Nintendo indulges in surprising scheme to revive dormant third party franchises...

Nintendo is to release a revival of the cult (and weird) Dreamcast 'classic' Seaman for 3DS, according to respected Japanese publication Nikkei (via Andriasang).

Seaman was a surreal virtual 'pet' sim, that had the player raising and interacting with a 'Seaman' creature by using a microphone.

The game was created by Yoot Saito, whose oeuvre includes Odama, the pinball-cum-war-simulator for Gamecube that was also controlled with a microphone. He is currently working on one of the titles in Level-5's four-games-in-one package Guild 01 for 3DS.

Perhaps the bigger news is that Nintendo's revival of Sega's property is part of a wider project to bring new "strong titles" to 3DS. This will seemingly entail the return of other publisher's dormant franchises under the banner of Nintendo.