History of Sega in Hungary

History of Sega in Hungary
Official Sega distributor(s): Sinus (1991-1992), Bakalory (1993-199x), Al-Step (199x-1996), EBM (1996-1998), NewWave Computers (2000-2003), Ecobit (2004-2006), CD Projekt (2007-2014), Cenega (2014-present)

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Hungary began its transition away from Soviet-style communism in 1990, and like many of its Warsaw pact neighbours became a more attractive place for foreign Western investers as the decade went on.

1991-1992

From 1991, Sega consoles were sold by Sinus. They released the first model of Sega Master System.

1992-October 1993

Mega Drive and Game Gear first appeared in Hungary at the end of 1992. In the same year, the first game in the Ecco series, developed by Hungarian studio Novotrade, had its premiere. The following year it was released in Hungary.

Sales of Sega consoles started to increase since the summer of 1993 when products began to appear in more and more places. At this time Master System II appeared in stores.

October 1993-1995

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Novotrade store in 1993

In October 1993, Nissho Iwai appointed Bakalory Bt as Sega's partner in Hungary. In addition to continuing the sale of more advanced consoles and the release of the Mega Drive II, the company began searching for partners, dealers, distributors and retailers to sell the full line of Sega games. The most important sellers from this period include 576 Kbyte Shop, Novotrade 2C, Videoton, Sonic Market, Elektroház, Euro Business Magyarorszag, Mikro C and many others.

The most popular consoles were Mega Drive and Master System. There have been many events such as Sega Verseny 1994, I. Sega játékbajnokság, Eternal Champion. In 1993, the Szegasztok series was created which focused on games for Sega consoles. In 1994, Pop Shop created Sega es Nintendo Klub.

During this time, Mega Drive became a very popular console and many events related to Sega were organized such as In the meantime, in Hungary appeared the famiclone Terminator 2 modeled on Sega Mega Drive and famiclones that look like Mega Drive in a green box from Asian distribution.

In 1994 the Mega CDII was released and in March 1995 the Mega Drive 32X.

Al-Step

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Sega Saturn first appeared in March 1995 through imports in 576 Kbyte stores. The console with one pad and the game Virtua Fighter cost 129999 HUF which was a huge price and hardly anyone in the country could buy this console. Saturn was released officially in September 1995.

In 199x, Al-Step became a distributor.The company complained that Saturn is a defective product that is not popular in the country. Al-Step also emphasized that older consoles such as Mega Drive II and Master System II are still selling well.There were fewer and fewer events related to Sega. The last big one was Sega Verseny 1996.

In 1996, TCI's technology group got the rights to distribute Sega Channel in Hungary, but it is not known that the service was launched there.

EBM

At the end of 1996, EBM became the official distributor. At that time, Saturn's prices went down, however, and that didn't help either, and like the rest of Europe, the console sold very poorly.

Dreamcast and present

From the second half of the 90s until the early 2000s, the distribution of arcades was handel by Novogame. Arcade machines in the 90s were popular in Hungary, but at the beginning of the 2000s they became less popular, as Novogame said, which in 2002 only received 5 orders for Sega machines.

Sega Dreamcast first appeared at the end of 1999 in 576 Kbyte stores at a price of 49999 HUF. However, the sale was quite small, so in April 2000 the console was only available on special order.Dreamcast officially appeared at the end of 2000 and its distributor was a young company-NewWave Computers. The console was little known and was sold until 2003.

After the Dreamcast console, Ecobit in 2004 became the distributor. Sega games from Empire and Xplosive were distributed by EVM.

In 2007 PlayOn took over the distribution. Since 2014, Cenega has been responsible for the distribution of Sega PC products in the country, alongside Poland, the Czech Republic and Slovakia.