Dreamcast

Dreamcast
Developer: Sega Publishers: Sega (JP/US/EU/AU), Tec Toy (BR) Released in JP: November 27, 1998 Released in US: September 9, 1999 Released in EU: October 14, 1999 Released in AU: November 30, 1999 Released in BR: October 4, 1999 This console has hidden developer credits. This console has hidden development-related text. This console has regional differences. This console has revisional differences. This console has a prototype article

The Dreamcast... wait, hang on...

BEEEEEEP. Please wait while disc is being checked. *SKRRRRRRT*
*whirrrrr... SKRRRR-KRRRRRT, SKRRRT*

There we go. Sorry about that. Anyway, the Dreamcast was Sega's final effort as a contender in the video game console market. While it was released to much applause with a strong library of games, it was eventually overshadowed by the success of the PlayStation 2 and was limited by both severe piracy problems (thanks to its proprietary GD-ROM discs being its only form of copy protection, which bit Sega royally when hackers discovered the console's support for multimedia CDs) and the string of failed hardware preceding its release.

Remarkably, the Dreamcast's library was a wild card. Even setting aside the loads of ports the console embraced, several developers and publishers often worked on games of varying genres with a high level of experimentation. From Sonic the Hedgehog to Godzilla, Soulcalibur to Mr. Driller, Rez to Space Channel 5, Daytona to Super Magnetic Neo, Shenmue to Sakura Wars, Blue Stinger to Illbleed, et cetera. The Dreamcast almost resembled an art gallery at times; if it was stuck on the Dreamcast, it was hastily scooped up and put on the PlayStation 2 or Xbox.

As people got used to modern disc-based consoles, the console's... idiosyncratic noisiness has since become a memorable aspect to fans and newcomers, mainly because most consoles don't angrily growl at you the instant the lid closed or the batteries ran out.

If it's any consolation, the Dreamcast's extreme vulnerability to piracy did end up giving birth to one of the most vibrant homebrew communities to date, with modifications to games being encouraged by some developers near the end of the console's life.

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Prototype Info

Development Text

All of these are present in the BIOS.

0x7B0:

SEGA SEGAKATANA KABUTO Ver.1.01d Copyright(c) SEGA ENTERPRISES LTD., 1998,1999

0x9EA4:

syTmr Version: 0.51.syTmr Build:Jun 23 199814:52:57

0xEB40:

syRtc Ver 1.00 Build:Sep 28 1998 05:10:44

0x10010:

SIMPLE PLAYER VER. 1.00 98/10/02

0xECA96:

COPYRIGHT        (C) NEC        Corporation 1998
All rights reserved by NEC Corporation. This program must be
used solely for the purpose for which it was furnished by NEC
Corporation. No part of this program may be reproduced or
disclosed to others, in any form, without the prior written
permission of NEC Corporation
Use of copyright notice does not evidence publication of this
program
Developed by 
 * Semiconductor Solution Engineering Division
   NEC Corpolation
 * Home Multimedia Development Division
   NEC Corpolation
 * Client Server Software Development Division
   NEC Software,Ltd

0x1A0090:

1998,(C)SEGA ENTERPRISES        1998.09.09:DIGITALMEDIA :Y.Kashima / K.Suyama   for Boot ROM ++

Hidden Alternate Menu

Having Puyo Puyo Fever data saved to a Visual Memory Unit will allow you to access a hidden menu in the Dreamcast BIOS, dubbed "Real Mode". Pressing Start on the controller will bring up an alternate 3D menu that you can move around.

(Source: It's Still Thinking)

Hidden Credits

Present at 0x1A1A0 in the flash ROM is a list of names.

Shoichiro Irimajiri
Sadahiko Hirose
Hidekazu Yukawa
Hideki Satou
Nobuhisa Yamada
Taku Matsubara
Kazuhiro Yasutomi
Shoji Nishikawa
Takashi Sekimoto
Toshihiro Oba
Shuji Hori
Masaharu Shinohara
Kazuhiro Baba
Katsunori Gendo
Kouji Horikawa
Masatoshi Horikawa
Osamu Hosokawa
Seiichi Kajiwara
Junko Kase
Toshikazu Kawada
Yasuhisa Kawase
Yusuke Kiguchi
Naohiko Kobayashi
Manabu Kubo
Teruaki Kuwana
Kunihiro Mori
Tomoyuki Mori
Shigeru Motoyoshi
Takeshi Nagashima
Yoshifumi Nakamura
Chuji Nakayama
Madoka Nakayama
Tatsuya Namatame
Yasuhiro Nishiyama
Toshiyuki Ogawa
Tadashi Ohya
Tetsuya Okawa
Tatsuya Sakurai
Hideaki Satou
Yutaka Suetsugi
Eriko Suzuki
Masahiko Takeuchi
Makoto Takiguchi
Ryo Taki
Masaki Tanaka
Kazuo Tsuda
Satoshi Tsuda
Koichi Takayasu
Naoki Niizuma
Atsunori Himoto
Tomoe Shinohara
Kunihiro Tokumaru
Yoshikazu Nagao
Satoshi Kira
Akitoshi Oikawa
Hirokazu Hama
Toshimichi Sugai
Naoji Ozaki
Hiroki Gotou
Masaharu Yoshii
Masaki Kawahori
Yuki Yamanaka
Shinichi Uchida
Masahiro Seki
Takashi Ando
Hideki Kudo
Nobuhiro Fukuda
Jiro Terakawa
Yoichi Uchida
Hiroki Okabata
Kazuyoshi Hara
Yuko Nasu
Syuuji Okada
Yutaka Okunoki
Tatuya Kouzaki
Tadashi Jokagi
Yoshiaki Kashima
Kazumi Suyama
Yutaka Sugano
Tomoko Hasegawa
Kazuhiro Matsuta
Katsuhiko Sato
Manabu Kusunoki
Shinichi Oya
Takeshi Suzuki
Kazunori Shibata
Shigeyuki Shimizu
Masayuki Imanishi
Kenji Ohtsuji
Masamichi Miyoshi
Tarou Mitani
Takaaki Jindou
Yoshitake Noguchi

Regional Differences

Japan/US	Europe/Australia

In Europe and Australia, the Dreamcast logo was changed from red to blue. The reason for this has never been officially confirmed, but the editors of Edge magazine theorized that it was to prevent legal problems with German publisher Tivola, as their logo is a red swirl.

It's a common misconception that the North American Dreamcast had a more saturated color scheme, but both non-European consoles use the same shade of orange.

Unusually, most games for the European Dreamcast prioritised 60hz. 50hz was often a secondary option, with only a few games supporting just 50hz.