Sega warms up for Beijing 2008

When Sega and Nintendo first announced Mario and Sonic at the Olympic Games, much of the project made complete sense. It was a perfect fit for the two companies' most prominent mascots to appear in a crossover collection of party games tied into a massively popular worldwide sporting event on broad-appeal systems like the DS and Wii.

However, one thing that didn't make a lot of sense was the timing of the game. Sega was aiming for a holiday 2007 release for a sporting event that wouldn't even start until August 2008. The move makes a little more sense today, as Sega announced Beijing 2008, the official game of "The Games," set for release as Olympics hype reaches a fever pitch this summer.

Providing a more straightforward approach to the Olympics than the cartoonlike Mario and Sonic, Beijing 2008 will appear on the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and PC with simulations of more than 35 official events and online multiplayer modes. The game is being developed by Eurocom Entertainment Software, which created the Athens 2004 game for Sony, and has since worked on a number of projects, including Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End, Batman Begins, and Sphinx and the Cursed Mummy.