SEGA through the ages by Sean B.

In the past few weeks, the gaming community has honored the 25th anniversary of the NES, Nintendo's first console to hit the home gaming market. This system also helped us out of a depressing video game market crash, where multiple developers and publishing companies went belly up. We know, Mario is awesome, the NES was a fabulous gem in the library of gaming history, but what's become of their biggest rival during that same era? Whatever happened to certain things doing, dare I say - what "Nintendon't"?

Well, aside from the unfortunate resignation from the standalone console market, SEGA has made quite the comeback as of late. For starters, Dreamcast classics are being digitally restored on XBLA and PSN, including last months re-release of Sonic Adventure and Crazy Taxi coming this November. Hell, we even have Sonic the Hedgehog 4, the sequel we've waited over a decade to see after a series of not-so-successful releases during the 3D graphics craze. It's safe to say the SEGA we knew and loved is finally returning, ready to impress after a prolonged period of darkness involving three-dimensional regurgitation and "werehogs".

Before this retro Sonic Dreamcast revival (or whatever the hell you want to call it), the best SEGA product to hit the shelves since Sonic Adventure was probably Sonic's Ultimate Genesis Collection in 2008. Over 40 Genesis titles including the Sonic trilogy, Golden Axe, Streets of Rage and Altered Beast, remastered and available for both the Xbox 360 and Playstation 3. How on Earth could you go wrong with a compilation like this, with a price tag of $19.99? Yeah, twenty bucks to experience some childhood or teen gaming memories all over again, without having to track down every single cartridge (which I think is fun either way, but whatever).

We even saw some decent SEGA releases on the Wii, including MadWorld, Conduit and my personal favorite, House of the Dead: Overkill, regardless of its overusing the "fuck-bomb" (yes, it's possible to overuse this word). Sure, none of these games can be compared to the unstoppable classics we saw on the Genesis, but it was still an improvement, a sign that SEGA had some of that amazing spunk left to be shared with the fans.

Let's hope we see much more from SEGA in the many years of gaming to come. Who knows, maybe we'll see the rebirth of the great SEGA console. There's definitely room for them, especially in an industry where we'd see new and different consoles practically every year. It'd be nice to see another home console contender in a world that seems so currently obsessed with portable "use-as-you-go" electronics. We still love you SEGA, and even though it's technically Nintendo's time to shine in their continuing glory (which we've also celebrated), we salute you for getting back to your glorious roots in order to do what you do best - straight forward, classic gaming.