There are many ways to deliver a “screw you” message to your enemies. From Twitter insult wars to full-blown industrial espionage, corporate trickery has a large palette from which to pick a prank. Trading one-liners and one-upping one another’s ads happen every day, but every once in a great while the fates align to create truly monumental tributes to the fine art of trolling the competition. Today in gaming history, we remember and celebrate one of the single most epic video game burns one company ever laid on another. Turn the clock to 1999 and put on your asbestos underwear, cuz it’s about to get hot in here as Sony and Sega go head to head over a release date.

Sony was no stranger to diamond-studded dick-baggery when it came to their treatment of Sega. Nintendo may have been content to take the high road when Sega rolled into their neighborhood, screaming and shouting and spray-painting their logo on everything, but Sony? Sony wasn’t afraid to slap on the leather and bend Sega over the sawhorse. Sega was going to release the Saturn at a $399 debut price point? Sony set the PlayStation’s debut price at $299 and dropped that mic so hard it left a hole in the stage. Sega had some great first-party software in development? Sony signed virtually every third-party developer in the world, including Microsoft, to make PlayStation titles. Sega launched the Saturn on May 11th, 1995 with seven games in the US? Sony countered with ten games available at their US launch on September 9th, 1995, covering every genre from fighting to platformers, air combat to extreme sports, racing to shoot ’em ups. And when Sega put a swirly metal thing on rapper Ice Cube’s noggin, Sony presumably called to get the number for the ad guy’s drug dealer.

Not a good day.

What gave Sony such a raging hate-boner for Sega? After Nintendo hung them out to dry over their proposed Super NES CD add-on, Sony approached Sega’s US division about a partnership. Sony would produce and manufacture the ‘Play Station’ as a stand-alone console, while Sega would take a percentage of the profits in exchange for marketing and distribution. Sega’s US CEO Tom Kalinsky liked this idea and took it to the board of directors at Sega Japan. Since Sony had little experience beyond making portable music players, the Japanese board scoffed and told Sony to stick their Play Station proposal where the sun don’t shine.

Sega based that decision on stuff like this, so it’s understandable.

Snubbed from playing with either team, Sony made both the PlayStation and Sega their bitch. Unlike John Romero, Sony kept their promise. Thanks to the power of the PlayStation brand, Sega couldn’t go anywhere without playing cigar box banjo to Sony’s 1,200-piece mega-orchestra for the next four years.

Ice Cube went. The swirl stayed.

But then came 1999, and Sega’s move to re-position themselves on top with the Dreamcast. It was new, it was slick, and most importantly, it would be out a full year before PlayStation 2 hit the market. Sega had managed, barely, to go the distance with Sony thus far. They were battered and bleeding, but not down for the count. When Sony announced an October of 2000 US launch for the PS2, Sega saw their opening. To metaphorically add girth without adding lube, Sega chose a release date for the new system of September 9th, 1999, otherwise known as “the fourth anniversary of the North American PlayStation launch”. Sega’s message couldn’t have been clearer if it was written on the surface of the moon in 2,500-foot-tall, laser-etched, rhodium-plated letters: “Here’s our sawhorse, Sony–bend over!”

Gimp costume not included.

No one was more shocked than Sega, however, when Sony responded with, “Nice launch date you got there. Be a shame if anything happened to it…” Sony could do nothing to preempt the Dreamcast’s launch themselves–they were in no position to push the PS2 out ahead of schedule, and even if they could it would be pointless to do so without a competent software lineup. That meant help would have to come from outside. Fortunately Sony knew one little company happy to assist:

Pictured: a small company, hardly worth mentioning.

Final Fantasy VII was the best-selling RPG in console history at this point. PlayStation exclusivity encouraged a generation of gamers raised on Nintendo to jump ship, but those millions could be enticed to mutiny again if Sega’s Dreamcast pulled off a similar coup. With game demos for Soulcalibur and the 2K sports franchise blowing away testers and magazine editors alike, a rock-bottom $199 price point, a record nineteen launch titles, and Sega’s announcement that Sonic Adventure would be available day one, it’s easy to see why Sony feared gaming enthusiasts might leave them behind come September. Unless, of course, the sequel to the best-selling RPG of all time also happened to release in September, 1999. Say, a certain Thursday selected entirely at random…

“Huh. What a coincidence.” — Sony

That white background, simple logo, and release date are literally everything you need to understand why the Dreamcast failed.

We’re not saying Final Fantasy VIII was the sole reason Dreamcast folded. Sega did plenty on their own to drive that, offering outlandish rebates for subscribing to SegaNet’s online gaming service, a $50 price drop in 2000, and tons of other giveaways which cost the company nearly half a billion dollars. But the collapse of the house of cards begins with one tiny gust of wind, and this was Sony doing what they did best in the 90’s: groin-punching Sega and laughing all the way to the bank. We’d deliver nothing less to our readers for a Wacky Wednesday feature.

Michael Crisman

In 1979, Michael Crisman was mauled by a radioactive Gorgar pinball machine. After the wounds healed, doctors discovered his DNA had been re-coded. No longer fully human, Michael requires regular infusions of video games in order to continue living among you. If you see him, he can see you. Make no sudden moves, but instead bribe him with old issues of computer and video game magazines or a mint-in-box copy of Dragon Warrior IV.


If he made you laugh, drop a tip in his jar at http://paypal.me/modernzorker


(If he didn't make you laugh, donate to cure his compulsion to bang keyboards by sending an absurdly huge amount of money to his tip jar instead. That'll show him!)