Just thinking about the Dreamcast brings back lots of fond memories.  Witnessing the red swirl as you powered it on, you knew that there was something special about it.   This was the first system that truly felt “next gen”.  The thought of playing an arcade-perfect Marvel vs. Capcom at the comfort of your home was simply marvelous.  Resident Evil sent chills down my spine as I was blasting zombies away in beautiful real-time graphics.  So, where did it all go wrong?

History in the Making
Towards the later part of the 90s, Sega was in a rut.  With the previous blunders of the Sega CD and 32X, Sega’s current console, the Saturn, was on the verge of yet another failure.  Despite some modest success in Japan, the Saturn only sold a mere 9 million units worldwide.  In comparison, the original Sony PlayStation dominated the sales charts with over 100 million units sold.  The public was starting to lose faith in Sega, and they needed a way to revitalize the Sega name.  Towards the end of the Saturn lifecycle, Sega had a secret project with 2 of their internal groups.  With one group in Japan, and the other in the U.S, they would be competing against each other to develop a new console system.  In the end, Sega crowned the Japanese team the victor, and thus the Dreamcast was born.

Revolutionary Specs
At the time, the Dreamcast specs were unparalleled.  Powered by a powerful 200MHz 128-bit Hitachi SH4 processor, 16MB of RAM, and a 12x GD-ROM drive, it was capable of crunching a whopping 7 million polygons per second.  To provide a different perspective, the original PlayStation only featured a 33MHz 32-bit MIPS processor, 2MB of RAM, and a 2x CD-ROM drive only capable of processing 360,000 polygons per second.  Clearly, nothing came close to the Dreamcast power.  What’s even more impressive was that it came boxed with a 56k modem.  You may scoff at the thought of dial-up Internet, but back then, playing games online was something simply ahead of its time.  Online game play was always a PC commodity up until the Dreamcast, since no prior consoles offered anything like it.  Contrary to prior beliefs, it was actually Sega who pioneered console online gameplay, not Microsoft.

Initial Impressions
Although the Japanese Dreamcast launch was met with hardware shortages and dissapointments, the North American launch was a whole different story.  The U.S. launch was highly publicized throughout the country.  Similar to what Nintendo did with the Wii, Sega was looking to broaden their demographic with their new ad campaign.  The whole idea of “It’s thinking” gave the impression that the Dreamcast was a very advanced, yet easy to use and family friendly.  Ditching the “blast processing” and “Ninten-dont” rubbish, Sega was actually focused on showcasing games that appealed to everyone.  In that respect, Sega delivered their promise.  At the North American September 9, 1999 launch (9-9-99), Sega showcased a solid launch lineup with such AAA hits like Soul Calibur, NFL 2K, Power Stone, and Sonic Adventures.  With all these great hits and a low retail price of $199, the Dreamcast to sold over half a million units within the first two weeks.  With this huge momentum, it seemed like Sega finally did it right. Until…

Its Demise
In March 1999, Sony revealed its elusive PlayStation 2 (PS2).  Although the PS2 would not be sold for another year and a half, it immediately casted a huge shadow over the Dreamcast.  There were ridiculous rumors surrounding the PS2’s processing capabilities.  Not only did it play games, it apparently had enough power to play DVDs, toast bread, drive cars, and guide nuclear missiles.  So really, who could compete against that?  As Sony began to build more hype around the PS2, Sega’s new console began to look less significant.  On top of that, most of the 3rd party game publishers who were burned by the previous Saturn failures did not support the Dreamcast.  Without big companies like Electronic Arts (EA) supporting them, Sega did not have enough new games that could sustain them in the console race.  You can say that Dreamcast was the XBox, without its Halo.  Finally, on January 31, 2001, Sega announced that the Dreamcast will be discontinued and will drop out of the hardware production.  The Dreamcast was put to sleep with only 10 million units sold worldwide.

My Thoughts
I actually didn’t jump into the Sega Dreamcast band-wagon until after Sega dropped out of the console race.  My brothers and I picked one up from Gamestop for only $50, and I can honestly say that it was one of the best $50 ever spent.  With 4 controller ports, a 56k modem, and solid games, it was one of those systems that gave you everything that you needed.  Since it had a Windows CE operating system, the Dreamcast provided a perfect opportunity for hackers to create their standalone applications.  With countless programs like emulators and DivX players, it grew from a standard gaming console to a versatile multimedia center.  All of these enhancements were surprisingly done without the need for a mod chip.  It’s sad to think that Sega failed around the time when it finally got it right.  Although shortlived, the Dreamcast will always be one of my favorite consoles of all time.

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