The video game landscape of the late 90s and early 2000s was very different than what we know today. At the time, the console race was between Nintendo, Sony, and, in place of Xbox, there was Sega.
Sega entered the console market with the SG-100, then moved on to the Master System, then the Mega Drive Genesis, but none of those sold well compared to their contemporaries. The Sega Saturn suffered a similar fate to its predecessors. So by the time 1998 rolled around, their entire console business came down to the success of the Dreamcast.
Released in November 1998 in Japan, the Dreamcast came with some pretty futuristic features at the time. It was the first video game console to include a built-in modem for internet browsing and online play. The controller could hold a Visual Memory Unit, a memory card that games could use as a second screen. The console displayed at 480p and ushered in the 128-bit era, serving as a major graphical upgrade over the N64.
The console also launched with some pretty great titles. These included Soul Calibur, Mortal Kombat Gold, Sonic Adventures, NFL 2K, The House of the Dead 2, and Power Stone.
What really held the Dreamcast back was EA choosing not to make any games for their console. This would include huge hits like John Madden Football, FIFA, Medal of Honor, and more. This stemmed from a dispute over how Sega informed developers of the console’s specs. Bing Gordon, EA’s chief creative officer, said at the time that Sega “was not acting like a competent hardware company”.
It also ran into the greatest-selling video game console of all time. The PlayStation 2 launched in March of 2000, coming to North America in October of that year. It went on to sell over 160-million units thanks to a great lineup of games and the fact that the console doubled as a DVD player. DVDs were just starting to gain popularity, and players sold for upwards of $400 while the PlayStation 2 ran customers $299. The Dreamcast, by contrast, used GD-ROMs, a proprietary optical disc format developed by Sega and Yamaha.
Competition from the PlayStation, GameCube, and Xbox was ultimately too strong for the Dreamcast to overcome. Both the GameCube and Xbox sold over 20 million units, while the Dreamcast finished its run with 9.13 million. This would be Sega’s final console, as it would shift to being a game publisher.
Even so, the Dreamcast is fondly remembered by those who played it near the millennium. In fact, since it disappeared right before many current gamers got into the hobby, it has built up a kind of mythos. What could have been had we gotten the Dreamcast 2?
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