sega

I grew up with my Sega Genesis, and Sonic was my Mario. I played all the games in high school, and the 2D games still represent the real Sonic to me. Those 3D versions? Not so much.

Sega's newest initiative, Sonic 4, has boldly named itself as the true successor to those old 16-bit gems. Available as a downloadable game for the Xbox 360 and PS3 (check out preGame's coverage here), it has also come to the iPhone, available today on the App Store for $9.99.

Thankfully, Sonic 4 plays pretty wonderfully from the starting gun; right … Read more

As a teenager I just about lived in the video arcade (Abbey Road in Farmington Hills, Mich.--anyone remember it?). I owned an Atari 2600, an Apple IIe, an Amiga, a Sega Dreamcast, and just about anything else that was good for games.

You'd think, then, that I'd go ape over something like C64 for iPhone 1.7, a newly updated Commodore 64 emulator that revives such classics as "Boulder Dash II," "Jupiter Lander," and "International Karate."

And you'd be wrong. While I have nothing but fondness for the videogames of … Read more

When Sega announced recently plans to bring Dreamcast titles, including Crazy Taxi and Sonic Adventure, to Xbox Live and PlayStation Network, the vast majority of Sega fans were excited. After all, the Dreamcast is one of the better consoles ever released, and many of its titles were outstanding.

But it looks like the company isn't done yet. Speaking in a recent interview, Sega's Yosuke Okunari, who is in charge of bringing Dreamcast games to the new consoles, said that porting Saturn games is a real possibility.

"We're of course thinking about ports of Saturn games," … Read more

I owned a Dreamcast, proudly, back in 1999. I loved Jet Grind Radio and Crazy Taxi. It's with a note of personal affection that I report that Sega's officially releasing Dreamcast games onto both PSN and Xbox Live later this year.

What that means, for now, is that only Crazy Taxi and Sonic Adventure are making the leap. Sonic Adventure, as one of the first 3D Sonics, is a dubious choice. Crazy Taxi, however, is sheer genius. I always felt that Grand Theft Auto owed a bit to Crazy Taxi's madcap mission-based racing. As a quick-fix arcade … Read more

Yes, plenty of Sega Dreamcast systems are available for purchase on the Internet, but we did a double-take when we noticed that Amazon was selling "new" models for $88.99. No, these aren't updated in anyway, but at least one Amazon user says they are "brand-new as stated." And Amazon is listed as the seller, not some third-party merchant.

Whether Amazon found a warehouse full of old "new" Dreamcasts or whether someone's actually producing these things, we don't know. But what's amusing is to see user reviews dating all way … Read more

Natali Del Conte replaces Justin Yu on today's show, as he's out looking for pickles. The name of today's show refers to the news that William Shatner of "Star Trek" fame will star in CBS' new sitcom "S**t My Dad Says," based on the same expletive-filled Twitter phenomenon. We think Jerry Stiller would make a better cranky old man. (By the way, CBS, you own a equally funny podcast/show/Twitter called The 404, available on @the404.)

Jeff has a beef with the number of 3D movie theaters out there right now. Apparently, the success of "Avatar" has led a swarm of 3D films to be released, and many theaters aren't equipped to handle the 3D projections just yet.

Next, we get to Sony building a universal game controller (a la the Logitech Harmony One, but for videogame consoles). We're not exactly sure how they plan on doing this, or whether it's useful in any way. We do, however, reminisce a bit about our favorite game controllers. The original Sega Saturn controller is Wilson's favorite for 2D games. "It melts in your hands," he says.

Finally, we get to some voice mails, and the racist polar bear on Xbox Live has really taken off as a meme now. We're encouraging our fans to send in their renditions of this meme. The best ones we will showcase on the show. Maybe a few Photoshoped images? Maybe a few voice mails as the racist polar bear? Send them in to the404 [at] cnet [dot] com or call us at 1-866-404-CNET (2638).

… Read more

The Sonic the Hedgehog franchise might have been created by Sega, but reports are swirling that Sonic the Hedgehog 4: Episode I, the latest in the famed franchise, won't be developed by Sega after all.

According to reports, Sonic 4 will be developed by a Japanese developer named Dimps. The news was originally reported by Destructoid.

The evidence that Dimps, rather than Sega, would be developing Sonic 4 came from Microsoft's Xbox Live Marketplace site where the game is listed. The listing says that Sega is publishing Sonic 4, but Dimps will be developing the game.

It shouldn'… Read more

With the Winter Olympics finally kicking off, it's time to take a quick look at Vancouver 2010, the "official" video game of the 2010 Winter Games. The title's been out for a couple of weeks, but I finally got around to playing it a bit and in typical Olympics video game fashion, it has just enough positives to frustrate you into thinking about how much fun you might be having had the developer had the time, money, or vision to take the gameplay to the next level.

For starters, as you can see by the screenshots below, Vancouver 2010, which is playable on the PS3, Xbox 360, and PC, looks pretty good. And individually, the events themselves (there are 14 of them) are engaging and keep you interested--at least initially. (Critics have said that this game's an improvement over Beijing 2008, which Sega also produced).

But then you start to notice that many of the events have similar mechanics. For instance, the skiing, bobsledding, and snowboarding events have you pointed down a mountain, trying to steer your way to the fastest line. The ski jump and aerials have button-timing controls to master and short-track speed-skating has you button-mashing to maintain top speed and cornering with the left trigger (on an Xbox 360 anyway).

As I said, it's all pretty fun at first and you'll certainly get a kick out of trying out each event and improving your performance to the point where you earn a medal. But what's ultimately lacking is a greater goal and bigger payoffs for victory.… Read more

Last year, Sega announced that it was working on Project Needlemouse, its code name for a reinvention of the popular Sonic the Hedgehog franchise. After a long wait, Sega has finally unveiled that Project Needlemouse is in fact, Sonic the Hedgehog 4: Episode 1. (See embedded video.)

Unlike Sonic's more recent 3D (mis)adventures, Sega's next Sonic game is a direct follow-up to Sonic the Hedgehog 3, which launched on the Sega Genesis back in 1994.

According to Sega associate brand manager Ken Balough, who recently sat down with GameSpot to talk about the game, Sonic the Hedgehog … Read more