Sega Dreamcast

From Sega Retro

European Sega Dreamcast console

The Sega Dreamcast (Japanese: ドリームキャスト; Romaji: Dorimu Kyasuto; code-named "Katana" and "Dural" during development) is a powerful console system designed primarily for fast, arcade quality games. It was the first machine released in a new generation of game consoles. The Dreamcast's next-generation console peers are the Sony Playstation 2, the Nintendo Gamecube and the Microsoft X-Box.

One of the main features of the Dreamcast, other than the fantastic fluid graphics and great games, is the built-in 56K modem. This gives users access to the Internet for web browsing, chat, email and (perhaps most importantly) online gaming.

Development

In 1996, rumours of a next generation Sega game console started surfacing. According to the rumours, the machine's development title was 'Dural', named after a character from the Sega arcade and Genesis game, Virtua Fighter 2. In early 1997, insiders told of two new developments - Sega and Microsoft were in discussions and NEC/Videologic had been approached with regard to the graphics chipset.

Soon after, 3DFX, the graphics technology company, revealed a deal with Sega to provide technology for a new machine codenamed 'BlackBelt'. At the time, 3DFX made a popular graphics accelerator chipset for the PC called Voodoo, and it was this chipset that was allegedly going to be used in Sega's new machine.

Now it became clear that Sega actually had two different machines in development, one in Japan (development names Dural/Katana), and one in America (development name BlackBelt). At one stage the BlackBelt, jointly developed by SegaSoft, Microsoft and 3DFX, was shown to a limited number of developers and was apparently very well received. The OS was designed to make the machine easy to develop for and allowed for quick conversions of games to and from PC. At the time Sega's policy seemed to be that raw processing power wasn't as important as an easy to develop for operating system. The Japanese 'Katana' generally outperformed the 'BlackBelt' in hardware terms, but had a more intricate and difficult operating system.

In July, Sega cancelled the 3DFX deal and it became apparent that the 'Blackbelt' had been dropped too. It is unknown exactly why the BlackBelt was dropped in favour of the Japanese design, but the most likely reason is that the production cost would have been higher and ultimately would have lead to a more expensive final street price. Another possibility is that the 'BlackBelt' just wasn't powerful enough to compete in a market with other next generation machines from companies like Sony and Nintendo.

At this stage it was reported that the now Japanese-developed console was being called the 'Katana' (a katana is a type of sword). It was officially announced that Hitachi would be making the CPU for the machine. In early 1998, NEC/Videologic was finally confirmed to be providing the new graphics chipset, the PowerVR Series II. The operating system was tweaked to make it as easy to use and develop for as 'BlackBelt' was going to be, and Microsoft wrote another development system, based on its Windows CE technologies. Microsoft cooperated with Sega hoping to promote its Windows CE operating system for video games, but Windows CE for the Dreamcast showed very limited capabilities when compared to the Dreamcast's native operating system. The libraries that Sega offered gave room for much more performance, but they were sometimes more difficult to utilize when porting over existing PC applications. In May 1998 the Dreamcast was officially announced by Bernie Stolar, then CEO of Sega of America.

Release

The Dreamcast was first released on the 27th of November 1998 in Japan. The US had to wait nearly a full year for theirs - Sega executed a massive launch on the 9th of September 1999. (9/9/99). The European release date was the 14th of October 1999, and the Australian/New Zealand release d ate was the 30th of November.

The Dreamcast took in over US$97 Million on the first day of launch in North America, and sold over 500,000 machines in the first two weeks. Sega were quick to point out that $97,000,000 is more than even Star Wars:Phantom Menace brought in on its first day of release.

Over a Million machines were sold in North America in just over 2 and a half months, making the Dreamcast the fastest selling video games machine in that region, ever!

Initial European sales figures look healthy. Over 100,000 machines were sold in Europe on launch day alone and over 185,000 in the first weekend.

Unfortunately, in the Australian region the launch was labelled a disaster by Sega fans. The official Sega distributor there, Ozisoft, only managed 9 launch titles, non of which were first party products - apparently Sega developed software had been held in customs. Also, VMS units and other peripherals weren't available at all. After what seemed like infinite delays, Australian fans deserved better. Sales information to follow shortly.

Dreamcast used a proprietary format called GD-ROM for storing games in order to foil software pirates, a strategy that ultimately backfired when the first run of discs had a high rate of defects, and pirates managed to pirate the games anyway. (In some cases, the pirated games were released before the legitimate versions.) Sega largely had themselves to blame for the high levels of Dreamcast piracy—their use of the GD-ROM format was completely undermined by the console's support for the Mil-CD format, which allowed the console to boot from a standard CD-R. Mil-CD support was removed from the final Dreamcast revisions toward the end of the console's life.

This was the first video game console to ship with a built-in 56k modem, though broadband adapters were available later on. This allowed the system to connect to the Internet using a custom, fully-functional web browser and e-mail client. In fact, many games released for the Dreamcast came with online play modes, the most popular being Phantasy Star Online and the Sega Sports lineup (now published under the ESPN label). Although other consoles before the Dreamcast had network gaming support, such as the Sega Saturn's NetLink and the Sega Genesis' XBAND, the Dreamcast was the first game console to include this ability out of the box and is therefore considered the first Internet-enabled home game system.

The Dreamcast has a modest hacking enthusiast community. The availability of Windows CE software development kits on the Internet—as well as ports of Linux (LinuxDC) and dreamcast NetBSD operating systems to the Dreamcast—gave programmers a selection of familiar development tools to work with, even though they do not really support the high speed graphics. A homebrew minimal operating system called Kallistios offers support for most hardware, while not offering multi-tasking, which is superfluous for games. Many emulators and other tools (MP3, DivX players, and image viewers) have been ported to or written for the console, taking advantage of the relative ease with which a home user can write a CD which is bootable by an unmodified Dreamcast.

Sega released a board, using the same technology as the Dreamcast, called Sega NAOMI for use in arcades.

Though the Dreamcast was officially discontinued in early 2001, commercial games were still developed for it and were released afterwards (though mostly only in Japan). On February 24, 2004, Sega released its final Dreamcast game, called Puyo Puyo Fever. A small number of third-party games are still being released.

Hardware

What's in the box?

You will normally find the following in your box, along with a bunch of advertising-based and warning pamphlets together with recycled and recyclable packaging materials.

  • The Dreamcast console
  • Modem (attached to the console, but detachable - try it!)†
  • One joypad controller
  • Demo GD-ROM Disc
  • PlanetWeb browser Disc
  • A long (30 foot) phone cable for the modem†
  • Power cable with the appropriate plug for your region
  • Composite video lead (also known as an AV cable)††
  • Manual (a simple black and white affair)

† If your machine is imported from Asia, or if you live there, you won't get a modem, just a lump of plastic so that you don't have a gaping hole in the side of your machine.

†† In the UK, a RF Unit was included instead of the AV cable to ensure that the Dreamcast was compatible with all TV's. I don't have any info yet on which TV leads were included in other European regions, but it is possible that an RGB/SCART cable was included.

There is no VMU in the standard Dreamcast packages in any of the 4 regions.

There is no RF unit in the standard North American Dreamcast package. For older TV's, you'll have to purchase this separately. Also, if you have a S-Video or SCART capable TV, you should buy the relevant cable for that too.

Console Versions

Asian Dreamcasts

The Asian Dreamcast itself is exactly the same as the original Japanese version; it also only plays Japanese software. No modem is included in this edition, and the manual is in English instead of Japanese.

North American Dreamcasts

The North American version is the same white colour as the original Japanese/Asian edition, with one minor difference, the little triangle on the GD-ROM lid is in solid light-grey plastic (The Japanese version had a transparent plastic triangle there) with the end of the triangle on the body of the machine transparent for the power light to shine through. There are at least two internally different machines in the US. The changes have to do with the cooling systems and don't affect operation of the machine in any way. The Dreamcast logo on the case and the accessories is also orange like the Japanese version in the US.

PAL Dreamcasts

The PAL version (Europe, Australia, New Zealand, including the United Kingdom) is identical in casing colour to the original Japanese and US versions, but in all PAL regions the Dreamcast swirl logo has been changed to a blue colour. Even the peripherals and accessories have the blue logo in PAL areas. This was due to a German company holding a trademark on the distinctive orange swirl present on American and Japanese Dreamcasts. The system power light remains the orange colour is on foreign Dreamcasts, however.

Special Dreamcasts

There have been many Dreamcast variations, the colour of the box being the only difference between them. All the colourful versions are from Japan. In Japan, the original white and light grey Dreamcast was released first, with an orange swirl logo on the case and the accessories. Quite a few special editions have also been released. Here is a list in chronological order:

  • Mazyora: The first special edition was the 'Mazyora' which was dark purple and came complete with a purple controller.
  • Seaman 1: The second special edition was a white skeleton version (i.e., transparent plastic) released with the game 'Seaman', the microphone peripheral, a transparent VMU and a music CD.
  • Hello Kitty 1 and 2: One transparent pink, the other transparent blue, these editions include a pink or purple controller, VMU, keyboard and the Hello Kitty Dream Passport software.
  • Seaman 2: The Christmas Seaman Dreamcast is entirely red, and comes with a VMU and controller, both the same colour as the console. Included is a special communication package which allows you to send voice messages (using the Dreamcast microphone) over the net. There's a silhouette picture of Seaman on the drive lid too.
  • Code Veronica 1 and 2: To celebrate the Japanese release of Capcom's successful series 'Resident Evil' on the Dreamcast, two specials machines were released. One is transparent dark purple, with a S

.T.A.R.S logo on the lid, the other is transparent dark red (The 'Claire-edition'). Both have matching controllers and a light purplish grey VMS. Of course both are bundled with the game. (Only the top plastic cover is coloured, the bottom piece is standard grey).

  • Fuji Television 'Devers 2000 Series CX-1': A combination TV/Dreamcast with a cool design - lots of curves and colours (it's designed to look like a Morolien from the game 'Space Channel Five'). Its light blue with little antennae on the top and the 4 Dreamcast controller ports under the screen.

Specifications

  • CPU: SH-4 RISC CPU with 128 Bit graphic computational engine built-in (operating frequency: 206 MHz 360 MIPS/1.4 GFLOPS)
  • Graphics Engine: PowerVR2 CLX2*
  • Memory: Main 16 MB (Hyundai HY57V161610D), Video 8 MB, Sound 2 MB
  • Sound Card: Super Intelligent (Yamaha) Sound Processor with 47MHz 32-Bit RISC [ARM7 CPU core built-in (64 channel PCM/ADPCM)
  • GD-ROM Drive: 12x maximum speed (when running in Constant Angular Velocity mode)
  • Inputs: Four ports that can support a digital and analog controller, steering wheel, joystick, keyboard, mouse, and more
  • Dimensions: 189mm x 195mm x 76mm (7 7/16" x 7 11/16" x 3")
  • Weight: 1.9kg (4.4lbs)
  • Modem: Removable; Original Asia/Japan model had a 33.6 Kbytes/s; models released after 9 September 1999 had a 56 Kbytes/s modem
  • Broadband: these adapters are available separately and replace the removable modem
  • HIT-400: "Broadband Adapter", the more common model, this used a RealTek 8139 chip and supported 10/100mbit
  • HIT-300: "Lan Adapter", this version used a Fujitsu MB86967 chip and supported only 10mbit
  • Color Output: Approx. 16.77 million simultaneous colors (24 bit)
  • Storage: "Visual Memory Unit" (VMU) 128 Kb removable storage device
  • It is capable of drawing around 7 million polygons per second, but the geometry data storage (the models for the polygons) would become a limiting factor, chipping away video memory for the textures.
  • Input devices: (4 custom controller ports)
    • Standard Dreamcast gamepad with two add-on ports
      • Add-ons: VMU, 4x Memory Card, Jump Pack
    • Sega Dreamcast Keyboard
    • Sega Dreamcast Mouse
    • Sega Dreamcast Fishing Controller
    • Sega Dreamcast Microphone (bundled with Seaman)
  • Add-ons:

Sega Dreamcast's motto in the US was "It's thinking."

Sonic Games

Normal Sonic games on the Sega Dreamcast

Other games featuring Sonic

Sonic Cameos on the Sega Dreamcast

Sega Home Video Game Systems
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