SEGA Has Taken a Huge Loss, Turning to Online Sales

[ChexGuy]

we're still getting that 20th anniversary Virtual-On event, right?!

...right?

[Zaarock]

If this makes them end up releasing VOOT on Steam that would be great. I know a lot of people who would want to play VOOT or VO4 but don't own a 360. I really don't have hopes for a new Virtual-On title at this point. But surely we'll see some good mech fighting games some time in the future.

If SEGA makes a lot of digital rereleases for PC I hope they're good ports instead of being rushed out.

[MentholMoose]

Here's another (apparent) source reporting the bad news. Sega posts first half loss

[Palmpoa]

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[MentholMoose]

New VO for PC I could live with.

[Palmpoa]

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[ChexGuy]

New? Maybe not.

Steam ports? hell yes

[guarayakha]

Shouldn't be a surprise. They make all sorts of dumb decisions all year, and the only recent great news I heard was Yakuza 5 finally gets an english release.

[ChexGuy]

Valkyria Chronicles' Steam port was the top seller on the store page for a good bit last year

[Porcupine]

Force was successful in the end so at this point I don't think the controversy hurts it one bit. If you look either online or in real life, Force has just as many players if not more, than VOOT. The only thing that happened was that Force and VOOT split the majority of the player base into those who strongly prefer one game over the other. At the same time, there are many new players who started only playing Force and only liking Force, so the title did what it was supposed to. I think time has shown that Force was a complete success in Japan in terms of sales and increasing the player population.

My personal opinion is that the people who created this series view it as complete so they aren't inclined to make any more games. I think they are correct as the evolution of the game series completed its course. I don't like to see game series run-on forever like Tekken, Soul Calibur, Dead or Alive, etc. It prevents fresh material from being created.

What I do think Sega should do is continue to re-release VOOM, VOOT, and Force for future platforms, but also at some point upgrade the graphics in a meaningful way (redraw the models and stages from scratch with higher polygon counts) if they want people to continue playing these classics.

If they do want to make a completely new game, I think they need to venture into new territory. If they make another 1-vs-1 game they should add a weapon customization or dress-up mode into it like a lot of other games do. :3

Better yet, they should make a new kind of VO game, continuing the pattern of evolution with previous games. The next game could be free-for-all multiplayer, like a FPS game but with VO rules. Or it could be a RPG or MMORPG (similar to how they inserted VO characters into one of the Phantasy Star Online games). One of the unique things I have always liked about VO is the ability to run away for timeout. A similar feature it lacks, but which many FPS games feature, is the ability to explore maps and hide and ambush. Hiding is like the natural partner to running away, and I would like to be able to do both because I am a coward. :>

[guarayakha]

They did. Border Break was arcade exclusive, though. Team-based 3rd person shooter mechas.

[ChexGuy]

why make a new Virtual-On when you can just add VRs to Border Break lolololol

[Viper2]

Yes it would. Is why I am working on because I don't have confidence SEGA will make/port over decade old (latest iteration) game for such a small audience.

VOOM should be easy to port, since a PC version exists. If they'd add the extra contents of the PS2/Saturn/Arcade versions + PS2 3D models + real online battles, it would of course be better.