Sega Announces Sonic Movie and Discusses the Future

Published: February 10, 2016 3:38 PM /

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Sega, the Japanese company which blessed the gaming industry with Sonic the Hedgehog and who have in recent years cursed the gaming industry with Sonic Boom, had its CEO Hajime Satomi discuss their past and future. Having been combined with Sammy, under the holding company Sega Sammy Holdings inc since 2004, it brought its plans for the home market as well as abroad clear. The domestic market appears to be more focused on the Sammy side which deals with Pachinko machines going forward, while abroad is more Sega who are working on different projects including, get this, a live-action animation hybrid film based on the Sonic franchise.

In an interview with The World Portfolio, Satomi  explains the company's renewed vision for the future. Satomi states that Sammy's technology mixed with Sega's intellectual property creates a ton of new opportunities for the company, opportunities that extend far outside the realm of video games. Their reasoning for branching out is due to console gaming in Japan shrinking significantly in the past few years, resulting in Sega moving on to creating games for mobile platforms. The company is also planning on acquiring existing companies in other entertainment fields, as well as export an idealized version of Japanese culture dubbed "Cool Japan". Their new strategy includes a more aggressive approach to overseas territories.

In addition to this, the company is developing an Integrated Resort in Incheon, a city in South Korea, which will house a casino, hotels, shopping malls and various forms of entertainment. Their plan is to attract between 30 to 40 million tourists every year. The entire venture will cost between 800 billion to 1 trillion yen to build. Satomi says that the dwindling Japanese population is part of why it's important to attract as many tourists as possible, which will give the local economy a much-needed boost. 

While the resort is going to be one of the pillars of the merged company, they are also planning on using Sega's intellectual property, which includes IP made by game studios like Atlus and Creative Assembly, to branch out into other forms of entertainment. The Sega Sammy Group is in talks with Sony Pictures to produce a live-action/animation hybrid feature film based on the Sonic the Hedgehog IP, which is scheduled to be released in 2018. Because there was a demand for that, apparently. We will, of course, update you on this potential trainwreck as more news comes in.

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Chris Anderson
| Staff Writer

I've been playing games since I was just barely able to walk so I might as well write about them.