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You may recall that, last year, SEGA announced that they were planning on a “super game” that would be a part of their 5-year plan. At the time, the company said that they had “focused investment” in the project, and intended to release it in the 2026 fiscal year.
Well, SEGA has now given a few more details on how this “super game” concept will work. According to executive vice-president Shuji Utsumi, producer Masayoshi Kikuchi, and general manager Katsuya Hisai, the idea for it was first put into motion in 2019. It involves strengthening the value of SEGA’s IP. This includes creating new games from older IPs.
There are now multiple games in development that fit within their “super game framework”. These games go beyond “the conventional framework”. For example, they create “new entertainment by focusing on the relationship between players and the audience watching them play”.
For a game to be considered a “super game”, the game must be aimed to be a worldwide high-selling title. For this, the game must be multiplatform, have global multilingual support, release worldwide simultaneously, and be AAA. The initial stage of this “super game” initiative is currently being carried out by about 50 developers. However, this number is expected to grow into the hundreds over time. The developers form a “hybrid team”. They have experience making multiple types of games, such as console, mobile, and arcade, and their experience will enable them to help create games that only SEGA can do.
New external technologies are also being implemented. For example, late last year, Microsoft and SEGA announced a partnership to use Microsoft’s Azure cloud platform in development of SEGA’s games. This is just one of various other pieces of technology that SEGA is bringing into their games, courtesy of partnerships with other companies.
Lastly, SEGA is also using Unreal Engine 5 for development. The company is embracing the field of AI technology, collaborating with start-up companies experienced in this field to do so. The work involves “both on back-end work like debugging and front-end work like in-game camera control, live commentary, and automated voice synthesis”.