Sega's Digital Restructure Means 300 Staff Will Be Offered Voluntary Retirement

I would make a joke about the quality of Sonic games but people losing their jobs is actually pretty serious. I wouldn't wish that even on SEGA employees. I mean, they're people too

Football Manager has an audience? Where have I been?

It's a shame for a company that used to be big, to get this bad. The genesis was my first sega system and I loved the dreamcast (didn't care too much for the game gear and 32x). I used to love playing the sonic games and all of their exclusive titles. I'm still waiting for a Super Monkey Ball game to release either on the Wii U or PS4 or even both. I hope they continue making some good console games.

sad to see a "Big 4" downsizing more jobs. I feel for the 300 who may end up without their jobs.

Restructuring around smartphone gaming is disappointing to hear but hopefully they still continue to release SEGA 3D classics and games on consoles and handhelds. I also hope Atlus(a now SEGA owned company) remains unaffected.

£500,000? Surely that's a typo. How could a company have so little money? If so, that's bad news for SEGA.

@64supermario It's not a "gamer's" franchise, but trust me, I have a lot of friends that don't really care about "proper" video games that play FM religiously. Kind of like Candy Crush. It's not something a traditional video game fan would be seen dead with, but it's tremendously popular.

How exactly is the quality of Sonic Boom relevant to any of this? Why is your video about it at the end of the article @Damo? It has absolutely nothing to do with any of this news.

I wonder what "voluntary retirement" means, and what life would be like for employees, targeted for it, that refuse whatever package is offered.

Also brings this to mind: “If we reduce the number of employees for better short-term financial results, employee morale will decrease,” he said during an investor Q&A. “I sincerely doubt employees who fear that they may be laid off will be able to develop software titles that could impress people around the world.” - Satoru Iwata.

@Damo Okay, my issue is why, if you felt that, to not put that explanation in the article. I was just very confused to see a seemingly unrelated video with no apparent reason for it to be there, that's all.

Good luck to the employees to find new jobs. I do hope Sega continue with 3D Classics, and bring classics back to the VC. Or at least sell the rights to reputable Softwear House to continue. Perhaps this could be something M2 and Ninty go after

Only £500,000 ? If that is correct then the end is certainly nigh.A sad thought indeed!

@Damo well said dude!

Yeah 500,000 doesn't sound like Mich for a side arm of Sega to have in the bank at all.

Wonder if Sega shut down, would Nintendo buy sonic and reboot him.

Sooo, Sega screws up by desperatly ignoring their fanbase time and time again, outsourcing games to a studio that couldnt even tie their own shoes without producing glitches and bugs and now they kick people out to buffer the losses ?
Classy Sega, real classy.
Maybe you should have listened a while ago...

Its funny, that as soon as japanese companies try to appeal to a ifferent audience (the fabeled west), they topple like a house of cards.
Konami, Capcom and Sega.
Its almost as if people liked them more, when they acted like japanese game developers...hmm

@Squid I can't speak for everyone, only myself, but the Sonic Boom video made sense to me, I didn't consider it unrelated to the news story or random at all. Anyway, sad news indeed

@Einherjar
Pandering to western audiences by becoming something you aren't always causes the downfall of any company, game developer or otherwise

I miss the sega of my youth

@luke88

Unfortunately my dad is going through this right now with his job. It does put you in a slightly awkward situation, as it makes you feel like you're constantly walking on eggshells. He's so close to his actual retirement too, he's been there almost 30 years and deserves his real retirement. You just have to hope they don't do something worse to get you out, if you say no.

It's basically a polite way of saying get out so we can hire cheaper/less experienced staff. But at least they're being polite, that's much better than doing a standard layoff.

Good quote from Iwata, it does speak for the "people."

Digital restructure? How about some Vrtual Console focus then? Maybe even some classic ports that people have been practically begging for? No? Well, have fun wallowing in the mobile market quicksand then.

Sad for job losses. Makes me remember an Edge mag cover from about 2001, read; DREAMCAST DEAD: SEGA UNSTOPPABLE..... How sadly wrong.

Sega what is wrong with you??? Ok you going digital?? POST SOME VIRTUAL CONSOLE GAMES ON WII U!!! YOU ARE LOSING $$$$ BY NOT DOING SO. WHILE YOURE AT IT ADD XONE AND PS4 TO THE LIST!!!!! You own piles and piles of classic games that can make you money!!!! I have NO interest in playing crazy taxi on a cell but on a wii u? Day 1 download!! Cmon sega get your pooooooooop together before you're gone completely!!! I don't understand the mindset at all!! It's just as frustrating as the way Nintendo handles the vc with 1 game a week!!!! Get off the fence and jump in!!! Hungry wii u gamers out there boys!! A lot of them ex sega console owners and LOVE the classics!! Lastly I'm a big sega fan who could give a pooooooooop less about total war OR football manager!! Yuck!! Afterburner? Outrun? Space harrier? Quartet? Fantasy zone? Power drift? Crazy taxi? Nights? Jet set radio? House of the dead? Virtua cop? Virtua fighter? Sega rally?? Daytona USA? Toe jam m earl? Wonder boy? Teddy boy? Action fighter? Alex kidd? Kid chameleon? THIS IS SEGA!!! These games will make you money and should all be on WII U VC!! Stop wasting your time with that other bullpooooooooop!!! You're not a sim company you're an arcade company!! Cmon!!!!!

I took a Voluntary/Mandatory retirement from Citibank 6 years ago. I was one of 35,000 to do so Worldwide. I got the notice the same day they got their government (taxpayer) bail out.

I received a nice payout so I took the retirement to heart (became a stay at home dad) - about three years ago I decided it was time to go back to work, and NOTHING!

Basically, if you are long term unemployed they just throw your resume in the garbage. The only time I get a call is when I lie on my resume and say I am still employed or just was laid off.

Thankfully, I know how to handle my money and have always lived within my means. The bills are still getting paid and nobody is going hungry. My gaming hasn't suffered either.

Being a big Sega fan growing up, this is sad news to me. While their Sonic Boom games have been less than good, Sega has has a catalog of top titles. They are also the only ones still carrying on the 3D Classics line on 3DS - all of which that have been released are solid efforts. I hope this downsizing can help them turn the corner from an overall downward spiral.

@JasonAnArgoNOT64 And yet, its still seems to be the "in" thing to do.
Are they really that dense to not see that they are loosing giant chunks a revenue since they started doing this ?
I mean lets Face it, Capcom is pretty much broke by doing this.
They ruined every franchise and IP they had by doing this.

You cant seriously tell me, that some business suit wearing monkey in their upper ranks still thinks, that stuff like that is a good idea...

Man, I dont wanna be an arm chair CEO, but I think Sega could greatly benefit from not only doing a temp partnership with Nintendo like they did a while back, but let Nintendo help with development itself. If there's literally anyone that can give Sonic (and other IPs) the turnaround they need, it's Nintendo (also Platinum, WayForward, Retro, Next Level Games, etc.)

@DTFaux Nintendo has their own production problems lol I don't see them helping sega anytime soon. Sega needs to get aggressive with the current gen consoles as I stated above and focus on getting their classics on wii u xone and ps4! I think their losing a lot of money not doing so! Just saying I love sega but who the hell is running that company????

@BLPs the article (not the video) has nothing to do wih "sniping" at one particular fan base... Let's be honest, when was the last time a Saw movie was good? (Answer? Never since the first one) but people continue to shovel money at the franchise and buy tickets. So... The studio continues to make more. Are they good movies? No. Are people buying tickets? Yes. So the producers don't care about the quality of their product, so long as it sells. That's the case here. Would you honestly compare Super Mario World 3D (heck, Super Mario Wii U, for that matter) with Sonic Boom? Most people (and sites) agreed "No.". I love old school Sonic just as much as the next gamer, but c'mon, these have been below average releases for the last decade

Man, what a bummer. That does not sound like much money in the bank, particularly for a company of this size. Is that accurate? Is that for Sega, or for Sega Sammy as a whole? I wonder if this means they're going to end up selling Atlus...

@joey302 I think Nintendo's issues more falls on the sides of physical production than game development. I mean, if they can take the time to work with Tecmo-Koei to make a Zelda themed Dynasty Warriors, I'm sure they can give a little time to Sega (even if it was just consulting on Nintendo's end).

As for Sega moving their classics on current gen consoles, that will only do so much. Especially considering a lot of them can be found on Steam and Apple/Android/Amazon market for so cheap, that really cuts down on their values and viability. Doing things like the 3D Classics and remasters does help breath new life (and justify higher prices), but they can't live on legacy alone without making new installments on those classics. And none of that will matter if their new games can't even hold up some standard of quality.

@DTFaux I agree with you on all only I'm not on steam and I hate playing games on my iPhone. I'm a console gamer back to Atari 2600!! I haven't played a PC game since the Amiga 500! I'm sure there are other gamers that are in my category??😜

Sega, stop cramming your flagship games with convoluted stories and cut scenes full of characters no one cares about.

So I’m guessing that deal with Nintendo about making four Nintendo exclusive Sonic games isn’t gonna happen anymore? I mean it’s not like they were producing anything good anyway.

@joey302 Oh yeah, I agree that there's definitely a market for those who'd rather game on their consoles than PC/Mobile, myself included. I do wonder how much work is required for them to port/format their games for current gen consoles?

@DTFaux lol I have no idea dude but I wish they'd just get to it!!! Experiment with it? Sega should throw up 3 or 4 games on vc and see what happens? If sales suck ok fine walk away but if sales are brisk then they can continue with little risk! Worth a shot that they should take I feel.

Only 500 thousand? That has to be a joke...

@joey302 An issue with Wii U VC right now is that it seems to only be reserved for Nintendo consoles, so unless it's a Sega game released on GBA or Wii, we might not be seeing it unless a remastered version popped up. Though I can't see why Sega can't push for it either, save for Nintendo stopping them. They managed to get a handful of Game Gear games on the 3DS VC and then promptly stopped.

@DracioKoi I think it was originally just 3 games. But yeah, Mario and Sonic 2014 and Lost World were passable to decent (IDK about the sales). But after something like Sonic Boom, I just can't imagine Nintendo would care to team up with Sega again for an exclusive partnership like this unless there was promise for better quality. It's almost hilarious how no one was bragging about the 3-game deal the closer we got to Sonic Boom's release.

Look at SEGA Nintendo..... buy them so that they can redeem themselves!

But in all seriousness, they really need to improve on their game quality especially Sonic otherwise more will lose jobs.

@Squid I agree.

They. Need. To. Put. Sonic. On. FORCED. Retirement.
No more poopitypoopity Sonic games. At least for 1-2 full console generations.
They need to focus on other franchises and bring the company back up before trying again with Sonic.

@Damo do you think this will affect atlus?

@BLPs AM2 is also conveniently ignored. (The best team is still that one). Border Break grossed 100,000,000$ and it is an Arcade game.

Wouldn't mind at all if Nintendo bought some IP's from Sega. Having them take over Sonic for example and make new games with Nintendo's quality would be awesome. Hate it that they rushed the whole Sonic Boom thing, since it obviously wasn't finished at released...

I wonder if Nintendo actually checked or tested Sonic Boom?

When a videogame developer comes to this(focusing on smartphones) he's basically dead .

they should "improve the efficiency" by making better games, I hate how sammy is handling sega nowadays.

So that's their answer. Rather than try to finally produce another quality Sonic game for consoles they decide to give up and focus on smartphones. No doubt they'll throw out all sorts of awful Sonic themed microtransaction wallet suckers now - oh wait they've already got a couple of those!

Really though, disappointed to see they're basically turning their back on consoles after so long. If anyone should be losing jobs, it's the ones who oversaw all the dreadful games they churned out over the last 10 years. The only silver lining to this news would be if they decided to give Nintendo a crack at developing a Sonic game, but I'm not holding my breathe.

@Ootfan98 Nintendo had no involvement with the actual development of the games they just signed an exclusive deal on 3 games. Sonic Lost World and Sonic Boom actually were in development years before that but for some reason after they switched to Nintendo platforms they rushed completion so it can have a year timeframe

I don't see how switching to digital games would generate better profits. That's one of the main reason vita doesn't have high sales still, Sony switched to digital releases making physical copies hard to find. Unless you look through the PS Store people could think they don't make Vita games anymore

You want to talk about digital releases?

Is Phantasy Star Online 2 either localized in English or has the Japanese servers officially opened up internationally so people aren't at risk of being banned from playing on it yet?

Get your crap together Sega people outside of Japan care about the IPs you have outside of Sonic.

Can Nintendo buy Sega now?

Sega is just trash now.

@TeeJay It has nothing to do with wishing. If those Sega employee's can't put out a quality product, they are personally making Sega unable to compete and make cash. This isn't really a feel sorry situation, its just Sega's bad practices coming back to haunt them. They really should look at the THQ fold and take a few lessons from that, those lessons being that even quality games can't save you if you keep doing lousy business practices.

If Sega wants to restructure around digital smartphone and PC releases, I don't care. They're a sad shadow of their glory days anyway. I just care about what happens to all the IP left laying around doing nothing. Please Sega, for the sake of your legacy, unload your properties like Yakuza, Valkyria Chronicles, Shining Force, and Phantasy Star onto a publisher who cares and don't drag Atlus down with you.

Hopefully someone else picks up Sega-owned Platinum IPs like Bayo and Vanquish too.

@Tiredman Sonic Lost World was just fine. (Better than Captain Toad/NSMBU anyway). Any problems are the fault of the player not the game. Sonic Boom was contracted out. (Sega do seem to get screwed over by developers all the time. Gearbox should have gone bankrupt for Alien Isolation).

Who will make Shenmue 3 now?

Will never see a skies of arcadia HD now... my heart is broken

Sega has tragically been a shell of it's former self for a decade now. Somehow they have always been a company that has been mismanaged from 1988 till now.
They had a brief window of being properly managed(2000-2003), creating new games, and showing respect for their history and franchises.

Maybe if Sega just made a new Phantasy Star, Shining Force, Chu Chu Rocket, Jet Grind Radio, or Streets of Rage they would be in better shape.

Such a rich history to draw upon. Im sure they'd make money even just getting M2 to port more of their amazing arcade games to consoles. SEGA games were such a part of my gaming history growing up and I hope they maybe look at extending their vintage range on dedicated console gaming download services, rather than creating bland tablet versions of once classic titles. That seems such a saturated marketplace.
If not, I still have my Master System, Megadrive, Saturn and Dreamcast. Alien Isolation is a great game by the way.

Poor Sega. On the bright side, at least they're not Capcom. Nintendo should buy some IPs from them, and buy out Capcom completely. Would love to see what Nintendo could do with some of Sega and Capcom's IPs, as well as locking down Monster Hunter, Bayonetta, and Ace Attorney as Nintendo exclusives.

So what does this mean for Atlus? Will they be forced to refocus on mobile instead of the 3DS?

If there's any justice in the world, the people upstairs responsible for running this company into the ground would be the ones receiving those 'offers'.

Hearing they're focusing more on Digital/PC content is understandable if it's actually helping them make a profit but concerning. Well... concerning in as what will happen to Project Diva and Atlus. Any other IP's I care about have either been run into the ground or are MIA anyway. If they don't make any more console games fine, just continue to offer the backlog on new gen consoles and I'm good.

@Damo @DiscoGentleman @BLPs
Nintendolife's rating on Sonic games have been described as biased by some of the fans here. I have only played Sonic Lost World but not Sonic Boom, but let's review what the review said about Lost World.

"there's a ludicrous difficulty spike late on": Zelda 2 on NES has 2x or 3x difficulty spike within the first 5 minutes into the game but no one complains about it.

"we consider ourselves reasonably skilled gamers — though not exceptional — and we saw Game Over many times": I do not know when video games are supposed to be easy. So a new standard of evaluating a game is whether a reviewer can master the game or not? This kind of opinion (not limited to those on Nintendolife) was one of the examples that encourage easy games in the market.

"With a reliance on auto-lock-on, there are times where Sonic will zoom to an enemy you don't want to or can't hit, or won't lock at all.": I agree, but this design was intentional. There are actually two jump buttons on the gamepad - one is purely for jumping (Button A) and another for both jumping and homing attack (Button B). Yes, the game did sometimes zoom to an enemy you should not hit. The correct reaction is then to press the jump button (i.e., Button A) rather than the homing attack button. This situation happens more frequently in the second half of the game, and "good" gamers should have started differentiating between the use of these two buttons.

Finally, the consistent observations among reviewers from different site is that reviewers in general continuously use Nintendo platformer's standard to review a Sonic game - lack of exploration, fiddling or complex control... I do not know when platformers are supposed to have strong exploration aspects. If a new game does not fit the windows of what a Nintendo platfromer should have (e.g., strong exploration, easy control) then a game is bad. In addition, reviewers seem to love games that they can play well but hate games that they do not. I believe that Nintendolife has missed the fact that Lost World, at least, was a technical platformer game rather than a Mario game, and thus the standard is not transferable from one to another.

While Nintendolife keeps saying or implying that Sonic games are consistently of low quality in various articles, it really does not resonate the opinions of sonic fans, as well as the opinions of other expert reviewers (e.g., Destructoid, Nintendo Insider, Famitsu). To people who love Sonic Lost World it was simply because the reviewers did not know how to play the game. Nevertheless, Nintendolife articles consistently acknowledges the consistent recent low-quality of sonic titles as A FACT rather than their subjective opinions (which are not unanimously shared by reviewers from other sites also).

It explains why people complain about your article. I just want to point this out as I found that Nintendolife's messages here constantly miss this issue and offends people who love Sonic games.

It's painful to see you like this, Sega.

@IceClimbers

I really hope not. Atlus has published a good amount of quality titles on 3DS so it's safe to assume that the 3DS is more than profitable for them.

Sounds like a really nice way of sayin' laid off.

Hoping SEGA just keeps spiraling down the drain. Sad thought from a person who's owned the Genesis, Saturn, and Dreamcast during their generation but it's the only way to free the franchises to more suitable companies like.....Nintendo.

@GreatPlayer I love Sonic. Have since Sonic 1 on Genesis. Sonic since the end of the Dreamcast era has been, on average, atrocious especially when you compare him to Mario. There's no escaping it. Every platformer that comes out WILL be compared to Mario. Sonic's games have not all been bad. Colors and Generations were the 2 best 3D platformers for Sonic since Adventure 2. The Advance and Rush series on the handheld were solid adventures that showed that Sonic in 2D was still fun.

However SEGA has mishandled him far more. 2006's debacle, the fact that they somehow messed up a Sonic 2D platformer with Sonic 4, and now Sonic Boom which took a backseat to its TV counterpart (which is an ok show with Dr. Eggman being genuinely funny) instead of the other way like in the 90's and even in the beginning of SEGA's 3rd party venture. Sonic diehards will never admit it but the character still looks up to Mario and probably from further down now than he has ever had to before.

Holy crap, they really only have 100 million yen left? That's practically nothing... I think we're about to see the end of an era, here; Sega is entering survival mode now.

I used to be (only slightly) acquainted with a person who was a big player community manager in the Phantasy Star Online titles, before those went Japan only... I wonder if he was affected by this, since he was hired by Sega due to his community outreach efforts, and became a part of the American branch's handling of Sonic properties in some way or another... Though I doubt he had any involvement in Sonic Boom.

@FJOJR Yeah, 2006 and the time period in general leading up to 2006 was a very bad time for Sega. They really weren't quite sure what they were doing anymore, and were trying to find themselves again.

@FJOJR @PlywoodStick
You have missed some important words in your comments:

(I THINK) Sonic since the end of the Dreamcast era has been, on average, atrocious especially when you compare him to Mario.

(I THINK IT IS) the fact that they somehow messed up a Sonic 2D platformer with Sonic 4.

Please be careful with your Procrustean attitude: Not everyone likes Mario platformers and your attitude perfectly explains why every platformer nowadays feel similar. They all see Mario as standard and thus no one else makes something different. The view that you have (and exactly the view that reviewers share) explains why there is a stagnancy in the platformer genre. I personally enjoy the more recent sonic games than those in the Genesis genre, and from the comments here there are people agree with me. Please do not confuse between your subjective, personal opinions and the fact - your subjective opinions are not shared by everyone else.

@GreatPlayer Huh!? Where did you get the idea I thought that? I thought Sonic Heroes was an interesting romp, I loved the Sonic Adventure titles, I had fun with Secret Rings, never played Sonic 4 and several of the 3D Sonics up until now so I can't judge them, and I enjoyed Phantasy Star Universe, despite it's many flaws. I'm nowhere near as big a critic of Sonic and Sonic Team titles as the seeming general consensus on Nintendo Life. (Except for the obviously bad ones, Sonic 06, Shadow the Hedgehog, and Sonic Boom.)

I definitely like the Mario titles, they are partially responsible for shaping my thoughts on gaming as a whole, but I still prefer classic style action-adventure sidescrollers like Tomba!, Cave Story, Popful Mail, Super Adventure Island 2, and Monster World 4. I definitely liked the classic Sonic titles, but I actually prefer the Sonic Adventure titles. I think you've misjudged me.

@GreatPlayer Oh wait, maybe you didn't direct that at me, but at FJOJR, woops! The @ was sent to me too, so I didn't realize that right away.