Here we are again folks. This time here it is an old MEAN MACHINES SEGA interview with ANDY MEE (SEGA EUROPE MARKETING BOSS)..
Read it and take your conclussions..
VIRTUA FIGHTER 3+ADD ON (on the back of the console, as clevely GIGADRIVE i think added...) for less than 80 pounds! price included! haha!
let's start the carnage!!!!!!!
Last edited by saturn_worship; 06-02-2009 at 04:46 AM.
"Why was Sonic X-treme canned?
It wasn't good enough"
Simple :clap:
And Yuji Naka was the responsable of the cancelation of the game!!! I can't believe it:noooo:
A lot of information here (Virtua Fighter 3, Heart of Darkness, Sonic Adventure confirmation for Saturn, etc)
Read the last question on the first page. Goes to show Yuji Naka was thinking with his ego over the reality of potential Sonic Extreme had over non-existant Sonic 3D.
It's a shame - in retrospect. Saturn was the beginning of the end for Sega!
Last edited by madhatter256; 06-02-2009 at 04:58 AM.
If you want a true story, don't ask a marketing director. Marketing director = doesn't give a shit about games, just wants to put positive spin on whatever he has to sell.
The press had this to say about Andy Mee:
Classic. :lol:Originally Posted by Haymarket Business Publications Ltd.
Last edited by Taucias; 06-02-2009 at 05:41 AM.
"No one shall defeat the Infamous SAGAT! Ah hahahahahaha!"
Anthaemia.: Anyway, that's enough crazy ranting and wild speculation for now...
ASSEMbler: Please don't invite him here, there's no room for crazies here we're full up.
Barc0de: I m biased for Nintendo
That can be true. OK, but keep in mind the serious theory people like GigaDrive told on those forums about the Saturn upgrade being put on the back of the console, just where the VCD card got through...
Also it clarifies the TRUE rumor that Sonic Adventure was being worked for the Sega Saturn.
Maybe 70% of what he says is bullshit, but there's an interesting 30%
Anyways, good point Taucias.
He was surprisingly humble and honest throughout all that. Too bad we didn't see the "over one hundred" games the following year.
Wish we saw that cart that could play VFIII.
"giving them access to model3"
as if!
He's essentially saying it's an arcade model 3 board in a tiny PCMCIA-type card, and for about 80 GBP at the time, not a chance. I m certain he didnt even know who was making it and what sort of power it would/should pack.
It was around the same time that a PowerPC-based accelerator for the Saturn was speculated based on "leaked information", with the word "64bits" somewhere in the relevant articles. Others said it would be a 3Dfx-based chip, and there's fair evidence that it was Lockheed's project to power it. It's all very confusing but it comes to show that they were never really serious or past prototyping, let alone setting a price.
You can ask for any old woman
You can ask for an army of ants
You can ask for a pillar of poison
You can ask for sheep and shavers
And you can die for
Be careful what you wish for
Sounds about right to me. Sonic 3D was of course, a turd, but still. I don't see why people blow themselves over Sonic Extreme.wasn't good enough
I find this comment very funny.
"The Saturn is close to creating Model 3 graphics" Yeah right. maybe after a few pints of wicked strength beer. I'm one of the Saturn's biggest fans but even I'd say it couldn't even do Model 2 perfrctly (It did a good job at mimicking them) never mind close to Model 3.
Yakumo
TWITTER @RetroCoreYakumo
After all the evidence we've been shown I think their move on Sonic Xtreme was the right one. Face it, that thing was turd. :p
I think extreme really got the attention it did cause of the sonic community and how the game also got caught up in internal politics. But of course yeah it really wasn't a good game based on the way the levels were designed.
But I would imagine if naka did take the time to develop a 3d sonic game on Saturn the issue would probably be speed. Even though the sonic world in sonic jam was sorta of a test, sonic felt like he was moving slow.
I was aware that Andy Mee commented on the Eclipse (Saturn cartridge upgrade) project, but didn't know he confirmed the existence of a "proper" Sonic game that later evolved into Adventure on Dreamcast. Also, it's great to read about Sega's contract with GT to produce a Saturn conversion of Quake - this fell through when its developers failed to get the game up and running, though fortunately Lobotomy proved first person shooters were possible with Exhumed and later took over responsibility of this key title along with Duke Nukem 3D. Returning back to the Eclipse for a moment, only Core Design was known to be actively supporting the accelerator, which I believe would indeed have gone to retail in the price margin suggested. Considering the fact Touring Car was less than 40% complete when it debuted at the 1997 E3, I'm surprised Mr. Mee was prepared to reveal that the Virtual On team would be handling this game so long before work presumably started. For the record, the group behind Saturn Touring Car was actually CSK Research Institute, led by Toru Kujirai with supervision from Sega Rally veterans Tetsuya Mizuguchi and Jun Taniguchi.
On the subject of Virtua Fighter 3, development of the Saturn version didn't start until after November 1996, when no less than Yu Suzuki first announced to the world his team had concluded a conversion of acceptable quality would be feasible. He later confirmed that both VF3 and the prototype of Shenmue were running on stock hardware, though it's little surprise both Sega Europe and its American counterpart - where the Eclipse was being designed - would reference VF3, especially since this was considered the benchmark for Model 3 performance. SCUD Race was definitely in the works at Core Design, though it later switched to Dreamcast where it became little more than a tech demo for the Katana development kit. Finally, it should be noted that rumours persist of an attempt to convert VF3 outside of AM2, perhaps by a US-led team consisting of similar members to the Sega Technical Institute and AM1 crossover unit that produced Die Hard Arcade. I've not heard much about this, but if there's any reality to VF3 being reprogrammed for Eclipse it definitely isn't from within Yu Suzuki's studio as they had no prior knowledge of this hardware along with the rest of SOJ. Either way, thanks for offering a fresh new angle from an official source (even though he's not always right, just as AM2 producer Hiroshi Kataoka denies the existence of Saturn VF3 to this day in spite of conflicting evidence!) and giving me an excuse to have a good rant in the name of all things Sega... if only I would resist the urge to write such long paragraphs, right?
P.S. Here's a quote from UK:Resistance (not always the most reliable source, I must admit) on the firing of Andy Mee, which further questions any link between Virtua Fighter 3 and the Eclipse cartridge:
Industry magazine CTW has reported that one of Sega UK's top cheeses has been made redundant. The P45 bears the name of Andy Mee, the chap who was thrust into the limelight a few months ago for "confirming" in an interview that Saturn VF3 would come with some sort of upgrade cart. Still no more news of Saturn VF3 by the way. Gary:24/05/97
Last edited by Anthaemia.; 06-02-2009 at 06:03 PM.
Sonic X-treme was amazing, from it's name to it's concept. Another different thing is that what REALLY was done was near to 0.
Have all you read about all the messy organization Sega got with that title? There are a lot of different builds, engines, etc of only 1 game, and i can assure that the only "greatly playable" thing out there was the boss engine fights with Metal Sonic and Fang the Neasel ..wich there are picures from, and even video of the last one.
It looks graphically amazing and surely playable. But to remark your words guys, i'm sure that Sonic X-treme never was the game worth of it's hype simply because they never let the creators make more of it than tech demos.
Oh Anthaemia, good point on that UK:Resistance...
Sega Technical Institute had some brilliant programmers that were restricted by the pressure of developing such a key title, not to mention the demand for regular progress in public along with frequent interference from overseas supervisors. Can you imagine Yuji Naka threatening to quit Sega if AM2 had messed up Sonic The Fighters or "borrowed" his own team's proprietary engine? Of course not, but that's just one of the ways SOJ wrestled power from its US counterpart after the MegaDrive era.
The first clear shift in this balance of power was the decision to go with a clearly inferior design for the Saturn (and later the Dreamcast, which I once read ended up featuring the Power VR2 chipset because Hayao Nakayama was a golfing partner with the president of NEC). I'm not saying the Americans were always right, yet they were more in tune with trends on home soil and with the majority of consumers it was natural Sonic Team would decamp to the US when producing follow-ups to its titular mascot. I can't picture Naka being too happy at giving up territory, which may explain why he didn't stay on for more recent Sonic efforts.
Another key problem that led to Sonic Xtreme's downfall was the Saturn's complex architecture, though I'm in absolutely no doubt the later PC version could have compensated. However, with management turning their collective noses up at anything not coming from a console or arcade machine, the game failed to materialise in this promising form, with STI closing soon after. Meanwhile, over in Japan there was absolutely no pressure on AM2 to deliver a pixel-perfect conversion of Virtua Fighter 3.
As with the ill-fated attempt to port VF4 to Dreamcast, if Yu Suzuki felt it was not possible he could have pulled the plug at any time quite easily. Instead, he ordered his team to deliver the best game they could at the time (and from what I can tell, they did just this if the Shenmue prototype is any indication), even if those in charge were already looking forward to the Dreamcast, hence the call to Genki for a quick port when AM2 was unavailable.
Anyway, I've gone on for more than long enough and should probably open the virtual floor to someone else for now because this thread's getting really interesting and I love the exchange of facts and ideas that are combining to help create a better picture of this key point in Sega's history when the company started making its worst mistakes...
The name sounds like 100% western bullshit to me. Extreme is about the most unimaginative word you can put into a title. I won't argue w/ you on the concept, but it obviously never came to fruitition. I have loads of great game concepts in my head, but they don't meant shit.from it's name to it's concept.
As this came from an old magazine, the next logical step is to comb through Japanese publications. For non-native speakers they are hard to penetrate, but possible. I had an entire run of Sega Saturn magazine at one point. I thumbed through it finding interesting bits, but didn't bother much w/ the interviews. My goals were different at the time. Maybe one day I'll do it again, but I've got a lot on my plate, and am far more interested in arcade games ATM.I love the exchange of facts and ideas that are combining to help create a better picture of this key point in Sega's history
He could have been referring to Sonic Jam, or the 3D "level" from Sonic Jam. We don't know.
The museum in Sonic Jam was actually a closed-off portion of a much larger free-roaming area that was originally intended for a full Saturn game (along with an early take on the Ice Cap Zone and several tube-like faster sections designed by Takashi Iizuka), which it has been confirmed - by no less than Sonic Team, for the record! - was delayed in order to take advantage of the extra power offered by Sega's next generation console. In other words, Sonic World became Adventure. Did you really think "Project Sonic" was just going to be a compilation and Mario Kart clone? Of course not... Sega planned to introduce newer players to their mascot with these lesser titles before launching his proper 32-bit debut. Ironically, Sonic 3D was never intended to form part of Project Sonic, though it did in Japan where the decision was made to delay it until 1999 for some reason. By this point, surely even the most die-hard Sonic fan would turn their nose up at such a game in favour of Adventure, especially when you consider it only appeared on the Saturn in the first place to compensate for the loss of Xtreme? Then again, Sega has never been one for making sound business decisions!
Ah! by the way the interview was publish in MEAN MACHINES SEGA nș 52 February 1997. I think the date is important.
And there is the editorial of this same number that i thinks complements very well the interview:
mmmm... I think i'm go to cry:crying:
More carnage ladies and gentlemen.
This time we got here the interview with Yuji Naka-Sonic Team at the SEGA SATURN MAGAZINE 36....
Judge by yourselves...
Posting Permissions
Reply With Quote
Bookmarks