Sega has a long history in the games industry, first starting during World War II, offering coin operated games. Over the years their business progressed and they became one of the biggest manufacturers of arcade games in the world, but it wasn not until the 1980s that Sega ventured into the home gaming console industry.
Seeing he success of the Nintendo Entertainment System, Sega ventured into the gaming console business with a number of systems including the Sega SG-1000, Sega SC-3000 and the Sega Master System before hitting it big with their Sega Genesis game console, which was called the Sega Mega Drive in some parts of the world. Soon Nintendo launched it is second system, the Super Nintendo and Sega knew they had to compete. They advertised extensively and came out with a mascot, which was Sonic the Hedgehog. This system was quite revolutionary for its time and offered players a high quality gaming experience compared to what was available at the time. Market share soared and soon Sega would introduce another system, the Sega 32X.
The Sega 32X was an upgrade to the Sega Genesis/Mega Drive console, offering more advanced graphics. Unfortunately this system did not do well as Sega had already started to leak out information about their latest system, the Sega Saturn. At the same time Sony was about to release the Sony Playstation, which hurt sales of the Sega 32X, which soon ended up in discount stores as retailers were just trying to get rid of them.
The Sega Saturn was released in 1995, which included a 32 bit processor, which was advanced for the day. They beat the Nintendo 64 and PlayStation to the market and offered such hits as Last Bronx, Panzer Dragoon and Saga.
 |
Not content with their success yet, Sega introduced the Sega Dreamcast in 1999. After heavy advertising and promotion campaigns it was released with a modem which allowed users to play online, which was very innovative for the time. Unfortunately it had only minor levels of success in some parts of the world, but was a complete failure in Japan. The United States launch was quite successful, selling over 500,000 units in the first week. Momentum was building, but was soon cut short with the release of the Sony PS2, which essentially dried up enthusiasm for the Sega Dreamcast.
Soon Sega was not able to compete with Nintendo, Sony and Microsoft so they shifted from production of gaming consoles to software. After the death of their founder and an acquisition from another company, Sega continued to have a successful business in making games, especially movie based games, partnering with such notables as New Line Cinema and Obsidian Entertainment.
For those familiar with the gaming industry itis well known that Sega has played a major role in pushing the industry forward. We can certainly thank the company for pushing other manufacturers to do better, giving us some of the great video game systems and consoles that we have available today.