Tracker_TD

Assuming Vergeben's not talking out his ass (which is steadily becoming harder and harder to believe):

Works just like it does in a 1v1. Press back from the way you're facing + B and do a Crack Shoot. Sorted. Same with recovering using it. Anyway, I am in love with how Terry plays. I was already over the moon with him being in but he's so satisfying to use. Incidentally if you want to see some footage of him being used in free for alls I just uploaded some footage... though I spend a fair amount of it crack shooting off stages so maybe it's not the best example.

Personally speaking, for me the worst period was around 2014 when Boom basically took over the franchise for a bit. At that point I just dipped out and went full on into Hatsune Miku hell. Not even because I particularly hate Boom as a concept, but Rise of Lyric didn't grab me for reasons that soon became obvious. ...but then Mania happened, so hell yeah.

I disagree. You evidently have more experience with Valkyria than I do, so yeah, I totally believe you there. But as I mentioned previously - bringing back House of the Dead for a proper, not reboot sequel wasn't boring to me (and I really like what I've played of Scarlet Dawn, too). Neither is bringing back Sakura Wars, let alone finally localising it. Or even PSO2 - as absolutely crap as it was for them to take so long to actually bring it over, I'm surprised they're actually trying with the MMO market now, and promising parity with the Japanese version to boot. For all I know Sakura Wars could suck (though I really hope it doesn't...), but they're giving it another chance with a gameplay retool that's arguably more befitting of being in giant mechs, and I'm down for that. It doesn't strike me as safe. Even Monkey Ball is giving me at least some kind of confidence - as much as a misfire remaking BB was, the dev team seem to want to use this as a springboard into making new stuff, and gauging feedback on stuff like level editors, or SMBDX remakes, and what have you. All through Twitter - it's made for refreshing reading compared to the Sonic Twitter at least, as it at least feels more involved than that one poll with a Chao Garden on it due to how they've kept up with actual posts from the devs themselves. I dunno. Maybe it's more of an on principle thing - even as crap as you say Valkyria has become, that's not to say bringing back NiGHTS would instantly be a winning formula either. While I can kind of get along with Journey of Dreams nowadays because I've come to realise the actual NiGHTS bits are a pretty good continuation of the original's gameplay, it wasn't what most were looking for. And as beloved as JSR apparently is, I equally see it cited as one of the more divisive DC games due to its controls. And having played PSO... I can admire the IP, but I did not particularly like what I played. SEGA aren't perfect now, I can't say they are. But it wasn't all the sunshine and rainbows on the DC either, and I feel my issue here was romanticising that era so much. Nah, I didn't want to insinuate that. I'm not sure if you have played Yakuza or any of these other franchises - I was taking issue with Azoo, who's generic GTA comparison clearly illustrated to me that he hadn't. Or if he had, hadn't for longer than 5 minutes. And his timelines all seemed to go pears up at some point anyway, so I got the impression it was more geared towards a timeline that secured those series he liked in the short term, at the expense of stuff that we have now like Yakuza that took a longer term to be established. It's my bad with the second part of that reply - I should've split those points up better. I'll definitely take the L there.

...all I did was quote you saying 'SEGA should have IPs in the place of these others' and say "they do, and here's examples". Like unless I've read you wrong there, there's nothing to get so sour about. The second part was less towards you and more towards the idea that these franchises are inexplicably "more SEGA" than what we have now instead, just because "they are" - based on impressions that seem to come from not much more than a cursory glance.

I probably would've let the Dreamcast nostalgia love-in happen (because "alternate timeline discussion" or not, I feel like that was the only real aim of this topic - it just didn't happen because we're on a Sonic board, I'm one of the most vocal not-just-Sonic SEGA fans here so I was one of the few that chose to weigh in, and I don't even like the Dreamcast that much so instead the dismissive attitude towards what original IP SEGA actually does have and continues to use was what caught my attention). I'm not letting nonsense like "Yakuza is just GTA" slide. Or even "SEGA don't care about their IP, which is why they let actually talented studios like LizardCube make spiritual successors, something they didn't do with JSR years before." Again, it's not about whether you like the games not - I don't like Valkyria. I might not even like Yakuza 7 and its genre shift, for all I know. It's about brushing it all off with increasingly flimsy reasoning and clearly demonstrating you don't have a real grasp on what these series are, because it's not specifically Jet Set Radio or SA3, things you do have a grasp on because you grew up with them. And things which wouldn't even necessarily be good themselves, even if this timeline of yours had happened. I mean I can say "man it sure would be nice if we had Fighting Vipers 3". Like... it would. But I don't need a topic or wall of text IRL fanfic to do that. And that's not even tied to nostalgia, because I didn't get to play Vipers until the Saturn had been dead for like, 15 years. This topic probably would've been better as a showcase thing, for "hey look at my extremely cool hypothetical hardware drawings", as opposed to the old "SEGA haven't made [specific title], therefore they suck as a whole because my tastes are truly what matter, and in a parallel universe where capitalism wasn't a thing all my specific dreams could've happened" stuff that I already got worn out from after dealing with Sonic Adventure fanboys on that one Facebook page years ago. Or dealing with people who's sole focus on the SEGA AGES line is just the safe stuff like Sonic, and brushing off the actual wins for preservation like Ichidant-R. Now step back and drink a Pepsi. It's what Pepsiman would want. And he was in Fighting Vipers, so he must be right. That's fine. It just kind of forgets that SEGA's IP portfolio right now... has plenty to fill that void. In fact I listed half of them at least twice on Page 1. Again, whether you like them or not, that's fine, maybe you don't. But they're not just licensed game city, are they? Perhaps you mean spiritual successors to those games specifically, but at that point you might as well just play it straight and say "bring back NiGHTS". Which is also fine, but doesn't need to come at the expense of Yakuza, Puyo, Sakura Wars, Virtual On, House of the Dead, etc etc.

As I said, it’s not about whether you like it or not. I don’t like Valkyria. That doesn’t mean I brush it off as “not real SEGA” with flimsy “Yakuza is just GTA” comparisons that hilariously misunderstand how Yakuza actually plays and its narrative. Because if nothing else, I at least tried Valkyria. And you don’t have to do that - no point spending money for something you might not like. But you’re not even giving these newer IPs a chance, when original IP was what SEGA did best. And they’re continuing to do well with. Your reasoning is as flimsy as “PSO is just liked because it was online”, is my point. Hence the nostalgia card.

Yeah, but as nice as throwing all that caution to the wind was - the Dreamcast died. Shenmue bombed. I can understand playing it safe when they're a much smaller company than they were, and even then I think you're underselling Yakuza a hell of a lot if "GTA but wacky" is your only take away from it. Like... that's the most tired, played out comparison for Yakuza, and if it were so safe the series wouldn't have outright died in the West for several years before its resurgence. And you also skimmed well over the continuing Puyo series, where they've been leaning even harder into their hardcore, competitive crowd, or even Valkyria! As well as them actually continuing arcade development for their legacy franchises - I didn't expect an actual, canonical sequel in the House of the Dead series in 2019, that let us finally face the "Mystery Man" teased all those years ago in III and IV, but there you go, Scarlet Dawn! You might not like these games, but pretending the IP-driven spirit of SEGA isn't there just because it's not specifically what you want just comes off as too dismissive. I don't even like Valkryia myself, as I'm not an SRPG kind of person - but these games are acclaimed by both their fans and critics. Same with Project DIVA just being well-received because "it's Vocaloid" - by your logic, I could say all the hype around the original PSO was just "wow, I can play this Dreamcast game online!" Or that Rez' hype was "man listen to this soundtrack", or "this game has a vibrator". The only main difference here is you don't have nostalgia for Yakuza, or Valkyria. And again, if SEGA cared so little about Streets of Rage IV and what have you - those projects just wouldn't exist, like the countless JSR reboot attempts from external companies. Or even their own internal ones - even back on the Dreamcast Streets of Rage IV got canned!

I think this is ultimately just a personal thing then. Yakuza is very much cut from the same charm-laden cloth as something like Jet Set Radio, just in a different way. Same for stuff like DIVA, or Sakura Wars. I struggle to say "what SEGA was in general", but what "SEGA was for you", sure. NiGHTS might get its due soon, anywho - that AIR NiGHTS thing is just sitting there, menacingly

Thing is, the OC in Forces is still very much a side-character. That apparently wasn't always the plan, but you rescue Sonic in the first 10 minutes. I think if Dragon Ball can afford to have several games based around making your own character, it's not much of a stretch to say Sonic can. It's no more of an identity loss than the series has already had since its origin, and no more than say introducing Tails as a second playable character again would be.

The thing I don't get is like... Streets of Rage, Space Channel, Puyo, PSO, Sakura Wars, Monkey Ball (EDIT: Panzer Dragoon! House of the Dead! I keep thinking of more stuff!). Even Daytona USA! A lot of the 'modern' SEGA stuff is just old SEGA stuff, revived and brought into modern times and, in my outlook, with surprisingly few compromises made. I feel like unless you're really specifically gunning for a specific title such as Skies of Arcadia 2 or god forbid, Sonic Adventure 3, I feel like SEGA's doing what they can to bring back their old stuff while still keeping it relevant, such as updating Sakura Wars into a full-on action RPG. But if that just feels like nostalgia milking, newer series like Yakuza still feel like positive spins on stuff from their heyday - up until 7 which is obviously going for the RPG shake-up, the series was building on what was good about SpikeOut. Same devs, innit. I think at least giving them a shake is fair. Even Project DIVA, which gets a bad rep as "just Japanese idol trash" or something, is a really competent rhythm game with a lot of design I find very in keeping with SEGA's old style - and I guess that makes sense because Mirai and DIVA Arcade/Megamix are by AM2. I'd have been singing a different tune many years ago, especially being in Europe; but I dunno what SEGA could really be doing now that's feasible beyond extremely specific requests that aren't necessarily easy to fulfil. Sakura Wars coming West is already crazy enough to me, let alone PSO2 after all this time. Hilariously, their biggest Achilles heel right now is their own mascot! I obviously can't force you to like any of these series, but it felt a bit dismissive to just brush off Modern SEGA like that, that's all.

The thing is, having a console in of itself wouldn't magically change the market perceptions that stopped SEGA making these games. It'd just lead less people to buy their console over the others, and so they'd arguably be in a worse position, especially in the outcome that Microsoft just Banjo'd their IP - which is not how it is with SEGA today. This is bearing in mind SEGA's actually existing Xbox exclusives evidently do much good either, as great as they may have been. In a perfect world, good games get good sales, but that's not how it is - IIRC, Peter Moore said part of the reason he had to literally tell Naka to fuck off at the end of the DC's life is because Naka was too stubborn to realise Sonic didn't have a stranglehold over its demographic anymore. Tying that to a new expensive piece of hardware wouldn't fix that, I don't think. It's not like SEGA even went completely dead over the noughties either, though admittedly their best output usually stayed in Japan - but Puyo Fever got ported to everything and Phantasy Star continued to actually get releases, as an example. Compared to the long term plan here of SEGA's IPs probably dying eventually anyway, I don't mind the bog as much.

As long as the games are good, I’m really not arsed how “niche” it is. God knows Fighting Vipers 3 isn’t happening but I still adore that series just fine. What you wanted is a change in market perceptions, that I don’t think would have been facilitated just by SEGA sticking around in consoles. The market conditions are shifting slowly back to catering for those with nostalgia for this era now like yourself, hence the resurgence. Likewise, SEGA may not be super hands on with TJ&E and etc, but they exist and as far as I’m aware they’re still good - so I fail to see the issue with handing properties back to their creators beyond the optics of SEGA being a ‘superpower’, which I don’t think is as important as just making good games. Which I think right now, SEGA do.

I feel like you're kind of forgetting SEGA isn't just some aimless husk nowadays. Yakuza is going hella strong and having a huge shake-up with 7, Valkyria exists, Puyo is back, Space Channel's making a comeback, even PSO2 is finally coming here, Sakura Wars is hitting a revival, they seem to be gearing up for the same with Monkey Ball, Project DIVA has them covered in rhythm games, and M2 are the best around in handling the old stuff. Oh, and even giving indie studios a chance with their IPs - Sonic Mania goes without saying, but so does Wonder Boy and Streets of Rage IV. And they have Atlus content now too! Like... it's one thing to be laser-focused on the DC era that you clearly have a lot of nostalgia for, and that's fine I guess, but SEGA 2019 is more than just bad 3D Sonic games. Just because Jet Set Radio hasn't come back doesn't mean SEGA's dead.

I've played it on both GC and PC. They're both abominations. In fact I think I found it worse on Gamecube, somehow. That and it was Sonic's first multiplatform title - I'm putting the blame on the PS2's crappy architecture and Sonic Team's crappy cross-platform work, not 5 year old Jimmy who just wanted to buy the new Sonic on his console of choice.