History of Sega in Czechia

History of Sega in Czechia
Official Sega distributor(s): Independent retail outlets (1988-1990), Sega Office CSRF (1990-19xx), Datart (1993-1996), ITO CS (1993-1996), Popron Distribuce (1994-1996), DDC Agency (1996-1998), Fliko (2000-2002), CD Projekt (2004-2016), Cenega (2016-present)

Czechoslovakia

Print advert in BIT (SK) #13: "10/1992" (1992-10-01)

Consoles existed in Czechoslovakia during communism and an example is the Tesla XD 8001 produced by the Czechoslovak company Tesla. The existence of Sega in Czechoslovakia is quite a mystery, and few facts are known at the moment. The first information about Sega's entry into this market comes from 1988, when independent retail outlets began the sale of Master System. The information gathered shows that Czechoslovakia was probably the first country in Eastern Europe where Sega products were introduced. This fact is little known, so it can be expected that the Master System was not successful in the country, especially since the political changes in Czechoslovakia continued during this period.

In 1990, Sega established its first office in the country. It is not known what the representative office was called, where it was located, how many years it existed or when it ended. It is known for sure that it did exist. It is also known, that Master System consoles were distributed further and was distributed at several retailers, such as IBEA, which imported and distributed to retailers and wholesalers in Slovakia, and at the Enisof company located in the Czech Republic. On January 1, 1993, Czechoslovakia split into two countries.

Datart, ITO CS and Popron Distribuce

After the break-up, Datart became the authorized distributor of Sega, which released Mega Drive, Master System II and Game Gear. At the end of 1993, the second distributor, ITO CS, was selected. This is also where the popularity of Sega consoles on the market began to grow and soon these video games became quite widespread in the Czech Republic. In 1994, in addition to the appearance of the Mega Drive II and Mega CD II, a third authorized distributor, Popron Distribuce, was selected. From that moment on, distributors also started to create Czech game manuals for Sega consoles.

Popron did not want to wait for the European premiere of Sega Saturn, so from March/April 1995, they started importing Japanese versions of the console, which cost 25,000 CZK.. At that time, the Mega Drive 32X and Sega Multi Mega officially appeared in the Czech Republic.

In addition to the official consoles, there were also famiclones on the market such as Terminator 2 modeled on Sega Mega Drive, Bel Game, Pegasus IQ-502, Video Game-GT3300, Micro Genius (via Atelier) and many more.

Mega Drive clones have also appeared along with bootleg games. The price of a clone named simply 'Mega Drive' with 2 turbo joysticks was around 3990 CZK in 1994.

Print advert in Excalibur (CZ) #16 (1993-04-10)
also published in:

• Excalibur (CZ) #15 (1993-03-10)
• Excalibur (CZ) #17 (1993-05-10)
• Excalibur (CZ) #18 (1993-09-10)
• Excalibur (CZ) #19 (1993-10-10)

Print advert in Excalibur (CZ) #21 (1993-12-10)

Print advert in Score (CZ) #10: "Říjen 1994" (1994-10-01)
also published in:

• Score (CZ) #11: "Listopad 1994" (1994-11-01)
• Score (CZ) #12: "Prosinec 1994" (1994-12-01)
• Score (CZ) #13: "Leden 1995" (1995-01-01)
• Score (CZ) #14: "Únor 1995" (1995-02-01)
• Score (CZ) #15: "Březen 1995" (1995-03-01)

Print advert in LeveL (CZ) #4: "Květen 1995" (1995-05-01)

DDC Agency

In 1996, the DDC Agency became a distributor of Sega and Atari in the Czech Republic and Slovakia and released Sega Saturn, also continued to sell all older Sega systems that were released in the Czechia so far. The company had four authorized distributors in the Czech Republic:

• Trojanec- Brno and South Moravia
• Ozón-West Bohemia and North Bohemia
• Euro Shop Ostrava-North Moravia and the East Bohemia
• Zlatý Tygr- South Bohemia

Sega's products have been well advertised in several major gaming magazines, the ABC children's magazine, at gaming events such as HIT 96 and from Summer 1996 Saturn prices were lowered to be equal to PlayStation. The DDC Agency has created a specialized Sega gaming magazine called Sega News, published since October 1996.

Mega Drive clones were still available, as well as pirated copies of games with Czech manuals. They were sold until the early 2000s. One of the sellers of these clones was Sat Game, which released Star Drive DS 1603 and Genesis 2.

Despite the promotion, Saturn did not sell that well in the Czech Republic. From the spring of 1997, Sega consoles were less and less advertised and the Sega brand began to lose its importance in the Czech Republic. Authorized distributors were selling Saturn and Mega Drive until 1998.

In second half of the 90s, Comex became distributor of Sega arcades.

Print advert in Score (CZ) #34: "Říjen 1996" (1996-10-01)
also published in:

• Sega News (CZ) #1: "Říjen 1996" (1996-xx-xx)
• Score (CZ) #35: "Listopad 1996" (1996-11-01)
• Sega News (CZ) #2: "Listopad 1996" (1996-1x-xx)
• Score (CZ) #36: "Prosinec 1996" (1996-12-01)
• Sega News (CZ) #3: "Prosinec 1996" (1996-1x-xx)

Print advert in Score (CZ) #34: "Říjen 1996" (1996-10-01)
also published in:

• Sega News (CZ) #1: "Říjen 1996" (1996-xx-xx)
• Score (CZ) #35: "Listopad 1996" (1996-11-01)
• Sega News (CZ) #2: "Listopad 1996" (1996-1x-xx)
• Score (CZ) #36: "Prosinec 1996" (1996-12-01)
• Sega News (CZ) #3: "Prosinec 1996" (1996-1x-xx)

Sega Saturn Hit Roku 1996 booklet added to some of the games

Fliko

Print advert in LeveL (CZ) #71: "Prosinec 2000" (2000-1x-xx)

The Sega Dreamcast console was available in the Czechia since March 2000 and its importer was Fliko, moreover, the console could be purchased at Game Line, Play Centrum, Digitec and Gamestar. The situation of the console was quite poor and most people thought that after Sega selected the exclusive distributor or representative for the Czechia, the situation would change but this did not happen until the end of Dreamcast, probably because the sales results in this country were quite small. About 500 Dreamcasts were sold throughout the 2000, compared to other consoles in the Czechia, Dreamcast had the smallest user base. For comparison, PlayStation had about 50,000 Czechs, Game Boy Color - 15,000, Nintendo 64 - 2,500 and PlayStation 2 - about 800. .

Dynamic Systems

Dynamic Systems distributed Sega games from Empire around 2000s.

CD Projekt and Cenega

In 2004, the CD Projekt company became a distributor of Sega in the Czech Republic and Slovakia.The company slowly became a representative of Sega in other countries of the Visegrad Group. In 2016, Cenega become representative of Sega.