Sega

Sega
Type	Subsidiary
Founded	June 3, 1960
Headquarters	Shinagawa, Tokyo
Key people	Hajime Satomi Hisao Oguchi Mike Hayes Yu Suzuki Takashi Iizuka
Industry	Video Games
Products	Various Video Games SG-1000 Master System Sega Genesis Game Gear Sega CD Sega Pico Sega 32X Sega Saturn Dreamcast
Employees	5,349 (Sega Sammy Holdings "Entertainment Contents Business")
Parent	Sega Sammy Holdings
Website	http://www.sega.com (US) http://www.sega.co.uk (Europe) http://www.sega.co.jp (Japanese, Japan)

Sega Corporation (株式会社セガ, Kabushiki-kaisha Sega), officially stylized as SEGA, is a multinational video game software and hardware development company, as well as previously a home computer and former console manufacturer. The origins can be traced back to 1940 as Standard Games, a developer of coin operated amusement and gambling machines meant for military use in Honolulu, Hawaii. After selling Standard Games in 1945, the founders created Service Games in 1946, which served a similar purpose. Service Games would expand into many other countries, with Japan being particularly successful. Also around this time in 1954, the first appearance of the SEGA logo appears on the Diamond Star slot machine. After increasing pressure from the US government looking into the criminal business practices of gambling, most of the company was dissolved on May 31st, 1960. On June 3rd of that year, Martin Bromley, one of the founders, formed two different companies. Nihon Goraku Bussan, the first company, was made to acquire the remains of Service Games and act as distributor of the machines that Nihon Kikai Seizō, the second company, would develop. The companies would merge in 1964, retaining the Nihon Goraku Bussan name. The company would then acquire Japanese photo booth distributor Rosen Enterprises and and was renamed to SEGA Enterprises Ltd. In 1969, Sega would be sold to Gulf and Western Industries, who would act as their parent company and distributor.

Sega, now called SEGA Enterprises Inc., would see great success throughout the 1970's during the arcade boom. Early successes include games like Periscope, Love Tester, Heavyweight Champ, Monaco GP, and Head On, along with securing the license to Frogger. After arcade revenue started to wane in the early 1980's, Gulf and Western decided to sell off the arcade division of Sega to Bally Manufacturing while retaining the R&D division. Also at this time, Sega decided to move to the home hardware industry. This led to the SC-3000 computer and the SG-1000 game console in 1983. While not failures, both were greatly outpaced by the Famicom. However, this was enough for Gulf and Western to sell off the remainder of Sega. An investor group led by former executives bought all the splintered assets in 1984 to form the modern Sega Enterprises Ltd. Sega would then redesign the SG-1000 into the Sega Mark III in 1985, known internationally as the Master System. While performing much better and dominating the console market in some regions, the Master System was still behind the Famicom, which broke out into other regions as the Nintendo Entertainment System.

With Sega picking up steam once again, they decided to create a new console that will directly compete with Nintendo, and in 1989, they created the Sega Mega Drive, known as the Genesis in certain regions. While initially a success, Nintendo almost immediately dented their revenue forecast by debuting the Super Famicom in 1990, releasing in other regions as the Super Nintendo Entertainment System a year later. By 1991, Sega made a plan to drop the price of all systems and bundle the console with Sonic the Hedgehog. This proved to be a huge success, even briefly over taking Nintendo in market share and starting what came to be known as the fourth generation console war. Sega would redesign their console several times, as well as receive many addons Like the Sega CD and Sega 32x. Sega also made the portable Game Gear, but it was handily out performed by Nintendo's Game Boy. However, by the end of the generation, Nintendo would retake their dominance due to brand confusion caused by the addons and poor marketing.

With their next console, the Saturn, Sega announced that it would release on September 2nd, 1995, but surprised everyone when they later announced the Saturn would actually release ahead of schedule on May 11th. This angered developers, distributors and potential consumers by not being informed ahead of time and subsequently not have adequate time to prepare. The Saturn would be outsold by the Sony Playstation and later the Nintendo 64. Sega would try once again to win people over in 1998 with the launch of the Dreamcast. While initially having a successful launch, sales would slow down almost immediately to due the high price and was completely overshadowed by the Playstation 2 in 2000. On January 31st, 2001, Sega announced that it would officially pull out of the console market and officially become a third party developer and publisher, which is how it operates today. On October 1st, 2004, they merged with Japanese pachinko company Sammy Corporation to form Sega Sammy Holdings, but still exist as a subsidiary of the company. On September 2013, Sega Sammy Holdings acquired Atlus, obtaining the publishing rights for franchises such as the Megami Tensei series and its various subseries such as Persona.

Currently headquartered in Ōta, Tokyo, Japan, with various offices around the world. The company is famous for many notable game franchises, including Sonic the Hedgehog, Bayonetta, Virtua Fighter, Puyo Puyo, Yakuza, Phantasy Star, Sakura Wars, and Valkyria Chronicles. Sega was notably Nintendo's greatest rival company during the fourth generation console war with the launch of the Sega Genesis (also known as the Mega Drive outside North America). While the company had significant success with both arcades and home consoles during that time, it would quickly decline following poor sales of later consoles, especially in western regions, and consequent internal conflicts. On March 31st, 2001, the Dreamcast was discontinued due to Sega running out of resources to compete and Sega restructured itself as a third-party software developer for multiple platforms. Since then, the company has made frequent collaborations with Nintendo, including releasing exclusive games for their consoles and occasionally developing games involving their IPs, such as F-Zero GX, F-Zero AX and the Mario & Sonic crossover sports series.

In Super Smash Bros. Brawl

Sega was described as being in "special collaboration" with Nintendo regarding Sonic's inclusion in Brawl, where he and Solid Snake became the first third-party characters to appear in the series. Additionally, other characters from the Sonic franchise, such as Shadow, Tails, Knuckles, and Silver, have minor roles in Brawl, and the iconic Sonic level, Green Hill Zone, appears as a stage. Content from F-Zero GX also makes its Super Smash Bros. debut in this game in the form of music, stickers and updated designs of featured F-Zero characters.

Jun Senoue was brought in to do an arrangement for the Sonic the Hedgehog series, Angel Island Zone.

In Super Smash Bros. 4

Sega's mascot Sonic returns as a third-party character in Super Smash Bros. 4. Additionally, Windy Hill Zone, a stage from their Nintendo (3DS/Wii U) exclusive Sonic Lost World, appears in Super Smash Bros. for Wii U, while Green Hill Zone returns from Brawl in Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS. Two Mii Brawler costumes based on Akira Yuki and Jacky Bryant from Sega's Virtua Fighter series appear as downloadable content. In addition, Mii costumes based off Knuckles and Tails appear for the Mii Brawlers and the Mii Gunners, respectively. Bayonetta from the Bayonetta series is another newcomer, available as DLC. She is Sega's second playable fighter in Super Smash Bros.

In Super Smash Bros. Ultimate

Both Sonic and Bayonetta return as third-party playable characters. In addition, the Green Hill Zone stage returns from Brawl and for 3DS as well as the Windy Hill Zone stage from for Wii U and the Umbra Clock Tower stage from both versions of Smash 4. Shadow returns as an Assist Trophy. Knuckles, Rodin, and Akira Yuki also debut as new Assist Trophies. Akira and Jacky Bryant also return as Mii Brawler costumes. Joker from Persona 5, developed and published by Sega's subsidiary Atlus, makes an appearance as a DLC character.

Jun Senoue makes a return to Ultimate with Mega Man 4 Medley, along with new arrangers for Ultimate with Tomoya Ohtani with Bomb Rush Blush, Takenobu Mitsuyoshi with F-ZERO Medley, and Hideaki Kobayashi with Midna's Lament.

Trivia

• With three characters originating from Sega properties in Ultimate, they tie with Konami, Capcom, and Square Enix for the most characters of all third-party companies. Like Square Enix, all three fighters are unique, with no Echoes. Unlike Square Enix however, all three Sega fighters come from different series.
  • Additionally, all three characters and their respective universes were created by different companies; Sonic was created by Sonic Team, Bayonetta was created by PlatinumGames, and Joker was created by Atlus.
  • All three playable fighters have their victory themes taken directly from their home games. However, in Bayonetta’s case, the theme itself isn’t from the Bayonetta games, but the individual parts are directly taken. In Sonic’s case in Ultimate, the Act Clear from Sonic the Hedgehog (2006) was sped up and slightly abridged.

This page uses content from Wikipedia. The original article was at Sega. The list of authors can be seen in their page's history. As with SmashWiki, the text of Wikipedia is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.