Sega named as one of the world's coolest brands

This week the annual CoolBrands list was published, with Sega making it into the final selection.

Every year The Centre for Brand Analysis in the UK assemble an "Expert Council", made up of fashion designers, artists, presenters and more, to decide which are the world's coolest brands. Members of the general public are also invited to share their opinion, and can nominate brands for consideration.

Brands, which can be products or companies, are rated on their style, innovation, originality, authenticity, desirability and uniqueness. Then, based on this criteria, the nominations are whittled down to a list of just 500, creating the CoolBrands Top 500.

Sega was one of the few games brands to make the list, with Nintendo, PlayStation, Xbox and Sony all finishing in the Top 20. Other games brands in the Top 500 included Atari, EA, Guitar Hero and Konami.

If this was the Nineties then Sega would surely have made the Top 20 ahead of Nintendo, who finished fifth. Oh well.

[Source: CoolBrands]

P.S. Today is SEGAtastic's first birthday! The blog managed to document an exciting year for Sega, which included the release of one of their best games for years (Valkyria Chronicles), marked them as the top publisher for hardcore Wii games (MadWorld, House of the Dead: Overkill) and (maybe) forecast a future of quality Sonic games (Project Needlemouse, All-Stars Racing).

Master Systems do not make good Tap boxes

Picos aren't much good either.

Sega of America employees have been competing in a Let's Tap Tap-Off, each using a specialist "box" of their choice. Let's Tap requires the Wii remote to be placed on tappable surface in order to pick up the vibrations which control the game.

Choices of weapon included an Xbox 360, a NiGHTS magazine cover, a PS3 box and a Wii box. By far the best (yet least effective) boxes were the Sega Pico box and the Master System.


Whilst the Pico box faired okay, the Master System proved unsuccessful. Here's what the Tapper said:

"Let me just say that this was a mistake. I completely failed the third round because the poor Master System wasn't picking up the vibrations, and I didn't have the heart to hit it hard.

Don't try this one at home, folks."

In future just stick to cardboard. Take it from Sega: don't risk destroying your beautiful old consoles!

[Source: Sega of America Flickr]

Sega to feature at New York Comic Con '09

It has been confirmed that Sega of America will have their own booth at next year's New York Comic Con, from February 6th - 8th. There they will feature demos of three upcoming Wii titles: MadWorld, The Conduit and House of the Dead: Overkill.

Members of Platinum Games and High Voltage Software will also be there, apparently with "special zombie surprises"! Sounds good.

[Source: Sega Nerds]

Win a Samba De Amigo iPod!

Snazzy!

This is a little old, but starting from last Monday you have the chance to win a Samba De Amigo iPod Nano, some official maracas and the game itself. To win you must strike the most creative Samba pose with your Wii controllers, although they would prefer it if you were not naked.

There will be eleven winners, announced in January 2009, and you have until midnight December 19th to submit your entries! Get posing!

Sega-based cheapness on Xbox Live

Argh! I can hear the colours!

In the US, today is "Black Friday", or the shopping-frenzy day after Thanksgiving. And that means sales, which aren't just limited to real-life shops. The PlayStation Network and Xbox Live Arcade all have lower prices today, limited to just US stores. As if things weren't cheap enough all ready.

Sega hasn't got much stuff on the PSN, but on the XBLA you can download the synaesthesia-inducing Rez for just 500 points instead of 800 points. Similarly the Sonic Unleashed theme has been reduced from 250 points to 180 points.

Get downloading before the sales end, and enjoy your lower-priced and earlier-released games! I'm looking at you Super Ultra Street Fighter II: Turbo High Definition Remix PlayStation Network Edition 2008 Deluxe Plus!

Interesting fact: I have spatial-sequence or number form synaesthesia. True.

North America, you can have a House of the Dead comic too!

I'm sure most of you North Americans were disappointed when you found out the comic book that comes with House of the Dead: Overkill Collector's Edition was PAL-only. I'm also sure you started the "Europe always gets better stuff than we do" rant again, before realising that you get games months or years before Europe at a fraction of the price.

Anyway (cough), Sega has confirmed that the comic will indeed be available in America through a preorder with the following retailers: GameStop, GameCrazy and Amazon. These are only available in limited supplies, and may turn into a Metal Gear Solid 4 watch situation whereby the item is worth over double what you bought it for within weeks.

Here is the press release:

The House of the Dead: Overkill^TM - Exclusive Graphic Novel Pre-Order Offer!

House of the Dead fans - today is your day. We’re happy to announce that if the spine tingling, blood curdling, flesh eating carnage that if The House of the Dead: Overkill is not enough to satiate your zombie needs, then we’re upping the ante with an exclusive graphic novel as a special pre-order item you can only receive when you pre-order this next chapter in the House of the Dead franchise.

This special pre-order offer will be available soon from GameStop, GameCrazy and Amazon.com (while supplies last).

“Prelude to an OVERKILL” tells the fateful stories of Agent Washington and Varla Gunns, on the night before the violent and shocking events of the game take place. Illustrated by Steve Copter, of dissident punk band ‘Black Mekon’ (www.myspace.com/blackmekon), this specially-commissioned comic is only available for those who pre-order the game.

Sonic's Ultimate Genesis Collection boxart released

Yesterday, Sega of America released the boxart for Sonic's Ultimate Genesis Collection, due for release next year on the PS3 and Xbox 360. The boxart features Sonic (circa 1994) standing in front of a wall of screens displaying Mega Drive games. Presumably, the European version will have different boxart as it is called Sega Mega Drive Ultimate Collection; however they may just change the logo and keep Sonic in.

Also released were some blobby Altered Beast screenshots. Children looking at these images will wonder how consoles fifteen years ago had such badly distorted graphics, but thankfully we can switch the pixels back on for some true Sega goodness. Again, children will wonder how consoles fifteen years ago had such badly distorted graphics. See more screenshots here.

What Altered Beast would look like if it melted.

New Empire City Sonic Unleashed trailer

Yesterday, Sega of America released a trailer for the new Sonic Unleashed level Empire City. It features rails and platforms in between skyscrapers, and loops that are unusable by cars. They really need to use public money better in New York!



Note near the start of the trailer is a beautiful golden Chrysler Building clone. Lovely!

Also uploaded yesterday is a new Holoska trailer, featuring beaucoup de ice slides. With every trailer this game looks less bad, thankfully.

Samba de Amigo comes to mobile phones

Samba de Amigo has you trying to catch doughnuts on your maracas whilst dancing.

Sega Mobile has brought the Dreamcast rhythm game Samba de Amigo to mobile phones. How this actually works I have no idea, but it probably involves pressing the keypad in time to midis.

“A classic and beloved rhythm music game, Samba de Amigo has had fans shaking for years with its party-like soundtrack, colourful characters and casual yet addictive gameplay,” said Tammy Robinson, Senior Director of Mobile, SEGA of America. “Samba de Amigo is another great example of the fun that can be had on the mobile platform.”

I can't play games on mobiles and struggle to even send a text, so I don't think I'd be very good at this game...

Valkyria Chronicles to get downloadable content

Valkyria Chronicles has been released over the past week in the west, and Sega of America confirmed today that it will be getting Japan's downloadable content. The content includes extra modes and missions, some focussed on one of the supporting characters Edie.

The release date is currently early 2009, and no pricing details have been released.