Around 93-94 one of the mail-order houses (Totally Turbo or maybe when NEC cleared everything out to TZD, I can't remember) there was the mother of all sales. They blew everything out, including most HuCards for $7-10. I remember that sale because that's when I got most of my Turbo collection (prior that that I only owned about a dozen games, rented all the rest).
Damn! I wish I had known about that.
Sega Japan used to have the entire Saturn catalog up on their web site, but I think it disappeared a few years back. They also had Dreamcast, but I'm not sure if that's still up or not either.
Hey, is this where you found some of the info on the Dreamcast PCE download service?
What happened to Telenet after 94-95 anyway? I wasn't even aware that they still existed. If you look at their site it appears they're making porno cell-phone games now. I think Wolfteam got into making the Tales RPG games in the mid to late 90s, so I figured that's where Telenet went. Hudson is just a shadow of their former selves as well, it's kind of sad to see lots of developers that were big back during the 16-bit days either just disappear or be reduced to churning out cell-phone games or regurgitating Bomberman and Mario Party every year.
Well, at a certain point, I think that Hudson, Telenet, Sunsoft (yeah, I found
their site not too long ago) realized that they are no longer able to compete as a mainstream developer / publisher, so they find a small niche that is profitable. For Telenet, the boobies are profitable in strip mah jong, delighting many a cell phone user, I'm sure ... Hudson, however, seems to be surviving somehow and publishing games on current consoles/handhelds, but with a new revenue stream coming from mobile / cellular gaming.
Sunsoft doesn't seem to be offering anything to get excited about.
I don't know, I guess they're making money, but it's really sad.