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Peter Moore: I didn't kill the Dreamcast

SmokedMeat

Gamer™
Sega if Japan killed it before it even reached the West.

Edit: What the fuck is auto correct’s problem with the word “of”??!! I’m sick of always having to fix it
 
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SkylineRKR

Member
This is silly reasoning, we have the sales, people weren't buying those games no matter how great someone may think some of them were. They were not appealing to people they were not helping sell consoles, and the DC's software sales were bad even early on. The Saturns software and hardware sales also suffered for the same reason, with the exception of Japan until the end of 96, where it started losing appeal there and that was before the PS1 had the big hitters release.

More games is fine, but what are those games that there would be "more" of with a longer lifecycle of the DC? More Fighter Vipers 2? More Capcom Vs. SNK? More Shenmue? More Head Hunter? More Seaman? That wouldn't solve the problem that they didn't have the game people wanted to buy a console for, and combine that with some of their more silly decisions choosing what partner games to push, it makes the DC a hardsale.

The guy your quoting already mentioned games earlier he said were great amazing games, but still knew they were not what the DC needed to survive alone.

The determinate to gaming line is silly.

Don't you know? Headhunter would pave the way for a 6+ million selling MGS killer. Hell, Sega pushed hard in third party mode and killed it with their lineup on Xbox, saleswise. Shenmue sold a whopping 50k and barely lost to GTA3. This was the DC's most hyped game, its supposed magnum opus. This was how many people really gave a fuck about the franchise.

But seriously, I remember DC mags being vigilant about Headhunter, they saw it as a sort of last straw, they wanted it to be a MGS killer. I think the one surviving DC mag gave it a ridiculous 90+ score or something. Its a janky, frustrating piece of shit with horrible controls, worse vehicle controls and long ass load times. On PS2 the game got more fair reviews since there was more competition and it was no swansong, and its sequel was murdered for being trash.

As I said, Sega to this day doesn't release many multi million seller games. Sonic is their pillar, and the reception of those is mixed to say the least. They acquired Atlus which might offset it somewhat though I think they bank mostly on Persona (and again, this is purely business viewpoint). Yakuza is a little bit above niche seller (I did my part and bought Ishin because I love Yakuza). Those games are and never will be huge mainstream hits. And its not like Yakuza is a new IP. Even Forspoken outsells any Yakuza game, why exactly is this?
 
Don't you know? Headhunter would pave the way for a 6+ million selling MGS killer. Hell, Sega pushed hard in third party mode and killed it with their lineup on Xbox, saleswise. Shenmue sold a whopping 50k and barely lost to GTA3. This was the DC's most hyped game, its supposed magnum opus. This was how many people really gave a fuck about the franchise.

But seriously, I remember DC mags being vigilant about Headhunter, they saw it as a sort of last straw, they wanted it to be a MGS killer. I think the one surviving DC mag gave it a ridiculous 90+ score or something. Its a janky, frustrating piece of shit with horrible controls, worse vehicle controls and long ass load times. On PS2 the game got more fair reviews since there was more competition and it was no swansong, and its sequel was murdered for being trash.

As I said, Sega to this day doesn't release many multi million seller games. Sonic is their pillar, and the reception of those is mixed to say the least. They acquired Atlus which might offset it somewhat though I think they bank mostly on Persona (and again, this is purely business viewpoint). Yakuza is a little bit above niche seller (I did my part and bought Ishin because I love Yakuza). Those games are and never will be huge mainstream hits. And its not like Yakuza is a new IP. Even Forspoken outsells any Yakuza game, why exactly is this?

Yeah current Sega's arguably has most of their reach through their western branch which they have been lacking in giving resources too recently.

Sonic hype after many bad games had good front loads for Frontiers, but even than it's only at 2.9 million, and Sonic sales are heavily front loaded, 2.5 Million in Nov and only 400k sold in Dec for 2.9 million tells me that the game is unlikely to hit 4 million, possibly even 3.5.

As for games like Headhunter, those weren't going to cut it obviously, and Sega's third party push after the DC died needs to be looked at in perspective. Looking at games non-sports or Sonic that were exclusive to each platform published or made by Sega,

PlayStation 2
  • Sega Ages games
  • Nightshade
  • Shinobi
  • The King of Route 66
  • Yakuza 1
  • Yakuza 2
  • Virtua Fighter 4 and 4 Evo
  • Virtual-On Marz
  • Astro Boy
  • Blood Will Tell
  • GunGrave
  • Gun Grave overdoes
  • Initial D 2nd stage
  • Puyo Pop Fever 2 (PS family)
  • Altered Beast Remake
  • Aero Elite
  • The Rumble Fish
  • Sakura Taisen series (Japan)
  • Seaman 2
  • Sega Genesis Collection
  • Sega Rally 2006
  • Shining Force EXA
  • Shining Force Neo
  • Shining Tears
  • Shining Wind
  • Thunder Force VI

Xbox
  • Crazy Taxi 3
  • Shenmue 2 (In English)
  • Panzer Dragoon Orta
  • Sega GT 2002
  • Spikeout Battle Street
  • Jet Set Radio Future
  • Gun Valkyrie
  • The House of the Dead 3
  • Iron Phoenix
  • Otogi
  • Otogi 2
  • Toe Jam and Earl 3

Gamecube
  • Amazing Island
  • Skies of Arcadia Legends
  • Super Monkey Ball
  • Super Monkey Ball 2
  • Some Bleach game
  • Billy Hatcher and the Giant egg
  • Beach spikers

Only the ones in bold sold great, and that's not including cross-platform stuff like Virtua Quest and all that other stuff that would make the list even longer. Sega was repeating the same bad choices the same poor promoting of the wrong games, and the same rapid fire strategy, in fact the most they ever did in output, during the post-DC era.

Even there They were relying on Sonic (which had its own share of ups and downs with its high output) and NFL etc, as they just has a whole catalog of games go nowhere and not very far.

None of these look like they would help the DC if they were released on it instead of Xbox/PS2/GC, except maybe Sakura might have increased sales somewhat in Japan. Shenmue and Yakuza would probably cannibalize each other if they were both on the DC.
 

Daniel Thomas MacInnes

GAF's Resident Saturn Omnibus
Please not for the official record: Nobody at Sega “killed” the company, not Kalinske, not Stolar, not Moore. Maybe Nakayama gets blamed, but only for not getting the F out of the hardware business by 1995 and making games exclusively for PlayStation.

Sega, Atari, Commodore, Spectrum, Hudson, SNK—these are the dinosaurs. Sony is the asteroid.

Spare yourself the needless suffering. Sega was doomed.
 
Please not for the official record: Nobody at Sega “killed” the company, not Kalinske, not Stolar, not Moore. Maybe Nakayama gets blamed, but only for not getting the F out of the hardware business by 1995 and making games exclusively for PlayStation.

Sega, Atari, Commodore, Spectrum, Hudson, SNK—these are the dinosaurs. Sony is the asteroid.

Spare yourself the needless suffering. Sega was doomed.
Sega going third party 20 years earlier than they did would have been interesting indeed. I wonder how successful they could have been on PlayStation?
 

SkylineRKR

Member
Sega going third party 20 years earlier than they did would have been interesting indeed. I wonder how successful they could have been on PlayStation?

Its always easy to speak in hindsight. Now yes, Sega should've bailed when console development became more expensive. There is a reason why only Sony and MS sustain, multi billion dollar companies with a global reach. And even Sony has struggled for a few years. Nintendo is never going to return to these spec wars ever again, they branched off. But they've always been smarter about business than Sega, not throwing everything at the kitchen sink.

Sega had success with the Genesis globally (excluding Japan), there was obvious demand for a new system. That they would want to succeed the Genesis makes sense. But after Saturn, they should've bailed for sure. There was absolutely no scenario where the DC would gain any kind of a foothold, despite the huge headstart. Not only PS2 would surface and ride off the PSX, but Microsoft would enter with near unlimited funds, and Nintendo was always there and always outsold and outsmarted Sega. Barely years after the western DC launch they went multiplatform, they should've done so 2 years after the Saturn launch. The DC was released with money Sega didn't even have to begin with, they were essentially bailed out by Okawa himself. Fears were DC was nothing more than a stop gap and ironically reality was worse than that, it was killed during the PS2 launch window and before GC and Xbox were even finalized. From business standpoint I think the Dreamcast was completely useless. In mainland Europe, the DC launch wasn't even advertised. It was just there in October, and many big retailers didn't even carry it. I've read reports that in the benelux region, the DC sold like 7k in total lol (this would mean that almost no one bought it after launch). For reference, the PS1 sold 27k total by late 1997, and then by late 1998 they were at 400k. If this is an indication the DC did worse than we think for sure.

But perhaps, Sega should've partnered with Microsoft instead of developing the Dreamcast.
 
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Sega going third party 20 years earlier than they did would have been interesting indeed. I wonder how successful they could have been on PlayStation?

I think you meant 5-6 years lol. 20 is the 80's.

Sega had success with the Genesis globally (excluding Japan), there was obvious demand for a new system. That they would want to succeed the Genesis makes sense. But after Saturn, they should've bailed for sure.

But perhaps, Sega should've partnered with Microsoft instead of developing the Dreamcast.

I'm of the opinion they should have launched the original Saturn as it was, and then made the bridge easier for devs to follow-up peoples favorite games on the Saturn. Games like Panzer Dragoon 1 and Daytona (though would be more flat shaded and other cuts) would still come out for the system, VF1 would not release in the west for the home over a year late, and Sega wouldn't have had to waste so much money reacting and trying to get their foot out their mouth.

As for what Sega should have done well, Sega was originally talking with 3DO on possibly jumping on to, the 3DO.

Then they came back to the table again for the M2.

Sega seemed aware that they were in a position with the Saturn that they were heading toward doom. That's why they tried to save themselves with many experiments, a new handheld, edutainment console, chuckie cheese clone, arcade amusement park, telephone service, releasing games on PC, attempting to make their own PC, throwing insane amounts of money into the arcades with expensive hardware when coinage was down and operators didn't want to overspend that still wanted arcades, and of course their push for the internet, which they continued with the Dreamcast.

That attempt to diversify to find the next lighting in a bottle (Genesis) all failed and only served to put them deeper into the red than they were already quickly falling into.

As you said, Sega had help keeping them live. So when Sega was propped up on the hospital bed the fact anyone though a new console after the Saturn will always be crazy to me because they basically were gambling for no reason at all. But not with enough money to take the hit if things weren't working out, ot to go all out on marketing, so the Dreamcast was already a dead idea and they still did it.

Not only did they release the console, but a NEW arcade board in parallel, so it was a double gamble, one on a console they didn't have the support for, and one in an industry that they were already losing money in and weren't getting enough coin-op for ROI, and operators were becoming less and less.

As for Microsoft, from the stories and interviews about Sega, Microsoft apparently rejected Sega reaching out for a buyout, which given their condition made sense to be fair.

Microsoft has had the chance to buy Sega many times, a few years ago the company was in a bad position, and was a penny-stock and they still didn't touch them. But while some often call MS dumb for not grabbing Sega, I'll always maintain the position that Microsoft wouldn't gain anything by doing so.
 
Can someone make a gif out of the end of spartacus where everyone who stands up is a reason for the death of the dreamcast? Sony, Sega, Pirates, Ea, all one at a time saying "I killed the dreamcast?"
 

Alan Wake

Member
Is it really someone out there who believe that he killed the Dreamcast? Sega did this to themselves way before Peter Moore joined the company (and he actually did a pretty good job). And that darn PS2.

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Daniel Thomas MacInnes

GAF's Resident Saturn Omnibus
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Splash Wave Racing League is a Twitter page that hosts racing competitions among classic videogame fans. This week’s game is Wipeout XL/2097 on Sega Saturn, yay! Always great to see some love for one of my all-time favorite racing games.

The competition ends today (March 3), all you need to do is post a screenshot of your race time on the winter course, using the Auricom vehicle. Post your times on Twitter with the hashtag #SplashWaveRacing.

All fans of Wipeout XL are encouraged to join. Categories include PlayStation and Saturn, NTSC and PAL editions.

Good luck and hurry, I’m going to take that top spot for the Saturn NTSC version!
 
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