Why did Sega pull out of the console wars?

Does anybody know why Sega decided enough was enough?

becuase they lost?

How did they lose though?

I still have all my Sega Consoles and enjoyed the games that were available for the Dreamcast.

Fair enough if it wasn't the most powerful console but neither was the N64 and that still did well.

I guess Sega couldn't compete with the likes of Sony with their huge financial backing. Also, I think the Dreamcast tanked, sales-wise - probably the last straw.

I think it was mainly becuase they had made such a loss with the 32x and Saturn systems and just couln't regain the market share lost to the playstation with the dreamcast.

Heh, i'd forgotten about some of Sega's ill-conceived hardware efforts, like the 32x and MegaDrive CD add-on. They just lost the plot, hardware-wise, and ended up paying for it...

Quote: Sega Adverts:
"To be this good takes Ages, to be this good takes Sega."

Didn't quite work out for them then, did it.

Did Sony ever get around to using "PlayStation - runs rings around Saturn"? :P

They pulled out mostly due to poor financial handling. The company was $700 million in debt. The Japanese CEO of the company at the time payed off the debt with his own money and then left the company. It was at that time they pulled out and decided to just make software due to the fact that hardware costs so much more than software to develop, manufacture, and distribute. Without a lot of capital in the bank the hardware business is pretty impossible to succeed at.

but we like sega hand Controllers.
they shold continue to produce such hardeware.


For retro :)

snes controllers where better. but yes retro controllers would be cool. sega had to pull out because unlike nintendo they didnt have the gameboy sells or pokimon to keep the money coming in when there main console started to go down in sales. i loved the dreamcast hardware just a shame about the small number of great games. still they are now making games for the wii so there not gone

I'm pretty sure you can get retro style controllers for the PC, if you really want one. I remember seeing a SNES one, some time back.

It's simple. Two of their consoles in a row tanked badly, being released only shortly before a PS each. Rather than take a bankrupting blow they decided to keep doing only what has actually been making them money.

Oh yeh, that 32x thing. I saw that at an expo once. Never saw it again =]


I think they did that in not so many words by making shops around my area have demo boxes that were showing Daytona and Ridge Racer ;] Or maybe the shops wanted to kill off the Saturn <shrugs>

I bought a DC when they were sold for $50 after Sega quit. A few of the games were ok, I liked tokyo extreme racer and metropolis street racer, as well as Virtua tennis.

The biggest problem for me was the stupit thumsticks had those embossed rings on top so I couldn't play for more than 20 - 45 minutes without rubbing blisters into my fingers.

That and the third party controllers were all terrible made me give up pretty quick.

The blame lies in Sega Of America for developing the 32X when Sega of Japan were at the same time developing the far superior Sega Saturn. God knows why the same company was developing 2 different gaming platforms.

That tarnished Sega's name forever, especially for customers in America who realised 32X was rubbish, and I think Sega were doomed from then on to be honest.
Which is a shame really since Sega have made better games than both Sony and Microsoft put together. Also, give me Sega's games over Nintendo's anyday.

>Does anybody know why Sega decided enough was enough?

They developed several consoles in a row and some times at the same time, with asskick hardware, but couldn't sign up enough development studios and then they relied on word of mouth to sell them, spending much less money on advertising than their competitors.

At that point Sega decided to go back to what they knew, they stopped console development and sold off the bulk of their hardware production facilities in asia and reinvested the money in making their amusement park division more efficient and paying down their debt. Although they cut some fat, the amusement park division(giant arcades basically) continued to lose money, so did their media division.

In 2004 they further downsized and merged with another media company called Sammy, creating Sega-Sammy Group, which was really a good choice for both, as SSG is doing relatively well.

http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_index.php?story=11611


Andy

I guess the MegaDrive/Genesis was their heyday. I loved my MegaDrive. Poor old Sega.

ET?

At least it's nice to see Sega team up with Microsoft and Nintendo for their console markets. They are a little reluctant with Sony, but they still develop for everybody. However, it seems like Sega seems to have strongest partnership with Nintendo, at the moment, especially with the Virtual Console offerings. I sort of wonder, if the Virtual Console's getting Sega Genesis games, shouldn't Xbox Live Arcade see some of these same games coming from them, too? I mean, it should be great playing the original Sonic the Hedgehog in HD, not just the current Sonic the Hedgehog that I played the demo far, and fell to my death off that bridge far too many times.