Community Post: Is Mike Hayes right for Sega America?
Posted by George. Filed under George, North America, Original Content. Tagged with Aki-at, Community Post, Mike Hayes, Simon Jeffery.
This is something I have wanted to do for awhile, post good community posts regarding changes in Sega. You probably already know that Simon Jeffery is no longer President and COO of Sega America and that he has been replaced by Mike Hayes.
Since Mike Hayes is already President of Sega Europe, he is pretty much in control of all of Sega West, but is he qualified? Giving us his take is Aki-at, who you might remember as the guy with the really long name in the Community Nerdcasts.
Aki-at’s community post can be read after the jump!
Mike Hayes promoted to President of ‘Sega West’
Posted by Graham. Filed under Europe, G, News, North America. Tagged with COO, Mike Hayes, Personnel, President of Sega America, President of Sega Europe, Promotion, Sega West, Simon Jeffery.
With the very recent news that Simon Jeffery has left his position as President of Sega America to join ngmoco, an iPhone games developer, the powers-that-be have promoted Mike Hayes to become what is (effectively) President of Sega West.
While that is not his official title, Mike Hayes already holds the positions of COO and President of Sega Europe and has now been given the same role over at Sega America - whilst keeping his current SoE duties. This move gives Hayes control and direction of both the European and US-based Sega studios.
While Sega is yet to deliver an official press release/announcement on the matter, MCV (one of the few trusty worthy sites around) is able to reveal Mike Hayes’ new role within the company.
It’s going to be interesting to see how things pan out with one boss covering the two largest gaming regions in the world. But the US and European game lineups tend to be almost identical, so I don’t think it will be too hard for him to handle and I don’t expect any big changes. What do you guys think?
P.S - I’ve shared a lift with that man! :o)
[Source: MCV]
“Sega was the first third-party publisher to believe in the Wii”
Posted by George. Filed under George, Interviews, Nintendo Wii, North America. Tagged with Love Letter, Simon Jeffery.
According to Sega of America President Simon Jeffery, Sega was the first publisher, not one of the first, to believe in the Wii. A new interview with Simon was done by San Francisco Chronicle about the Wii fanbase.
“70 to 80 percent of Wii owners are young males, and there hasn’t been much fodder for them on the Wii.”
Really? According to Nintendo a huge chunk of their profits come from females, who do I believe? I will just go with Sega, if I say otherwise people will call me a Nintendo nerd, don’t want that to happen.
I think Sega should try to have this sort of success on HD consoles and fill up PSN/XBLA with some goodies, seriously they are pretty bare boned right now, outside of some Sega Genesis games.
[Source SFC]
Simon Jeffery talks about The Conduit
Posted by George. Filed under George, Interviews, Nintendo Wii, North America. Tagged with High Voltage Software, Simon Jeffery, The Conduit.
It seems that every time Sega makes a big deal, they have Simon Jeffery talk to IGN and ignore us. This time is no exception, here is Simon Jeffery making Sega sounding like the Wii’s savior:
“SEGA is making considerable investment in core games for the Wii. We strongly believe that games like Mad World and House of the Dead Overkill have a great place on the Wii ….. Everyone is churning out wide market and family-friendly fare for the Wii platform, but there are millions of core gamers being underserved right now – and SEGA was delighted that HVS feel the same way.”
I guess it’s true, Sega does what Nintendon’t!
[Source IGN]
[Image Venture Beat]
Simon Jeffery: “There is a lot of crap coming out for the Wii”
Posted by Graham. Filed under G, Interviews, News, Nintendo Wii. Tagged with MadWorld, Simon Jeffery.
Everybodys favourite President (Sega President), is out there speaking his mind (as always), and I applaud him for it.
In a recent interview with VentureBeat, Simon Jeffery is asked about future Sega mes appearing on the Wii, and this is what he said:
“The Wii is a very cost effective platform to experiment with. There is a lot of crap coming out for the Wii in general. But if it’s not a good game, it doesn’t sell.”
Now, I have said this loads of times, I am a pretty big fan of the Wii. A lot bigger than many people on this site - but even I cannot deny that there is a lot of rubbish on the console, and what Wii gamers need are more ‘decent’ games.
Simon Jeffery speaks his mind about EA - gaming world applauds him
Posted by Graham. Filed under G, Interviews, News. Tagged with Simon Jeffery.
If you had asked me what I thought about Simon Jeffery a month ago, I might have said “Simon who?”Â
Yeah, I know he’s the President of Sega America, but back then he was nothing more than a blip on my radar. However, in the last month, with all the E3 interviews going on, I have grown to love this man!
He seems so switched on, and pretty much speaks his mind - which is exactly what he did in a recent interview with American news agency, Forbes, where he compared EA to a “petulant child” - which is right on the money (in my opinion).
E3 had “atmosphere of a large hospital corridor” - but Sega still backs events
Posted by Graham. Filed under G, Interviews, News, North America. Tagged with E3, Simon Jeffery.
Just the other day, we reported on how several top game developing companies, including Sega, spoke of their disappointment at this years E3, and that something had to be done.
Speaking with MCV, Simon Jeffery (yep that guy again!) wanted to clarify his views on the matter:
“E3 was a strange beast this year. We had an extremely strong product showing, had some great meetings, and got our messaging over pretty strongly - all at an event that had all the atmosphere of a large hospital corridor.”
But Simon also assures the gaming world that Sega would still back the annual event. However, it is clear that something does need to change:
Kotaku asks Simon Jeffery the generic E3 questions - receives usual answers
Posted by Graham. Filed under G, Interviews, News, Video. Tagged with Dreamcast, Shenmue III, Simon Jeffery.
Gaming events are great fun aren’t they?
You get to see some videos/screenshots of new games, hear developers talk about upcoming projects and get to read some interesting interviews… and watch as the world goes crazy, speculating at some mad new inventions and hearing wild rumours.
It’s always the same, and this year was no different - with the typical rumours of Shenmue III, springing up a couple of months ago. It’s something as gamers we just have to put up with.
But in all honesty I wouldn’t change it for the world! It gets frustrating, sure, and I’m confident developers hate getting asked the same questions. But really, it wouldn’t be the same without the rumours or typical questions being asked “Will they? Won’t they?”
Simon Jeffery makes a slip about Resident Evil 5, on the Wii
Posted by Graham. Filed under G, Interviews, News, Video. Tagged with Capcom, Simon Jeffery.
Now, don’t get too excited. The slip was not about how Sega would be publishing/developing Resident Evil 5 on the Wii - I think Capcom is happy enough with their own teams to handle any of their franchises. However, Simon Jeffery has made a ’slip’ (if you will) about Resident Evil 5 coming to the Wii.
In a recent E3 interview with Kotaku, the Sega of America President was asked whether Sega was taking a chance by putting a violent ‘core gamer’ oriented game on the Wii, with MADWORLD.
[Note: Above video doesn’t always seem to work or takes ages to load. After the break is the transcribed (by yours truly) response from Simon.
Simon Jeffery talks about Platinum Games with Gamespot
Posted by George. Filed under George, Microsoft Xbox 360, Nintendo DS, Nintendo Wii, North America, Sony PlayStation 3. Tagged with interview, Platinum Games, Simon Jeffery.
Have some questions about the Platinum Games deal? Simon Jeffery has got you covered. Here are the important highlights of the interview:
- The Sega contract gives Platinum Games total freedom. They get to make the game how they want it, the trailers, and all that stuff. While Sega tries to give them advice on how best to market the games.
- Platinum Games is exclusive to Sega for the time being. Meaning they can’t go make games with other publishers.
- The new games are owned by Sega.
- Deal is long term. This is just the first step.
- These games are meant to become franchises.
Click here for the full interview.
