Slashdot Mirror
Former Sega Prez Discusses the Dreamcast's Failure
An anonymous reader writes "Former Sega of America president Bernie Stolar speaks out about the man who ousted him, EA's attempt to monopolize sports games on the Dreamcast, why the Dreamcast failed, and a legendary prank he pulled against Sony. 'I fought to have a modem on the platform. Maybe it was early — who knows. But I fought for a modem in the beginning because I wanted to have massively multiplayer online games on that system.' When asked about the console's online capabilities not catching on with consumers, he said, 'It doesn't surprise me, because there wasn't software tied into it. They were not building and going after software to start that. I mean, I was looking for developers and content providers to start doing that. Sega did not do that after I left. They just abandoned it.'"
"The consumer judged that it was the right hardware and the right software. Look at the software that was on that system. Look at the sporting titles that". Compared with it's rivals, Nintendo 64, already out with a fair string of Great Mario games, Zelda games, and 3d party titles, ps2 was on it's way, as was xbox. " Look at the software that was on that system" You mean um, 'crazy taxi' (good for a little while, but wears thin) and um, Mavel v. Capcon 2? and um, well I"m sure if you owned the system you could think of more, but those are the only ones I ever saw that looked worth playing. That's the problem, even if it had great titles, no one was aware of them.
But it is true that Sony was holding its first golf tournament -- I believe in Napa [California]...I forget which golf course. I had someone go to the golf pro, paid him money to take out all the Sony golf balls and put in Sega golf balls instead.
And I had somebody dressed up as Sonic driving around the course, and skywriters writing 'Dreamcast is coming' up in the air. That part is true, yes.
I love my Dreamcast, it's an elegant gaming solution that had ~700 games. With so many excellent fighting games... Marvel vs. Capcom, Soul Caliber, Powerstone... Plus some of my personal favorites Shenmue and Tony Hawk 2. It was a wonderful system that in a different world could of dominated. Either way it holds a certain place in my heart that few systems will ever attain.
On the Oregon Cost born and raised, On the beach is where I spent most of my days
I agree with him. However, the Dreamcast had some of the best software available, including the best sports games, arcade games and fighting games. I play a lot of RPGs and still think Skies of Arcadia is one of the best ever. It had games that were ported onto XBOX and went on to become some of the best XBOX games. It had cutting edge online gaming with Phantasy Star, innovative arcade adventures like Shemue, and better graphic versions of exisiting hits like Tony Hawk (a truly superior version compared to PS1). So with all that great software, then there's still something missing to his arguement - if it's all about the software, and the dreamcast had a ton of great software, then maybe you need to come up with a better reason why it failed.
Let me predict the comments on this topic. Everyone praises the dreamcast, how great it was, or always wanted to buy one. Well, I got some news for you. It's your FAULT it died. You should had mentioned its greatness back when it mattered and perhaps its fate would had been different today wouldn't it?
I had one, and it was a great system, RIP.
But I dislike how this guy tries to shift the blame throughout the interview - the Dreamcast was a lot like the PS3 of this generation - too ahead of its time. It's not that it was overpriced like the PS3 was, but developing for it was a big pain in the ass (although there were some great games because of its powerful hardware). When the PS2 came out soon after, it had a DVD player and truly felt next-gen. The modem this guy pushed for was a pretty crappy feature compared to a fully-featured DVD player.
And I so rarely see it spoken of. Easily pirated software. All you needed was the internet and a cd burner. No modding; burn and go. And everyone did it.
"Former Sega Prez Discusses" "Prez"? Prez??? Who wrote TFA title, and it is from the article, not /. A highschool AOL reject?
So it was because the company hired someone who basically didn't care about the (hardware) product. That sounds epic on the same level of Apple hiring John Sculley... yeah, a soft-drinks guy is really going to understand how to sell computers.
Not only that, but the guy actually believed they could distribute games through the internet... in a day when modems were still king? And then they released the Ethernet module in such low quantities the US, just as broadband was on the rise.
I signed up for the extra run of BBAs, but nothing ever came of that. (and that company's domain is now owned by squatters) I only ended up with one because of a lucky Buy It Now on ebay.
#naabhaprzrag, #sverubfr-000, #agi-fcbafberq, negvpyr[pynff*=' negvpyr-ary-'] { qvfcynl: abar !vzcbegnag; }
When they get it right, they get it right. Their arcade titles, the Genesis and Dreamcast were awesome.
But when they get it wrong, they really get it wrong, like when some genius decides to release 9 million awful add-ons for the Genesis. Getting out of the hardware biz was supposed to make them better. It hasn't. They mainly make awful rehashes of their old franchises. Madworld is the only Sega title I've considred buying for years but even then I know it won't be great so I'll pick it up cheap.
I get the impression Sega was a company that had great developers and poor managers and as time goes on the good devs leave and more bad managers come on board.
That's a question I'd rather not answer.
In the last two generations of consoles, the big winners are the ones that offer a single feature:
Backwards Compatibility.
PS1->PS2 = WIN (against DC which was a superb system)
GameCube -> Wii = Win (against VASTLY superior hardware)
In the case of the Wii, the hardware was actually substandard when compared to PS3 and XBox Live. The innovative control setup made a difference, but a lot of us parents eneded up buying Wiis because we could get away with buying 2-3 Wii games and the kids could still use all the old Gamecube games. I would venture a guess that close to 85-90% of Gamecube owners bought a Wii, just like PS1 owners upgraded to the PS2. The allure of $10 games (old PS1 games and old Gamecube games) is huge for families that are buying a game system.
-- $G
Alright I post this as someone who wasn't really interested in the DC or most of SEGA until fairly recently. But I can probably provide some insight into what SEGA has become in the recent years, which pretty much match the thoughts of this man.
Two years ago I started playing Phantasy Star Universe, the successor to Phantasy Star Online. Many people know about PSO which was one of the first MMO so I don't feel the need to explain that many people had huge expectations for the game. But management killed its potential and the lifetime of the game is just a flow of bad decisions.
First error was to build hype around the game (as they do with all their games, and they do it pretty well) only to release it with next to nothing to do online. A couple missions, that's it. You could play everything from the beginning and be done in a day. Then you could replay them over and over to reach the cap. Pretty poor for an online game. Why did they do that? Because they didn't have much content and they wanted to make it last as long as possible. Every two weeks or so they release maybe a new mission (or a new difficulty of an existing mission) that includes "new items" that were available on the original disc. 3 years after the release they still have a handful of items from the original disc they never released. Frustration and quitting ensue.
What does that tells us? That they made as little investment as possible with the hope to make it last long enough to collect many monthly fees. They also got a substantial amount of money by selling the discs (original game and expansion).
Now I won't bore you with more of the many details about this game and will go on to one of the last chapter. Recently they added a cash shop (in addition of the monthly fee and the price of the game). This cash shop doesn't give your usual items like EXP or drop boosts though. Through the cash shop you can obtain many exclusivity including: the best weapons in the game for almost each category (account bound, can't be traded), cool clothes available on the original disc, a service to upgrade your weapons and armors in a way that gives a huge advantage to those who do, etc. In other words, they went and made playing the game almost pointless because you can just buy everything you need. It's also expensive. Frustration and people quitting ensue.
This feature gives them an additional revenue stream that gives them money "right now" despite being immensely negative on the game later on. Because the end-game at this point was still to improve your character. Now there's no more end-game, therefore no reason to play after you buy what you need.
Those two points show that they don't have a long term goal. They're only trying to find cheap ways to get the maximum money without investing much. Instead of using the old method of building a great game and making your customers happy.
They can do that because of their old reputation and their extensive hype-building skills. Old fans always look forward to the next game even if the previous wasn't all that good.
So yes, the indie developer feeling isn't there. The management and marketing feeling is very strong though.
"BS: I think theyâ(TM)re going through some really difficult times. I donâ(TM)t believe they have the content, developers, and producers there that they had at one time. I donâ(TM)t know their financial position, but theyâ(TM)re probably not spending the type of money they should be spending. You tell me the last time you saw a great Sonic game."
He obviously doesn't read /.
2D Sonic
I actually worked at Sega when the Dreamcast was released, and it was quite ahead of its time which, admittedly, given the console development timeframe, is not the coup that it might be, but none the less, a market edge. Sega, IMHO, has miscalculated many such opportunities to get a "leg up" in various market areas. They were also pioneers, or at least robust competitors, in online game matchmaking, a la Steam, etc. They also failed to invest in, nurture and capitalize on that market angle. It's unfortunate, because earlier on they had so much brand cache and they seem to have frittered that away.
CD Copy Protection could have saved the system.
For any of you who owned the Dreamcast you know how easy it was to obtain pirated copies of games.
Or how easy it was to find tutorials on copying games yourself from your local blockbuster.
It's funny how people blame it's failure on other business reasons, management, marketing, timing, when really you can attribute a lot to the hacks.
Just like the Saturn, some of the games were second-to-none.
(Sorry, I am a SEGA fan boy)
Not so. I'm sure many, many people did not. Not everyone is comfortable downloading and burning off the net. Many people will pay good money for bottled water, never mind colorful videogames.
I bought the system for one game only: Jet Set Radio. I saw a legit copy from Japan and couldn't get it out of my head. It was the only game I ever copied, because when I got my system it was not available in North America. As soon as Jet Grind Radio (the poorly-named American version) was released, I bought it. I never copied another game - though I bought a whole bunch.
The Dreamcast is the only console I have ever owned. And I have seen many consoles. I remember when Pac Man was released for Atari. But the Dreamcast was the only one that made me really, really want one.
What it came down to, in my mind, was momentum --
Sega was coming off a long string of failed consoles (particularly in America, where the Saturn was never popular against the playstation). They had the stench of desperation about them, and brought out a console a year earlier than its biggest (and rising star) competitor. They came to the party *early*, and that's social suicide. Not to mention that many Sega fans has finally accepted the failure of the Saturn and jumped ship just a year or two before. Many publishers and developers lost faith in Sega, including EA who was/is, for better or worse, the biggest player in the game -- Madden moves consoles in the US (even though I much preferred the Sega Sports versions, personally), and FIFA moves consoles everywhere else. The Dreamcast got neither.
Now Sony, who had mopped up the floor during the Saturn's generation, and was the new, exciting player in the console space, was right there shouting "We have movie-quality graphics! We Have tons of developer support! PS1 was a success! Oh, and we play DVDs too!!!" -- Everyone was excited about DVD in particular and many a PS2 were sold to parents looking for a cheap entry to DVDs that the kids could also enjoy, and to younger folks wanting DVDs and games.
The irony, of course, is that the DC actually delivered -- The hardware was quite powerful, It was cheap to develop and produce (off the shelf hardware), and it was a joy to develop for. They even had many greats in their library despite the tepid response from developers.
The Dreamcast wasn't really killed. It was born on life-support.
People seem to forget why Stolar was fired in the first place. He was instrumental in killing the Saturn (though he certainly doesn't shoulder all of the blame for that). People complain that Sega has always had terrible management, well Stolar was at the top of that list at that time.
Of course this is my opinion, but I think that one of the reasons the Saturn couldn't compete was lack of diversity in software (ironically, the very thing he touts in the interview). Stolar was obsessed with sports titles. He was convinced that Americans would play nothing else (probably came up with that idea from the popularity of Genesis success with sports titles), and he became notorious for blocking developers of anything else. The Saturn's library stagnated due to Sega's worsening relationship with developers, while Sony went out of their way to put anything and everything on the PS1.
Stolar was not the genius that could have saved the DC, he is the cancer that killed it before it had a chance. It's unfortunate that Sega didn't fire him during the Saturn days - it might have saved their future.
SIDE NOTE: I think it's funny that, even after all these years, all that Stolar can talk about is sports. Every anecdote he has in that interview is sports related. Some things never change.
so EA wouldn't develop sports games on the dreamcast if the best deal Stolar could offer them was them being the only 3rd party sports publisher and sega being their only competitor? one competitor was too scary for EA? do their games really suck that bad that such a good deal scared them off?
This was back when people believed the hype about the Emotion Engine. Squaresoft hyped a possible FF7 remake, and the possibility of viewing scenes rendered in realtime from Final Fantasy: Spirits Within. The hype killed desire for the Dreamcast.
The rest was because people were pirating games on the Dreamcast left and right.
Twinstiq, game news
Actually piracy did not kill the dreamcast, sales were quite good until the day the PS2 hit the streets.
Then everything took a nosedive, so go figure how much impact piracy had in the death of the dreamcast.
So far no console has been killed by piracy, in fact some have become number one by being easily piratable
(PS1, Nintendo DS)
The only console I can remotely think of of might be being killed by being easily piratable is the PSP, but there are
also other factores which are slowly killing the system.
Heck not even the AMIGA was killed by piracy it was killed by SVGA on the PC and on that system as well as the C64
everyone and his mother was pirating games.