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“DC is kinda Marilyn Monroe. Died "too young" so we hold it up for that more than merit actually warrants.”
2001 – Dreamcast Dies
This grammatically-challenged tweet was something I sent to Leigh Alexander earlier in the year as she was engaged in some Twitter discussion about the Dreamcast. 2001 essentially marked the American death of the Sega's last gasp in the console market. Many consider it the best console released and just never got a chance to fufill its promise. Then there are those of us that then and now never got caught up in the romanticism and just acknowledge it as Sega did, failed.
It's nothing against the Dreamcast nor Sega. One my favorite consoles was the Genesis and it saddens me still that Sega isn't still in the console business. The Dreamcast was a nice piece of electronics with some great ideas. Then again, the Betamax was technically superior to VHS and died an early death as well. However the film industry and consumers for much more mileage out of the "lesser" tech. So sometimes calling something “ahead of its time” is often avoiding admitting something not serving its present.
In spite of my usual annoyance with elements of the PC gaming community, one refrain from that group is pretty undeniable: console gamers often toss around “pioneering” for innovations that have ceased to be innovations to PC gamers. As such, I won't confuse being the first with the inclusion of a modem, voice chat and downloadable with illuminating the world to concepts that were inevitably in the future of consoles. A running trend throughout the evolution of consoles has always been trying to catch up with the power of the PC and adapt PC features a console box and controllers.
Being first to implement it and make it work is an achievement worth noting, but since when did we people start deifying entities that did things first in leui of those that made them the standard. Seriously, there's no such love of people associating XP perk systems in multiplayer shooters with Rainbow Six Vegas because Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare put it in a gold standard package that far more a success.
On the subject of games, those were another bright spot remembered as little more a blinding force than in reality. There were many really good games released on the console, including a personal favorite in Hydro Thunder. Not all I like but plenty I respect. I'm not a Marvel vs. Capcom or Soul Calibur fan, Shenmue wasn't a my cup of open world tea and Phantasy Star Online never appealed to me but I can appreciate what they are. But there just weren't enough of them to sustain the system.
That's the story of the Dreamcast from my point of view; good system, not great, that couldn't keep Sega in the console business despite a valiant effort. I've never bought into its supposed legacy as innovator and greatest console ever built. I respect the contributions but I do think do think we tend to make things bigger in death than they ever were in life.
More of Gerren's Decade Diary: