The GHZ Forum

SEGA of Japan have put up a mysterious website for a new game produced by Takao Miyoshi. The site says Coming Soon and has a mushroom on it similar to the mushroom from Super Mario Bros 1 except for the different colours. When you run your mouse over the mushroom it shakes. The web adress has the word 'pole' and at the bottom of the page there is a timer which is counting down to the games official unveiling I'm guessing. It currently states 10 days, 6 hours and 17 minutes. No platforms for the game are mentioned.

Wonder what this could be...

Link - http://pole.sega.jp/

Source: http://www.seganerds.com/2009/01/13/seg ... down-page/

IT'S "SONIC AND MARIO" FOR SERIOUS

NO DOUBT IT'S THE SEGATON ANNOUNCEMENT WE'VE ALL BEEN WAITING FOR: DREAMCAST 2!

(09.09.09)

A mario-ish mushroom, but blue?

You know, i think this actually could be the countdown to that as-of-yet imaginary game which the mere thought of were enough to provide the worlds nerds and children with wet dreams back in the early 90's.

You know, i think this actually could be the countdown to that as-of-yet imaginary game which the mere thought of were enough to provide the worlds nerds and children with wet dreams back in the early 90's.

Super Smash Bros. Brawl?

That's not the Super Mario Bros. mushroom, but it does look familiar somehow.

Man, I think we'd all rather see Nintendo get their hands on Sonic than Sega have anything to do with Mario.

This does have me curious though. Is it even possible to make a mushroom themed video game without getting immediate comparisons to Mario? Whoever designed this teaser site must have been completely aware of the connection people would make to Mario, especially with the way Nintendo parades around 1980s style sprite based nostalgia at every available opportunity.

Why would Sega, with their recent track record, want people to think about the greatest and most influential video game series ever? It's like, "Hey, remember the old Mario games? Awesome right? And the new ones are pretty great too! Now here's some of our completely unrelated bullshit that probably won't be half as entertaining."

It's an odd marketing strategy!

If this site was for any other company I would be excited but because it's Sega I'm worried.

Alternate post:

GABBO! GABBO! GABBO!

Crazy Penguin wrote:Whoever designed this teaser site must have been completely aware of the connection people would make to Mario, especially with the way Nintendo parades around 1980s style sprite based nostalgia at every available opportunity.

Well, it is an incredibly easy way to drum up interest in an unseen, untested game without actually having anything to do with a quality franchise beloved by children the world over.

So there's that.

GABBO!

Crazy Penguin wrote:Man, I think we'd all rather see Nintendo get their hands on Sonic than Sega have anything to do with Mario.

This does have me curious though. Is it even possible to make a mushroom themed video game without getting immediate comparisons to Mario? Whoever designed this teaser site must have been completely aware of the connection people would make to Mario, especially with the way Nintendo parades around 1980s style sprite based nostalgia at every available opportunity.

Why would Sega, with their recent track record, want people to think about the greatest and most influential video game series ever? It's like, "Hey, remember the old Mario games? Awesome right? And the new ones are pretty great too! Now here's some of our completely unrelated bullshit that probably won't be half as entertaining."

It's an odd marketing strategy!

Except they already did it and made the best selling third party game on Wii?

Also Mario never had a great game since, I think, 1991? (World)

Although maybe I live in a hole and Nintendo invented pixels and mushrooms, like they did with cards and video games.

You're being wilfully obtuse. Anyone who has even just a slight familiarity with video games or pop culture in general will immediately connect a pixelated spotted mushroom to Nintendo's Mario series.

I would imagine that 99.99% of the people who look at video game teaser countdown web pages would have some familiarity with video games.

Well if 99.99% of people are idiots who cannot take 3 seconds to think about something, then I suppose so.

I'm sure there's a point you're trying to make, here. Elucidate.

I think it's to announce that SEGA's acquired the Madden series.

Think about it: mushroom, fungus. Fungus, athlete's foot. Athlete's foot, BOOM! Tough-actin' Tinactin. BOOM! Tough-actin' Tinactin, John Madden. John Madden, Madden NFL.

Mario was the first thing I thought.

I feel like I've seen that 5 spotted mushroom elsewhere, but at the very least they surely realized they'd be producing speculation about Mario involvement. But the only thing linking it to Sonic (besides the company) is the blue color. Takao Miyoshi seems to be known more for his work on PSO/PSU than his sporadic involvement with Sonic. It's not quite the right tone of blue for the Sega logo though, so I don't know what else it could be.

On a possibly related note, I'm expecting Sega's answer to Megaman 9 this year.

Frieza2000 wrote:On a possibly related note, I'm expecting Sega's answer to Megaman 9 this year.

Pretty sure the answer isn't going to be Sonic 4.

It's probably going to be Merchandised Sonic DLC X.

Apparently clicking some of the letters yields other game pages, like Let's Catch, Let's Tap and some learning game. I doubt trying to figure out where this is going will yield anything, though.

Believe it or not, the first thing I thought when I saw this was Centipede.

Shadow Hog wrote:Apparently clicking some of the letters yields other game pages, like Let's Catch, Let's Tap and some learning game. I doubt trying to figure out where this is going will yield anything, though.

Mario-related non-game?
Of course not!... LOL

Now there's sound effects. Click "p" for a chiptune-y jingle, the mushroom for a 1up-esque sound, and SEGA for the old Sega Chorus. And there's a CERO B rating now, so whatever this is might not necessarily be an all-ages thing...

Baba O'Riley wrote:Pretty sure the answer isn't going to be Sonic 4.

My brother is always telling me that the day they actually make a Sonic 4 is the day that Sega stops sucking and returns to the creative force they once were. Which by that logic means that we'll never see a truly good Sonic game again.

I recently realized that the mushroom actually looks more like the mushroom sprite in SMB2 than the one in SMB1.

Oompa Star wrote:My brother is always telling me that the day they actually make a Sonic 4 is the day that Sega stops sucking and returns to the creative force they once were.

Huh. By that logic, is it safe to assume he spewed his load over Mega Man 9?