Time to renew the call for a Sega channel on Wii
I’ve made my desire for a Sega Channel on Wii, that is to say a channel that functions as a Saturn and Dreamcast emulator, in the past. It wouldn’t take a lot of work for Nintendo and Sega to pull this off, and Sega could even sell the thing for a few bucks. I’m going to start talking about it again, because I want to know how Sega feels about it.
The problem there is… how to reach Sega? I’m working on that, and I’ll get back to you.
In the mean time, let’s talk pros and cons.
Pros.
The pros are pretty straightforward. Incorporate a large library of critically-acclaimed games on very underrated systems. Save Sega the trouble of porting the rest of the Dreamcast’s library to Wii one title at a time. Sega can sell this channel for 500 points or whatever and make bank on it very quickly from Wii’s core gamers, many of whom missed out on the two Sega platforms. They could even treat it like the Nintendo Channel and incorporate trailers for new Sega games, or even provide the games as downloadables if Nintendo ever addresses the storage crisis.
Cons.
The cons are mostly logistical. None of these games are in production anymore in the US, though Dreamcast titles do periodically still appear in Japan, if I’m not mistaken. The result will be that you’re opening up the ability to play all these old games without being able to effectively provide the games at retail, as some people won’t buy used. Sega would like the money, but I doubt they would want to once again begin production on the GD-ROMs that Dreamcast games run from. Of course, the games don’t have to be on GD-ROMs if you’re doing emulation, but that’s beside the point.
What do you think?
In the end, something like this will come down to consumer desire. Would you buy a Sega Channel that would run original Saturn and Dreamcast discs on Wii, and if so, how many Wii Points would you pay for it? I would say I’d pay up to 1000 points for it if the emulation was as good as Virtual Console generally is. That would be if it only worked the way the Disc Channel does on Wii: pop in a disc and it runs. I might pay more for better features, like controller customization and the like. Let’s sound off people, this could be our chance to get Sega’s attention.
See also: Saturn, Dreamcast support on Wii possible, but will it happen?
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