SEGA bounce back into Australia

Mike Bantick
Wednesday, 05 September 2007 10:49

Your IT - Entertainment

After a number of years in the wilderness, the ageless SEGA return to Australia with a new lease on gaming life.

Taking back the reins from THQ and setting up a new Australian presence in Sydney, SEGA are back-in-town.

Vispi Bhopti, SEGA’s new Aussie PR Manager sat down with IGN AU recently to go over the details on the rebirth.  He covered the reasons for the decision to put some bricks-and-mortar down on this wide brown continent; “Firstly I must say that THQ has done a tremendous job in handling the SEGA brand thus far, and building it to the stage it's at now. We all know the guys over at THQ well and they're a great bunch of people. That said, with the significant line-up that we have planned to the end of this year and particularly in 2008, we saw value in investing directly in this territory, and having more control and command over our brand in Australia”, Bhopti said.

From the interview it is apparent that SEGA 2.0 will be broadening its appeal to gamers, no longer relying on “Mascots” from the past such as Sonic.

In fact from a quick glance at the proposed release schedule, it can be seen that there is a real mix of product.

Sonic Rush Adventure racing onto Nintendo DS on September 27th

A new release of SEGA Rally going up against Colin McRae: DiRT on PS3, Xbox 360, PC and PSP, also on September 27th

Universe at War brings some PC RTS action out of the SEGA closet in late October

Other highlights towards the end of the year, Football Manager 2008, Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games for Wii and a cross platform movie/book tie-in with The Golden Compass.

If competition is good, then the local Australian games scene just got,,, errr.  gooderer.