Sega Game Station

Sega Game Station (セガ・ゲームステーション) was Sega of Japan's online presence available through several Japanese proprietary networks.

People

People World, a joint venture between IBM Japan, Toshiba, Mitsubishi, and Hitachi launched the People service, for IBM PC compatible computers, on August 1st, 1994. Not long after, on October 1st, 1994, Sega Game Station was launched.

Content included the latest information on consumer and arcade games, with pictures and video initially available through People's user friendly "GUIPPY" GUI communication software, along with user message boards.

People had a reciprocal connection service with the comparatively minor Asahi Net network . People would become the third biggest Japanese proprietary online service (far behind PC-VAN and NIFTY-Serve), before the service was closed in 2001.

NIFTY-Serve

Pad Nifty UI

Fujitsu's NIFTY-Serve had been running since 1987, and along with PC-Van was one of the two large Japanese networks, with over 1.2 million subscribers as of 1995, and peaking at about 2 million subscribers in 1996. The international CompuServe network was also accessible through NIFTY-Serve.

Sega Game Station through Sega Saturn's Pad Nifty

Sega had a presence on NIFTY-Serve with Sega Game Information Station (code "SSEGA"), with the network previously hosting dedicated Sega bulletin boards (code "FSEGA"). The service could be accessed on a Sega Saturn via the Pad Nifty software. The virtual world Habitat II also ran on the NIFTY-Serve network, linking Sega Saturn, Windows 3.1, Windows 95, and FM Town Marty users.

NIFTY-Serve on a Sega Saturn

NIFTY-Serve was the last surviving proprietary online service in Japan when it was terminated in 2006.

PC-VAN

NEC's PC-VAN network dated back to 1986, initially targeting owners of their "PC-XXXX" range of computers.

Information from Sega was available in Sega Game Station (code "SEGAGS"), whilst bulletin boards were available in Sega Players World (セガ・プレイヤーズワールド), (code "SPW", formerly "MDWORLD").

PC-VAN and NIFTY-Serve were by far the biggest proprietary online services in Japan, peaking at about 2 million subscribers each in 1996. PC-VAN ended service in 2001.

Menus (PC-VAN)