And incredibly, you earn this respect by performing tasks for gang bosses and winning races. In a further refreshing twist, the money you earn may then be spent on modifying your car.

This is the press release for mobile Saint’s Row. We’d rather work in a meat factory that processes pig anuses into sausages, picking out the lumps of gristle from the raw pig anuses for 25p a week than have to write press releases like this as a job:

If you work for THQ or any other company that regularly writes words like ‘respect’, ‘notoriety’ and ‘gangsta’ up on its meeting room whiteboard, we’re here to help. Our confidential 24-hour helpline is waiting for your call.

IN OTHER AMAZINGLY DEPRESSING AND FRANKLY UNBELIEVABLE MOBILE PHONE GAME NEWS:
They’ve made a game about Bob Marley.

It was a good day for emails. We got two about sex drugs, two MySpace friend requests (more bloody men) and an amazing FIVE containing weird SEGA-related photographs.

Here they are all at once, as the harsh truth is that none are quite good enough to make it into individual updates. But together they are stronger.

This is the ‘Sonic and Tails Spinner’. We have no idea what it is or how it’s supposed to be a game. Here’s what the photographer had to say about it:

“The spinner was made Sonic Adventure era as there’s a picture of the robot with the bird what’s inside of him on the right of the base. I’d lost interest by then though and some 7 year olds were watching me with a view to steal my phone, so I didn’t get a picture. Note how Sonic appears to be either bumming or fisting tails. Maybe that’s why it broke? The worst part is it’s about 5 minutes away from where I work and will no doubt be in there on payday, spunking money away like there’s no tomorrow.“

This is an anti-nazi parade and they have an actual Sonic banner made up. Sonic stands for freedom!

“I found this picture in an article about the protest of a German anti-fascistic rganisation called ‘Antifa’. They were protesting against the fact that neo-nazis want to buy the untenanted hotel shown in this picture to establish a nazi meeting point there. I don’t know why they painted Sonic on their banner.“

Sticking with the German-language territories, this is the SEGABAR. We presume it’s a bar – the only information the sender provided was that it’s “probably the roughest fleshpot in Salzburg”. We always knew that if SEGA did fleshpots in Salzburg, they’d probably be the roughest fleshpots in Salzburg.

It’s an exciting cardboard box! It appears to be a SEGA Mark III box of games box. The sender seemed very excited about having it in his possession.

SEGA World Shanghai.

“I was in a large shopping centre in Xu Jia Hui Shanghai and noticed a rather large ‘Sega World’ logo on top of a machine as I went up the escalator. It looked rather dirty so I figured it was some throw-back machine from the early 90s. Upon further investigation I discovered a fully functioning Sega World, complete with OutRun2, House of the Dead and a whole load of other things. The people were loving it. Despite the lack of interest in OutRun2 the other games were getting a lot of play time. It must be one of the only places in Shanghai where you can play games legitimately without them being copies…“

It’s a box that says Sonic on it that someone thought we’d like to see. They took the photo on holiday and probably wish they’d saved the money and stayed at home watching telly if this was the highlight of the trip.

There’s no way Kotaku is going to link to this :(

Maybe if it was an official SEGA cardboard box we’d be a bit more enthusiastic.

SOME FAN FICTION ABOUT A CARDBOARD BOX

THE BOX OF JOY
By Michael Zorg

Who’s this in this box? Why, it’s Cream The Rabbit!

“Hello, big strong man. Do you want to get into the box with me?”

“Yes”

“I’m naked apart from my little orange shoes”

“Good”

We get in the box and a workman comes along, tapes up the box and puts it in a truck. The truck drives to Monaco and the journey goes really quickly because we’re having sex all the time.

In Monaco there’s a big house there which we’re allowed to have for free and live in together forever with no one else ever talking to us. It’s got satellite TV with all the sport and porn channels, and no internet or telephone.

The end.

We’ve been doing Employee of the Week on and mostly off for eight years, but have only managed to do 131 of them. Sorry about that. We’ll make practically zero effort to get back on track.

IGN has launched its UK operation, using the blandest, most predictable and generic attempt at “British speak” we’ve ever seen. They’re trying to be ‘zany’ by inventing new words for the internet, like ‘worldwide Intertube’ :(

It’s also doing ‘funny’ captions that are placed beneath ‘amusing’ images like we do only without our unrealistic wage demands. This is because they’re British, and British people are funny and wacky! All of them! Literally everything a British person ever says is funny, as you can see from the above attempt at British Speak that was obviously written by an American.

IGN UK’S MOST PATRONISING LOWLIGHTS:

“That’s right — IGN has moved across the Atlantic and opened an office in olde Londontowne”

“IGN’s US and UK staff will form an invincible gaming Voltron hell-bent on defeating Robeasts throughout the galaxy”

“We’ll also provide some UK reviews to give a second opinion on many games that appeal to a more European audience, such as rally racing and soccer titles”

“Expect the use of words such as “colour,” “blimey” and “wanker” in those articles”

The full English cliche-fest is here: IGN: Introducing IGN UK. It makes Gamesradar look good. We’re looking forward to this new era of British craziness — it’ll be like Monty Python but about games! And more about creaming off UK ad revenue.

We’ve counted seven so far :(

1) Old men in suits working at SEGA. 2) Sonic’s left eye is on upside-down. 3) Sonic’s left shoulder is on wrong. 4) Sonic’s nose is coming off. 5) Sonic’s head and face in general. 6) Sonic’s arms should be the same colour as his belly. 7) Carpet and wall indicates photo was taken in a bland office, not on Mobius.

READER-SUGGESTED ALTERNATIVE HEADLINES:

SONIC’S BACK, IN HIS MOST CORPORATE ADVENTURE YET!

GET CLOSER TO THE ACCOUNTS DEPARTMENT THAN EVER BEFORE IN SONIC THE HEDGEHOG!

MICROSOFT TO SUPPLY ‘NEW FRIENDS’ FOR SONIC’S EXCITING DEBUT ON XBOX 360

In America, at least, where it would appear they’ve now caught up with the jokes we were making in the late 1970s.

Modern ‘pads’ are much more dependent on thumbs than wrists. In fact, it’s pretty much nothing to do with the wrist at all these days – unless you’re a fat 45-year-old marketing man with no new ideas for weak sexual innuendo to sell your tat to some idiots.

JOKES AMERICA STILL HAS TO COME

“Push my buttons” – sounds a bit like turning a woman on

“Let me go on top” – split-screen gaming phrase that sounds a bit like a sexual position

“Waggle my stick” – by ‘stick’ they might actually mean ‘cock’ and by ‘waggle’ they might mean ‘masturbate’ or ‘rub’ even though no one uses sticks any more

“You came up my arse” – driving game reference that could also possibly also infer anal sex

“Let’s take turns” – possible roasting/group sex multiplayer misunderstanding with hilarious and/or sexual harassment in the workplace consequences.

“There’s a party in my pocket” – your new handheld gaming device is as much fun as having a wank

Just when you thought you couldn’t get more bored of our incredibly dull series of updates about closed SEGA Worlds, a man goes and sends us a photograph of the carpet in SEGA World Southampton.

Who would’ve thought that one day we’d become the sort of web site that uploads photographs of carpets like it’s news?

It’s an ideal carpet for lying down on in the dark, as when you roll over to sob into the floor you’d see Sonic and maybe feel a bit happier about the way things have turned out.

***UPDATE***
The carpet was made by Grosvenor Carpets and it’s actually called SEGA Park, not SEGA World.

SOME CARPET-INSPIRED FAN FICTION WE’VE JUST WRITTEN:

SONIC GETS A CARPETING
By Michael Zorg

“Oh, do we HAVE to?” moaned Sonic, as Amy dragged him through the car park of Carpet Megastore.

“Yes, Sonic, we DO” said Amy, firmly, tugging his hand and quickening her walk.

“You’ve worn them all out with your constant spinning”

It was a Saturday afternoon, and Sonic was thinking he’d rather be anywhere than shopping for carpets. Not only shopping for carpets, but shopping for carpets with Amy. Amy loved shopping for carpets, heck, Amy loved shopping for anything!

Last Saturday it was ring holders, the Saturday before it was emerald stands, the Saturday before that was… something Sonic really wasn’t interested in and also considered a waste of time buying.

This Saturday was carpets.

Sonic trudged along behind Amy, occasionally pretending he had an opinion on a carpet before being told it wasn’t good enough and they had to carry on looking. Perhaps, later, they may have to go to another carpet store to see more carpets, said Amy, such was the lack of a suitable carpet in this shop that contained 1000 carpets.

Sonic, unusually for him, was dragging his feet and walking slowly. So slowly, in fact, that Amy had wandered off ahead of him separating the two of them.

“Hey Sonic!”

It was Cream!

“Oh, er, hey Cream!” said Sonic, nervously glancing around to make sure Amy wasn’t about. “How are you?”

“Oh, you know, bored of shopping for carpets. Mum made me come, she says the one in my bedroom is all worn out because I’m always spinning on it. How I hate shopping for carpets!”

“Yeah, carpets are stupid!” said Sonic, after once again checking that Amy wasn’t within earshot.

“No, wait! Come and see what I’ve found!” Cream said, her eyes suddenly widening and, unbeknownst to Sonic, weeing herself slightly from being so excited.

Before he could protest, Cream grabbed Sonic by the hand and ran very fast – almost as fast as Sonic himself! – through the carpet store into a dark, deserted aisle.

“Look!”

Cream pointed to an old cylinder of carpet. It was grey with a blue design. It was dusty, and had probably lain there untouched since about 1992.

“The design, Sonic, look at the design!!”

Cream pulled Sonic roughly toward the carpet rack, and punched the old carpet to remove some of the dust. Sonic sneezed, waved the dust from the air and peered at the carpet.

“It’s… it’s ME!”

“Yes, Sonic! You’re so famous and cool they made a carpet after you!”

Sonic couldn’t believe his eyes. They had made a carpet after him! Probably in 1992, when he was the most famous because of Sonic 2 on the Mega Drive.

“Wow!” said Sonic, grabbing the frayed end of the carpet and yanking it hard to unfurl a fresh, clean and dust free section. “It’s as good as new!”

“Yes, and so soft!” said Cream, as she unfurled loads more carpet, until carpet was covering the entire width of the aisle!

Cream stroked the carpet, then lay down on it. She rolled over onto her tummy, letting her little orange dress ride up to reveal her white knickers.

“Come here, Sonic!”

Sonic looked around nervously.

“Come on! It’s all soft and like new!” giggled Cream, slipping off her orange shoes and lying back on the carpet, playfully kissing the woven Sonic image on the carpet and smiling up at the real Sonic standing there in front of her.

Sonic looked around nervously again, before smiling – with attitude! – and rolling up beside Cream on the lovely soft carpet.

“It’s so soft, isn’t it?” said Cream, gently, stroking the carpet and gradually moving her hand toward Sonic, then stroking Sonic’s arm.

Sonic looked at Cream. “Yes, Cream, it’s very soft and I…”

“SONIC!”

It was Amy.

“What the HELL are you doing with HER?!”

“Oh, Amy! It’s, er, I can…” stuttered Sonic.

“I’m going home!” squealed Amy in a very angry voice indeed.

Amy then turned around and started to run at full speed – but she was so angry she didn’t look where she was going and hit her head on a metal carpet rail.

Amy fell on the ground. You could tell she was dead immediately, because of the brain and stuff that had come out.

“Oh well” said Sonic.

“Oh well” said Cream.

Sonic grabbed the carpet cutting tool and cut off a length of the Sonic carpet, rolled Amy’s body up in it and put it in a big trolley. They paid for the carpet – it was cheap because it was so old – and then Sonic and Cream drove in Amy’s car to some cliffs and threw the carpet-wrapped body off into the sea, where it sank to the bottom and was never found.

They then went home and had sex on the threadbare carpet in Sonic’s house, but they didn’t notice that the carpet was threadbare because sex is better and more fun than carpets.

The end.

We’ve been sent photos of the inside of SEGA World Sydney, back during the short period it was open and seemed like maybe being financially viable.

It looks like they had too much space to put everything in, and as if the whole place was designed by the BBC special effects department in collaboration with the National Film Board of Canada. In 1981.

In short, it looks rubbish.

It’s a nice sign. We’d be tempted in by that. Before you scroll down, be warned that this is by far the highlight of the photos. If you’re sensitive about having your dreams about SEGA palaces crushed, don’t scroll down.

The quality of these photos isn’t good enough to tell if that’s a real person or a model of a person. Stupid 2001 cameras and their abysmal pixel counts. Either way, it’s a rubbish sign that looks like it belongs in the 1940s not a cutting-edge SEGA amusement/dream-making facility.

This is rubbish. It’s like a Soviet Union children zoo. That’s not fun. And it’s dirty. The poor kids.

This is the family. Dad’s taking the photos and mentally totting up how much money he’s wasted on this amazingly disappointing day out.

Not really that exciting.

Not really that exciting.

We know people got more excitied about rubbish things back in the ‘old days’ before all the cool stuff we have now was invented, but this was only made in the late 1990s. Even in the late 1990s we wouldn’t have got excited about a big plastic tube standing on an unconvincing sci-fi floor.

As disappointing as the SEGA AGES series.

So this is why no one goes to arcades any more, and why SEGA Worlds are being replaced by more branches of Starbucks the world over. We now stand for the complete annihilation of these miserable hell holes.

So we went and investigated it! The sign looked like it had where it says ‘SEGA’ covered up with a sticker, so it might’ve been a closed, abandoned SEGA World facility, with lots of classic games in that everyone’s forgotten about! This could be a lost tomb, sealed forever in 1998 and therefore with everything in mint condition and probably set to freeplay!

It’s worrying that the ‘SEGA’ bit seems to have been covered up.

It’s definitely been covered up, hasn’t it? It would be some coincidence for a piece of paper exactly that size to randomly attach itself to that sign in that specific place, wouldn’t it?

Sadly, to get to SEGA World, you have to walk down the sort of underpass that we usually associate with buying heavily-cut drugs from tramps or having our laptop stolen. This might explain why the sign has been papered over and why it looks like it might be closed and abandoned. What lies down the underpass of DOOM? Is it really a SEGA World? Is it still open? Or is it closed? Or has it been turned into a McDonalds or a Starbucks like every other available retail space?

It’s a boring shopping center. There is no SEGA World in Sydney any more. That was a waste of everyone’s time. We looked for ages. Nothing.

THEN, JUST NOW, THREE WEEKS LATER AND AS IF BY COINCIDENCE!
We got an email from this bloke who saw a second closed SEGA World in Shanghai. What is happening to the world? :(

All the while, Apple is opening *more* iPod hellholes. The end times really are upon us.