Sega pulled the plug on the Dreamcast too soon

[duffmanth]

I was just reading an article on ign.com about the history of the Dreamcast, and came to the conclusion that Sega should have given that system more of a chance than they did. I know at the time people were saying that Sega couldn't compete with the deep pockets of Nintendo, Sony, and MS, but I think the Dreamcast might have lasted another 1-2 years? Now ten years later, while the PS2 game library blew the other consoles away, I don't think the Gamecube and Xbox game libraries were that much better than the Dreamcast. I know that some may make the argument that Sega didn't have the support of big publishers like EA and others, but the Gamecube and Xbox didn't exactly have the most support from 3rd party publishers either. Maybe it was Nintendo and MS's lst party games that gave them a bit of an advantage over the Dreamcast, who knows? I wish I'd kept my Dreamcast longer...fuck now I want to buy another one!!!! Anyone have similar thoughts?

[ClassicGameTrader]

Yeah I don't think you'll find much argument on this forum, we pretty much worship the damn thing here.


I was just reading an article on ign.com about the history of the Dreamcast, and came to the conclusion that Sega should have given that system more of a chance than they did. I know at the time people were saying that Sega couldn't compete with the deep pockets of Nintendo, Sony, and MS, but I think the Dreamcast might have lasted another 1-2 years? Now ten years later, while the PS2 game library blew the other consoles away, I don't think the Gamecube and Xbox game libraries were that much better than the Dreamcast. I know that some may make the argument that Sega didn't have the support of big publishers like EA and others, but the Gamecube and Xbox didn't exactly have the most support from 3rd party publishers either. Maybe it was Nintendo and MS's lst party games that gave them a bit of an advantage over the Dreamcast, who knows? I wish I'd kept my Dreamcast longer...fuck now I want to buy another one!!!! Anyone have similar thoughts?

[aclbandit]

The reason the Dreamcast is such a fan-favorite these days, I think, is that no one had ever heard of some of the best games for it, and the first-party titles left something to be desired (read: Sonic Adventure, no matter how much I love it, wasn't very good). In hindsight, it was ahead of its time, powerful, pretty, and had damn good games to boot. Too bad nobody seemed to find said good games until the Dreamcast had been sent to console manufacturing heaven and the games were in the bargain bin.

[T2KFreeker]

The reason the Dreamcast is such a fan-favorite these days, I think, is that no one had ever heard of some of the best games for it, and the first-party titles left something to be desired (read: Sonic Adventure, no matter how much I love it, wasn't very good). In hindsight, it was ahead of its time, powerful, pretty, and had damn good games to boot. Too bad nobody seemed to find said good games until the Dreamcast had been sent to console manufacturing heaven and the games were in the bargain bin.
I bought my Dreamcast on L<aunch and still bought several games throughout it's lifespan. I hated the PS2 and hated the fact that everyone seemed ready to give the Dreamcast the old Heave Ho upon release. Dreamcast is still a better system in my opinion.

[dr101z]

Yeah I don't think you'll find much argument on this forum, we pretty much worship the damn thing here.

Sounds about right. I really wish Sega would have stuck it out another year or so with the Dreamcast. I'm still buying stuff for it and I'm only two games away from completing my US game collection.

I'm supposed to be getting together with some friends Friday night for a Dreamcast party to celebrate the tenth anniversary of the US launch.

[BetaWolf47]

This whole forum bows before Sega's almightiness. I doubt you'll find that many people who'd argue that SMS, Saturn, and Dreamcast weren't underrated.

[Sonicwolf]

Its the Dreamcast's 10th birthday here in North America in a day and a half. Such a great, short lived little console.

[udisi]

It was a great system. It's probably the last of the great 2D fighter machines. That said I wasn't found of the controller. I also still firmly believe that piracy played a big part in killing the DC. It was way too easy to pirate games for. Just burn the game CD.

[jcalder8]

It was a great system. It's probably the last of the great 2D fighter machines. That said I wasn't found of the controller. I also still firmly believe that piracy played a big part in killing the DC. It was way too easy to pirate games for. Just burn the game CD.
I agree with this.

It's the only system that I've downloaded and played games for rather than buying them. I have 200+ games but only 5 are retail. It was just too easy and kids who grew up with the NES and SNES were of the age that they were in college/university so money was tight.

Also I agree about the controller, I've never been a fan of it.

I still love my DC though.

[Sonicwolf]

Also I agree about the controller, I've never been a fan of it.

One thing about the DC controller is that it was the first major console controller that actually got the Analog stick/d-pad positions right where the thumb is on the Analog stick primarily and the d-pad is easily accessable underneath. Excluding the limitedly released Saturn controller.

[Icarus Moonsight]

If Sega hadn't squandered all them resources and the goodwill of their customers through the SCD, 32X and Saturn, they probably would have taken the DC into market longer and had some left over for a succeeding console. They screwed themselves so thoroughly that they could not possibly do it. If only they applied some of their aggression to the software side rather than keeping focused on hardware...

When ifs and buts are candies and nuts we'll all have a merry Christmas! LOL

The DC control should have had six face buttons...

[Sonicwolf]

If Sega hadn't squandered all them resources and the goodwill of their customers through the SCD, 32X and Saturn, they probably would have taken the DC into market longer and had some left over for a succeeding console. They screwed themselves so thoroughly that they could not possibly do it. If only they applied some of their aggression to the software side rather than keeping focused on hardware...

When ifs and buts are candies and nuts we'll all have a merry Christmas! LOL

The sad thing is that when Sega did the right thing, and very well, thats the one time they lost the race.

[j_factor]

I do think Sega made a mistake by pulling the plug. I remember doing some comparisons and they actually did better, as a software publisher, in the year 2000 putting out strictly Dreamcast games, than they did in 2002 publishing on all platforms. Also it was way too early to say that they "lost" anything since PS2 had only been out a few months and their other two competitors were not yet on the market. I also find it curious that they made their announcement almost immediately after the release of PSO, which did pretty well, only a few months after their successful roll-out of online gameplay, and right before the release of Sakura Taisen 3, which was hotly anticipated in Japan and expected to be a significant system seller. It seemed like Dreamcast was on the uptick when they killed it.

I also was personally pissed off at the way Sega (especially SoA) cancelled a bunch of games, even after clarifying that they were still coming out, and how they treated third party supporters of the Dreamcast. No Cliche and Ripcord Games both went out of business because Sega were dickheads and wouldn't let them release their games.

[Sonicwolf]

I also was personally pissed off at the way Sega (especially SoA) cancelled a bunch of games, even after clarifying that they were still coming out, and how they treated third party supporters of the Dreamcast. No Cliche and Ripcord Games both went out of business because Sega were dickheads and wouldn't let them release their games.

Sega really treated the Dreamcast and its impending software releases as a devil child in North America after they cancelled system production.

One things for sure. The Dreamcast left a hole in the video game market that will never heal. The PlayStation and XBOX consoles of yesteryear were closely related for releases and the Gamecube was chugging along but the Dreamcast always had the special, unique and classic library that had a different, less mass produced feel to them.

[Baloo]

Although I do think the Dreamcast had a lot of untapped potential, I prefer the Saturn as a system overall. Dreamcast is nice, but I don't think there's enough platforming goodness on there for me. It's great for fighters. There's just something I like about the Saturn more though.

If anything was discontinued too early though by Sega, it was definitely the Genesis and not the Dreamcast.

[Sonicwolf]

Although I do think the Dreamcast had a lot of untapped potential, I prefer the Saturn as a system overall. Dreamcast is nice, but I don't think there's enough platforming goodness on there for me. It's great for fighters. There's just something I like about the Saturn more though.

If anything was discontinued too early though by Sega, it was definitely the Genesis and not the Dreamcast.

I dont appreciate the Saturn much because it's hard as hell to find Saturn games, systems and accessories where I live. I have seen 3 Saturns in the last 6 years and about 10 games max. Pretty sad. It's hard to get into a console when your entire game selection is Daytona stretched over 2 thirds a decade.

[swlovinist]

The system will always have a close place in my heart. It came out when I first started working at a Gamestop nearly ten years ago. Like others have said, the system got so many things right. A couple of different moves by sega, and it could have contended with the other systems. I agree that piracy hurt the system big time. In honor of the Dreamcast 10th anniv, I will be playing some propeller arena!

[A Black Falcon]

I do think Sega made a mistake by pulling the plug. I remember doing some comparisons and they actually did better, as a software publisher, in the year 2000 putting out strictly Dreamcast games, than they did in 2002 publishing on all platforms. Also it was way too early to say that they "lost" anything since PS2 had only been out a few months and their other two competitors were not yet on the market. I also find it curious that they made their announcement almost immediately after the release of PSO, which did pretty well, only a few months after their successful roll-out of online gameplay, and right before the release of Sakura Taisen 3, which was hotly anticipated in Japan and expected to be a significant system seller. It seemed like Dreamcast was on the uptick when they killed it.

I also was personally pissed off at the way Sega (especially SoA) cancelled a bunch of games, even after clarifying that they were still coming out, and how they treated third party supporters of the Dreamcast. No Cliche and Ripcord Games both went out of business because Sega were dickheads and wouldn't let them release their games.

Sega did worse in 2002? Sega lost money every year from 1996 to 2001, while also the Western arcade market fell off a cliff, hurting their arcade business as well. That's why they gave up, they just couldn't afford to keep going anymore. Sure, they could have tried... but the likely result would have been bankruptcy. Sega started making money again in 2002, as a result of their new strategy.

Oh, and the problem wasn't piracy, it was that they weren't selling anywhere near enough hardware. Yes, they were selling it at a loss so the piracy hurt, but when their hardware sales were so far below what they needed to make money, that was a minor problem in comparison. Sega didn't lose quite as much money on Dreamcast as they had on Saturn... but they didn't keep going with it for as long either.

I mean, yes, the Dreamcast was amazing. But the fact is, financially it was losing money with no reasonable hope of change. For instance, in Holiday season 2000, just before the announcement in January 2001 that the DC was going to be discontinued, in the US the Dreamcast actually finished behind not just behind the PS2 in terms of sales, but also behind the N64. It just wasn't selling well enough. They discontinued it right after the PS2 launch because the PS2 was already destroying it... sales off the charts, sellout every month, and the fact that it had almost no good games while DC had lots of them didn't matter.

... Of course, it's all because of Sega's own problems. If they hadn't done such a thorough job of destroying all of their credibility with all of their fans in the West over the 1995-1999 period, thanks to their many, many mistakes and the legacy of the constant infighting between the US and Japanese branches of Sega, they wouldn't have been in such dire financial straits. I mean, they took the Genesis, a system which won Europe, led America for years, and sold probably about 40 million systems worldwide... and with their next one sold maybe 2 million units in the US, fewer in Europe, and maybe 9.5 million systems worldwide. And that also lost Sega lots of money, hundreds of millions of dollars.

I've said before that Sega pretty much needed the DC to be a Wii or DS-level instant massive smash hit to be able to feasibly continue as a hardware manufacturer, really. They weren't even close to that, DC lost them lots of money too. Of course the goal is to get through the early days when you usually lose money in the hopes of making it back in later years, but Sega's finances were just too weak to do that.

Sega's finances could be entirely blamed for the system's failure, in fact, from what I've read. Evidently Sega was interested in putting a DVD drive in the Dreamcast, but simply couldn't afford it because of their financial state, and had to drop the idea... but can you imagine how much more successful the DC would have been with DVD movie playback capabilities? A lot of people worldwide bought PS2s for the movie playback. DC being able to do that, a year earlier, would have helped a lot. It probably wouldn't have been enough to stop the massive PS2 juggernaut, but it might have helped Sega survive... too bad.

Also, shortly before giving up on hardware Sega had a change of leadership to a new guy who had wanted to drop hardware for years (they'd been thinking about it for some time, always having far less money than the other hardware manufacturers). That was definitely a factor as well, Sega COULD have kept going and just risked it all on the chance of somehow avoiding bankruptcy. But they decided that they'd rather take the safe path to financial success for once, unlike usual (Sega's so infamous for making bad financial decisions...), and go multiplatform.

Of course long-term, particularly after the Sammy merger in 2004, Sega's quality completely fell apart, but they did stop losing money. Not caring about that for a while is fine, but it does begin to matter at some point... unless you think Sega should have just kept trying with their own hardware until they collapsed? I don't know how smart that would be, myself...

I mean, I love Sega's consoles (not as much as Nintendo's, but I love them), and definitely wish that they were still a hardware manufacturer. Sega just messed up too much. :(

[chrisbid]

they were too small of a fish, there was no way they could compete with three different sharks, maybe they couldve stuck with it another six months, but their accountants likely crunched the math properly to determine their best exit

the love the dc gets is due to it being the last great home arcade port machine. since 2002, arcade ports have been nothing more than novelties with the big three

[Sonicwolf]

Sega's finances could be entirely blamed for the system's failure, in fact, from what I've read. Evidently Sega was interested in putting a DVD drive in the Dreamcast, but simply couldn't afford it because of their financial state, and had to drop the idea... but can you imagine how much more successful the DC would have been with DVD movie playback capabilities? A lot of people worldwide bought PS2s for the movie playback. DC being able to do that, a year earlier, would have helped a lot. It probably wouldn't have been enough to stop the massive PS2 juggernaut, but it might have helped Sega survive... too bad.

Sega had decided to do the DVD thing a little too late and all that was seen was a prototype DreamcastDVD player add-on in a quiet Sega booth just before the Dreamcast's demise.

http://i575.photobucket.com/albums/ss191/Sonicwolf359/Dreamcast-DVD-Player-small-Proto-1.jpg

[Icarus Moonsight]

The sad thing is that when Sega did the right thing, and very well, thats the one time they lost the race.

To be fair, they were losing (in NA, Saturn did fairly well in Japan as far as I'm aware) for quite a while before the DC. It was a slow creeping death. It doesn't matter much that the straw that breaks your back is made of gold.

[Gentlegamer]

I was out of video gaming at the time, but looking back after playing Dreamcast games I've come to this conclusion: Dreamcast didn't deserve to die. It was a great system. It had the games. Sega just didn't have the money to keep going.

I've played Dreamcast sporadically over the past couple years. I just got a black Sega Sports console, and I'll be celebrating Dreamcast this month playing pick up games of Crazy Taxi, Power Stone, NFL 2K2, and culminating in a longer playthrough of a game like Shenmue or Skies of Arcadia.

[duffmanth]

I forgot all about the rampent piracy on the Dreamcast. I guess that's one thing that did it in early. I remember getting my Dreamcast for xmas 2000 and was looking so forward to playing Sega GT and Tokyo Xtreme Racer, then found out you had to use the trigger buttons for gas and brake, this pissed me off royally. I should point out that at this time I had just come off playing Gran Turismo 2 for almost a year and had become very accustomed to the "GT" controller layout for PS1 racing games and just couldn't get used to the Dreamcast style with the triggers. Needless to say I made a hasty decision and returned the Dreamcast and the games to Gamestop for a full refund, I was lucky you could do that back then! I was pretty disappointed for a while, but only until I walked into my local Wal Mart in early 2001 and found 1 lone PS2 sitting there and snapped that up right away.

In hindsight though. I wish I had kept my Dreamcast just for games like Crazy Taxi, Soul Calibur, DOA, Jet Grind Radio, and others...oh well might pick up another one in the near future?

[duffmanth]

I was out of gaming when the Dreamcast launched as well, actually I had missed the latter half of the 90's for gaming. My buddy got the Dreamcast on launch day, and my eyes popped out of my head when I saw him playing Soul Calibur I believe it was?

[garagesaleking!!]

how is it that sega was so successful in the genesis days and then was considered a small fish when the dreamcast was released? I understand they probably lost a lot of money with the sega 32x, saturn, and other 90' systems, but i just dont see how they did not have the funds to support the dreamcast, and there is so much dreamcast stuff out there, i almost consider it a success for how many system made it onto the market and were actually sold.

[Icarus Moonsight]

Many of those systems were not sold as much as they were liquidated though. They overran production, grossly.

[duffmanth]

I think maybe Sega figured they couldn't compete with Sony financially, and with MS entering the console market at the time, Sega probably felt the situation wasn't going to get much better for them? I guess they thought at the time they could be more successful strictly making software for other consoles?

[JunkTheMagicDragon]

the dc was a financial bomb. staying in the market longer wouldn't have reversed sega's fortunes, only plunged the company deeper in the hole. despite the things it got right (and the fellating it gets on these forums) the dc was outclassed by the ps2. a number of factors beyond hardware created this situation (factors others have already pointed out) from which there was no recovery. love the console all you want, but face reality.

[DreamTR]

Sega had fleeced their customers for years with the 32x, Sega CD, and Saturn. The Genesis and to a point the Master System were the only ones viable enough for longevity with enough quality titles on all ends.

Piracy really did kill the Dreamcast. As soon as that hit, EVERYONE was pirating games. People don't understand how that hurts sales...look at the PSP...Same crap is happening, no one is buying any of the games because they're downloading them all.

People seriously need to get a clue about this stuff instead of expecting everything for free. This is just another step in the I DOWNLOAD MUSIC MOVIES DVDS bs...We hardly have ANY music/movie/DVD places because of this garbage as well.

I'm seriously so sick of people and piracy. End rant.

[j_factor]

Sega did worse in 2002? Sega lost money every year from 1996 to 2001, while also the Western arcade market fell off a cliff, hurting their arcade business as well. That's why they gave up, they just couldn't afford to keep going anymore. Sure, they could have tried... but the likely result would have been bankruptcy. Sega started making money again in 2002, as a result of their new strategy.

Sega did not make money again in 2002. They continued to lose money up until the Sammy merger. They sold more games in 2000 than 2002. In 2000, they were the #6 game publisher in North America; in 2002, they were no longer in the top ten. See also here:

http://i31.tinypic.com/33aex4i.jpg

News item on sales Oct. 2000 (http://web.archive.org/web/20001102141947/www.ebworld.com/ebx/news/content_item.asp?cont_id=16047):

"It has been five weeks since the price reduction has gone into effect, and in that time Sega’s share of the market has increased to almost 30 percent of all unit sales nearly 40 percent of revenue (Sony’s share saw an increase as well, and rests at a strong 49 percent in unit sales and 42 percent in revenue). The underdog Nintendo 64 saw its share decline to almost 21 percent in unit sales and nearly 18 percent for revenue."

[kupomogli]

I don't think that the Dreamcast failed because "people didn't play the good games" because the majority of Dreamcast games were good. It's just that most people didn't play a the system period.

I think if you were a person who either owned a Dreamcast or played one, you would have thought the system was the best one out there at the time. I honestly don't think the Dreamcast is better than PS2 now, but back when the PS2 first came out, I definitely thought it was with games Phantasy Star Online, Shenmue, Sword of the Berserk, Dead or Alive 2, Soul Calibur, Powerstone, etc. On the Dreamcast version of PSO, me and my friend put quite a bit of time into that(took turns since we didn't have online unfortunately and we both didn't have the game.)

Of course, now, the PS2 is alot better than the Dreamcast, but for the time that the Dreamcast coexisted with the PS2, it was the better system.

[BetaWolf47]

Dreamcast became a bargain bin haven. A lot of people bought it and the games for bargain prices after it became discontinued. I actually wanted one when they first became $20. When PS2 was out for a year or two you could dig through the used pile in game stores and find tons of great Dreamcast games for dirt cheap. Perhaps this is why so many collectors own the system. That, and it just flat-out rocks!

[Melf]

I loved the DC when it came out, but in typical Sega fashion, the company found a way to make me go over to the competition. Here it was, banging its chest about how it wasn't going to leave owners high and dry like it did with the Saturn, and it did exactly that, and in half the time.

The business end of the company was a clusterfuck. They were giving away the console for free if you subscribed to Seganet. WTF? You give away hardware you're already losing money on? Sega launches SegaNet with some great free games, and then WHAM! starts charging. I remember how massively popular PSO was when it was free, when the subscription kicked in, the servers became a cemetary. With good reason too, as for the first six months after they started charging, the only content we got was that Nights quest. I quit shortly after.

I love Sega games, but I will never, EVER buy another console if they release one. Fuck Sega and hardware.

[Sonicwolf]

I love Sega games, but I will never, EVER buy another console if they release one. Fuck Sega and hardware.

Same with me. I think Sega sucks more now than ever and if they couldnt do it all right when they were still awesome, it would be a disaster in the future to release new hardware.

[The 1 2 P]

Sadly I didn't get into the Dreamcast until after Sega bowed out of the console race. But I worked at Toys R Us that holiday season('99) and remember playing Soul Calibur during my lunch breaks. I was amazed how little the load times were and it sure was gorgeous.

Today I have a nice mix of US and Japanese DC games and I think it was definitely one of the better systems to be put out in the last 10 years. But like many others have already said, Sega had so much going against them at the time that it would have been pretty impossible for them to have prevailed.

[duffmanth]

Yeah I think Sega has gone for a shit with a lot of their games since they started making software exclusively. They've put out some great games since the Dreamcast days , but a lot of shitty games as well, especially some of the Sonic games. Sega has kind of become like EA and Activision over the last 5-10 years, they have so many games on the go all at once and the result is a nice mix of great games and pure shit that should have never made it to retail.

[otaku]

its crazy how easy pirating was for the DC considering the steps taken on the saturn to prevent copies being made etc. I owned/rented loads of games at the time of the systems release/lifespan because I was a kid with no pc and about 11 years old :) however when I acquired one a year or two ago being a college student I had 200 burns...

By far the greatest system of its generation (well maybe ps2 but the DC could have been and is still damn good)

[chrisbid]

I'm seriously so sick of people and piracy. End rant.


ease of piracy is one of the reasons the playstation rocketed to the top in the late 90's

[Ponyone]

I usually just download DC games these days, try them out, and if I like them I go to my local Best Buy and purchase.

I do not support piracy. but it's okay to sample with the intention to buy.

[Frankie_Says_Relax]

I usually just download DC games these days, try them out, and if I like them I go to my local Best Buy and purchase.

I do not support piracy. but it's okay to sample with the intention to buy.

Wait. What?

You purchase Dreamcast games at Best Buy?

[Greg2600]

Wait. What?

You purchase Dreamcast games at Best Buy?
LOL, sure, you just hop in your DeLorean and away you go. Finally a thread with rational comments on SEGA and the Dreamcast.

[Sonicwolf]

Wait. What?

You purchase Dreamcast games at Best Buy?

I think he meant to post that in the year 2001.

[T2KFreeker]

Wait. What?

You purchase Dreamcast games at Best Buy?
Yeah, didn't you know that Best Buy has a secret astahs vault with classic games in it for peo0ple that pirated the ISO to test drive it. What a load! ):(

[Ed Oscuro]

astahs vault
Squadrala?

Man, this thread...

[crazyjackcsa]

As a system, the plug was pulled to early on the Dreamcast to be sure.

As a company, Sega pulled the plug too late, or maybe shouldn't have even started.

[PapaStu]

Wait. What?

You purchase Dreamcast games at Best Buy?

I just bought new sealed DC games at Fry's (and new sealed PS games for that matter) a few weeks ago.

[The 1 2 P]

I just bought new sealed DC games at Fry's (and new sealed PS games for that matter) a few weeks ago.

Up until last year both Walmart and Sears up here still sold PS1 sports games and FYE and Circuit City still sold DC sports games. More than likely a case of extreme overstock but they still had them

[vincewy]

What Sega could've done with DC?

-Continued supporting the system for 1-2 years
-Publish a handful of games like they did in Japan, maybe 1-2 games a month, remember many games were developed, but canceled.
-Continued to make the console at small quantity.

In the same time, they could keep making games for other consoles, those guys just didn't get it. In Japan this sucker lasted for 10 years, even today, my DC collection is the most valued despite the market value.

[udisi]

ease of piracy is one of the reasons the playstation rocketed to the top in the late 90's

uh no.....The PS had a better library than the N64. and here's the #1 reason

If a new cross-platform game came out it was far superior graphically and sound wise than it's N64 counterpart.AND...ps games retailed for 39.99 new whereas the N64 version was 59.99 minimum depending on the size of the game.

[A Black Falcon]

Sega had decided to do the DVD thing a little too late and all that was seen was a prototype DreamcastDVD player add-on in a quiet Sega booth just before the Dreamcast's demise.

Interesting, I don't think I'd seen that before. Still, it doesn't disprove what I said at all. I think that the most likely story is that despite the inability to put a DVD player in the original system probably due to financial constraints, they kept trying to release one for the system in some fashion... too bad it didn't come out. It's cool to see, though, for sure. :)


Sega did not make money again in 2002. They continued to lose money up until the Sammy merger. They sold more games in 2000 than 2002. In 2000, they were the #6 game publisher in North America; in 2002, they were no longer in the top ten. See also here:

Ah, but how much did their losses go down by? Because I'm sure they lost less money... looking at just profits without also looking at loss gives an incomplete picture.

You're right that Sega's financial troubles were not solved by the move, of course, given the sale to Sammy several years later, but I'd be surprised if it didn't help them a little.

Sega actually made a profit in both halves of the 2002-2003 fiscal year (april '02-march '03), after four straight years of year-round losses. I think that's a clear statement on the effect of dropping a system that just wasn't selling well enough to be sustained by a seriously financially weak company.

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/sega-reports-a-profit-but-top-execs-step-down

Total game sales matter less than whether they're actually making money. They weren't.

As Sega has said, essentially in holiday 2000, Sega of Japan set a sales target in the US. If Sega met the target, they'd keep trying. They'd given up on Japan pretty much by this point, their marketshare had never gotten out of the single digits... but in the US, despite weak sales after the initially good launch, they thought they had a chance. Unfortunately, they did not meet their targets, and as I said I'm pretty sure that N64 sold more hardware units than Dreamcast. Regardless on that, the failure to meet sales targets while Sony sold every system they could make was a clear sign, and Sega heeded it.

A more financially strong company probably would have been able to keep the thing going, but after so many years of losses from both the Saturn and DC, and the fact that they'd never had that much money to begin with, and the fading arcade market, Sega was far from financially strong. Really, as I said before, releasing the DC at all was a serious gamble without much hope of success... that they tried at all shows how much they wanted to stay in hardware. Its failure shows that they just couldn't afford to do it anymore, particularly against such well-funded opposition. Sad, but true. :(


What Sega could've done with DC?

-Continued supporting the system for 1-2 years
-Publish a handful of games like they did in Japan, maybe 1-2 games a month, remember many games were developed, but canceled.
-Continued to make the console at small quantity.

In the same time, they could keep making games for other consoles, those guys just didn't get it. In Japan this sucker lasted for 10 years, even today, my DC collection is the most valued despite the market value.

Huh? Sega stopped developing for the DC in March 2002 in Japan. After March 2002, in Japan Sega released exactly two internally developed DC games: NHL 2k2 in July 2002 (a February 2002 US release, and the last DC game released in the US), and Puyo Puyo Fever in early 2004. That's it. They did make the GD-ROM discs and also published Chaos Field in 2004 and Under Defeat in 2006, but those of course were extremely limited runs.

In Europe there was one original title released in April 2002 (a European exclusive), and another port of a 2001 US game that month and one final one that November, so it lasted slightly longer there than in the US, but only slightly. I would say that that month was the month the DC effectively died, for Sega had released its last DC game in Japan for two years in March, the last US game had come out in February, and the last original European title came out in April. After that all that was left were the visual novel and shmup ports.

So, after April 2002, almost every single DC release was either a visual novel (usually ported from PC) or a shmup (usually ported from Naomi). There are only seven exceptions. One is European (noted), the others Japanese.

2002 (May and beyond): The King of Fighters 2000, The King of Fighters 2001, Kidou Senshi Gundam: Renpou vs. Zeon DX, Razor Freestyle Scooter (European release, came out in the US in 2001, never released in Japan), Castle Fantasia: Seima Taisen (a visual novel with strategy-RPG style battles)
2003: The King of Fighters 2002
2004: Puyo Puyo Fever (first-party)

And that's it. Not exactly a varied release list there, to say the least. The only reason the DC made it past February-April 2002 was because of demand in Japan for visual novels and shmups, with the DC's miniscule but hardcore fanbase. (Remember that the DC actually did worse in Japan marketshare-wise than it did in the US, and by a good margin too I think. Success was NOT the reason for these releases, that's for sure. The devoted, hardcore nature of that fanbase was, and the ease of the ports from Naomi or PC.)

[Ed Oscuro]

If a new cross-platform game came out (for the PS) it was far superior graphically
Shadowman puts the lie to this claim. There were, believe it or not, a number of N64 games that used the cartridge to do quick swapping between scenes (i.e. unlocking scenes in Banjo-Kazooie) that would have been very hard to do on the PS.

I never heard of the Dreamcast DVD player, thanks Sonicwolf. Sounds even sadder than the 360's HD-DVD player (except that was additionally sad for being for a format that has since died).

[A Black Falcon]

Shadowman puts the lie to this claim. There were, believe it or not, a number of N64 games that used the cartridge to do quick swapping between scenes (i.e. unlocking scenes in Banjo-Kazooie) that would have been very hard to do on the PS.

Every N64 game that was competently programmed puts the lie to that claim. :)

... I don't think I really want to restart that PSX-vs-N64 thing though... we just argued about that recently. :)

[Sonicwolf]

Every N64 game that was competently programmed puts the lie to that claim. :)

... I don't think I really want to restart that PSX-vs-N64 thing though... we just argued about that recently. :)

I think everyone has had a long enough amount of time to argue the merits of the PS vs the 64.

It's not 1998 anymore...

Although I wish it was :(

[j_factor]

Ah, but how much did their losses go down by? Because I'm sure they lost less money... looking at just profits without also looking at loss gives an incomplete picture.

You're right that Sega's financial troubles were not solved by the move, of course, given the sale to Sammy several years later, but I'd be surprised if it didn't help them a little.

Sega actually made a profit in both halves of the 2002-2003 fiscal year (april '02-march '03), after four straight years of year-round losses. I think that's a clear statement on the effect of dropping a system that just wasn't selling well enough to be sustained by a seriously financially weak company.

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/sega-reports-a-profit-but-top-execs-step-down

Total game sales matter less than whether they're actually making money. They weren't.

As Sega has said, essentially in holiday 2000, Sega of Japan set a sales target in the US. If Sega met the target, they'd keep trying. They'd given up on Japan pretty much by this point, their marketshare had never gotten out of the single digits... but in the US, despite weak sales after the initially good launch, they thought they had a chance. Unfortunately, they did not meet their targets, and as I said I'm pretty sure that N64 sold more hardware units than Dreamcast. Regardless on that, the failure to meet sales targets while Sony sold every system they could make was a clear sign, and Sega heeded it.

A more financially strong company probably would have been able to keep the thing going, but after so many years of losses from both the Saturn and DC, and the fact that they'd never had that much money to begin with, and the fading arcade market, Sega was far from financially strong. Really, as I said before, releasing the DC at all was a serious gamble without much hope of success... that they tried at all shows how much they wanted to stay in hardware. Its failure shows that they just couldn't afford to do it anymore, particularly against such well-funded opposition. Sad, but true. :(

I still don't see any real reason they couldn't have given it another year or something. Their competition wasn't even out yet. Yes, they were still being outsold by PSX, but that's normal -- NES outsold Genesis for almost two years, and the same thing happened with PS2 and Xbox 360. And if they're going to go third party anyway, they might as well wait until the new systems are actually established and have a significant install base. I firmly believe that Jet Set Radio Future, Gunvalkyrie, Shenmue II, Toejam & Earl 3, Gungrave, Shinobi, House of the Dead 3, Sega GT 2002, etc. etc. etc. would have sold better than they did if they'd been on DC. Hell, NFL 2K1 outsold Madden 2001 on PS2.

The sales targets that SoJ set were unrealistic and unnecessary. And "giving up" on Japan was stupid. They had every opportunity to make Dreamcast a success there. They failed, but I still think Dreamcast was on its way up when they pulled the plug. Two new entries in the Sakura Taisen franchise (along with a couple other releases) increased demand for the system quite a bit. Demand for Dreamcast in Japan after they got rid of it was so heavy that they re-started production after the fact. And if Virtua Fighter 4 had been on Dreamcast (and actually a good port, unlike 3tb), its Japanese sales would've gone through the roof. It never would've posed a threat to PS2 (but nothing else did anyway), but I think it could've outperformed Gamecube, and it obviously would've done better than Xbox.

Also I'm pretty sure you're wrong about N64 outselling Dreamcast (except in the first half of 2000). But I couldn't find any numbers for anything in that time period (other than the article I linked), except for one week's European sales. During the week ending 25 November, PSX took 42% of sales, Dreamcast took 27% and N64 took 26%. Not that it proves anything, but I do know that Dreamcast overall did significantly worse in Europe than in North America.

[Icarus Moonsight]

This is like a little girls birthday party, and all people can talk about is how cute her older sisters are... Poor kid.

[Mac Tonight]

The Dreamcast wasn't killed by the Gamecube, N64 or PSX. The Dreamcast was killed by the Saturn, Sega CD and 32X. American consumers lost faith that Sega was willing to support its systems.

I owned a Dreamcast during its run, but I remember feeling like a sucker thinking (at the time) that they'd release an all new DVD-capable console before I'd own a dozen games for the thing when I already had a Saturn collecting dust. Add to that the saturation of Sonic on a plethora of sub-standard games (a trend that has continued) and it's easy to understand why the casual gamer had given up on Sega. The simple truth is that Sega had given up on itself.

As for my household, I think that Sega Swirl gets more play than any game released in the past two years.

ps: Sega's insistence on a default controller that was the size of a small dog certainly didn't help.

[Rob2600]

If a new cross-platform game came out [on the PS] it was far superior graphically and sound wise than it's N64 counterpart.

Actually, half of the cross-platform games looked better on the N64:

Doom
F-1 World Grand Prix
FIFA series
Forsaken
Gauntlet Legends
Hydro Thunder
Madden NFL series
Mortal Kombat 4
NBA Showtime
NFL Blitz series
NHL '99
Quake series
Rayman 2: The Great Escape
Resident Evil 2
San Francisco Rush
Shadow Man
South Park

[udisi]

I'm not an N64 hater at all, I still love and play several games on the system. Now, maybe there is some debate to graphics on some games, but the number one reason I'd say would have been price.

when the average gamer saw the same game(take NHL 99 for example) and see's 39.99 for the PS version and 59.99 for the N64 version, which do you think they bought?