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Sega Announces Dreamcast Successor
aardwolf64 writes: "msnbc.com has a story (taken from Inside.com) about the successor to Sega's DreamCast. Aparently it won't play actual DreamCast discs, but will instead download them to an internal hard drive through a digital cable connection. According to the article: 'Wallace said that the box, called the Games Gateway, can store up to 60 games at a time, and will play any and all of the 350 or so games developed for the Dreamcast platform. The box will ship next year, though Wallace declined to speculate whether it would ship in the U.S. or U.K. first. The deal is mutually non-exclusive; the box itself has been a year in development'"
This sounds like a step back for sega, instead of doing some marketing, which they sorely need (I have many casual gamer friends who when I brought out my Dreamcast, had no idea that sega still made a console.) they are going to a segment in which even less people will be able to use their machine. Obviously this thing is broadband only, which is a very small portion of the US and UK. They had better keep the original model around, cause this machine is a niche player if I've ever seen one. Sega missed a golden opportunity, a media blitz right after the PS2 launch could have catapulted the system. Sony got ya down, cant get a PS2? Take a look at us, we got better games, the same level of graphics, and we can actually ship enough out to meet demand, at half the price too.
"My head hurts, My feet stink, and I dont love Jesus." -Jimmy Buffett
Note: I'm not saying that X-Box/DC compatiblity would be a bad thing. Only that Sega denied the rumors before, and it would be delightfully ironic if they embraced it now.
-bugg
I am sick of people assuming that the dreamcast automatically runs WinCE. Only certain games use it. Very few in fact, sega rally, and some vegas gambling game are the only two I know of. If you look on the dreamcast it says COMPATIBLE with WinCE. Not powered by. Most of the games use sega's proprietary OS, like jet grind radio, NFL2k1, Crazy Taxi, pretty much all of the major games out. So, to run dreamcast games, you'd have to emulate 2 different OS's. I think it would be just cheaper to put a SH-4 and a Power VR chip in it, use them as your display and main processor and be done with it. The cost of just slapping them on the side, or having hardware fast enough for emulation would be ridiculous, especially for a low cost set top box. Hell, with a 40gig hd, your gonna have to cut costs somewhere, so just use the same chips.
Since WinCE is a kernel remotely related to win2k and designed to be customizable for non-intel processors, and since it basicly just runs MZ code, i think any MS OS will lend itself quite quickly to be patcheable for running Dreamcast games that required WinCE, without much cost. Emulating sega`s own OS would ofcourse mean speed penalties, so that`s not an option, unless stuff like the X-Box is really going to be packed with Sega hardware so it can boot DreamCast games. But yeah I have my doubts on that one too..
With great power comes great electricity bills.
I think that it's a box waiting to be hacked!
Keeping
2)I wonder also about the copy protection stuff, based on the news we have seen recently. Could they say "Sorry, Game Over?"
3)It has a 40 gig HD, so what OS are they running? (again looking at upgrading the drive, or copying the drive content someplace else.
[sigh] so many possibilities.
"It is a greater offense to steal men's labor, than their clothes"
Me: Hi, I'd like to sign up for cable service.
Cable Company: Okay, would you like the movie channels too?
Me: I guess.
CC: Do you have a computer? We also have high speed internet access.
Me: sure.
CC:Do you like video games? You can download and play Sega DreamCast games on your cable box for only an extra $10 a month.
Me: Ten dollars a month!?! That's cheaper than HBO! Sign me up!
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This is being developed by British set-top box manufacturer Pace Micro Technology in a joint venture with Sega.
Sega getting out of the hardware market just means that THEY won't produce the units - someone else will for them while they provide the chipset.
I'd guess the rumor was created by yet another game nerd (different than "real" nerd) who compares Mhz of different processors and thinks higher numbers always means better. He probably put two and two together (Xbox runs Windows CE? I don't know, and Dreamcast games were developed using Windows CE) and concluded that they must be compatible.
I'm just doubting it.
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Stupid sexy Flanders.
I think the fact that most people are reluctant to provide a revenue stream (think on the order of $9.95-$19.95/month) combined with the other fact that lots of games that would have been a $30-$50 sale will lose their appeal after two plays will result in a quick death for this system.
CEE5210S The signal SIGHUP was received.
This doesn't seem to be the next generation of Dreamcast, but rather just a way for Sega to repackage Dreamcast into a new product that they can get some more money out of.
If it's the next generation anything, it's the next generation Sega Channel.
Jon
All opinions expressed herein are my own, and not those of my employers, who are appalled.
Every time I point my dish at birds, it tends to build up sticky white gunk. Apparently, it makes a convenient bullseye.
THIS BRINGS "CONSOLE-QUALITY gaming to the digital TV industry," said Andrew Wallace, senior vice president of worldwide marketing for Pace, in a conference call this morning. It "addresses the casual gaming market," he noted, while providing lower costs than actually going out and buying a game.
Wallace said that the box, called the Games Gateway, can store up to 60 games at a time, and will play any and all of the 350 or so games developed for the Dreamcast platform. The box will ship next year, though Wallace declined to speculate whether it would ship in the U.S. or U.K. first. The deal is mutually non-exclusive; the box itself has been a year in development.
God. I don't want forced interactivity on my game console. What's more, I do not want to have to subject my child to a
Furthermore, what the hell is the casual gaming market? I have over 200 games for various platforms, many of which run on emulators on my PC, and this thing only will allow 60 games to be stored? Where can I store the rest? Is it pirating if I store the rest on my hard drive?
Maybe we should sue Sega for monopoly behavior. If it wants to separate the deck from the games, fine! We will treat it like two different products. It's bullshit to force ten million parents to go out and buy the new console just so their children can get the new Pokemon for their game, and then to sit there for the hours on end while they play video games just to make sure they aren't talking to anyone unsavory!
Goat sex free since 2001
I don't know why you're buying all these dishes, but every one I've seen can do all of these things in one smallish dish (even local channels, which AFAIK are a no-cost option if you are outside a certain radius from the transmission tower).
So yes, it would be nice to get y'all out in the sticks wired (then I could move there! Yay!) but the problem with satellite is not quite as dire as you make it out to be.
(Cept for the latency, and that really sucks. Damn Einstein...)
Why yes, I AM a rocket scientist!
-Sega has huge losses over 4 straight quarters, including the very successful Dreamcast US launch.
-They still build a user base of several million rather devoted users.
-Sega says that over 100 new titles will hit the Dreamcast library this year. This I believe.
-Sega decides to release a new box that is an even more dangerous money hole than the previous one? What will stop Johnny user from downloading instructions off the internet to copy a game to his friend's? Or, more importantly, download an M rated game while Mommy isn't looking?
Furthermore, why wouldn't they learn from the relatively great decision of Sony to release a system that can play last generation's games, therefore increasing the previous generation's game base as well as the current (driving up license profits)?
This whole thing doesn't make sense, particularly since the Dreamcast has been out only 1 and a quarter years in America.
I love the Dreamcast (I like it more than my PS2), but this doesn't seem like a correct decision at all (or a credible rumor, for that matter).
- I don't care if they globalize against free speech. All my best free thoughts are done in my head.
Dear 7334 kIdZ: we are not giving up on the Dreamcast. We are going to make a whole bunch of Dreamcast games this year. We are not going to stop selling the Dreamcast for the foreseeable future. We are thinking up a bunch of new hardware designs around the SH-4 and PVR2 chipset. We have a prototype set-top box that looks pretty cool.
My specific advice: unless you've heard it directly from us -- meaning from www.sega.com -- take it with a small salt shaker.
John Byrd
Sega of America Dreamcast
^^ As seen on port-dreamcast@netbsd.org ^^
Beware, Nugget is watching... See?
Not if you get everything from the same provider, which is certainly possible with several of the services available today.
I read the internet for the articles.
I for one am very excited about this product. I see most of the comments here are pissed because it may not work for them so it must suck.
Sega is doing the right thing by picking a distribution method that is reasonable and has a reasonably large market share (or will have...)
If they made it over broadband you'd all complain; if it was over standard cable you'd complain it was too slow; if it was dialup you'd complain.
I had the Sega Channel as a child and I for one cannot wait to have this in my area!
.plan!! what plan?
I own a DC, I love it, but it's pretty clear where Sega is going with this. They are looking to get out of the business. Who will this sort of Set-top-box device appeal to? Hotel owners. A closed box with no GD-ROM drive (which is supposedly backwards compatible?) and the games are an afterthought, which will be set-up on a Pay-per-play basis, with a built in cable-modem for web-surfing on the side.
What software developer is going to develop for a box like this? None of them. Old games will be downloaded to the HD and stored there. The hotel crowd will probably get a kick out of Chu-Chu Rocket and Tetris.
Is Sega that strapped for cash that they have to start selling off the DC technology to anyone who wants it? Rumors are flying about a soon to be $99 Dreamcast. If true this would only confirm my suspicion that Sega is looking to clear out old inventory and get out.
Which makes it bastardized version of a bastardized version of Sun's Jini and "The Dot-Com Home."
Microsoft has had a lot of things to admire them for... but new original ideas has never been one of them.
Kinda justice really since Windows is bastardized version of the Mac Finder which is a bastardized version of the Xerox Star....
Um.. Like EverQuest???? Phantasy Star Online???
These types of games, obvously, already exist and are very popular. But its not "pay per play" rather its like a magazine subscription, where you pay to keep playign because they keep adding things to the game. When they stop adding things, these games quickly die. (UOL anyone?)
For the sake of accuracy, this set-top box is, and never was a successor to the Dreamcast. It is stupid to assume that it is.
Sega made a statement last week that they would be packaging DC technology and licencing it to third-parties. This is not a replacement, nor a replacement to the DC. In fact Sega also stated that they were looking into making a DC PCI-card for PC's... May as well say that Taco's PC is the DC successor as well.
-Jayde
What's a sig?
...which is the bastardized version of the mechanical adding machine, which is the bastardized version of the abacus, which is the bastardized version of two sticks rubbed together to make fire...
Since I live in Perth, Australia where cable (as in pay TV) -based internet connections are non-existent and (A)DSL is only available in the CBD an a couple of select suburbs, I have to add a big "whatever" to this discussion. This product is impossible for me to use. Anyway, I don't care -- I'm having fun buying secondhand SNES carts from swapmeets and pawnbrokers. There are enough games out there already that I've never tried such that if all game production were to cease today I'd be dead before I ran out of fun.
Sounds like Sega is limiting its market share by requiring people:
1. Have cable in their residence
2. Care to pay money for a digital cable connection
This restricts both the tech-less (antenna, analog cable), and the tech-savvy (digital satellite reciever). To me, it sounds like a great feature and option, but even with a digital cable line myself I'm not sure I'd want to be restricted to loading new games only at home..especially if it restricted me from taking it to another place (i.e. college dorm, apartment, etc.) without a cable connection.
But it's still a year away from release, so perhaps they'll change their minds and find more reasonable distribution methods.
"The universe seems neither benign nor hostile, merely indifferent." --Carl Sagan
Not saying this isnt a good idea, just wondering why.
Given a reasonably level playing field, who would win a fight between a bear and a shark?
Looks like Timothy don't even bottered to read the story. And from a imparcial news source like MS-NBC, with a misleading header... go figure.
/. is beccoming "rumours for nerds, rumours that matters" (driving a company out of bussines by rumours is not a small thing, and matters to all their workers, who would buy a product that is already "discontinued" and "unsupported" by the manufacturer? WHO?)
What have the slashdot crew against Sega, it's that difficult to check first the story, then post?
Still, I expect (wish) that Sega will be on the HW market more time than the people think.
On a side note, IIRC in Japan Pioneer built Saturn comptible hardware in 1997 or 1998 so this isn't a new move for Sega.
sigh.
Mexico: 100% conservative's America now!