SEGA are no strangers to the music or rhythm game genre. With titles like Samba De Amigo, Space Channel 5, Project Diva, and Persona Dancing, there’s plenty to choose from when turning to them for this niche. What I would love to see from the industry legends is a SEGA All-Stars approach to the genre. This would mark a celebration of their history, and it’s a great reason to bring the best of their franchises’ musical endeavours together.
Franchises
Sonic the Hedgehog
SEGA has a rich history of gaming iconography that it can pull from to make a fantastic combination of music. This could excite any fan of the publisher, regardless of age. Sonic the Hedgehog is a no-brainer here; they could even lead the franchise with him if they wanted. He boasts a rich tapestry of music from the last 35 years. This even goes to the extent that they hold regular symphony orchestras and rock concerts celebrating this one element. Sonic Team has produced enough high-quality music to make a rhythm game for the blue bur on its own, so the difficulty will be more about where you stop, more than where you begin.
Established Rhythm Games
The next obvious choices would be SEGA’s pre-existing rhythm game titles, as mentioned in the introduction. Space Channel 5 and Samba de Amigo feature their own unique blend of music that can add a twist to the gameplay if it were built flexibly enough. However, Samba de Amigo is a bit limited as it’s known for using licensed music in its series, but there are enough original pieces to allow it to have some room to shine here.
Moving into a rhythm game side mode, the Yakuza/Like a Dragon series has a number of karaoke minigames with their own soundtracks. These are iconic to fans of the series, and they would be a welcome addition. It would be a travesty not to include ‘Friday Night’ or ‘Baka Mitai’.
Don’t Forget Atlus
In 2013, SEGA became the parent company of Atlus. Because of this, the Shin Megami Tensei series (and by extension the Persona franchise) became a part of their arsenal. Persona is no stranger to the rhythm genre. It has already produced three spin-offs to celebrate its rich musical diversity. I feel as if these songs, as well as tracks from their parent series, would fit into this project perfectly. You could also include Etrian Odyssey, Metaphor, and a plethora of other Atlus titles, which would all offer their own unique feel, thus mixing up a soundtrack pretty well.
A Wasted Masterpiece
The most notable non-rhythm titles with the most unique and beloved soundtrack has to be the Jet Set Radio games. The fact that this series has been sitting in limbo for so long is a shame. However, the main victim is its soundtrack. The soundtrack to Jet Set Radio deserves to be heard by many more people, and this would be the ideal way to do it. Hideki Naganuma’s contribution to this series cannot be understated; between this and Sonic Rush, he has cemented himself as a true funk master. The ability to play along with these songs in real time would be a treat for the ears.
Of course, there are some non-musically focused franchises, but that doesn’t mean their songs aren’t iconic, or don’t have a great beat to listen to, and potentially play around with. Notable examples include NiGHTS, Super Monkey Ball, Crazy Taxi, Billy Hatcher, and even Puyo Puyo. This list can be extended massively if you include some of the 8 and 16-bit entries, but I feel like they may have a better place in this title that I will discuss later.
Presentation
So, when you’re rocking out to ‘Live and Learn’, you obviously don’t want it to be on a blank screen, a PNG of Biolizard, or the game art for Sonic Adventure 2… So what should we do? There are two approaches to this that I think will work, including one that would take drastically more work than the other.
The first option would be to take the MMD (MikuMikuDance) route, where a character dances along to the music in a stage related to the song. Whether you make this a selectable character or a predetermined one would depend on the developer license and the models provided, naturally. However, this can add a more fleshed-out—albeit silly— view of the songs.
The much easier way, and my preference, would be to take a video or a montage of the moment in the game the music came from. Jumping back to ‘Live and Learn’, you would be seeing the gameplay of the transformation, boss fight, or cutscenes surrounding the level it is featured in. It would be something to fill the void and feel that cool factor while playing and celebrating the history of the video games that introduced us to this music. This would serve as a reminder as to why they became iconic in the first place.
Gameplay
This is an easy choice for me. If SEGA cannot get Crypton Media to provide them with their Project Diva engine, then utilise Atlus’s Persona Dancing engine. Both are competent and well-made engines, perfect for the music genres with their own unique flair, and easily applicable across franchises. If you’re a stranger to both titles, they both take similar yet unique ways to present the notes that you must hit.
The Project Diva series includes four buttons that must be pressed on time: ◯, ✖, ▲ and ◼, as well as the d-pad buttons that correspond to the placement of each symbol. This means if ✖ appears, you can press down or ✖ and both will give you the score, aiding with tricky or fast note changes. Future Tone rewards players for consistency over accuracy at times too, meaning that sometimes it’s worth missing notes to keep a held note going. The accuracy of note hitting with this sacrificial note system creates a tactical framework that provides more thoughtful gameplay than most of its contemporaries.
If It Aint Broke, Don’t Fix It
Persona Dancing takes a much simpler approach: there are 6 button prompts with 3 on each side of the screen. These are represented by the face buttons that reflect the position of the prompts, up, left and down on the d-pad, and ▲, ◯ and ✖. There are also scratch notes that circle around the whole screen that need to be hit with the shoulder buttons, which don’t break streaks but affect your overall percentage and score.
Both of these titles score the player on accuracy, and they are awarded with a rank depending on their performance. They also both show the player a percentage of their notes hit and a breakdown of which notes were perfect, good, missed or incorrect to help show players where they need to improve. They also both feature systems of add-ons that can make the gameplay easier at the sacrifice of overall score, or harder but you’ll gain more points for a successful playthrough of the song.
Composers
Whilst I believe that just ripping the songs directly from the aforementioned games would be a satisfying time, they could go a step further. Take the classic songs, for example. Playing through the 16-bit Green Hill Zone might be fun for nostalgia, but it ultimately doesn’t make for a complete rhythm game experience. So, if the composers were brought in to do new versions of classic songs from older franchises (like the Persona Dancing games), it would breathe new life into them and make them more enjoyable. Take the Green Hill example above from GlitchxCity, it offers the same tune but more in line with something you’d presumably want to play in a rhythm game.
This doesn’t just apply to older songs too. SEGA often mix their composers around to make new versions of existing songs. Take the Rock’N’Sonic The Hedgehog: Sessions album SEGA released in 2022, as a great example. They took existing composers such as Tee Lopes, Tyler Smyth and Lyn and recorded new versions of classic Sonic songs such as ‘Escape from the City’.
Giving free rein to do this across all of SEGA’s IP with the likes of Tomoya Ohtani, Hideki Naganuma, Tyler Smyth, Tee Lopes, Hidenori Shoji and even throw in some Vocaloid composers for good measure. With all this talent, you could have a complete celebration of SEGA’s rich musical history combined with fresh remixes to get players and listeners invested in this outing.
Conclusion
SEGA is a company that lots of us hold in high regard, whether we love their characters, stories or their music. The music is something that brings people together, which was evident when I attended the Sonic Symphony in 2024. The love and memories we all hold towards their songs are infectious, and if SEGA are willing to let their characters play tennis or go-kart racing together, then a musical entry isn’t completely out of the question. How ambitious they want to be will depend on budgets and other corporate planning, but if we can’t get this can we at least get a Sonic rhythm game, please SEGA?
What is your favourite SEGA franchise and what is your favourite song? Please let us know, mine is probably Sonic the Hedgehog and ‘Find Your Flame’!
Video game completionist and 3D platformer connoisseur, Riley is a fan of the whimsical frenzy of bright and colourful characters that blessed us in the late 90's. Their favourite game's are Spyro, Persona 5 and Super Mario Sunshine.
1 comment