We’ll see Sonic more often in the future – but that’s not Sega’s main plan.
We owe wonderful series and memories to the Japanese gaming industry – Mario, Sonic, Zelda, Resident Evil, Metal Gear Solid, Silent Hill, Castlevania, Final Fantasy, Pokémon, Yakuza, Secret of Mana and many, many more.
But the Japanese games industry is under pressure, which can be seen in three companies in particular: Sega, Square Enix and Konami have announced that they will radically reorganize their business models.
What this conversion consists of and the reasons behind it, Micha discusses in the podcast with Human Nagafi discussed, management consultant at 1789 Innovations and podcasters at Corporate Therapy such as Critical Infinity.
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If you exclude the globally successful platform operators Sony and Nintendo, for years it was enough for Japanese publishers to concentrate on their home market – and there, above all, on the mobile business, in the home country of Mario and Sonic the smartphone is the one By far the most popular gaming platform. Sega, Konami and Square Enix also made a lot of money from this, with mobile revenues running into billions.
As a result, Japan is relatively spared from the issues plaguing Western publishers like Electronic Arts and Activision, which we discuss in our AAA identity crisis podcast:
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The AAA Identity Crisis: What Game Companies Are Failing To Do Right Now
But the smartphone market has now been exhausted, growth is stagnating – and suddenly long-established companies are realizing that they have ignored international business for too long. Capcom serves as a model here, who have celebrated global success with Monter Hunter and Resident Evil and have long been more independent of the Japanese market.
So Sega, Square Enix and Konami are putting out feelers for new ideas:
- Sega makes a big impression and promises “Super Games” from 2026, i.e. AAA games that are supposed to overshadow all previous Sega projects. In addition, the corporate mascot Sonic will sprint across our path in more and more other media – from films to series to appearances in Roblox.
- Konami has peed at Ubisoft and wants to roll out its brands through more games and channels: Like Assassin’s Creed, Silent Hill is also said to get several new games (Silent Hill f, Silent Hill Townfall and the remake of Silent Hill 2), as well as a TV series and a movie planned.
- Square Enix strives for the most radical change and after the surprising sale of its western studios and brands (Tomb Raider, Deus Ex) wants to open its remaining development teams to external investors – it is quite possible that Tencent or Sony will participate financially in the next Final Fantasy. In addition, Square is much more oriented towards NFTs, blockchain and cryptogaming than the other two.
Can this go well? We discuss it in the podcast! Or in two podcasts, you can already hear our opinion about NFTs and cryptogaming in this episode:
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Cryptogaming doesn’t solve problems, it creates them
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