The Dreamcast is _really_ dead now... *sniff*

[deadnail]

Sega is going to stop making hardware and becoming a gaming software company.

Come Feb. 4 the Dreamcast's list price will drop to $99, and the smash-pack bundle (the one that comes with some older games with an emulator on-disc) will only be $119.

Sega is currently developing PS2 games, including Virtua Fighter 4, as well as Gameboy Advance games including Sonic Advance. The Dreamcast will continue to recieve exclusive content. They are under negotiations right now to release software for the X-Box console.

This is a point in history right now, one of the biggest video game manufacturers of all time is closing down it's hardware section.

I also find this quite strange, considering that the graphics of the Dreamcast are often better than the graphics of the Playstation 2. Why?

Dreamcast: 200Mhz processor, 8 megs of VRam with texture compression
PS2: 300Mhz processor, 4 megs of VRam, no texture compression

Think about it logically, about how many textures can fit, the quality of the textures, and you can't forget the framebuffer. Thus far almost all PS2 games have cut the resolution into 3/4 just to cut down on the framebuffer and have some more room for textures. If this *one* single thing were changed on the PS2 it would be an unstoppable machine. Instead, the Dreamcast remains with sharper graphics. Ouch.

The better machine lost this time.

If you will all excuse me, I'm going to play SoulCalibur again right now.

/me walks against the wind.

[NiGHTMARE]

Heh, where've you been, this is pretty old news. I think someone already posted about it a few days ago, probably on the General forum.

Anyway, looks like the Gamecube and the X-Box are the only two contenders left for the next-gen console. My money's on the X-Box, if only because it has so many cool games being developed for it. Hell, if Halo wasn't going to be on the PC too, I'd buy it just for that :)

But who cares? The PC will always outlive the console. Why? The console's greatest flaw: you can't upgrade it (well, other than adding memory chips or whatever). If you could, it wouldn't really be a console any more.

[deadnail]

Well, rumors passed around all week but they've only been confirmed today. This is what I somewhat expected from Sega... although, I must say, this is the finest gaming console that has ever been released thus far. It's just amazing.

Another interesting bit is that Square wants to develop for Nintendo again. Square was looking to rerelease Final Fantasy 4 and 6 on the Gameboy Advance. Nintendo made a press release that basically said, "No. We don't have a contract with them and we're not considering one either."

What happened to Nintendo? Final Fantasy 7 sold a million Playstations, what the hell is wrong with them?

When asked about the X-Box, Nintendo isn't even passing it a second thought. To them Bill Gates might be a savvy business man but he, quote, "Doesn't know games."

Yeah, that's why he hired a panel of ex-game developers to design a console from the ground up that would be 100% aimed at gaming. No Windows, no Excel, no on-board internet capability (other than online gaming). I remember an interview a while ago with an X-Box man and they asked him some questions to which he gave really intriguing answers.

He talked about how they were the first with ease of game development as a focus, then Nintendo came along and announced that Gamecube would be the same thing. Another funny thing was when they asked parents if they wanted kids to have web browsers in their bedrooms and the answer was an overwhelming *no*, so that's why it won't have web surfing capability. At least not right off, anyway.

[Guest Doom4Ever]

yes it is sad that the dreamcast is dead. i have been a huge sega fan fer years now. i remember laying down 400 buks fer a saturn and now well... anyway i'll tell you the reall reason the ps2 suks. its not the graphics (alltho they arnt as good) its that the games suck, plain and simple.

[Psyonisis]

Well think about it... Sega is probably the most hated company. It's been around forever, made amazing games, but no one likes them. lol

Genesis sucked, Saturn sucked, Sega CD sucked, that cd/genesis hybrid sucked, Nimrod sucked, game gear sucked. There are too many sonic games. Sega is just a dead company.

Any money sometime this decade Sega will be no more...

[sirgalahadwizar]

NiGHTMARE said:

Heh, where've you been, this is pretty old news. I think someone already posted about it a few days ago, probably on the General forum.

Anyway, looks like the Gamecube and the X-Box are the only two contenders left for the next-gen console. My money's on the X-Box, if only because it has so many cool games being developed for it. Hell, if Halo wasn't going to be on the PC too, I'd buy it just for that :)

But who cares? The PC will always outlive the console. Why? The console's greatest flaw: you can't upgrade it (well, other than adding memory chips or whatever). If you could, it wouldn't really be a console any more.

Isn't the X-box going to be another one of those Billdos (Bill-doze) productions?

Doesn't that mean it's doomed to failure and bug-glitches?

And because it's being developed by our old greedy friend bill, the price will probably never come down to where we want it (it'll probably never go under $200).

I think the PS2 just got lots of hype and that's the only reason why it won over dreamcast. Not to mention that a big reason for people not making games for certain systems is that they don't like to develop for things that have hard-to-deal-with archetecture, it's the main reason why you never see games come out on PC and Mac at the same time (if some ever make it onto the Mac), becasue people jsut don't want to make things for the Mac becasue everything ahs to be in one crappy language.

I don't know if the dreamcast is hard to develop for, I just know that when things dont get things made for them that:
A) The other company got all the contracts first.
B) People don't like it.
or...
C) It's hard to make things for it.

I really hope that Doom3 comes out on PC first, and if they end up making a version for console, that there will be a patch available to upgrade our own doom3 to match the console's graphics and sound enhancements (because when things goto console, they ususally get better gfx, take doom64 for example...).

[sirgalahadwizar]

deadnail said:

You mean like the web-browsers we have in our rooms right now that we are using to talk to each other?

That sounds like a step-backwards in technology (and that's usually only caused by facism - does that make Bill Gates a facist ["death to the poor!"]).

[deadnail]

sirgalahadwizar said:

What I meant by the web browsers in the bedrooms is when parents by their little kids a video game machine... they don't want it to have internet capability. You know, porn 'n stuff.

Oh, and the Dreamcast? Very easy to program for, this was it's secondary focus since the Saturn was such a bitch to program for. The first focus? Incredible power. And, for a few years ago, you must admit it's a helluva machine! You ever seen SoulCalibur?!

Oh, and better GFX? SNES Doom. 'Nuff said? No? PSX Quake 2. Howabout now? :)

BTW, the X-Box has Micro$oft funding and marketing... it's being developed by a new wing of the company that not only has experience in the gaming field but are also avid gamers themselves... I remember reading that. :) Probably hype, tho.

I was just at Target and saw that all of their new DC games, including Quake 3 and Jet Grind, have been sliced from $50 to $20 in an effort to clear the space.

Excuse me I need to be alone...
/me covers his face while running away in shame.

[Charon]

deadnail said:

Another interesting bit is that Square wants to develop for Nintendo again. Square was looking to rerelease Final Fantasy 4 and 6 on the Gameboy Advance. Nintendo made a press release that basically s

Ignore what Yamauchi says. He's just a senile old man who believe it or not, does not have all that much authority inside Nintendo anymore.

As for not them wanting Square, I think they have something up their sleeves here. Pure speculation, but I think they are working on a new Fire Emblem game. This was not released in the US, but Japan absolutely loved it. If this is the case, Japanese gamers will go insane! Personally, I could care less about Square, I am not into RPG's. But I think that it would definetely help their image.

As far as Xbox goes, once again, ignore Yamauchi. Like I said, he's senile. I think that if Xbox can pull off a successfull launch and get great games from people other than PC developers, then it will do well.

The outlook on the next-gen console war is still quite cloudy. It is basically between Nintendo and Microsoft. Though if Sony's developers can manage to actually make some good games, they might not do quite so bad after all.

[Zaldron]

Sega should had mantained this news in secret for some more time...

With this kind of announcement, the developers will get scared. They´re not going to push along new ports, nor create exclusive DC games.

I can´t believe how crappy´s the PS2. EVERYBODY knows today that RAM is life. I think consoles in the way they were conceibed are not going to last much longer. Look at the PS2, it isn´t really a revolution. X-box goes on the good track, because it resembles more an hardcore gaming PC than a console.
I´m sticking to my PC, there´s something about editing/creating that can´t be fashioned on consoles...

Im not really sad about Sega. Im not much of a console fan. But if it there´s something I´m really waiting from SEGA is a fucking System 32 emulator (looks like no one´s making one) to play Golden Axe II.

[masterhassan]

NO GOD NO. i love sega. the genesis is still my favorite system. they'd better make up for this with tons of really good sonic game sin the future. then again the only bad sonic game sive ever playe were mean bean machine and sonic 3d blast. and those were pretty good. only bad compared to the others. my favorite part of the sonic games is teh music. i love it. and during the boss scenes on sonic and knuckles it liek death metal and techno combined. its awesome

[NiGHTMARE]

Charon said:

Ignore what Yamauchi says. He's just a senile old man who believe it or not, does not have all that much authority inside Nintendo anymore.

As for not them wanting Square, I think they have something up their sleeves here. Pure speculation, but I think they are working on a new Fire Emblem game. This was not released in the US, but Japan absolutely loved it. If this is the case, Japanese gamers will go insane! Personally, I could care less about Square, I am not into RPG's. But I think that it would definetely help their image.

As far as Xbox goes, once again, ignore Yamauchi. Like I said, he's senile. I think that if Xbox can pull off a successfull launch and get great games from people other than PC developers, then it will do well.

The outlook on the next-gen console war is still quite cloudy. It is basically between Nintendo and Microsoft. Though if Sony's developers can manage to actually make some good games, they might not do quite so bad after all.

Technically the guys making Halo aren't PC developers, because AFAIK they haven't released any previous games, and Halo will be out for the X-Box before it is for the PC :)

[Charon]

I probably should have phrased that differently. I meant to say that they need more traditional console developers. Gamers in Japan have basically decided to boycott Xbox because of the lack of Japanese developer support. (I'm not saying they should, but they are...) If MS can get guarateed support from Namco, Square, Enix, etc... then they have a chance.

[deadnail]

Charon said:

Ignore what Yamauchi says. He's just a senile old man who believe it or not, does not have all that much authority inside Nintendo anymore.

As for not them wanting Square, I think they have something up their sleeves here. Pure speculation, but I think they are working on a new Fire Emblem game. This was not released in the US, but Japan absolutely loved it. If this is the case, Japanese gamers will go insane! Personally, I could care less about Square, I am not into RPG's. But I think that it would definetely help their image.

As far as Xbox goes, once again, ignore Yamauchi. Like I said, he's senile. I think that if Xbox can pull off a successfull launch and get great games from people other than PC developers, then it will do well.

The outlook on the next-gen console war is still quite cloudy. It is basically between Nintendo and Microsoft. Though if Sony's developers can manage to actually make some good games, they might not do quite so bad after all.

Square is *NOT* just RPG games!

Parasite Eve 2 is just about the BEST Survival Horror game ever made! I've gotten TONS more enjoyment out of it than I have Final Fantasy 8, 9, or RE: Code Veronica for that matter!

What about Brave Fencer Musashi, which is like a kiddie version of Zelda. That game is strange, because on one hand it's not too challenging... but on the other two hands, it has KICKASS graphics as well as a ton of secrets for experienced players. On the last hand, the voice over work is some of the best on the PSX, it doesn't totally and utterly suck! Wait, that's four hands...

What about Legend of Mana? It's a good action adventure slasher with TONS of replayability in it. I'd love to see a hi-res PC or other version of it.

WHAT ABOUT EINHANDER?! God DAMN I love shooters! I have G Darius, Thunderforce 5, Raystorm, Raycrisis, R-Types, R-Type Delta, Omega Boost, Elemental Gearbolt, Both Contras AND Einhander in my PSX collection! I've been playing shooters since SPACE INVADERS at the arcade when I was 4!! Then I'd come home and play Parsec on the TI-994A...

What about Ehrgeitz? Boy I butchered that spelling... anyway my point is made. =)

[Charon]

Sorry, I probably should have said I could care less about Final Fantasy. If they wanted to bring some other killer games to Xbox or Gamecube, I'd be all for it.

[Charon]

deadnail said:

Just an update. Perhaps Yamauchi san isn't quite as senile as I had thought. Here's an interesting article that gives a little insight to the whole situation: http://www.consolehorizon.com/yamauchivsworld.html

Also, here is a quote from the president of SquareSoft:

"We're not expecting to be accepted by Nintendo right away, but we're doing everything to get the relationship positive again. The most important thing is hard to loose one of these. We have to try to convince Nintendo, by showing them our plans for GBA and GameCube that we will boost their hardware sales"

This was taken from the Japanese newspaper Nihon Kougyou Shinbun.