Last updated March 28, 2007 9:41 p.m. PT

End of console rivalry enables Mario vs.

Sonic

The plumber and the hedgehog will soon share the same screen -- and it just goes to show how much things have changed in the video-game industry.
Nintendo Co.'s Mario and Sega Corp.

's Sonic, two of the best-known characters in video games, will appear together for the first time in a new title due out later this year, the companies said Wednesday.
Such a move would have been almost unthinkable when Sega and Nintendo were direct rivals in the video-game hardware business.
However, Sega no longer makes consoles itself.

It publishes games for machines from Nintendo, Microsoft and Sony.
But don't read too much into the announcement from a corporate perspective, said George Harrison, a senior vice president with Redmond-based Nintendo of America. Although Mario and Sonic are getting together, it doesn't signal any plans for a broader corporate merger.

"It's a huge gaming announcement, but it is just the announcement of a game," said Simon Jeffery, president of Sega of America, which is a subsidiary of Sega Sammy Holdings Inc.
Sega and Nintendo "have been very close in spirit over the years, even when we were competitors," Jeffery explained.
For several years, he said, the companies had been looking for an opportunity to make a game co-starring their two icons, Sonic and Mario.

The breakthrough came when Sega was granted the exclusive right to make video games related to the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing.
"It dawned on us that that would provide some common ground so that the two characters could appear together for the very first time," Jeffery said.
"Mario Sonic at the Olympic Games" will be available by the holidays, the companies said.

It will be made for Nintendo's Wii console and DS hand-held gaming device.
Nintendo will publish the game in Japan, and Sega will publish it in Europe and North America.
The game will also bring together others from the respective worlds of the two characters, including Tails and Knuckles from the Sonic games and Luigi and Yoshi from the Mario games.

They will all compete in different Olympic events.
Prices for the Mario and Sonic game weren't announced.
Back in the days when Nintendo and Sega were console competitors, putting Mario and Sonic in a game together would have been "antithetical to everything," said Steven Kent, author of "The Ultimate History of Video Games.

" But with Sega no longer making its own hardware, it now makes sense.
"They have wanted to get together for a long time," he said.
Kent pointed out that it will be interesting to see how the game deals with one of the biggest differences between the characters: Mario is relatively slow, potentially putting him at a big disadvantage against the legendary speed of Sonic in some of the track and field events.

But the companies said the game will also include swimming and table tennis, among other events. And Mario is the better swimmer, Kent said, so in that way it would be more even.
Or maybe, he said, they should compete in "track, field and mushroom eating.

"

Name
Place
7 + 2 =
Comments