I miss the Dreamcast!! Anyone else ?

Outkast_IRE

Ah the days of Shenmue , Sonic, Chu chu rocket.
There was some real classics!!!

K.O.Kiki

On the one hand, Sega's failure to best Sony's marketing muscle & bow out from the hardware scene leaves me sad.

OTOH, I doubt I would've ever been able to play Ico & Shadow of the Colossus if not for the PS2's market dominance.

Retr0gamer

Sega did everything right with the Dreamcast except market it properly. They shouldn't have done a Sony with their terrible adverts that don't show any games. All they had to do was show Sonic Adventure and Soul Calibur in motion and perhaps the gaming landscape would be different now. The Dreamcast was a fantastic console. It had the third party support. Itactually had good games and a rake of them unlike the PS2 had at the time. It had the quirky games and even though it didn't have the support of EA, Sega were bettering them with their own 2K sports label. I love the console, for it's short life span it had so many great games and has it's own distinctive feel and look. I'm pretty disappointed with this generation since it hasn't given us an experience that couldn't have been done on the previous generation except with the odd exception like Dead Rising.

Mossy Monk

I must be one of the few who has never played a Dreamcast

Kimbot

Mossy Monk wrote: »

I must be one of the few who has never played a Dreamcast

You better get your hands on one so!!

I'm going to dust mine off today and fix the random reset problem then get a few games in. Class machine so it is.

Jazzy

WELCOME TO POWER STONE ADVENTURES!

wat a console

Firefox10

Crazy Taxi....Such a mad game!:D Still play my dreamcast the odd time.

Outkast_IRE

It had these creative accesabile deep games .
Like sonic for example it wasnt just a simple platformer they really outdid themselves

Anyone else own Ecco the dolphin man that was some hard game ,
gorgeous looking game though downright stunning not many games can be that beautiful.


The problem now is you have creative and little dept eg. Wii
Or PS3 spawning sequel after sequel .
If i had to pick one this generation it would be xbox360

What were your favourite games

roryok

I always rage at myself now for trading in so many of my old DC games back around 2000 or so (usually to buy more) costs me a bit to replace them on ebay etc.

love my dc but possibly more fond of the saturn if i'm honest (preferred the pad for fighting games)

noodler

I don't understand the love. Liked the look of Senmue and Phantasy Star Online but otherwise I will never quite understand the love.

I know it was technically the first online console and had quite another few 'firsts' but I wouldn't trade what might have been for the mountains of excellent games I got to play on the PS2.

That said, if Sega were still here in a console capacity, would we still have Sony, Nintendo and Microsoft?

I must go dust mine off, Soul Calibur and Shenmue were great, must go and see what other games I have lying around.

corblimey

No, I don't miss it at all....

'Cos I play mine every weekend still. Haha, I kill me.

As a little side note, I've got the DC to thank for the my upcoming trip of a lifetime to Japan. While looking for new games about 2 years ago, I stumbled across the bizarre Bomber Hehhe. I've managed to cobble together a rudimentary understanding of that game since I got it, but it piqued my interest in learning Japanese which I've been doing ever since, leading inevitably to my planned 3 month journey later this year around the islands of Japan.

Thanks, DC! Now, if only your controller wouldn't hurt my fat man-fingers so much

Retr0gamer

noodler wrote:

I don't understand the love.

If you remember around the time the PS2 came out the Dreamcast was a far better machine. The PS2 couldn't match the DC graphically, games like Shenmue, Ferrari F355 challenge and Soul Calibur were ahead graphically over anything the PS2 had to offer at the time. The PS2 was a bitch to develop for so it took ages for developers to start producing games to match and beat the DC, while the DC was a breeze to develop for since it was basically a windows based PC. Even still later games like Ikaruga and Under Defeat are on par with the PS2's best looking games imo. The PS2 also had a really had a lack of any decent games for almost a year. Then GTA3 came out and the PS2 picked up a lot of steam. It was still slow going for the PS2 with regards to it getting decent games, it wasn't until after 2 years and the DC was discontinued that the PS2 started to really deliver the goods.

Other reasons the DC was better was how Sega treated it's customers. People went crazy buying import DC's and Soul Calibur since they feared the usual awful PAL conversion. However they needn't have bothered since the DC offered a 60Hz PAL mode for all of it's releases and decent 50Hz modes. Sega also made sure that even it's most obscure games got a worldwide release with very few games staying in japan. Basing it's console off it's very popular arcade hardware also ensured arcade perfect or even better conversions.

The fact is that the PS2 was a very poor console for a very long time and the DC was so much better in terms of everything it offered. The PS2 was like a backwards step in console design. Only 2 controller ports, no online out of the box (and only many months after the DC was discontinued did it offer online) and lack of 480P output until much later while the DC supported this for many games through a VGA cable. Dreadful PAL 50Hz conversions also plagued european gamers for the first 3 years.

The PS2 eventually became the better console but had it lasted longer I'm sure the DC would have been much better. For a console that had been discontinued after 2 years it has an amzing amount of great games. It was also the last time we would see Sega being such a great developer of games. Since the DC died we've only had Panzer Dragoon Orta and Valkyria Chronicles as stand out Sega developed games.

noodler

Retr0gamer wrote: »

If you remember around the time the PS2 came out the Dreamcast was a far better machine. The PS2 couldn't match the DC graphically, games like Shenmue, Ferrari F355 challenge and Soul Calibur were ahead graphically over anything the PS2 had to offer at the time. The PS2 was a bitch to develop for so it took ages for developers to start producing games to match and beat the DC, while the DC was a breeze to develop for since it was basically a windows based PC. Even still later games like Ikaruga and Under Defeat are on par with the PS2's best looking games imo. The PS2 also had a really had a lack of any decent games for almost a year. Then GTA3 came out and the PS2 picked up a lot of steam. It was still slow going for the PS2 with regards to it getting decent games, it wasn't until after 2 years and the DC was discontinued that the PS2 started to really deliver the goods.

Other reasons the DC was better was how Sega treated it's customers. People went crazy buying import DC's and Soul Calibur since they feared the usual awful PAL conversion. However they needn't have bothered since the DC offered a 60Hz PAL mode for all of it's releases and decent 50Hz modes. Sega also made sure that even it's most obscure games got a worldwide release with very few games staying in japan. Basing it's console off it's very popular arcade hardware also ensured arcade perfect or even better conversions.

The fact is that the PS2 was a very poor console for a very long time and the DC was so much better in terms of everything it offered. The PS2 was like a backwards step in console design. Only 2 controller ports, no online out of the box (and only many months after the DC was discontinued did it offer online) and lack of 480P output until much later while the DC supported this for many games through a VGA cable. Dreadful PAL 50Hz conversions also plagued european gamers for the first 3 years.

The PS2 eventually became the better console but had it lasted longer I'm sure the DC would have been much better. For a console that had been discontinued after 2 years it has an amzing amount of great games. It was also the last time we would see Sega being such a great developer of games. Since the DC died we've only had Panzer Dragoon Orta and Valkyria Chronicles as stand out Sega developed games.

Thats some amount of conjecture and assumptions for one post.

Your hardware arguments reflect alot of the current stuff that people say regarding the PS3/360. Specifically that although the PS3 is well-built and has alot of other features the 360 is preferable becasue it has better/more games.

ironictoaster

I have never played it either. What's the big deal about this Shenmue game and what did the little screen on the controller do?

Retr0gamer

noodler wrote: »

Thats some amount of conjecture and assumptions for one post.

Conjecture and assumptions? There's no assumptions there and the only bit that could even be considered conjecture would be about there being a lack of decent PS2 games in the first few months which is more personal opinion. Whatever, all i know is I got my PS2 9 months after it launched and was mostly playing PS1 games on it for a year due to the lack of decent PS2 titles while my mate was enjoying loads of excellent DC games.

corcaigh07

fully agree with retro, the dreamcast was a stunning console, i remember people around demo booths being absolutely gobsmacked by its capabilites, espcially by how good looking soul calibur was and how fun ready to rumble was.

* the games were stellar and regular
* online gaming with dialup, not without its flaws but amazing nonetheless, monaco gp, ferrari f355 and pso were terrific.
* the controller was extremely comfy
* Graphics are still stunning, jet set radio, shenmue, dead or alive, sonic adventure 2 all still look terrific and ive yet to get a VGA cable for my DC.
*right up until its death, the dreamcast was a superior console to PS2. theres no question that the ps2 is now far superior but if only dreamcast was able to carry on, it could have been matched or maybe lasted long enough to justify a new sega console.

in hindsight though, sega were right to cull it as soon as they did as pirate CD-R copies were starting to hurt sales very badly. console sales were also losing far too much money so it was best to just stop and cut losses.

BlitzKrieg

I have never played it either. What's the big deal about this Shenmue game

Shenmue was an imensely ambitious game, one that tends to be a love it or hate it kind of result. One of the most expensive games ever (it was when it was made, dont know if its been surpassed since) its tale was so vast that it was broken down into at one point rumoured twelve different games (it fluctuated during production). The game itself goes against alot of what we get today in games, it wasnt a very big scope in its setting or plot but it was huge in how focused the game was on little details. It was an RPG fan's wet dream in how much detail went into the games setting, every little detail had relevence and it was staggering for the time.

But the gameplay itself was very slow, very narrative focused and it took time to get into and while there was a large arcing plot the immediate tasks felt borderline monotonous in their goals (get a job, look for sailors etc etc) but too many including myself, the monotony added to its greatness because it was a game where you could wade waist deep in its depth, and it made the player play the game as a proper role playing game, rather then having the story/game structure being two very seperate components.

In the end the game got very good with some great plot twists, excellent villians and nice diversity to its gameplay. It ended on a high note.

Shenmue 2 took all the elements from shenmue 1 (even if you have a saved game all your items from 1) and brought the overall scope out a bit so it was bigger. didnt have the same details as the first game, but it was grander and kept enough of the first games elements to make it a charming sequel.

By todays standard alot of what shenmue did would be standard in the do's and dont's of gaming (a fair few donts were learnt aswell as do's such as QTE events)

overall its a game thats worth trying even if you didnt like it.

and what did the little screen on the controller do?

the vmu.

thats actually the memory card. It doubled as a tiny handheld device. Some games could download stuff to it to be played outside the full game. Sonic adventure took the biggest advantage with a tamagotchi like chao game that when put back in the full game resulted in a stronger chao for the player.

Otherwise it was used for a variety of things, including health meters (code veronica) tips, scores, team layouts etc etc.

It didnt get enough use due to the short lifespan of the dreamcast. But it was a great touch and a decent memory card to booth.

MooseJam

owned one, yes it was great, shame it wasn't a success commercially , it deserved to be

Retr0gamer

I think Shenmue cost nearly 70 million to make and Sega needed something stupid like nearly every Dreamcast owner to buy a copy to break even. Although saying that the budget was mostly wasted on the saturn port and the planned sequels would have made it back since the engine was already there.

theteal

ye've all made me really want to fire it up, it's been a while. . .if i only i could find the bleedin' games. . .where's crazy taxi, my fingers haven't been in pain in a while!

Gummy Panda

Dreamcast had some awesome games. Loved Shenmue but hated sonic. House of the dead was also a lot of fun.

But it was a noisy piece of hardware, kinda like the xbox 360 (or my dreamcast was a faulty one). I think DVD also helped kill it as it had no DVD playback and when the ps2 launch, they were bundling DVD players with the dreamcast to try compete.

Retr0gamer

The DC is definitely a noisy machine, even worse than the 360.

noodler

Retr0gamer wrote: »

Conjecture and assumptions? There's no assumptions there and the only bit that could even be considered conjecture would be about there being a lack of decent PS2 games in the first few months which is more personal opinion. Whatever, all i know is I got my PS2 9 months after it launched and was mostly playing PS1 games on it for a year due to the lack of decent PS2 titles while my mate was enjoying loads of excellent DC games.

The conjecture relates to the degree of success the DC would have had if this had happened or that had happened etc.

Kiith

I absolutly loved the Dreamcast, if only for Shenmue. Probably one of my favourite games ever. I remember being absolutly blown away by it at the time, and loved the QTE events.

I wanted to kick Lan Di's ass, bang Nozomi and kill Megumi and her ****ing cat.

Do you know where i can find some sailors?

Firefox10

Retr0gamer wrote: »

The DC is definitely a noisy machine, even worse than the 360.

I don't think you can get anything worse than the 360 for noise! Except maybe the vacum cleaner.:D

Seeker

I like to play Shenmue every few years. Now I cant find my DC. Going nuts!

Firefox10

Hmm...I might take it out now and have a go at Soul Calibur and Rez. Another classic.

Retr0gamer

noodler wrote: »

The conjecture relates to the degree of success the DC would have had if this had happened or that had happened etc.

It was speculation not a statement.

Firefox10 wrote: »

I don't think you can get anything worse than the 360 for noise! Except maybe the vacum cleaner.:D

Trust me it's worse. It's a really tiny console, the smallest one I have out in fact, and the fan that keeps it cool is really noisy. The disc drive is just as bad. When you play skies of arcadia you can tell when a random battle is about to happen from the disc spool up just beforehand.

I think the worst thing about the DC is that it's probably the only console that failed that was also a brilliant machine. Every other console failure deserved to or was destined to fail due to poor handling by the manufacturer but the DC was a great powerful machine with an amazing software catalogue and third party support.

Outkast_IRE

I think one of the reasons it failed was the saturn and how sega abandoned the customers with that . people were actually afraid to buy the dreamcast in case it went down the same route. Granted it did go down the same route but it was a good couple of years i enjoyed:D

BlitzKrieg

nice sum up of the console here

http://www.onnetworks.com/videos/play-value/sega-dreamcast?autoplay=true

Retr0gamer

Outkast_IRE wrote: »

I think one of the reasons it failed was the saturn and how sega abandoned the customers with that . people were actually afraid to buy the dreamcast in case it went down the same route. Granted it did go down the same route but it was a good couple of years i enjoyed:D

It was definitely a factor but I think the main reason it failed was the massive success of the Playstation. At the time the playstation was synonymous with gaming like Nintendo was in the late 80's/early 90's and could sell on the brand name alone. Let's face it, the PS2 hardly sold on the strength of it's games in the first few months. I remember a magazine running a massive article on how to get the best out of your MGS2 demo, thats how bad it was

However I wouldn't say the DC was like the saturn other than the fact it got dropped way too early. Sega actually did support it after they stopped manufacturing units for quite some time but the announcement that they were no longer making units was the final nail in the coffin even if sales had slowed to a trickle.

The saturn was a terrible underpowered console that was difficult to program for and didn't have many good games on it because Sega refused to bring the good ones from Japan. The DC was a very powerful machine ahead of it's time which was a joy to develop on and had an amazing selection of games including lots of obscurities from japan.

FruitLover

noodler wrote: »

Phantasy Star Online

I've just about paid off the loan I had to take out to pay the phone bill I racked up playing that fecker over the modem...

ironictoaster

It's so weird, I don't even remember anyone having a dreamcast back in the day..It was PS1 and N64, that's it.

Cravez

creggy wrote: »

It's so weird, I don't even remember anyone having a dreamcast back in the day..It was PS1 and N64, that's it.

Me and another friend had a dreamcast, the others had as you said N64 or PS1. And it really boiled down to at the time if you looked back over what consoles we had. Throughout my life after the Commodore 64 every console i had was a Sega machine.... Master System, Game Gear, Mega Drive, Mega CD, Saturn etc and my friend who had the N64 had the Nes,Snes, Gameboy etc. I think really at the time alot of people who were gamers were influenced greatly by what 'brand' they stuck to. I enjoyed playing Sega consoles greatly so naturally i went out of my way to get a Dreamcast. Alot of people would have owned a Megadrive (i cant imagine anyone who didnt at the time) but alot of them didn't have a Saturn or a Master System.

I miss playing my Dreamcast, i actually still have my console and games but the power cable is missing, must get one off ebay or somthing and start playing it again

Amalgam

[drool]Soulcalibur[/drool]

The Dreamcast seems more appreciated now than a few years back. Not as cheap to buy as it was.

Ziggurat

I've been thinking of buying one lately and this thread just makes me want to do it all the more.

Outkast_IRE

I loved how sega sent out chu chu rocket to everyone for free That was class

Shiminay

Ah yes, was playing my DC daily until I moved to my current flat (over a year ago). I keep meaning to hook it up, but I'm tight on space.

I bought my DC on release day with as it was the thing I'd been looking forward to most since I'd finished college. It's a shame it didn't last longer, but there was a hell of a lot of quality squeezed into it's short life-span.

Playing House of the Dead by yourself with 2 guns is fun (if a little awkward) Never got into Shenmue, I do have it though. It's not my sort of game at all though. MANY hours of multi-player Soul Calibur were had when I lived in Galway and there were regular gatherings in the flat. UEFA Striker got a good run too until we got a Pro Evo on our PS2 in them days too. Powerstone was a lot of fun and quite innovative in the use of the environment. Ready 2 Rumble was a great laugh too. Ikaruga - has to go down as one of the greatest games ever made. You could never get bored of it.

[note to mods, feel free to edit/remove this bit]
There are also a healthy amount of emulators for the DC. Have seen Mega-Drive, Master-System, Gameboy, NES, SNES emus out there. Was definitely one of the benefits of running on a modified version of Windows CE.

I never went online with mine, does that service still exist?

Greyfox

Retr0gamer wrote: »

It was definitely a factor but I think the main reason it failed was the massive success of the Playstation. At the time the playstation was synonymous with gaming like Nintendo was in the late 80's/early 90's and could sell on the brand name alone. Let's face it, the PS2 hardly sold on the strength of it's games in the first few months. I remember a magazine running a massive article on how to get the best out of your MGS2 demo, thats how bad it was

The big word here as Michael also says is "brand". It's true that for the first 18 months the Dreamcast had the better games but I couldn't see it at the time as I was blinded by my love and loyalty to Sony, at the time if I'd a dreamcast I wouldn't of pi**ed on it if it was on fire because I was 1000% certain it was doomed to failure from day 1 and resented anybody who thought otherwise!

Sony's position in the market was now absolutely miles ahead of Sega and to compete Sega needed a astronomical amount of marketing money, money Sega definitely didn't have. When i worked in gamestop for 4months I was shocked at the utter sh**e some people buy, I seen so many people making a purchasing decision after looking at the back of the case, remember Joey casual gamer doesn't read game reviews! The superb original playstation cashed in big time on the casual gamer and it's not Sony's fault that so many of the games buying public are stoopid!

You have market leaders Sony, Microsoft with nearly unlimited resourses, and the Spieldberg of games Nintendo...their was no room for Sega so it was only a matter of time befor the 3rd parties that supported Sega jumped ship!

I bought a 2nd hand Dreamcast in the end as needed to buy RE:Code Veronica (4 months befor I realised it was been ported to the PS2) and got it with the excellent Soul Calibur, glad I got one in the end!

cherryghost

trickstyle!! oooh yeah and soul calibur. and quake III!

Retr0gamer

cherryghost wrote: »

quake III!

First game with cross platform multipayer? I remember you could play against dreamcast players on the PC.

Outkast_IRE

Ya playin with dreamcast contoller against pc players was some way to get beat down!!! ah funny days.
Im getting a emulator there now and downloading Shenmue 1 and 2 for pc

noodler

Retr0gamer wrote: »

First game with cross platform multipayer? I remember you could play against dreamcast players on the PC.

A ****ing disgrace more of this sort of thing isn't implemented by the way.

It would really help keep online communities alive for longer.

corcaigh07

Firefox10 wrote: »

I don't think you can get anything worse than the 360 for noise! Except maybe the vacum cleaner.:D

then you never owned a dreamcast. its far worse than the 360 for noise. Playing PSO online was brutal!

corcaigh07

Retr0gamer wrote: »

It was speculation not a statement.



I think the worst thing about the DC is that it's probably the only console that failed that was also a brilliant machine. Every other console failure deserved to or was destined to fail due to poor handling by the manufacturer but the DC was a great powerful machine with an amazing software catalogue and third party support.

brilliant console but a terrible machine. i had 2 fail on me and my current machine is well sick.

Outkast_IRE

Never had a problem , with any of my consoles iv ever owned think sometimes you just get unlucky

GothPunk

My only memory of the Dreamcast is playing Crazy Taxi in my mates house. I remember thinking it was so great to have an internet browser in a console, of course the thing my friend did to demonstrate how cool it was was to print off a badly photoshopped photo of Britney Spears touching herself. :pac: I can't remember if it was some kind of Dreamcast printer or a normal PC one, did the Dreamcast support PC peripherals?

ClayDavis

Retr0gamer wrote: »

First game with cross platform multipayer? I remember you could play against dreamcast players on the PC.

I thought they decided this was a bad idea. But then some pc players managed to hack into dreamcast servers and absolutely tank them.

I played it a bit on the dreamcast, not great but playable.

Amalgam

Retr0gamer wrote: »

First game with cross platform multipayer? I remember you could play against dreamcast players on the PC.

You had to kludge tweaked maps onto the PC to get access to the DC servers, the maps were different from the PC in small ways. PC -> DC, but not the other way around. I have a vague memory of downloading a 50MB zip file of DC version QIII maps.

..and as ClayDavis pointed out, there was a mix of skills, full mouse users against joystick, 'turret' turning DC players.

Sephiroth_dude

I actually really regret not buying one of these and the saturn when they around.