The Sega Saturn appreciation thread

[Moirai]

They should have bundled games with the Saturn in 1997/1998. Bundles usually sell well in the US... like, they could have done one new game and one older game, like NiGHTS and Burning Ragers + 1 3D pad, or Guardian Heroes and Radiant + 2 standard pads, or Daytona USA CE and Fighters Megamix + 2 standard pad.

Think NES action set.

[TrekkiesUnite118]

They did do bundles, in Japan.

Like I said what would have probably helped the most at that point would have been to start localizing more games from Japan. A lot of them wouldn't even have required much work, just changing the disc region and making a few minor tweaks. The only ones that would have been difficult would have been the RPGs, but seeing the cost cutting tactics they used with Panzer Dragoon Saga I don't see why a similar treatment couldn't have been done with Grandia or the rest of Shining Force III. It's also a shame they had to go and piss off Working Designs. You don't go and insult the developer who has stuck with you through all your mistakes and failures.

[Moirai]

There are plenty of fighters, shmups, and other arcade-style games that could have been easily localized at little cost. But would they have sold at all in the US?

[TrekkiesUnite118]

They seemed to sell well enough on the PS1.

[zetastrike]

I don't get why Sega would actively try to screw over their own supporters. Why would they bother making and marketing the 32X and convincing people to buy it if they knew from the get-go they were going to toss it out in less than a year? They wanted to get a little more cash out of everyone? They could have done that by pushing the Genesis and Sega CD. Then to just stop making games for the Saturn and tell people that the Dreamcast was coming and "Saturn sucked, but this will be great! You won't regret this one!". I mean, what the fuck were these guys smoking? Any one of us would have done a better job running that company. They thought they knew what gamers wanted better than the gamers.

[Thenewguy]

Any one of us would have done a better job running that company.

I disagree, I think Sheath would've run the company into the ground by the mid 90s

Just joking Sheath

[Da_Shocker]

They should have bundled games with the Saturn in 1997/1998. Bundles usually sell well in the US... like, they could have done one new game and one older game, like NiGHTS and Burning Ragers + 1 3D pad, or Guardian Heroes and Radiant + 2 standard pads, or Daytona USA CE and Fighters Megamix + 2 standard pad.

Think NES action set.

They were still bundling the 3 in 1 gamepack well into late 97 when I bought my Saturn. Neither Sony nor Nintendo were offering anything comparable here.

I don't get why Sega would actively try to screw over their own supporters. Why would they bother making and marketing the 32X and convincing people to buy it if they knew from the get-go they were going to toss it out in less than a year? They wanted to get a little more cash out of everyone? They could have done that by pushing the Genesis and Sega CD. Then to just stop making games for the Saturn and tell people that the Dreamcast was coming and "Saturn sucked, but this will be great! You won't regret this one!". I mean, what the fuck were these guys smoking? Any one of us would have done a better job running that company. They thought they knew what gamers wanted better than the gamers.

Uhm SoJ and SoA had different agendas. I highly doubt SoA wanted to kill the 32X in a year but SoJ could overrule any choice SoA had made.

[Team Andromeda]

They did do bundles, in Japan.

Like I said what would have probably helped the most at that point would have been to start localizing more games from Japan. A lot of them wouldn't even have required much work, just changing the disc region and making a few minor tweaks. The only ones that would have been difficult would have been the RPGs, but seeing the cost cutting tactics they used with Panzer Dragoon Saga I don't see why a similar treatment couldn't have been done with Grandia or the rest of Shining Force III. It's also a shame they had to go and piss off Working Designs. You don't go and insult the developer who has stuck with you through all your mistakes and failures.

I agree though SOJ didn't tend to do bundles , you just get far more limited edition consoles and they wasn't any cost cutting down with Saga really . Bernie should have made the best of a bad card he was dealt and brought the White Saturn over to the west and then hand pick the best games that used the system and do a limited production run of games of games that really used the system and worked together with WD to bring Grandia , Shining Force III series and the likes Wachenroder over to the west . It wouldn't have made a blind bit of difference to sales , but would have helped with SEGA PR and the Saturn image and showed SEGA was ready to stand behind is own consumers

[Sean697]

I don't know. It's hard to second guess. They were going up against a huge, financially healthy company in Sony. Sony outmuscled Sega by buying up developers and exclusively. It's hard to fault them too much when going up against a corporate juggernaut with a well respected consumer electronics name. Just like Microsft , Sony threw everything and the kitchen sink into their consoles and it paid off. I think the best scenario would have been if Microsoft could have successfully partnered with Sega for another console after the Dreamcast. Or better yet what if Microsoft bought out Sega after the Saturn and put its combined money and branding to a new console. Could have heavily marketed a new console console with deep pockets and kept the Sega branding to make it more popular in Japan.

[Chilly Willy]

It's kinda funny how people look back on certain platforms... there were millions of SCDs sold, and over a hundred titles, and yet it's a "horrible failure"... there were over 400,000 32Xs sold by xmas in 94, and yet there was "no demand"...

I didn't expect Sega to give the exact same support for the 32X as for either the Genesis or the Saturn, but SCD level support would have been fine for most owners. Say 150 games or so. That would have been plenty until we were ready to step up to true 32-bit and the Saturn.

The problem is that people judge them based on current leading sales... if you don't have several THOUSAND games, you failed pathetically... if you don't sell tens of MILLIONS of consoles, you failed... if you aren't number one, you're a big loser. That last one you see quite often... look at how many people are truly baffled at why the PSP continued to be supported since it "lost" to the NDS... like somehow 70 million devices suddenly got thrown away because they didn't win.

There's plenty of room in the console market for even small/niche systems, with small libraries. It doesn't make them losers or failures to not sell thousands of games or millions of consoles.

[Sean697]

There's plenty of room in the console market for even small/niche systems, with small libraries. It doesn't make them losers or failures to not sell thousands of games or millions of consoles.

I wholeheartedly agree, except with the 32 X. It fragmented the market and diluted the impact of the Saturn and the Genesis. It was a waste of money for them. But yea the Saturn and Dreamcast were hardly failures. It was the perceived value going forward of the Dreamcast vs the PS2 that killed the Dreamcast. It was successful in its own right. But the PS2 was so wildly successful it didn't make sense to try and fight it, or at least that's what they probrably though. Any new console buyer from that point forward was probrably going to buy a PS2. The Dreamcasts staying power was in question. I just wish they would have continued to support the Dreamcast installed base instead of dropping support completely. It could have existed longer as a number 2 console. Or maybe even longer if they could have got out a value Dreamcast model at a say half the price of PS2.

[sheath]

Ah the old "fragmented markets" complaint again. The NEO GEO, 3DO and Jaguar had already "fragmented" the market. Diversification is a good thing in any and all business scenarios where the industry can afford to support it. Today the industry has fragmented the market between PC, PS3, PS2, Xbox 360, Wii, WiiU, NDS, 3DS, PSP and Vita. Tons of companies support them all, or just some of them, with their mainstay products and their more obscure budget titles. None of these companies are running themselves too thin by porting the same game to multiple platforms, they are diversifying.

With the Genesis, Sega CD, 32X and Saturn companies could choose which platform held the best chance of selling their product, or they could just put the product on all of them, plus the SNES, 3DO and Jaguar to hit the widest audience. It is no different, and once Sega put the 32X on the market it should have been more cost effective to keep selling it to recoup development costs. They didn't even need to make expensive exclusives for it, they just needed to port Saturn and Genesis games to it for a cheap easy buck and good fanfare.

[Da_Shocker]

It's kinda funny how people look back on certain platforms... there were millions of SCDs sold, and over a hundred titles, and yet it's a "horrible failure"... there were over 400,000 32Xs sold by xmas in 94, and yet there was "no demand"...

I didn't expect Sega to give the exact same support for the 32X as for either the Genesis or the Saturn, but SCD level support would have been fine for most owners. Say 150 games or so. That would have been plenty until we were ready to step up to true 32-bit and the Saturn.

The problem is that people judge them based on current leading sales... if you don't have several THOUSAND games, you failed pathetically... if you don't sell tens of MILLIONS of consoles, you failed... if you aren't number one, you're a big loser. That last one you see quite often... look at how many people are truly baffled at why the PSP continued to be supported since it "lost" to the NDS... like somehow 70 million devices suddenly got thrown away because they didn't win.

There's plenty of room in the console market for even small/niche systems, with small libraries. It doesn't make them losers or failures to not sell thousands of games or millions of consoles.

Not to many people remember who finished second and third. The only losers I can remember all the time is that Buffalo Bills teams that made it to the Super Bowl 4 years in a row and lost all 4 times. I think Sega's systems being called failures because alot of them simply didn't last that long. The SCD had decent support but some of the other systems had terrible support and didn't last long.

[Chilly Willy]

Ah the old "fragmented markets" complaint again. The NEO GEO, 3DO and Jaguar had already "fragmented" the market. Diversification is a good thing in any and all business scenarios where the industry can afford to support it. Today the industry has fragmented the market between PC, PS3, PS2, Xbox 360, Wii, WiiU, NDS, 3DS, PSP and Vita. Tons of companies support them all, or just some of them, with their mainstay products and their more obscure budget titles. None of these companies are running themselves too thin by porting the same game to multiple platforms, they are diversifying.

With the Genesis, Sega CD, 32X and Saturn companies could choose which platform held the best chance of selling their product, or they could just put the product on all of them, plus the SNES, 3DO and Jaguar to hit the widest audience. It is no different, and once Sega put the 32X on the market it should have been more cost effective to keep selling it to recoup development costs. They didn't even need to make expensive exclusives for it, they just needed to port Saturn and Genesis games to it for a cheap easy buck and good fanfare.

QFT

I keep trying to give you rep, and it keeps telling me I can't...

[EclecticGroove]

There is a fair bit of difference between a market comprised of systems from multiple companies, each of which can focus attention upon their own system.
3rd party manufacturers can port their games to any they feel work and would be economically beneficial for them.

Sega's situation was not comparable to that because they were one company with 3 distinct systems (and half of another if you count the 32x CD). All of them were dependent upon having the Genesis.
A new buyer could not just go out and buy a Sega CD or a 32x and play it, they had to have the Genesis first. That is not comparable to someone looking between the 360 and the PS3 for instance.
Likewise many of the systems you mention above target different markets.
The PS2 doesn't target the same market as the ps3/360, which do not target the same people as the handheld systems.

In time frame we are talking about here, the genesis, 32x, sega cd, and saturn were all targeting functionally the exact same demographic. The average age and income for gamers at the time was also lower. Meaning a purchase for one was often more likely to cannibalize the expenses of a purchase for another.

Sega split it's effort into too many similar areas at the time. Had the 32X been a new handheld instead of an add on, things might have been different from a market perspective. But even that is a moot point. They might have changed their minds if it sold obscenely well... but short of some miraculous turn like that, they were never going to give it a chance, and barely had the ability to do so. It sold on promises they never had any intention of delivering. Not that the hardware was incapable, but the company itself was unwilling, perhaps at the time fully unable, to fulfill them.

When it came time for the Saturn, the Sega CD and 32x came back to haunt them. Sony's serious push to gain entry to the market cemented the misgivings of other gamers and retailers alike who were ready and willing with wallets in hand to give the new guy a chance, especially since Nintendo was still in the game to fall back onto if the playstation was a bomb.