Sega Wow

Sega Wow

Former type	Division (Defunct)
Industry	Video games industry
Fate	Merged with Sega's Research and Development
Founded	2000 (2000)
Founder	Rikiya Nakagawa Noriyoshi Ohba
Defunct	2004 (2004)
Headquarters	Japan
Owner	Sega
Website	www.segawow.com

Sega Wow was a division of Japanese video game developer Sega.

History

In 2000 all of Sega's in-house Consumer Software (CS) and Amusement Machine (AM) R&D departments were separated from the main company and established on 9 semi-autonomous subsidiaries, with each subsidiary getting an elected president as a studio head.^[1] However, for more financial stability, Sega began consolidating its studios into six main ones (Sega Wow, Sega AM2, Hitmaker, Amusement Vision, Smilebit, Sonic Team) and merged them back into a uniform R&D structure in 2004.

WOW Entertainment was headed by Rikiya Nakagawa and Kazunari Tsukamoto. In addition to an continued arcade line-up, WOW Entertainment made efforts on the consumer market with the SEGA GT racing series, an effort to compete against Sony's Gran Turismo. They also made efforts on the Game Boy Advance.

Overworks was formed from CS2, and headed by Noriyoshi Ohba. Out of the gate it came out with Skies of Arcadia for Dreamcast and GameCube, and also continued the Sakura Taisen series. In 2002, it came with the Shinobi reboot on PlayStation 2.

In 2003 it was renamed to SEGA WOW and absorbed Overworks. The line-up of action games Blood Will Tell, Nightshade and the RPG Sakura Taisen became part of SEGA WOW. By 2004, Sega Wow had 215 employees which were split across consumer and arcade development after the integration back into Sega.^[2]

List of games

WOW Entertainment

Arcade

• Quiz Aa! Megami-sama: Tatakau Tsubasa to Tomoni (2000)
• Sega Strike Fighter (2000)
• Sports Jam (2000)
• Wild Riders (2001)
• World Series Baseball (2001)
• Alien Front (2001)
• Dynamic Golf (2001)
• Inu no Osanpo (2001)
• Lupin III: The Shooting (2001)
• Lupin III: The Typing (2002)
• The House of the Dead III (2002)

Dreamcast

• Quiz Aa! Megami-sama: Tatakau Tsubasa to Tomoni (2000)
• Sega GT (2000)
• Sega Marine Fishing (2000)
• Sega Tetris (2000)
• Alien Front Online (2001)
• Candy Stripe (2001)
• Sega Bass Fishing 2 (2001)
• Sports Jam (2001)
• World Series Baseball 2K1 (2001)

Xbox

• Sega GT 2002 (2002)

Game Boy Advance

• Columns Crown (2001)
• The Pinball of the Dead (2002)

PlayStation 2

• Sega Bass Fishing Duel (2002)

PC

• Sega GT (2001)
• Sega Bass Fishing (2001)
• The House of the Dead 2 (2001)
• Sega Marine Fishing (2002)

Overworks

Dreamcast

• Skies of Arcadia (2000)
• Guru Guru Onsen 2 (2001)
• Sakura Taisen 3 (2001)
• Guru Guru Onsen 3 (2002)
• Sakura Taisen 4 (2002)

PlayStation 2

• Shinobi (2002)
• Online Games: Dai Guru Guru Onsen (2002)

GameCube

• Skies of Arcadia: Legends (2002)

PC

• Sakura Taisen 2 (2001)
• Guru Guru Onsen (2002)

Sega Wow

PlayStation 2

• Gekitou Pro Yakyuu (2003)
• Nightshade (2003)
• Sakura Taisen: Atsuki Chishio Ni (2003)
• Blood Will Tell: Tezuka Osamu's Dororo (2004)
• Sakura Taisen Monogatari: Mysterious Paris (2004)
• Sakura Taisen V Episode 0: Kouya no Samurai Musume (2004)

GameCube

• Gekitou Pro Yakyuu (2003)

Xbox

• Sega GT Online (2003)
• The House of the Dead III (2003)

Game Boy Advance

• Lilliput Oukoku: Lillimoni to Issho Puni! (2004)

PC

• The House of the Dead 3 (2003)
• Sakura Taisen 3 (2004)

References