I would say there would be a much bigger chance of them selling off a few development studios than the whole company being taken over.

Nintendo should just buy the Sonic license and let sega die.

 err.. Sega has other franchises

if sega does get over taken i think it will be by EA

I think they should make a Sonic rush / Sonic and Knuckles sequel for PSN and Live. Proper 2D sonic!!!! Think how amazing that would be. It would be a lot cheaper than another complete failure like Sonic The Hedgehog and everyone loves 2d sonic!! COME ON SEGA!

Actually since I just noticed that Sega stock was only at 2.20 a share I just brought over 100 shares.It is down from 3 dollars a share a few weeks ago but it may be a good time to buy but only wiht money you are prepared to lose.

All this pessimistic talk is rather annoying.

The idea that Sega's talent has evaporated is complete idiocy; Virtua Fighter, Virtua Tennis, Total War, Football Manager and so on and so forth are and have been for years the most critically acclaimed games in their genres, including their most recent incarnations.

Even more stupid is this notion that they're failing. The recent downturn is due to problems over at Sammy's side and the arcade market in Japan finally keeling over to die.

Football Manager 2008 was the 5th fastest selling game ever released in Europe. Mario and Sonic is going to hit 4 million by mid March. Sonic Rush just passed the 2 million mark. Love and Berry became the second game in Sega's history to pass the one million mark in Japan. The Yakuza series has become one of the biggest series in Japan right now (Yakuza 2 is still in the Top 50 a year and a half later). Mushi King has become a rather milkable franchise.

Sega's biggest mistake last gen, IMHO, was trying to divvy support up on all next gen consoles, especially when their games sold the best on the GC.

But the real issue was that, with the death of the Dreamcast, Sega suddenly had a detached fanbase with no "home" console, and their answer to that was to send Sonic to the GC, Toejam and Earl to the Xbox (to die), Crazy Taxi to the PS2, etc.

It was idiotic. If things had been the other way around and Nintendo had gone 3rd party, how would you feel about buying a PS3 to play LoZ, a 360 to play Metroid and a Dreamcast 2 to play Mario games?

It would royally suck to either shell out $1200 or be denied the ability to play all of your favorite franchises of that gen, and yet that's basically what Sega did to their fanbase (it was more to the tune of $800, but still, it sucked).

I think that was the beginning of the end for them, and I don't know what could save the company now, but I don't think Nintendo or anyone else will bite with what they have left.

Sega's franchises have been gone too long that they don't have the fanbase necessary to survive on fan appreciation, and we've seen what happens when they attempt to create new IPs (Billy Hatcher, anyone?). I don't know how Sega's story will end, but I doubt it'll end well.

New franchises have worked out well for Sega also you know. Yakuza, Love and Berry and Mushi King are all pretty big stuff in Japan.

 thats pretty good, nintendoes