Virtua Fighter Crossroads and Future Sega Titles Will Offer Full Support for NVIDIA RTX Spark

NVIDIA and Sega have officially celebrated over three decades of collaboration, announcing a new phase of their strategic partnership. The announcement, made in Akihabara at the historic GiGO Akihabara 3 (formerly known as Sega Akihabara Arcade), marks an agreement that will bring Virtua Fighter and other future titles from the Japanese company to the new NVIDIA RTX Spark platform.

Key figures from both companies participated in the event, including NVIDIA's founder and CEO Jensen Huang, Sega's CEO Haruki Satomi, COO Shuji Utsumi, former Sega president Shoichiro Irimajiri, and Yu Suzuki, the renowned creator of Virtua Fighter.

Virtua Fighter 30th Anniversary Special Message

As part of today's event in Akihabara celebrating 30 years of partnership between SEGA and NVIDIA, we're resharing a special video message from NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang and Virtua Fighter creator Yu Suzuki.

Don't miss this… pic.twitter.com/kBYioB3JNB
— VIRTUA FIGHTER CROSSROADS (@VFCROSSROADS)
July 15, 2026

The intertwined history of the two giants dates back to 1995 with the launch of the NV1, NVIDIA's first 2D/3D graphics accelerator. This chip enabled the porting of Sega's early 3D classics to PC, including the original Virtua Fighter. However, it was a poorly successful chip due to fundamental architecture issues.

NVIDIA chose to adopt Quadratic Texture Mapping (SEGA implemented it in the Saturn), a step forward compared to the triangular primitives used by competitors. However, the market opted for a different approach, and the release of Microsoft’s DirectX APIs formally killed the project: with API support for triangular primitives, NVIDIA's technology became obsolete. The chip, among other things, lacked a depth management unit (Z-Buffer), which is now a fundamental cornerstone of GPUs.

Despite the obstacles, Sega invested $5 million in NVIDIA, giving a company almost on the brink of failure the capital injection that led it to make a comeback first with the RIVA 128 and then with the GeForce 256. The rest is history.

Coming to the present day, all eyes are on RTX Spark, NVIDIA's first processor for computers, initially aimed at ultra-thin Windows laptops and compact low-power desktop systems. Future titles from Sega, led by the upcoming Virtua Fighter Crossroads, will leverage the RTX Spark hardware and software ecosystem.

The integration involves implementing cutting-edge proprietary technologies such as ray tracing and DLSS. Of course, we can only wait for autumn to experience the first RTX Spark solutions, while the release date for the Sega title is generally expected in 2027.