Battle of the 1990 Console’s and the Birth of Segata Sanshiro

By: Vinayak Ahuja

Marketing will always play a huge role in shaping our lives, from what soap we use in the shower to which man we select to run our country (something I’ll be touching on in my special November 4th article). A strong marketing concept can help keep you in the mind of your consumers almost indefinitely and become that sweet golden egg laying goose that keeps you keep afloat when times get rough.

One of the most proficient life preservers I’ve had the pleasure of learning about took place during the mid 1990s. You gamers out there may be familiar that around this time three powerhouses (Nintendo, Sony, and Sega) were locked in an all-out royal rumble trying to find a place in the world’s home entertainment system market place. In the west, Sega was tossed out of the ring faster than the heel, but in Japan, a particularly strong marketing concept going by the name of Segata Sanshiro kept them in the game well into the turn of the century.

“Segata Sanshiro” is a parody of “Sugata Sanshiro”, a popular fictional Japanese martial artist and hero. The name is also meant to sound a lot like “Sega Saturn Shiro”, which loosely translates into “You must play Sega Saturn”! As a master of all martial arts, his goal was to punish kids who wouldn’t play their Sega Saturn enough. Here are some of my favorite commercials of the character: baseball, soccer, and fish is a particular one that I’ve come to respect.

The campaign was such a large success that it had reclaimed and began to gain ground on both Sony’s Playstation and Nintendo’s Nintendo 64 in Japan. Segata Sanshiro had become a loveable icon for the Sega Saturn Product Brand similar to 7-up’s Cool Spot or Domino’s Noid. Unfortunately, Sanshiro was an icon of the Saturn, not Sega, forcing Sega to end the concept with the release of their new console, the Dreamcast.

This isn’t the first time a successful product brand icon has been let go in order to continue promotion of new products from the same brand. What I can’t understand is the abrupt discontinuation with no transition from one concept to the next. Not to say that the Dreamcast marketing strategies weren’t popular – the US campaigns looked amazing and were very well crafted, but it seems to me it’d be more productive to utilize the popularity of the character and make the transition with more ease for loyal fanatics who were deeply invested in the Segata Sanshiro concept. It’s something I plan to look into for my article Wednesday. Be sure to check it out then and tomorrow’s special Presidential Election Day article (which will also make up for Friday’s missing article). Until next time my fellow chias.