The article has many viewpoints, but the most logical one (to me, at least) is that the DC failed because there wasn't enough money to properly market the thing. If they had deeper pockets, it might well have thrived and Sega might still be a contender in the console market today. There were other factors, of course, such as the loss of EA's support, the stained legacy of the Saturn, and the general excitement that Microsoft was about to release a new platform. Plus, everyone seemed to know that Sega was doing badly and didn't much faith (or their hard-earned dollars!) into the platform.
Well, you can nix the Microsoft thing right there as far as I'm concerned. I remember very clearly that being a non-factor (and let's remember, Microsoft was a Sega partner in the Dreamcast, providing one of the two operating systems). By the time of the Xbox's pending release, the Dreamcast was already discontinued. What doomed the Dreamcast was the pending release of the PS2. In Japan, they jumped on the PS2 because of the DVD playback capabilities (since DVD player penetration was not like it was here) and players in the US were waiting because it was hyped as the ultimate game machine. Of course the PS2's launch was rather pathetic, with jaggy games that often looked WORSE than their Dreamcast counterparts, but the damage had already been done. Ironically the Dreamcast, despite being released years earlier, could have been competitive with the PS2 technologically speaking for at least the first two years of that system's life, before it's "powers" were truly tapped.
The article has many viewpoints, but the most logical one (to me, at least) is that the DC failed because there wasn't enough money to properly market the thing. If they had deeper pockets, it might well have thrived and Sega might still be a contender in the console market today. There were other factors, of course, such as the loss of EA's support, the stained legacy of the Saturn, and the general excitement that Microsoft was about to release a new platform. Plus, everyone seemed to know that Sega was doing badly and didn't much faith (or their hard-earned dollars!) into the platform.
Well, you can nix the Microsoft thing right there as far as I'm concerned. I remember very clearly that being a non-factor (and let's remember, Microsoft was a Sega partner in the Dreamcast, providing one of the two operating systems). By the time of the Xbox's pending release, the Dreamcast was already discontinued. What doomed the Dreamcast was the pending release of the PS2. In Japan, they jumped on the PS2 because of the DVD playback capabilities (since DVD player penetration was not like it was here) and players in the US were waiting because it was hyped as the ultimate game machine. Of course the PS2's launch was rather pathetic, with jaggy games that often looked WORSE than their Dreamcast counterparts, but the damage had already been done. Ironically the Dreamcast, despite being released years earlier, could have been competitive with the PS2 technologically speaking for at least the first two years of that system's life, before it's "powers" were truly tapped.
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Bill Loguidice, Managing Director | Armchair Arcade, Inc.
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Bill Loguidice, Managing Director
Armchair Arcade, Inc.