Sonic Team
The initial team formed in 1990 and was composed of developers from Sega's Consumer Development division, including programmer Yuji Naka, artist Naoto Ohshima, and level designer Hirokazu Yasuhara. The team took the name Sonic Team in 1991 with the release of "Sonic the Hedgehog" for the Sega Genesis. The game was a major success that contributed to millions of Genesis sales. The next "Sonic" games were developed by Naka and Yasuhara in America at Sega Technical Institute, while Ohshima worked on "Sonic CD" in Japan. Naka returned to Japan in late 1994 to become the head of CS3, later renamed R&D #8. During this time, the division took on the Sonic Team brand but developed games that do not feature Sonic, such as "Nights into Dreams" (1996) and "Burning Rangers" (1998).
Video game console
The Nomad was released in October 1995 in North America only. The release was five years into the market span of the Genesis, with an existing library of more than 500 Genesis games. According to former Sega of America research and development head Joe Miller, the Nomad was not intended to be the Game Gear's replacement and believes that there was little planning from Sega of Japan for the new handheld. Sega was supporting five different consoles: Saturn, Genesis, Game Gear, Pico, and the Master System, as well as the Sega CD and 32X add-ons. In Japan, the Mega Drive had never been successful and the Saturn was more successful than Sony's PlayStation, so Sega Enterprises CEO Hayao Nakayama decided to focus on the Saturn. By 1999, the Nomad was being sold at less than a third of its original price.