Today, November 22, 2023, the home game console “Dreamcast” (hereinafter referred to as Dreamcast) released by Sega Enterprises will celebrate its 25th anniversary.
DreamCast is a game console released as a successor to the Sega Saturn (hereinafter referred to as Saturn). It was released ahead of its rival models at the same time, the PlayStation 2 (released on March 4, 2000) and the GameCube (released on September 14, 2001).
Typical DreamCast titles include “Sonic Adventure,” “Virtua Fighter 3TB,” “Cyber Troopers Virtual-On Oratorio Tangram,” and “Phantasy Star Online.”
It is clear that DreamCast was conscious of competing against PlayStation in the DreamCast TV commercial. Eiichi Yukawa, then the managing director of Sega, was used in the commercial, and the character was marketed as “Managing Director Yukawa.” As Managing Director Yukawa is about to get into a taxi, he overhears two children on the street saying, “Sega is stupid!” and “PlayStation is more interesting!” When I asked his subordinates about this, “Is that so?”, they all looked away. Managing Director Yukawa heads to a batting center to vent his worries, and while out drinking afterward, he gets in trouble with a tough-looking man, and when he returns home with a blue bruise, his wife is surprised and takes care of him… It’s a very self-deprecating story. . Even after this, DreamCast’s commercials basically included a lot of self-deprecation material, and they had a very strong impact as commercials for home video game consoles. Now that I think about it, I can’t help but feel that Managing Director Yukawa has become more famous than the game consoles.
Sega’s last game console, which strongly promoted the “vs. PlayStation” game, celebrates its 25th birthday today. Today I would like to talk about my memories of the game console that held the dream of overthrowing PlayStation.
[Dreamcast]
The home game console war is intensifying.From maniac game console to major game console
It feels like the fire has died down now, but at the time, competition for sales of home game consoles was extremely fierce. At that time, various companies were releasing game consoles, and many game consoles were lined up in toy stores. A fierce battle for survival took place, and the only survivors were Nintendo and Sega. A new force, Sony Computer Entertainment (currently Sony Interactive Entertainment), came along with the PlayStation.
Is it like the Romance of the Three Kingdoms on Saturn, Nintendo 64, and PlayStation? As a child, I felt that “the average household owned a PlayStation and a Nintendo 64, while the maniacs bought a Saturn.” I don’t think this idea was completely wrong. SEGA was on the side of the minority.
So, first of all, it was necessary to make “SEGA” familiar to households. I believe that the result is the aforementioned commercial tactic using self-deprecation material. In fact, at the school I was attending at the time, very few of my classmates owned Sega hardware. However, everyone loved Managing Director Yukawa’s commercials. In that sense, Sega’s strategy of infiltrating the market was probably successful.
And on the earliest Dreamcast packaging, a famous scene from the commercial featuring Managing Director Yukawa was printed. That’s how effective the advertising was.
The box that contained the first Dreamcast console featured a scene from a commercial by Managing Director Yukawa.The package was later changed to a white motif (image on the right).The transparent white color is nice, but considering the popularity of commercials at the time, what I wanted was Managing Director Yukawa’s packaging.
“When it comes to arcade ports, Sega” is still alive and well! Game console compatible with NAOMI board
In this way, the Dreamcast was an attempt to spread Sega into ordinary households, but arcade game ports were also popular. Like the Sega Saturn, the Dreamcast was also compatible with the media used in arcade games.
Since the Dreamcast was compatible with Sega’s arcade board “NAOMI”, it was ported to be as good as the arcade version. If you wanted to play Sega arcade games from 1998 to the early 2000s, you should have had this hardware. At the time, zombie-killing games were becoming popular, and being able to experience the powerful creatures of the gun shooting game “The House of the Dead 2” at home was extremely satisfying.
NAOMI boards were also used by manufacturers other than Sega, so if you want to play not only Sega but also the “modern” arcade, there is probably no other game machine that meets the requirements as well.
The image is of “The House of the Dead 2” which was ported to Wii. This is Treasure’s “Ikaruga”, which used the NAOMI board and had a great influence on STG history, which was able to be played at the same quality as the game center at home and without deterioration porting, probably because it was compatible.This masterpiece was later ported to various game consoles, but the Dreamcast was the first to enjoy this beautiful production at home.
I tried to make DreamCast fit into the home, but it turned out to be SEGA’s mysterious work “Seaman.”
Many games were released on the Dreamcast that could be played by people who don’t normally play games.
The game that comes to mind is “Seaman.” A fish with only a human face, a human-faced fish? It is a game where you communicate with a mysterious creature called Seaman using a microphone device connected to the controller.
Seaman’s appearance.The impact is too strong, and compared to “Tamagotchi” and “Digital Monster”, which were popular training games at the time, it’s in the crappy category no matter how you look at it.
In the first place, before the release of Seaman, a game called “Pikachu Genki Dechu” was released, which featured Nintendo’s Pokémon Pikachu, which was also a mascot character at the time and had the power to knock down flying birds. Like Seaman, it also communicates by speaking through a microphone connected to the controller, so it is very similar to Seaman.
A package for the Nintendo 64 game “Pikachu Genki Dechu”, which was released before Seaman. It is a very large box because the game software comes with a NINTENDO64 VRS peripheral. If I were the author, I would definitely choose this one.Because this one is cuter
I had not played this game, but I understood the gameplay. A senior in the art club I belonged to at the time was so hooked on this game that he approached the author, who was able to talk about the game.
When the art club activities begin, most of the girls are excited about the content of this week’s weekly manga. Once that was finished, I started painting. There were a few male members as well, so we talked about games there. When that was over, a certain senior colleague came up to me and started telling me about his conversation with Seaman, saying, “Yesterday, my Seaman…” Now that I think about it, I think he was talking about something like a pet’s upbringing diary. The creatures in the game are treated like real pets. In that sense, DreamCast was probably pervasive in households.
Online matches, online game marriage, etc. Numerous functions that are ahead of the times and culture
In fact, Sega has been making online-compatible hardware since the Saturn. This trend was continued in Dreamcast, but there were titles that were easier to play than Saturn, and it gained popularity. That is “Atsume! Guruguru Onsen”.
This had the ability to play table games not only offline but also online, allowing you to play mahjong, shogi, and cards with people from all over the country. It became a popular series, and up to “3” was released on DreamCast. There was also an online lobby where you could interact with others.
“Phantasy Star Online” (PSO), which is now famous as an online game that Japan is proud of, has its origins in DreamCast. Around this time, the game of forming a party online and continuing to search for rare items while visiting various maps was established. What is surprising is that something called “online game marriage” existed even back then. A game magazine published at the time had a page dedicated to “PSO” in the reader submission section. Among them, there were many posts saying that they started dating after meeting at “PSO” and that they successfully crossed the finish line. At the time, I was surprised to find out that they even got married in such a way!? Could they even make a living by meeting each other this way? However, about 10 years later, my best friend also got married online and we are still good friends. At the time, I never imagined that it would become such a popular way to meet people.
“PSO” was a pioneer of domestic online MMORPG. I am an offline player even in the Windows ported version, and I started interacting online with PSO2.However, I remember that the reader submission section was very interesting reading even for me, who has never played online.
It also linked game data between home and arcade games. This feature itself was also available in Neo Geo, PlayStation, etc., so Sega was by no means ahead of the curve.
Specifically, Capcom’s arcade games had a housing into which the Dreamcast’s visual memory, a save medium, was inserted, allowing players to play against each other using data created for home use. In some games, you can accumulate play points and unlock hidden characters. In particular, “MARVEL VS. CAPCOM 2” had a large number of hidden characters, so it was necessary to link to the arcade and play a large amount of online battles in order to unlock the characters.
I also think that being able to play by connecting a Dreamcast controller to the arcade cabinet was a unique feature at the time.
【MARVEL VS. CAPCOM 2】
*Image is PS3/Xbox 360 version image is a case photo of the arcade game “Street Fighter V”. Currently, some arcade game consoles allow you to connect a PC-compatible controller to play the game.Since they were able to do this in the 2000s, their ability to stay ahead of the times must have been extremely high.
