We might be fortunate enough to be witnessing a growing trust from Sega to allow out-of-house developers to create new games for their classic IP. For those of you born after the year 2000, Sega is sitting on a treasure trove of beloved characters and IPs that is rivaled only by Nintendo.
For years, though, Sega refused to leverage many of these IPs. The tide appears to be turning though with 2D Sonic, Shenmue, and Streets of Rage being handed over to folks outside of the Sega network. Rather than sit on their hands because they don’t have the right team, they are letting capable developers work their magic.
Sega is receiving tons of positive reinforcement through the warm reception of their recently published hits, and now fantasies that were unrealistic could become reality.
Let’s dream a little and think up five forgotten Sega IPs that could thrive once again if given to a third-party developer either fully, or as a collaborative effort with their internal teams.
Golden Axe
This one’s easy right? DotEmu just knocked it out of the part with Streets of Rage 4, so why not keep this positive momentum going and have them reimagine a similar classic beat-em-up with Golden Axe.
While the core beat-em-up gameplay is similar to Streets of Rage on the surface, Golden Axe has its own quirks that help it stand apart in a lot of different ways.
Golden Axe features weapons which can be leant in a new game to open up gameplay variation. There are also magical spells which can either be used right away or built up for massive attacks. That dragon spell from Tyris Flare on the Genesis from Golden Axe 2 blew my mind. And finally, of course, are the beasts you can ride to mow down groups of enemies.
DotEmu has proven capable of refining classic gameplay while adding their own flair, and I’d love to see what they could do with Golden Axe if they were up for it.
