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of Pocket Gaming World for this article on the Dreamcast. Dreamcast I think its about time someone said something good about Sega, so I guess its going to be me, and, being an owner of aDreamcast, I guess that I know what I’m talking about. The beginning I remember seeing the first picture of the Dreamcast and I was like ‘oh, another new console’ and most people were saying ‘Sega, oh no, they made the Saturn’ so the DC was guaranteed to have a bit of a rocky future. Fortunately things went reasonably well for the UK launch of the console, everything seemed to work (apart from problems with the on-line capabilities) and they had some good games from day one. I didn’t buy my Dreamcast on the launch, but I know people that did and they were very happy people. Anyway it was a few months later when I finally decided to buy one (after months of listening to people saying how good it is, and, come to think of it, how bad it is). To cut things short I was very pleased with my Dreamcast. Now, enough of the boring old ‘why I bought a Dreamcast’, lets get onto the interesting stuff. The games One thing Sega have to be congratulated on, their absolutely amazing games! Games like Crazy Taxi, Sonic Adventure, Soul Calibur, Sega Rally 2 and even the FREE on-line game Chu Chu Rocket are classics. Never before have I played such playable and well made games. The main problem with the Dreamcast is its lack of 3rd party support, but of the support it’s had there have still been some amazing games; Resident Evil Code: Veronica (truly amazing!), Dead or Alive 2 (with better graphics than the PS2 version), Rayman 2 (the best version of this top platform game) and many other brilliant games. So, overall I’m pleased with the DC’s games, although I would like to see more GOOD games from people other than Sega and its developers. The on-line capabilities I didn’t buy my DC for its ‘on-line capabilities’ as I have a perfectly good PC for that. Out of all the things on the DC this is what I am most disappointed with, the on screen keyboard is a nightmare (so you’ll have to spend another £20 to get a proper keyboard). The main problem is the games, basically I have only played one on-line game, and that’s Chu Chu Rocket, which is a very basic, but truly addictive puzzle game. But it seems we will be getting more on-line games soon (Quake 3 anyone?). The future The most important question on people’s minds, 'what will happen to the Dreamcast when the new consoles come out?' Well despite what most people think, I believe it could be a good Christmas for Sega this year. Firstly they have an absolutely stunning release schedule. This includes Shenmue (amazing RPG), Metropolis Street Racer (the best racer ever), Half-Life (best PC game appears on DC), Silent Scope (Konami’s top arcade hit), F355 Challenge (extremely realistic racing sim), the list goes on, but I don’t want to get boring by listing all the games, so I won’t. So all in all there are a lot very good games coming to DC between now and the end of the year, and, when you compare these games to the PS2 launch games, I think you’ll easily be able to tell which system has the most original and playable games. I won’t say much about the PS2, as I don’t think Sony have done a good job at all. Everyone has heard about the shortage of PS2 units, well it seems that now the initial stocks have sold out people won’t be able to get their hands on one until May 2001! So that means if your wanting one for Christmas and didn’t pre-order one you are likely to be very disappointed; step in Dreamcast. Parents will be going into games shops like Electronics Boutique and will want to purchase a PS2. The shop assistant tells the parent that they can’t have one until May next year (the parent pictures a particularly disappointed child). The parent then looks around the store for another option, sees the N64 with not a lot of games, then the Dreamcast. There are loads of new games and they could get one off the shelf, now, for under half the price of what the PS2 would cost. Hey, if their very lucky they’ll even get a game thrown in too! Ok, if I’m wrong here please point me out, but which option sounds better? I believe I have justified my point here, and now we need to look at one thing; Sega’s DC promotion. What Sega really need is to have a great marketing strategy (not something Sega is famous for). Between now, and say, the end of November they need to get as many people as they can to understand that the DC is very reasonably priced, has many great games, and is available in stores now. If they do this then they have a change of stealing the limelight from Sony. To conclude I think the Dreamcast is a great console, which has many great games that are original, very playable and hugely addictive. For this reason I would recommend that any person into gaming, and looking for a new console, to buy one. There are many benefits as described in my review, and I think these easily outweigh the bad points of the Dreamcast. A few useful Links: Official Sega Website - http://www.sega.com/sega/index.jhtmlOfficial Dreamcast Magazine Website - http://www.sega.com/sega/index.jhtml Dreamcast IGN - http://dreamcast.ign.com/ Thankyou to John Mobbs of Pocket Gaming World for this article on the Dreamcast. |
