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Sammy, the Japanese gaming that tried to merge with Sega last year and already owned around 25% of the company's stock, has bought out the rest of Sega outright for $1.45 billion. The combined will be known as Sega Sammy Holdings.

The company will have a strong presence in all areas of gaming entertainment: console gaming, pachinko, "pachislot" (pachinko/slot machines), amusement, arcade games, and the content services market. Sammy, in fact, is the largest Pachinko machine manufacturer in the world. There are plans to have the company organized into four main divisions by 2007: pachinko and pachislot, amusement and consumer games, media content and network, and miscellaneous. Until that time, Sega and Sammy will continue to run as if separate companies. Sammy's financial strength and Sega's creativity will be the key to the whole company as it predicts an income of $4.4 billion for the fiscal year of 2005


Source: Gamespot

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Hopefully, Sammy will not pull Sega out of the console market. I don't have the exact quote at the moment, but I remember that around the time of the attempted merger last year that one of the high executives of Sammy said that Sega needed "to focus on the arcade market more than home console market."

On the other hand, Sammy's financial strength may allow Sega to devote more resources to their console games than they have been able to as of late.

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"It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it." - Aristotle

Quote (SSJ_Cloud @ 24th May 2004 12:51)

I don't have the exact quote at the moment, but I remember that around the time of the attempted merger last year that one of the high executives of Sammy said that Sega needed "to focus on the arcade market more than home console market."

I remember reading that quote as well. I think the reason Sammy wanted to do that is because arcades are still extremely popular overseas, while they are dying in America. Hopefully the Sammy exec just hadn't looked into Sega's main source of revenue here in the States.

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"My impersonation of an ordinary person was flawless." - Neal

"Don't cry because it's over. Smile because it happened." - Dr. Seuss

Interesting, and also, how Popular is the arcade overseas?

I could see them pulling Sega out of the console market on general principle. Do they have a system that's been doing well lately?

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Veni, vidi, dormivi.

While Sega consoles haven't been doing so well, I heard Sega did well as a Third Party supplier of games (as I've said before, I almost cried when I saw a Sonic game for a Nintendo console).
I don't have much experience with the other Sega consoles, but I loves the Genesis and the DreamCast, so f Sammy lets Sega come out of being just a third party, I would love to see what kind of console they could come up with, wondering what kind of advancement they might come up with, since Sega had been the first in big areas (console games on CD, console connection to the internet, etc).

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"I had to write four novels before they let me write comic books."
-Brad Meltzer

What he's meaning by pulling Sega out of the console market, is having Sega stop making games for the the three main consoles. Sega announced after the failure of the Dreamcast that they were not going to make another console and focus on the software aspect. The exec at Sammy was basically saying that they wanted to sack the people making games for the three consoles, which would be a sad thing.

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"My impersonation of an ordinary person was flawless." - Neal

"Don't cry because it's over. Smile because it happened." - Dr. Seuss

I hope it's not as bad as the Square-Enix merge. While Sega hasn't been good for a while over here (exceptions being Sonic) it could be big overseas. I've never heard of Sammy, but maybe it could improve Sega. But I do hope that Sega stays in the console market aslo.

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I fear my heart and fear my soul
Life goes on, it surely will,
Without me and I wonder:
Will I ever see light again?

Life goes on...

I haven't played a recent Sega game in years, but I would still like to see them coming out with good games... maybe for PS2 and future Sony consoles so that I'll never have to bother paying for two systems of the same generation.

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Get me off this Disciplinary Committee so I can play any FF except for FF8!!!