News March

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March 31, 1996

Daytona 2 Correction
Earlier, in the March 28 News, it was stated that ‘Daytona 2 is also in the works’, and I did not specify that it is only in the works for the arcade. I apologize for the mistake. Daytona 2 has only been announced for the Arcade Model 3 and not for the Sega Saturn, as of yet.

X-Men and Night Warriors News
Acclaim appears to have pushed up the released date of X-Men CotA from May to April 5. This news comes from posts on the r.g.v.s newsgroup from some EB, Software Etc., and Waldensoftware employees. Night Warriors has been released in limited supplies to select stores (3/29) and will be available everywhere early this week. Two great capcom fighters in one week, albeit one has the Acclaim name on it.
information from r.g.v.s newsgroup

 


March 29, 1996

Sega claims 500,000 Saturn’s sold
Sega is claiming to have sold 500,000 units of their Sega Saturn. I don’t know if this is the sell through number or the amount sold to retailers (like Sony’s One Million).
information from Next Generation Online

 


March 28, 1996

Saturn Price Drop
The price for the “core” Sega Saturn Unit has dropped to $249.99. Some stores are already selling it at this price but the price drop won’t start nationwide until monday. The price of the Saturn w/Virtua Fighter will be $299.99. This is not the “New” Cheaper Saturn, that will be released later at under $200, but a price drop of the original Saturn.
information from Next Generation Online and IGonline

 

Daytona Remix and Daytona 2 News
According to IGonline, Daytona Remix is 50% done. It will feature a complete graphics overhaul, new tracks and a track editor, which will allow you to save the tracks to the Systems Ram. Daytona 2 is also in the works by AM2. Supposedly Daytona 2 will be comparable to Daytana, like Virtua Fighter 3 is to Virtua Fighter 2.
information from IGonline

 

Sega, Softbank Team Up For PC Market
Intelligent Gamer Online has learned that Sega and Softbank will jointly form a new company tomorrow (Friday) to market some of Sega’s most popular home video game and arcade titles for use on the PC platform. This is the second major announcement this week involving console and PC gaming. The new venture, called Sega Entertainment, will begin with plans to port over some of the company’s 3D driving games to the PC including Sega Rally and Daytona USA. The first title will be released as early as June of this year and an additional 24 others are expected to be released by the end of 1996. Both Sega and Softbank say they are aiming for sales of 200,000-300,000 copies per title, bringing in a total of 50 million dollars in the first year for the company.
information from IGonline

New Game from Sonic Team
“Nights” is the latest creation by Yuji Naka, the creator of Sonic the Hedgehog. Nights will be a “flight-action” game that will take advantage of a 3-D analog “thumbpad” (much like the forthcoming Nintendo 64 and M2 controllers). “Nights is like nothing anyone has ever seen before on Sega Saturn or any other next generation platform,” Tom Kalinske, president and CEO of Sega of America, said. “We are completely convinced that this title will do for Sega Saturn what Sonic the Hedgehog did for the Genesis.” The premise behind Nights is a fairly typical, good versus evil plot, where Nights (the hero) must save “Nightopia” from the evil leader of “Nightmare”. The game will also take advantage of the new graphic development tools from Sega and is slated to be released “Fall 96”.
information from Next Generation Online

 


March 23, 1996

Night Warriors Delayed
Capcom has delayed their highly anticipated fighter, Night Warriors: Darkstalker’s Revenge. The game was to be released on the 20th of March, but will be delayed another two to three weeks.
information from Capcom

 


March 20, 1996

Crystal Dynamics pushes back Blood Omen and 3D Baseball
The 32bit specialists Crystal Dynamics has pushed back the release dates of two of their highly anticipated Saturn (and Playstation) games, Blood Omen: Legacy of Kain, and 3D Baseball 96, to the fall of 1996.
information from Next Generation Online and Crystal Dynamics customer service number

 


March 17, 1996

X-Men: Children of the Atom delayed
The release date for X-Men: CotA has been delayed again, despite being out in Japan for months. The date has been pushed back to April 18th by AccLAME. If I were really naive, I would assume that Acclaim is delaying the game to make it even better, possibly trying to increase the amount of frames, but I am not naive but am cynical. Acclaim is either trying to screw it up or waiting for the Playstation version to be finished.
information from Dustin’s Page

 


March 14, 1996

Sega Announces Link Cable (well, kinda)
Sega of America’s Terry Tang has said that Sega is looking into bringing a link cable to the U.S. but they don’t have any specific plans as to when it will come out, or at what price it will be. What will determine the release of the link cable is compatible software.
information from EGM online

 


March 8, 1996

Sega to Introduce 20,000 Yen Saturn (about $200)
Sega Enterprises Ltd., has decided to release a scaled down Saturn. This will be released in Japan on March 22, 1996 at a price of Y20,000 ($200) which is Y14,800 ($148) cheaper than the current price of Y34,800 ($340). Sega says that they will be able to produce a Saturn this ‘cheap’ because of mass production techniques and hardware design changes, by the way, they will still contain all of the same functions of the current Saturns. It will be released in the US, but as of now, there is no set price or release date. Sega is now projecting over 5 million units to be sold in Japan by the end of March 1997.
information from IGonline

 


March 7, 1996

Sega Readies $500 Internet Bundle
Sega has confirmed that it will be launching an Internet Saturn pack later this year with a price tag of “under $500”. The complete package will include a Saturn console, modem and software. The package is being readied for fall. A keyboard will also be offered as an extra option. An extra pack will be made available for existing Saturn owners with a retail tag of $150 to $200. Sega is currently negotiating with browser suppliers including Netscape which is also understood to be in talks with Nintendo.
information from Next Generation online


March 1, 1996

Sega Decides to Push Toshinden Remix Out
Having mulled their options with Battle Arena Toshinden Remix for two months, Sega has opted to rush a slightly improved but mostly unchanged revision to market, fixing a few of the Japanese game’s problems (a few infinite damage combos and other minor problems), but leaving the rest of the game intact rather than polishing it to perfection — a time issue more than anything else. Noting that further delays to the release would only push BAT1 into competition with the impending American release of BAT2, Sega officials have expressed concern over the state of the product but say that there’s little more that they can do: Coordination between Takara in Japan and Sega of America is difficult and time-consuming, so the modifications made have been minor ones. Look out for the hot new box artwork, though — flames behind a sword, with the words Battle Arena Toshinden cut from metal and the prominent word “Remix” centered on the box.
information from Next Generation online

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