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[Gen X]

In aus it wasnt the ps2 that killed the dreamcast here the dreamcast marketing was non existant and the console was hideously overpriced like all aus sega software and games.....it died here because nobody knew it existed

Hell even the saturn got a few tv adds before
It died

Best hardware and games library does not always equal victory

I had.my DC round at the missus place the first Xmas it was out in NZ. All her family was there and the.kids were ib absolute awe picking their jaws off the floor over Soul Calibur. When they asked what console it was their response to my reply was "Ehhh. We only play Playstation" and walked away. These kids were in their mid teens.

 

[Satchel]

Still wish that Microsoft included Dreamcast compatiblity in the original Xbox like was rumoured.

It was Sega that nixed that deal. Not Microsoft.

 

[Phire Phox]

I still to this day believe the NA DC launch was the best launch line-up for any console.

Shame PS2 killed it off.

 

[Mammoth Jones]

Piracy
PS2

This. It's not complicated.

People were pirating the CD's left and right.

People were holding out for the PS2.

 

[Picobrain]

This. It's not complicated.

People were pirating the CD's left and right.

PS2 was most pirated system of all time and yet they sold shit load of consoles. It's not piracy that killed Dreamcast.

 

[Dark Octave]

They heard MS was jumping into the game and decided to cut their losses.

Probably the best move they ever made. They never stood a chance and it wasn't like Sony and Nintendo wasn't already bringing the pain.

 

[IrishNinja]

rumor has it microsoft was simply trying to buy their way into the market with the xbox. they tried nintendo, bungie, sega, and rare. they were mostly successful. only nintendo didn't budge. sega was supposedly in deep talks with microsoft for a while, but backed out last minute. however as part of doing so, they still had to make a certain amount of exclusive games for the xbox, none of which microsoft backed with advertisements and none of which sold. their failure to really find an audience after going third party was partially aided by whatever went down with microsoft.

really wish we knew what the details were on that...after the DC BC talk & those exclusives (which as you said, got no real exposure & seemed to sour whatever they had going) there had to've been something there. reminds me a bit of sony/nintendo

It was Sega that nixed that deal. Not Microsoft.

based on what?

This. It's not complicated.

People were pirating the CD's left and right.

People were holding out for the PS2.

those are factors, not nearly the whole story - sega going under wasn't just the DC, and the DC didn't just struggle because of those elements alone

 

[Raging Spaniard]

The Dreamcast was super popular in college, but it was sooo easy to hack. Barely anybody I knew bought any games, they just pirated the software.


In the same timeframe though, noody that I knew was pirating PS2 games. Small sample size Im sure, but it was a factor.

 

[erawsd]

DC wasn't really that great. People look back on it fondly but at the time it was quite the let down, despite being Sega's best system since the Genesis.

Eh, I disagree. I certainly wouldn't say it was anywhere near the best console of all time, but between Soul Calibur, Sonic, and Power Stone I don't think I've been as please with console launch since.

 

[Anticitizen One]

In many ways the Dreamcast morphed into the Xbox. I mean they even have the same looking controller and alot of the same games (Jet Grind Radio, Shenmue 2, Crazy Taxi 3, etc.)

 

[erawsd]

PS2 was most pirated system of all time and yet they sold shit load of consoles. It's not piracy that killed Dreamcast.

Definitely not. Truth is, Dreamcast had no DRM at all, you could just burn copies onto a disc without mod chips or anything else.

 

[A Black Falcon]

I'm sure it's been said, but it's because Sega ran out of money. Also because they lost several hundred million dollars on the Dreamcast, with no profit. Maybe had it lasted years more they'd eventually have made money, but they didn't have the cash to survive that long; they needed money, now, or they were doomed. It didn't happen. Sega was in dire financial trouble because of the collapse of the arcade industry (everywhere except for Japan), the money they'd spent developing the Dreamcast that they never got back (and it was sold at a loss from day one, too!), and all the money they'd lost on Saturn too.

Also, while DC sales were decent, particularly in the US, it did terribly in Japan, never cracking low single digit marketshare, and didn't do great in Europe either. But even in the US it wasn't always outselling the N64 and PS1, and the PS2 was a massive success from day one. DC sales did not seem likely to improve. Sega didn't do as well as they had been hoping in the US in Christmas 2000, and that was a likely factor in their announcement in January 2001 that they were going third party by the end of the year, along with the impact the PS2 had made of course.

As for piracy, no, that wasn't a major factor. I know a lot of people like to blame piracy, but I very highly doubt that it had any kind of relevant role in Sega's troubles. A few more sales here and there (and remember that most pirated games would never have been purchased new) would have done nothing; what Sega needed was lots more hardware sales, and lots more software sales too. Piracy wasn't really the problem, slow sales and being out of money were the problems. Sure, it hurt them a bit, but it was NOT why Sega failed. The Saturn had very little piracy, and Sega lost just as much money on that system as they did the Dreamcast. Piracy had nothing to do with the DC's failure.

 

[Tellaerin]

Dreamcast was discontinued because they didn't have the money to support it, and the rampant piracy on the platform made it poison for 3rd parties. EA refused to support it, and so did most influential 3rd parties.

Dreamcast is considered a failure because it was discontinued after less than 2 years.

"Rampant piracy" wasn't the reason EA refused to support the DC.

 

[A Black Falcon]

"Rampant piracy" wasn't the reason EA refused to support the DC.

EA refused to support it because they'd been burned by how badly the Saturn had done (and had supported that system fairly well, surely to their financial detriment), and wanted serious incentives to back Sega's next system -- isn't the rumor that they wanted exclusivity on sports games (ie, no sports competition from Sega)? Sega said no, so no EA.

 

[Aquamarine]

That analysis seems too simplistic. The arcade market dying probably contributed to those losses.

You're right...it is too simplistic. Let me be more specific:

• Sluggish growth in Dreamcast market penetration with virtually flat momentum
  
• Low yield Dreamcast returns
  
• Bloated corporate organization
  
• Rampant inefficiency

^ All of those factors within Sega contributed to their demise after the Dreamcast was introduced.

Compounding those factors was the lack of consumer trust post-Saturn, awkward timing (the DC was instantly overshadowed by the PS2), and a host of other factors that made the Dreamcast business horribly unprofitable.


To set the record straight, the lack of Arcade Machine sales was NOT a key factor in Sega flirting with Bankruptcy...while the sector dramatically contracted throughout the late-90s, the losses accrued by Sega were either relatively minimal or the sector remained profitable through immediate streamlining efforts.

 

[Tellaerin]

EA refused to support it because they'd been burned by how badly the Saturn had done (and had supported that system fairly well, surely to their financial detriment), and wanted serious incentives to back Sega's next system -- isn't the rumor that they wanted exclusivity on sports games (ie, no sports competition from Sega)? Sega said no, so no EA.

*nod* Gamasutra did a nice piece on it.

http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/132517/the_rise_and_fall_of_the_dreamcast.php?print=1

Skip down to "Why Electronic Arts Shunned The Dreamcast" and "The Sports Situation".

 

[WolvenOne]

Nintendo's toy licensing probably helps as well. Like I said, they probably wouldn't be in as bad a situation as Sega was, but I don't think they'd be anywhere near a healthy situation either. I cannot see them being so thoroughly beaten down, and not coming back out it in desperate straits.

A little desperation, some real hunter, can be a good thing for a company, it can motivate them to do better. a LOT of desperation however, tends to cause them to make short sighted decisions, like rushing out game development.

This is what happened to a lot of Sega's games after going third party. They rushed out a lot of games to try helping with X or Y years earning reports, which of course only hurt them.

I'd love to see Nintendo pushed to finally hire on some new talent, that understand where the industry is headed, and as eager to adapt and compete. However, I don't want to see the company so thoroughly trashed, that rushing out incomplete games becomes attractive.

For all Nintendo's recent fumbles, their games at least, tend to be incredibly well polished. I'd hate to lost that as well.

 

[Dorimukyasuto]

EA refused to support it because they'd been burned by how badly the Saturn had done (and had supported that system fairly well, surely to their financial detriment), and wanted serious incentives to back Sega's next system -- isn't the rumor that they wanted exclusivity on sports games (ie, no sports competition from Sega)? Sega said no, so no EA.

Though true, Sega did create some damn good sports games. Also, that sexy black DC is all mine.

 

[TheSeks]

........I recall him saying the exact opposite.

Correct, but he then said different.

 

[Mr.Wreckless]

PS2 was most pirated system of all time and yet they sold shit load of consoles. It's not piracy that killed Dreamcast.

You actually had to do things to the PS2 in order to pirate games. With the DC all you had to do was burn the disc. I was in college during the DC lifetime and nobody actually bought games for it. It's a shame because it was a fighting game players dream console.

 

[JerryThePredator]

I still consider this the biggest tragedy in the history of gaming. Sega was on such an unbelievable creative roll with the DC and we haven't seen anything like that from a publisher before or since.

I'm not sure how dozens and dozens of arcade ports would be considering "an unbelievable creative roll" but different strokes, I guess.

 

[Oblivion]

Quoting myself from a couple of months ago:



^ Basically, the Dreamcast ran Sega into ruin, so they needed to discontinue it to stave off bankruptcy.

Huh, that's kinda interesting. I thought Sega was bleeding money for years before the DC even appeared on the map.

 

[NeoRausch]

The all-time struggle between Sega Japan and Sega America...

 

[IrishNinja]

Quoting myself from a couple of months ago:

^ Basically, the Dreamcast ran Sega into ruin, so they needed to discontinue it to stave off bankruptcy.

Huh, that's kinda interesting. I thought Sega was bleeding money for years before the DC even appeared on the map.

from that thread though: it's not the entire picture!

I believe the reason they made it through the very rough Saturn years is because Isao Okawa infused $40 million of his own money and gave SEGA around $700 million USD worth of CSK shares.

Yeah, I agree with the people blaming the Sammy merger; early post-DC Sega made some great games, but that stopped, abruptly, when they merged with Sammy. Of course though, that merger happened because of Sega's awful financial situation... but still, that is the reason.

No, what happened was that both the Saturn and Dreamcast lost Sega several hundred million dollars each. Sega didn't start losing money until FY 1998 (that is, sometime in early/mid 1997, when that fiscal year started), that is true, but look at how much less money Sega made in FYs 1996 and 1997, versus the years before. You can see the huge decline, and that's because they completely failed the generation transition, lost a lot of money on the Saturn, and while for a few years they propped it up with the Saturn's moderate success at home and continuing Genesis profits from the West (remember, Sega tried to kill the Genesis in 1995, but it was still selling in the hundreds of thousands until 1998; I don't think it's really a coincidence that it's 1997 when Sega started losing money. That's right about when the Genesis was fading out.), that eventually faded, and with it went Sega's profitability.

Also, remember that in the late '90s Sega's arcade business, always central, wasn't as profitable as it had been earlier. This is a really important point, and might be more important than the whole paragraph above; Sega couldn't rely on big arcade profits as much as they had before.

Also, in 1996 Sega also gave up on the handheld business, since they mostly stopped making new Game Gear games in 1996, gave up on the Nomad, and replaced them with nothing. The GG had been a reasonably successful system, selling in the usual non-Genesis Sega 9-13 million range, so abandoning that business completely was, I would guess, likely an overall negative to their long-term profitability. (And a foolish decision overall, too...)

So, it would be a mistake to look at that chart and and blame that on the Dreamcast. It's just that during the Dreamcast era Sega didn't have a profitable arcade business and continuing Genesis sales in the West to prop up the company's profitability; if we had numbers from just the Saturn business, it'd be very, very deep in the red, just like Sega in general became later on.



Sega's problem wasn't that they lost several hundred million dollars, it was that they never had much money to begin with. That's why those losses hurt so much -- even at its Genesis peak, Sega wasn't a cash-rich company, and were better at wasting that money they were making than saving it. The Sega Multimedia Studio (at Sega of America) cost them a good $10 million, apparently, for example, and only ended up making two games, Jurassic Park (Sega CD) and Wild Woody (Sega CD... and then there's the 32X, Saturn debacle, other studios, etc.

Sega didn't have much money to begin with, so they could never compete equally on a financial level with NEC or Sony. That was true for Nintendo too, but unlike Nintendo, Sega also wasn't any good at saving or making good investments, and that eventually came back to bite them. Nintendo, in contrast, has billions in the bank. Yamauchi thought that in this industry, having a solid cash reserve as a backup would be important. That caution is now showing its usefulness, I think...

i don't disagree with aqua about the overall grim picture it paints for the DC, but looking at those #'s alone would lead you to believe it was the only real loss they took post genesis, which was sadly not the case.

 

[Oroboros+]

As a huge fan of the Dreamcast, I think the main issue came down to the software which ultimately resulted in the systems demise.

As someone put it earlier, Sega's biggest franchise and killer app was Sonic and Shenmue, while the rest of the games were mostly arcadey ports which despite being impressive, didn't hold that lasting following which the PS2 stole with their lineup.

The fact that the system never had any good RPG's, with the exception of Skies Of Arcadia couldn't have helped during a time when those games were considered 'killer apps' on consoles. It was a shame to see it go, but the lack of variety in titles and third party support definitely sealed it's fate imo.

 

[Shenzakai]

Sadly the DC was my first and last Sega console at the same time

I read a lot about Sega's history and first of all, like the others already said, Sega had to stop with HW because they simply ran out of money. Why?

They messed it totally up with their fanbase with all the fuck about Sega 32X, Mega-CD and Saturn. All of them failed, had a few really outstanding games and were canceled before usual EOL. That gave Sega a huge loss of trust from their fanbase, which then didn't consider to buy a DC.
Also even today I want to slap every single frikkin idiot from Segas marketing team back in the days since they made the WORST ad campaign (at least in Europe) ever! Absolutely no in-game scenes, just abstract things (i.e. this), bad print ads and the like. They literally smashed themselves as deep as possible into the dirt ;(

Anyway, I loved the small thing for games like Sonic Adventure, RE:CV, Shenmue etc.

 

[clem84]

Piracy hurt it really bad. Including audio CD support was a costly mistake by Sega. I wonder how the DC would have fared had it not been for piracy. Would it have survived? Maybe not. But maybe we would have gotten it for a little longer. That year and a half to 2 years after the DC launch are some of the fondest memories I have as a gamer.

 

[A Black Falcon]

Quoting myself from a couple of months ago:



^ Basically, the Dreamcast ran Sega into ruin, so they needed to discontinue it to stave off bankruptcy.

That's very inaccurate, as I've said before. The Saturn probably lost about as much money as the Dreamcast did, it just didn't have any cover from continuing sales from past successful systems, as the Saturn did to cover some of its losses.

from that thread though: it's not the entire picture!





i don't disagree with aqua about the overall grim picture it paints for the DC, but looking at those #'s alone would lead you to believe it was the only real loss they took post genesis, which was sadly not the case.

One thing I didn't mention there is that Sega also phased out the Master System in Europe in 1995, as well as phasing out the Game Gear in 1996 in Japan and in 1997 in the US and Europe, and the Genesis in 1995 in Japan and 1995-1998 in the US (Japan mostly stopped making games in fall 1995, etc etc). Sega of Japan was trying really hard to get people to move over to Saturn by phasing out their other systems, but all they succeeded at doing was killing their own profitability, while failing to sell many Saturns.

To set the record straight, the lack of Arcade Machine sales was NOT a key factor in Sega flirting with Bankruptcy...while the sector dramatically contracted throughout the late-90s, the losses accrued by Sega were either relatively minimal or the sector remained profitable through immediate streamlining efforts.

Even if it remained profitable, I'm sure its profits were much reduced, and that had an impact.

Correct, but he then said different.

I don't know which one of those to believe...

 

[MidgarBlowedUp]

It's hard to find fault in the system.

There was Soul Calibur, Sonic Adventure 2, Power Stone, Skies of Arcadia, Jet Set Radio, Marvel Vs Capcom 2, Ready 2 Rumble Boxing, Crazy Taxi, Dead or Alive 2 etc.

Don't forget the graphics were mind blowing for their time and it kickstarted online gaming.

I disagree. Mom got me and my brother one and we both thought the games on it were lacking. We never thought the graphics were mind blowing except for a few titles like DOA. I even remember shenmue being impressive but laughing at how boring the game was with loading screens everywhere. Then a few months later they discontinued the console. My mom was pretty pissed, but my brother and I could care less.

We were little kids at the time so I'm just stating my opinion from way back then. I might pick one up now and enjoy it.

 

[iamvin22]

Clone CD. That is all.

 

[polyh3dron]

Why is the WiiU still going? Coz Nintendo are better at planning. You don't see them making a $100 million RPG trilogy for their console.

Instead they're making games that could've been made for the 3DS.

And yeah, piracy hit the DC really hard

I bought all my games.

 

[Terrible Majesty]

I think its because of 1. Sega has a history of poor business practices/decision making and 2. Sega stopped making games for it. Couldn't Sega have just continued to support the system until the end of the generation?

 

[A Black Falcon]

I think its because of 1. Sega has a history of poor business practices/decision making and 2. Sega stopped making games for it. Couldn't Sega have just continued to support the system until the end of the generation?

Sure, they could have. Games including Panzer Dragoon Orta, House of the Dead 3, Super Monkey Ball, Virtua Fighter 4, Beach Spikers, GunValkyrie, Jet Set Radio Future, and ToeJam & Earl 3 all started development for the Dreamcast, before moving to other systems (other games, like Sonic Heroes and Billy Hatcher feel Dreamcast-style, but there isn't proof that the games actually started development for Dreamcast, and not newer systems.). They could have stuck with it, released those and other games, and maybe even managed to release another console in 2004-2005, if they could have managed to stave off bankrupty and release it.

However, that path would probably have led to Sega going under. They thought that their only chance to become a profitable company again was to abandon the DC, which was not selling well enough. Considering that Sega was profitable again by mid 2002, they may well have been right, unfortunately.

 

[SPACECADET]

I was going to go to toys r' us to pick up some pokemon cards. when a friend of mine asked if he could tag along. when we got there, i spotted this box where you could sign up to win a dreamcast and got my friend and we both entered for it, my friend got his filled out and dropped his in he box first followed by mine. a week later he calls me all excited saying he had won the contest and he was picking up his dreamcast later that day. i was happy for him but also jealous, as i irrationally felt that if i had only not let him come with me that day i would have entered my slip in first like he had done and i would have won it, at least that's how my young mind worked. but anyways, it was still fun because we would get to play the sonic demo that came with it. and once he even rented soul caliber and power stone. but that was about the extent of it. the only game that house ever owned for DC was a bass fishing game... and he never rented any other games after that first week. it kind of sat and ate up dust. when the dreamcast died i was happy... happy everyone would feel my regret... my sadness... my rage....


hahahaha.......ahahahahahaha


ahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaaaaaaaaa

 

[KnockOneOff]

I miss Dreamcast, it had everything, I spent so much time with my console

I think the PS2 and the piracy killed it also the saturns fail which ate the extra cash flow

I remember buying crazy taxi like 3 weeks before release and all the game stores thought I had an illegal copy when I asked them trade price as they wouldn't believe I bought it from a store

 

[Synth_floyd]

He also knew that Sega would eventually have to get out of the console hardware business altogether, because it was simply too expensive for a company with limited resources like Sega to keep going. Nevertheless, Okawa did not want Sega to have to bail with the stink of Saturn on its back. It was going to cost money that Sega did not have, putting his beloved company further in the hole, but it was now a matter of honor for Okawa. Remember, Japanese businessmen such as Isao Okawa place a great amount of value in the concept of honor, and Okawa still believe that Sega was and always would be an honorable company.

LOL if true.

 

[Tizoc]

Sony fanboys ruined it and wrote the history books. Dreamcast was the last great console.

ALL HAIL SEGA

You're sounding like a butthurt SEGA fanboy >_>;

 

[IrishNinja]

Clone CD. That is all.

this thread happens every other month, and the piracy meme never dies

You're sounding like a butthurt SEGA fanboy >_>;

yeah, i empathize with the view, but while sony did them no favors, it was sega's doing for quite a while there. i never really hated sony, i mean they're at least somewhat in spirit the way they push tech sometimes...god, UKresistance would weep to hear such things said though

 

[ArchangelWest]

There were things called the Sega CD, Sega 32X, Sega Nomad, and Sega Saturn. All were considered failures.

I think you can only fail so many times before you need to call it quits.

Yeah, that was the thing as far as I remember. They had all of those Genesis plug in enhancers, then the Saturn, then the Dreamcast, and people didn't seem to bite on any of them in numbers large enough to keep them from draining all of their capital. Dreamcast was just the final nail in the coffin, and that had to do more with the previous knocks they took and the fact that Sega was bleeding cash at that point, faster than the I.V. could replace it

 

[Nekofrog]

Because Bernie Stolar was incompetent.

 

[To Far Away Times]

The Dreamcast failing wasn't Sega's fault; it was our fault. Sega's first party was the stuff of legends.

 

[Ecotic]

After the Sega Saturn failed Sega had essentially exited the console space for a number of years prior to the Dreamcast. Video gaming had become the N64, Playstation, and Pokemon for a solid 3-4 years. By 1999 the 16-bit era where Sega was a big name was a distant memory.

It was extremely hard to get people to even take notice that Sega was back. I remember shelf space for Dreamcast was minimal.

 

[Absinthian]

The reason was because Dreamcasts played .ISO files allowing anyone to easily pirate games with very little effort. People stopped buying games.

 

[Tizoc]

yeah, i empathize with the view, but while sony did them no favors, it was sega's doing for quite a while there. i never really hated sony, i mean they're at least somewhat in spirit the way they push tech sometimes...god, UKresistance would weep to hear such things said though

I recall watching a long time ago a really interesting video on Youtube on why the Dreamcast failed; due to SEGA releasing the SEGA CD and then the 32X add on a year afterwards, with the latter having under 100 titles, FOLLOWED by the Saturn releasing in 1995/96 turned off their consumer base, it was too much money spent on addons that were not supported for very long.
It was also not to SEGA's advantage how well the PSX was recieved and it getting some of the best titles during the 32-bit era such as Final Fantasy and Resident Evil to name a few.
Which solidified the fanbase of the system and its sequel, heck in that video I mentioned?
Some people were willing to wait for a PS2 instead of getting a Dreamcast, while it seems somewhat farfetched, I wouldn't be surprised if it were true >_>;

 

[encephalon]

It was DOA in Japan and ended up being a sort of a reverse Saturn in that regard. To the west, it looks like the console that corrected the sins of the Saturn. To Japan, it must have looked like a console that didn't even live up to the Saturn. The Japanese 3rd party support just wasn't there to compete with the PS2 either.

 

[speedline]

Though true, Sega did create some damn good sports games. Also, that sexy black DC is all mine.

So true, I preferred all of Sega Sports games over EA. Probably still would if EA didn't have that monopoly thing going on.

 

[joeblow]

Owning the DC was the last time I went multi-console in a generation. A fine machine that I wished had a longer life.

 

[PastorOfMuppets]

I think if you look hard enough, you can find the NeoGaf megathread about the day the Dreamcast died. A lot of these posts are written by people who weren't there to experience the slow death of the Dreamcast.

 

[KillerTravis]

Which will be remembered as the biggest failure, Dreamcast or Vita?

 

[ReBurn]

I bought mine during the fire sale. $50 for the console and 10 games between $5 and $10 each, picking up more as I could find them.

So many games had that feel that only Sega could produce at the time. It was like bringing Sega's arcade experience home for me, as I sunk a bunch of quarters into their games. But Sega just couldn't stand up to the PS2.

Off topic a bit, but after nearly going under Sega lost something for me that they have never been able to recapture. I wish they would bring more of their old arcade properties to PSN or XBL, like Power Drift, Space Harrier, Rad Mobile. Stuff like that. I guess I just miss those days and get a bit bleary-eyed thinking about them.

The Dreamcast failing wasn't Sega's fault; it was our fault. Sega's first party was the stuff of legends.

Their first party stuff was the best. I miss it.