Eternal Champions producer and designer, Michael Latham, passes away

SEGA of America in the 1990s was a force to be reckoned with. Their marketing and game library was second to none, giving Nintendo a run for their money with the SEGA Genesis. Michael Latham was an integral part of SEGA of America’s history, producing games like Eternal Champions, Ghostbusters, and Home Alone. We are sad to report Michael Latham passed away this week.

A recent tweet from Sega-16 broke the news to their followers:

Before SEGA, he worked at Mediagenic where he worked on Ghostbusters II and Tongue of the Fatman. Latham joined SEGA of America in 1991 as producer, helping create some of the games we mentioned above. In 1994, Latham’s group merged into Omega Group, serving as their new director.

Latham was interviewed by Sega-16 in 2005, where he was asked about his time at SEGA:

 It was simply the most fun of any job I ever had. Everything just exploded, and for a young guy in the business it allowed me to do so much so fast. I entered the company as a producer, quickly moved up to run my own production group, and even became a VP before the age of 30, thanks to the unbelievable growth and talented people I worked with. It’s so hard to have all the right people in the right places, and when you do, you get hit companies and products. We were on movie sets, meeting with sport teams, going backstage at concerts – all kinds of exciting projects – and the development teams were still small and you really knew everyone you worked with unlike the mega development teams of today’s games.

Michael Latham

Our hearts are heavy with the news of Michael’s passing, and we send our condolences to his friends and family. Let’s all go play some Eternal Champions in honor of Michael Latham.