xbox officially solidfied itself as sega\'s successor? I mean sega wasn\'t a total bust, they were successful with the genesis and saturn, but i never really understood how they fell off with the dreamcast...even with the sony hype machine.
I know shortly after the dreamcast they were reduced to just makin\' games, but for a company that was well known in the arcades as well as in residential homes, it\'s kinda hard to believe that they won\'t make another run at it..... Meh now that i think about it, at this point it\'d probably be pretty hard to break the stranglehold that sony,ms & nintendo has on the industry...any newcomer would probably fail to capture an audience at this point.
i think sega was somewhat successful with Sega master system, and very successful with sega genesis. then they started to went downhill afterward by releasing add-on and newer consoles every year or so. Sega is a great example of why add-ons and releasing new consoles every 18 months will lost supports from consumers and developers.
Maybe you have forgotten the Saturn was a failed console actually. I heard they released a few months early to lure sells and to compete with the upcoming release of the PlayStation which comes out a few months later. Heard that it was difficult to programs game on the Saturn too. But I know for sure this is one of the biggest reason why it failed is the $400 price tag when the PlayStation debut at $300. and PlayStation is much easier to program games. Not to mention about a year later in 1996 in E3 i believe, Sony said they will slashed the price of PSOne to $200 to compete with the upcoming N64. This really makes it harder for Sega.
Don\'t forget years before the launched of Saturn, Sega was making wrong decisions by releasing add-on to the Genesis like the Sega CD, and a newer console like Sega 32x as a cheaper alternative to the Saturn. So, they actually have 3 major failure consoles there. Looking back, if Sega hadn\'t bother with the Sega CD or the 32x, but rather wait till like a 5 years lifespan of the Sega Genesis to release the Sega Saturn, they might have more supports from developers and consumers. They need to sell at $300 to lure more buyers and to compete with Sony PlayStation too when they first launched and don\'t rush releasing the console early, making it hard to programs will discourage developers too.
I think Sega learned their lessons with the Sega CD, 32x, and Saturn. So, they did a lot of things right with Sega Dreamcast. But it was too late for Sega to regain a good position as the popularity of the PlayStation from both the developers and the consumers are just too much for Sega. As soon as the PS2 comes out, there are more big titles support for it, and the fact that it can support DVD playback really gave the consumers the confident of getting the PS2 and not worrying about the console to be a failure down the road. Which it didn\'t and the PS2 was the most successful consoles ever sold in history.
So, it\'s unlikely that Sega can make a comeback or bother too.
