h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I purchased a Dreamcast on launch day (Sep. 9). Soul Calibur is by far the only game worth owning for it. It surpasses the arcade version with higher resolution, and is by far the best and most amazing fighting game I have ever played (and I'm not even much of a fan of the genre).

Other than Soul Calibur, there's nothing worth buying. There are about seven fighting games out for the Dreamcast right now, and they ALL suck compared to Soul Calibur. In the same way, Gran Turismo (Playstation) has forever ruined all other driving games for me (No other driving game, and I mean _none_ has a better physics engine than Gran Turismo).

Since the September launch, virtually nothing new has come out for the Dreamcast. There are still no 3D shooters (doom clones), no puzzle games, no RPGs (unless you count Blue Stinger, but I wouldn't), and no strategy games. There are a couple of sports titles, lots of lousy fighting games, several driving games (none of which do anything for me after Gran Turismo), and one light-gun game (House of the Dead 2, which is useless because there are no light guns available for the Dreamcast yet).

So, while my Dreamcast sits collecting dust while I wait for 'Resident Evil: Codename Veronica' to come out, I have bought several playstation games (Resident Evil 3, Omega Boost, Wipeout 3 (not as fun as XL), and Final Fantasy VIII). Currently, I am desperately trying to get my hands on a copy of Gran Turismo 2, but it's sold out everywhere I go.

To sum up, Sega, IMHO, has screwed up again. There will be no new games until after the new year, apparently. I suggest holding on to your money until the PS2 comes out. At least it will have Gran Turismo 2000 on it.

Happy holidays, everyone.

soul calibur and crazy taxi alone make the machine worth owning. Keep an eye out for MSR!

I still haven't managed to play DC Crazy Taxi, I'm not convinced that it would have transferred to a console particularly well. For one thing I can't imagine playing the game without the "proper" steering wheel and pedals of the arcade machine, and for another the only incentive to play it after a while was to beat other peoples' high scores.

Soul Calibur's not bad as smack 'em ups go, only played it very briefly though.

MSR?

Gran Turismo 2000 is just Gran Turismo 2 with nice graphics. Same situation with Tekken Tag Tournament and Tekken 3.
I wanted a PS2 for ages and, to be honest, I'm disappointed that there ain't a single game coming out for it that excites me in any way. All the good stufff seems to be sequels - in fact, often not really that, just graphical updates of existing PSX games.
So I bought a Dreamcast, because there are at least nine games out already or in production that do interest me, like Soul Calibur, Crazy Taxi, Shenmue, Half-Life and Unreal Tournament.
Another thing; I don't think PS2 will wipe the floor with Dreamcast. I think it'll be too expensive initially for it to be hyper-big right from the start. I reckon that eventually the situation'll be like the SNES and MegaDrive in the early 'nineties, where one machine has a margin of technical superiority but not enough to close out the other.

You're wrong about Gran Turismo 2000. Aside from prettier graphics (like heat shimmer effects, fog, and glare), the AI is being redone such that, if you cut off a computer opponent, they may get pissed off and go after you.

Besides, better, faster graphics is a good thing. I'd rather have GT2000 looking ten times better and running at 60fps than Crazy Taxi where the only difference between it and the arcade version is that you don't have to keep feeding it quarters. I'm not knocking the Dreamcast, though (I have one ) - it has several top-notch games.

I disagree with most of what you said about the PS2 (it has 2 to 4 times more horsepower than the DC - in the long run, PS2 will ultimately have the better version of games released for both systems). But I do agree with one thing you said, which is that you bought a Dreamcast because you were interested in the games available for it. The games are what everyone's choice should be based on.

I agree. I was just a bit disappointed that with a cool system like PS2, the three best-looking and most publicised launch games are all sequels. I dunno if that's a good thing.
PS2 is virtually certain to be a success. Only two things worry me - the price (will either PS2 or Dreamcast actually replace the original Playstation when they're so damned expensive?) and the decision to release a modem as an aftermarket upgrade (because how many people buy upgrade parts for consoles, particulary expensive parts?)

Never pass final judgment on a system based only on the games available at launch (with the exception of Soul Calibur, of course). All of the third party developers are just learning the hardware environment (I've been through it twice, myself). Give it time.

Not building a modem into the PS2 was a very very good idea. The biggest drawback to the built-in modem on my Dreamcast is that I can't use it with my ADSL line. Anyone with an internet connection that *doesn't* use a modem (eg, cable modem, ADSL, optical, etc) is unable to use a modem. Although it's still possible to use the built-in modem by, say, getting a separate dial-up account, it's an unnecessary expense and a pain.

As technology improves and better, faster internet access (ie, non-modem) becomes cheaper, the USB port on the PS2 will allow users to continually adapt to this newer technology if they so desire. I'd much rather hook my Dreamcast up to my ADSL with a download rate of 100-200K/second than to tie up my phone line with a 56K modem.

But you're right, it is expensive, but only in the beginning. The price inevitably falls as a result of competition. The N64 price was dropped at one point to "whatever the Playstation costs". Now both are way, way cheaper than when they first came out. The same thing will eventually happen to the DC, the PS2, and the Dolphin. The high expense sucks, but all it really means is that some people will have to wait for the price to drop before getting one.

But look at it this way: everyone outside of Japan has had to wait months for the PS2 (and still must wait), while people in Japan are already enjoying the thing. My local Virgin Megastore had five Japanese PS2's for sale a month ago. I could have bought one if I wanted to cough up $1200.00 (Canadian) but that's a little too rich for my blood, so I'll wait for the price to come down (ie, when it's officially released in North America). I could always consider selling my Playstation to offset the cost, since my games will still work on the PS2 (well, most of them, anyway).

Happy gaming!

My mate (searley on h2g2) has a Dreamcast. Don't tell him I said this, but I don't think it's very good
I used to be ace at these sort of games. Now I'm old before my time. These kids are all under my ankles blowing my face off!

Though I must say, Goldeneye on N64 is class
Especially with 3/4 players

Last note: Dreamcast's internet thing is ok. It has a zoom feature which make porn sites fun, but you try surfin' h2g2 with it and it looks totally f**ked!
Emails are a pain to. Links don't work on it, y'see

Ah yes, GoldenEye. There's an excellent game that also made me feel old when I tried to go for the easter egg time trials. I got a few of them, but I never play the thing in multiplayer mode, so it really ticked me off when I'd bust my ass to beat this stupid time on a particular level, only to get some multiplayer-only prize. I don't understand how these people beat these times. I've tried and tried and it just doesn't seem possible for many (most) levels.

I totally love sniping guys on the communications tower level, though.

I just got Gundam and Maken X for the Dreamcast and they're both unusually hard to play. Especially Gundam - even with the game set on "easy", I still had to do the second mission about twelve times before I made it through. It's not a very well-designed game at all.

Maken X is an OK FPS, but I'm currently stuck on this one boss who is huge and has this massive axe and four times my reach, and all I have is this stupid cattle-prod. This game has some design issues as well, but not nearly as many as Gundam.

Although I've never used it, the Dreamcast web browser software is probably useless, as you say. However, the DC modem isn't really meant for surfing the web or reading/sending e-mail. It's meant for playing online games, and Sega's reasoning was that they wanted people to be able to play online games out of the box. It's too bad the DC is forever stuck with a 56K modem because, excluding the fact that it ties up your phone line, 56K modem technology is well on the way out in favour of DSL, cable modems and optical fibre. All of these can be supported on the PS2 through the two USB ports. This is why it's a good thing that Sony didn't hard-wire some telecom device into the PS2.

Still, if I had a PS2, I'd probably continue to use my computer for surfing/e-mail instead of my PS2.

Well, you obviouisly know what you're talking about. I am getting so out of touch with computers now

My favourite Goldeneye level is the facility (level 2). Never get tired of it

There's cheats for Goldeneye which mean you can get the time cheats without having to bomb through the levels. You hit a dozen or so buttons and you have your cheat. Dig?
It's cool anyway

Heard Sega have cable modem and DSL modules in development for Dreamcast. You just unclip your existing modem and shove the new one in its place. That's if anything Sega are planning actually gets made now.
Here's an admission; I dunno why, but I never "got" Goldeneye. And that's pretty severe heresy, given that it's accepted as one of the greatest games of all time. But I did really like that artic level with the radar station. That kicked ass.

Hmmm...I don't think I do. It's walk walk shoot shoot...any cunning and "sneaky spy" that can be applied there is used up by me in the facility *^_^*

Methinks Sega are putting in an awful lot of bother into the Dreamcast. I don't recall many other consoles faring like the Dreamcast is right now. Actually, I don't remember any. Anyone wanna give me a refresher course?

Okay, so maybe I'm a bit biased, given I own one of the things, but I reckon Dreamcast is still doing better than the Saturn did, at least in Britain. Maybe I'm wrong. At least there's some good stuff on the horizon, like... shitloads of PC games, with nicer graphics. Hmm.
Actually, I'd really love it if PS2 and Dreamcast could co-exist, like (I know I've said this before) the SNES and Mega Drive, or the Playstation and N64.
People are still talking about how you can bugger up the PS2's DVD drivers by accident. That does not sound good.

I haven't been paying attention to the gaming world, so to me the Dreamcast s still very new. BUt it's been out several months now, hasn't it?

I wish these consoles could co-exist without the rivalry, but I think that would take out some of the fun of owning them . Especially back in the 16-bit days.

Rivalry is great fun. The problem here is, even though it isn't released for another five months, PS2 is practically guaranteed to be a massive success and outsell all its rivals, present and future, by a load. That situation's never happened before. PS2 could well end up not only the best selling console, but the /only/ console. Not much room for rivalry there.

Well, I'm not going to start predicting PS2s immediate domination of the market. We'll wait and see shall we?

I remember when the Playstation first came out and Sony was pretty cocky about it. I recall reading a comment in a magazine from a reviewer who took issue with this attitude when he wrote, "...Sony, you don't own the entire gaming market, so stop acting like you already do...". As we know, they now dominate the gaming market, but not because of their attitude as much as they had lots and lots of games coming out all the time. This put them above the Saturn, which utterly flopped in North America (it wasn't quite as powerful as the PSX and it was *very* complicated to program compared to the PSX - I know, I've programmed both ). It also put it ahead of the N64 because new N64 games were (and still are) few and far between, even though some of them were excellent games (like Goldeneye, for example). The N64/PSX rivalry existed primarily because the N64 had some really great games - otherwise the N64 would have been buried just like the Saturn.

Another reason why N64 has so few games for it is that Nintendo has always had very restrictive licensing that makes their consoles less attractive to developers. Their NES licensing was the worst because you were only allowed to manufacture a specific number of cartridges for your game, and you had to buy all the lock chips from Nintendo - and that's only IF Nintendo decided to LET you release the game on their system. Nintendo's licensing has always been like this. Plus, their SNES hardware documentation was a total disgrace, where phrases like "...never, never do this..." in Japanese wound up translating as "...always do this...". I guess the two negatives cancelled each other out or something.

The Dreamcast won't flop like the Saturn did. If it were going to flop like that, it would already be doing so. Like the N64, even though great DC games are released sparingly, there are (already) some really great DC games (Soul Calibur, Resident Evil, Rayman 2, etc). Being able to port PC games over to DC using Windows CE is a great plus for the DC (even though I avoid any game with "Windows CE compatible" written on the back of the package - I want DC games, not PC games).

I don't know how Sega is going to allow people to upgrade the modem in the DC, since it's not a removable module - it's hard-wired inside the unit. Perhaps it might be possible to provide a DSL or cable modem adapter that plugs into the phone line jack on the DC, but any data still has to go through the built-in 56K modem. I'm not a hardware guy, so I don't know if this will cause a data traffic bottleneck or not (I'm not even sure if building such an adapter is possible).

In any event, since I'm a single geek, I tend to spend my money on home entertainment. I have most of the consoles (SNES, Genesis, Saturn, N64, PSX, Dreamcast), and when the PS2 comes out, it's mine, dammit! I just buy whatever games are good, regardless of what platform they're released on. This tactic may not be for everyone, but I don't have much else to do with my money, and I love playing games.

This is a man who knows the score. I feel like a student nodding in agreement and going "uh-huh", coas that is what I'm doing right now

I don't do video game programming anymore, or at least not lately, so I'm definitely out of touch with the development side of the Dreamcast and the PS2. I do a fair bit of surfing to keep up on the specs of the DC and the PS2, though.

I'm still waiting for the sequel to Banjo Kazooie for the N64. I don't think I'm going to wait much longer. Rare is taking forever to release the thing, which leads me to believe that they're having problems, either with the game or the team working on it (or both). This would be an odd thing to happen for Rare, who usually do pretty good work. There's always a chance that they've just gone over schedule and they don't want to release it until it's ready. At least, I hope this is the case.

One argument that the Dreamcast could outperform PS2 was that PS2 uses completely new technology so it will take a while for games developers to get their heads round it. However, methinks the developers are having ample time to work out how to program it.

I never really got off with Banjo Kazooie - my little brother shone at that game. In terms of 3D-platformers, Mario 64 is mine