Sega won't stop making console games, but their new parent company wants them to do more of what they do best.

In a recent interview with Bloomberg Japan, Sammy president Hajime Satomi talked about how his company could help Sega become profitable once again.

It's no secret that Sega is and always has been very profitable in the arcade business, and has been hit or miss on the console side of things. Because of this, Sammy would like Sega to concentrate more on the coin-op side of their operations, hopefully making more money in the process.

Massively multiplayer online titles are the way to crack the piracy problems, and unlock huge revenues in China according to the analysts.

VIDEO GAME REVENUES FOR MASSIVELY MULTIPLAYER ONLINE GAMES MARKET IN

CHINA TO GROW BY 64% THROUGH 2006

OFFICIAL INTRODUCTION OF GAME CONSOLES FACES TOUGHER BATTLE IN CHINA DUE

TO SEVERE PIRACY RATE

San Francisco, CA - Dec. 10, 2003 - A recent study on the interactive games market in China by Niko Partners and International Development Group shows that the massively multiplayer online games (MMOG) market in

Is this a hint of more online games in 2004?

According to a story by Reuters news agency, AOL's new online gaming "ladder" service will be serving GameCube users next year. The service is currently launching for the PS2 and is available free to AOL subscribers, or for about twenty bucks per month for everyone else.

AOL Ladders is based... Read more...

See the unveiling take place in a short, free movie download.

Mario's very own wax figure was unveiled today at the Hollywood Wax Museum, and being the insane Nintendo geeks that we are, of course Planet GameCube was present at the event. Steven "WindyMan" Rodriguez was on hand to capture the ceremony in picture. You can see his digital photos in the event profile, but here's a brief video clip of the unveiling ceremony.

Four Swords, Tetra's Trackers, and the new Shadow Battle are one GameCube game now!

Nintendo has revealed that Four Swords, Tetra's Trackers and the new Shadow Battle will be available as one GameCube game. There's new details on the gameplay, too. Each mode now has single-player versions!

Four Swords is renamed to Hyrule Adventure. The GBA can still be used to display the action, but players without GBAs can join in on on-screen windows, too. It has a storyline too, for single-player adventuring.

He gets older and taller every year.

Though it's now two days late (for shame!), we at PGC wanted to wish a very Happy Birthday to Daniel Bloodworth. Dan is our Content Editor, in charge of editing all the articles you see posted on the site everyday. He does a ton of other stuff as well, everything from helping with PR to moderating... Read more...

It's only in the Japanese version so far, but a bug's a bug. UPDATE: North American copies will be affected too.

Japanese gamers who have had the GBA Pokémon games since their launch last year are just now starting to find a bug that is screwing with how the game works.

Apparently, the internal clocks in the cartridges are on the fritz, and they are affecting time-lapse and other time-sensitive events... Read more...

Sega thinks one of the Simpsons games is a bit too much like Crazy Taxi, and is suing.

Simpsons Road Rage is a product of developer Radical Games, and publishers Fox Interactive (now Vivendi) and Electronic Arts. Sega is taking all these parties to court for infringing on a patent that it holds for Crazy Taxi.

Sega says that the year-old Road Rage game was designed to "deliberately... Read more...

Win a Flame Game Boy Advance SP and a copy of Fire Emblem this week... and next week! Click for all the details.

Tonight in our chatroom, as we do every Friday here at Planet GameCube, we're holding our weekly Trivia event. This week it's Planet Trivia, and next time we'll play Radio Trivia.

Both of these games will have a sweet prize go to our winners: A Flame-colored Game Boy Advance SP and a copy of Fire Emblem! All you have to do to score this amazing prize is to be the winner in either one of our Trivia games.

Two weeks until the Japanese release! Optimus Prime and Solid Snake, together at last!?

DreamMix TV World Fighters, a new mascot fighting game featuring the unlikely union of Konami, Hudson and Takara characters, is coming out on the 18th of this month in Japan. The official Japanese site features character profiles, screenshots, wallpapers and a whole lot of Japanese text (it's still easy to navigate, though).

The ex-Nintendo president looks to fund a foundation that likes poetry and playing cards.

The Ogura Hyakunin Isshu Project is a Japanese foundation that specializes in promoting ancient poetry from the country. It just so happens that the Ogura Hyakunin Isshu, as it's called, also is the basis of a card game.

Hiroshi Yamauchi will soon become the president of the foundation, and... Read more...

See the avalanche in a free movie download.

1080: Avalanche is heading to stores this week, and we've got a FREE movie of the final version to whet your appetite. This movie shows a complete run on the avalanche stage. It could be considered a SPOILER, so don't download the movie if you want it to be a surprise.

This particular movie... Read more...

Mike Sklens turns the big 2-0!

You know him as a legendary trivia player and one of our most prolific reviewers. We know him as the tall one with scary hair. Known to many and loved by all, Mike Sklens, a.k.a. Striker Obi, has turned twenty years old today. From all of us at Planet GameCube, Happy Birthday Mike!

Boys want Game Boys, girls want Barbie. So what else is new?

Kids Tell Santa They Want Game Boy Advance and Barbie For Christmas

NEW YORK--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Dec. 1, 2003--Game Boy Advance and Barbie of Swan Lake will be filling Santa's sack this holiday season as they are among the most requested toys children asked for when they visited the Jolly Old Elf... Read more...

The long-awaited Virtua Fighter Quest is finally announced in Japan. Pics and info!

Sega has just revealed the first information and screenshots of its long-awaited Virtua Fighter RPG game. Virtua Fighter: Cyber Generation is the official Japanese name, though it could be different in other regions. It's an action-RPG (or as I like to call it, "adventure") based on the Virtua Fighter series. The game will be released on both GameCube and PS2.

The annual Golden Joystick Awards have been presented, with the introduction of the gaming Personality of the Year award.

This year’s Golden Joystick Awards were held in London with the first presentation of the “Hall of Fame Industry Personality of the Year” going to Shigeru Miyamoto.

The company behind this annual UK based awards ceremony is Dennis Publishing, which publishes a number of games and lifestyles magazines and websites. Many of the awards are voted for by the readers of sponsoring websites and magazines.

Play Mario Kart and Kirby online after you gobble up tonight's turkeys.

The fine folks over at the Warp Pipe Project have just released Warp Pipe 0.3 Beta. That means the GameCube tunnelling program is available for all to download and enjoy.

You'll need a pretty mean broadband connection in order to get the most out of the program's LAN-faking capabilities (at... Read more...

Show up dressed as Mario to compete for a prize.

We told you about the Mario wax figure a while back, but now Nintendo is beginning to promote the upcoming debut. On December 9th, Mario will become the first video game character to be immortalized in wax at the famous Hollywood Wax Museum on Hollywood Boulevard.

We'd expect some of our more... Read more...

Beta release looms and Mario Kart plays it smooth.

The guys behind the Warp Pipe Project have updated their website with some news on the beta release in development. The program is currently running Mario Kart: Double Dash very smoothly across a distance of 250 miles, and optimization is continuing. You can download a movie of the current performance from their site at the link above.

Talk about a face lift.

Nintendo of America's official homepage has gotten a major upgrade over the weekend. You can take a gander at it by heading over to the usual web address, but here's a quick rundown of the new stuff.

The most obvious difference is the new white backdrop, which makes the site look really slick.... Read more...