Friday, October 2, 2009

The oldest Sega Commercials Youtube can offer

You probably already knew this, but the infamous 'SEGA!' voice wasn't first used at the start of Sonic 1, but in fact many years earlier in commercials on Japanese TV as far back as 1983! Hunting around Youtube you can find plenty of just-about watchable recording of some of these relics of Sega advertising, starting with this collection of ads selling Sega's first ever console the SG-1000. Oh, and you may want to watch this with your fingers in your ears at the start, as they may hurt otherwise.




Apparently the girl goes by the name of Saito Yuko and was quite the popular TV type person at the time. I guess you could call her the first member of G.L.O.S: The Gorgeous Ladies of Sega (As Classic Game Room revealed in their Daytona USA review) as Sega have since had a whole string of girls as their advertising mascots over the years. There is also apparently an extremely nerdy pun in that last ad that will go over most people's heads even if they know Japanese. I'm only going by what people in the comments are saying, mind you.




Now this one is for the SG-3000, which was a sort of home computer version of the SG-1000 I guess, much like the Tera Drive which was a PC combined with a Mega Drive (that we got in the UK as the Amstrad Mega PC). What's with the giant teeth/brushes? Why do they light up like Christmas decorations? I have no idea what in the hell is going on but it's hilarious!Just look at that guys face about 10 seconds in!



Remember, Sega have made toys too! This rather elaborate commercial is for the Zillion laser tag game from 1987. A similar toy was released here in 1992 called the Sega Lock-On, though they changed the gun design which in Japan is the same as that of the Mark III/Master System light gun. There is another ad for it here. Zillion was quite a big deal for Sega in the eighties, with two games and even an anime by Tatsunoko.



Finally, I really couldn't resist posting this one just because of the voice. WEELEE! JAAAMP! TUNAAP! You should really check out Nazca88's channel, he has a pile of old Sega commercials and interesting Sonic videos from Japan.