In the late 1990s, with the bitter taste of the Saturn's commercial flop lingering in their mouth, and the looming presence of a gargantuan new competitor on the scene, the folks at Sega rallied round the idea that they could revive their financial fortunes by getting a new home console onto the market. In that moment, high-stakes decisions needed to be made about the characteristics that would define what came to be known as the Dreamcast. What would the technical architecture of the hardware be? How would developers be brought on board? What direction would the branding take? How comically loud could the operation of the disc drive possibly be?
One concept that Sega firmly hung their hat on was online gameplay. The Dreamcast was to be the first home console to be online out of the box, a distinction which Sega hoped would have punters flooding forth with a much-needed cash injection into the company's coffers. Online gameplay was a central pillar of the Dreamcast brand, featuring front and centre in the console's marketing campaigns. In the States, Sega called on nu-metal titan Fred Durst to push SegaNet. Here in Europe, a range of tongue-in-cheek adverts were published that played to nationalistic jockeying (think harmless English-French banter, rather than the disintegration of Yugoslavia). Japan didn't miss the memo either, although a big chunk of their marketing eschewed the macho competitive aspect in favour of pushing the Dreamcast's internet capabilities to a female demographic.
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A selection of advertising materials focusing on the Dreamcast's online functionalities,
from left to right: USA, France, Japan.
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Of course, during it's official lifetime, the Dreamcast never got close to fulfilling the upper limit of its "up to 6 billion players" tagline. However, Sega did erect a superb online architecture that allowed hundreds of thousands to experience online competitive and cooperative gameplay for the first time. Compared to the lifespan of the official servers of some contemporary games, many titles in the Dreamcast's online library had a damn good innings too. The official PAL and Japanese servers for the OG grandaddy of online RPGs,
Phantasy Star Online
, were maintained well into 2007, with hundreds of players logging on to say emotional goodbyes in the final couple of days (I'm not crying, you're crying). Others lasted even longer. The official servers for
Starlancer
, hosted by GameSpy, held on all the way to 2014, although we cannot be sure whether that was a deliberate stay of execution or some admins simply forgetting that the things still existed.
However, regardless of the staying power of some, eventually every single online Dreamcast game had its official servers switched off. Luckily for us though, the scene has persistently had a cohort of skilled and generous technicians working in the shadows to revive these online functions through unofficial measures (shout out to the likes of
bluecrab
,
Flyinghead
,
ioncannon
,
petter3k
, and
Shuouma
). More recently, they have even been bolstered by developers bringing brand new titles online, such as the indie smash-hit
Driving Strikers
, or freely distributed homebrew projects like
ClassiCube
,
NuQuake
and even
Counter Strike
.
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 |
| 'There's an interesting story behind this Dreamcast game. In 1999 I remember it was. I got up in the morning and made myself a piece of toast. I set the toaster to three -
medium brown
...'
|
Alas, despite all this wizardry, there are still
64 games
with online functions which have not been used since the day their official servers closed, 55 of which had fully fledged online multiplayer modes. Some of these titles, such as
Unreal Tournament
, are highly recognised and the status of their online multiplayer modes are asked after time and time again. Yet, I would contend that there are others which are actually worthy of more attention, and that is exactly what I hope to achieve with this article. So, with the customary rambling introduction over, let's get into it. Here are the Dreamcast games whose online revival I am anticipating the most...
Hundred Swords
(offline since January 2003)
You'd think a real-time strategy game with an epic storyline and crisp graphics coming from the development studio that brought us
Jet Set Radio
would garner plenty of attention. Yet following an initial flurry of reviews back in 2001, Smilebit's
Hundred Swords
has fallen into a degree of obscurity which really should be reserved for the console's shoddier fare (I'm looking at you
Freestyle Scooter
). Admittedly, the lack of attention is probably due in part to the fact that this title was a Japan exclusive, and, unlike titles such as
Cosmic Smash
or
Radirgy,
a reasonable grasp of Japanese is necessary to play through it in any depth. Furthermore, unlike many other Japan-only titles, a translation patch has yet to be produced.
Nonetheless, I feel there should be a greater swell of interest in
Hundred Swords
, not least because the game featured an online multiplayer mode which offered something entirely unique amongst the Dreamcast's online library. For this reason alone, the four-player real time strategy experience of
Hundred Swords
is top of my wishlist when it comes to online Dreamcast experiences. Oh, and a translation patch to boot would be grand. The English PC version is alright, but lacks that special touch that can only be brought by Sega's swansong console.
N.B. Just as I was finalising this article, Holsten of the
Sega Online discord server
told me that this game (and
Aero Dancing
) may actually be playable online once again via the extremely new and little publicised
DCnet method
. Here at the Junkyard we'll be having a sniff around this project and report back on what we find soon...
Outtrigger
(offline since September 2003)
Quake III Arena
is rightly revered as a masterpiece on the Dreamcast and players will no doubt continue to flock around it for fraggin' fridays until the very day that life on earth is extinguished (after which our AI successors shall continue the tradition).
Unreal Tournament
is also clearly viewed as a big hitter, regularly attracting the question "is anyone working to get this back online?" from scene newbies. However, in my eyes,
Outtrigger
is the absolute crème de la crème of Dreamcast first-person-shooters. Dripping in AM2 style with arcade gameplay, garish colours, and an awful-yet-somehow-sublime soundtrack, the game just screams Sega. Perhaps that is why it has never been ported elsewhere.
Of course, as would be expected of a top-draw Dreamcast game,
Outtrigger
also featured an online multiplayer mode which allowed up to SIX players to duke it out in arena-style combat. Too much fun for Europeans to handle, the mode was sensibly stripped from the PAL release, however, Japanese outtrigger-ers could play online until August 2002, while their American compatriots had until September of 2003.
In my eyes, the revival of
Outtrigger
's online mode is about as desirable as it can get. Let's make it happen before the rubber track ball in my mouse perishes any further...
Guru Guru Onsen
(offline since November 2005)
Today, Nintendo's consoles are frequently characterised as being highly dependent upon their first-party titles. Games from third-parties may occasionally turn out to be big-hitters, but really (or so it seems to my inexperienced mind) it's the Zeldas, Marios and god damn Pokey-mons that are keeping the enterprise afloat. Back in the Dreamcast era, this claim could probably have applied just as much to Sega. Sure, support from the likes of Capcom was invaluable, but once you realise how many of the system's developers were actually just divisions of Sega (Hitmaker, Overworks, Smilebit, Visual Concepts, Wow Entertainment etc.) it becomes abundantly clear how self-reliant they were during this period.
Both of the preceding titles in this article were made by Sega, and I won't apologise for maintaining the trend with this third entry. The
Guru Guru Onsen
series featured no fewer than four entries on the Dreamcast. It was emblematic of the console's online experience in Japan, with the first arriving in 1999, and the last (
Guru Guru Onsen 3
) being released into the world in March 2002 - that is, Sega of Japan were putting new online releases out well over a year after the dream machine had purportedly been killed off.
Evidently the kitsch style of
Guru Guru Onsen
hit a chord with the Japanese public, who were blessed with the ability to play this laid back online board game collection for many years before the servers were terminated late in 2005. At the time, the game was deemed unmarketable to American and European audiences, yet in the contemporary period, where tastes have shifted, I suspect many of us would welcome this style of game with open arms. Shitty day at work? Relax and play some
Animal Crossing
Guru Guru Onsen
.
Presently, the only thing we have close to this is the entertaining but underbaked
Internet Game Pack
. Personally I'd much prefer to play some online table games immersed in a serene Overworks setting.
Pro Yakyuu Team de Asobou Net!
(offline since August 2001)
The second entry from Smilebit in this blog piece,
Pro Yakyuu Team de Asobou Net!
is another entry in a series that knocked it out of the park (get it?) in Japan, but was deemed unworthy of being ported overseas. No doubt the cutesy bobblehead style was presumed to be unfitting to the XTREME vibes of the North American market of this period, and in Europe, well, Baseball is virtually unknown (we prefer proper sports,
like cheese rolling
). However, that decision is a crying shame given the overall quality of the game, it's immaculately styled design, and most importantly for the purposes of this article, it's four-player online multiplayer mode.
As the series title of 'Let's Make' would suggest, this game, like it's predecessors and successors, offers players a virtual sports team management experience - something that a generation of fellow Brits have lost countless hours to thanks to the likes of
Championship Manager
or the more contemporary
Football Manager.
To top this off,
Pro Yakyuu
also offers a fully interactive baseball game experience to boot. With the best of both worlds, it should therefore, in theory, offer a richer experience than its 2K compadres...
The trouble is, as the game went offline years before I got my hands on it, and given that an English translation isn't available, I'm not entirely sure what the online multiplayer experience consists of. If you can join with three others to manage a team through a gruelling season, then acrimoniously split when the mounting tension finally overcomes your fragile bonds, that would be superb. On the other hand, if it only allows you to play baseball with a few mates, then that would be great too.
Pro Yakyuu
delivers the renowned Smilebit antidepressive style, and for that reason alone, we should be clamouring for it to be brought back online.
Culdcept II
(offline since March 2003)
This strategy title, whose board game mechanics are put front and centre with turn-taking, dice rolls and card decks, was highly praised by reviewers upon its release in July 2001. Primarily that was because the gameplay, involving a combination of several shifting elements, allows players to engage in a battle where there is a real depth and nuance to the strategies taken. Of course, with those dice-rolls, there is a potentially infuriating component of luck involved too, but as with any good board game, that brings a sense of trepidation that (mostly) adds to the thrill.
The isometric old-school style of
Culdcept II
didn't even come close to pushing the graphical capabilities of the Dreamcast. While this may be a negative for some, I am not in that camp. As with
Bangai-O
, or
Dee Dee Planet
, the art style is technically less advanced, but suits the game, and is implemented beautifully - especially in some of the card art.
A translation patch is probably a must-have if this wonderful game is to be opened up to a broader audience. If someone can take care of that and simultaneously revive it's online server, that would be lovely thanks. How long could that possibly take? 30 days max?
Honourable Mentions
Bomberman Online
, one of the late, great, US online exclusives (alongside
Alien Front Online
and
Ooga Booga
) could perhaps demand a space at the top table. Its crisp visual style and variety of game modes certainly earned it the respect of reviewers back in the day. I wouldn't turn my nose up at its online revival, but, personally, I feel that
ChuChu! Rocket
already fulfils a similar role.
Those with more refined palettes than I will probably note that the Dreamcast has no less than twelve 2D versus fighting games which once boasted functioning online multiplayer modes. This dozen (mostly Capcom) titles even includes the highly revered
Marvel vs. Capcom 2
. However, to be frank, the serious 2D sub-genre frightens and confuses me, and so, I would rather see the altogether more accessible
Power Stone 2
back online instead.
The last game I was close to giving a top billing is
Rune Jade
.
Given that it is a Japan-exclusive, without a translation patch available (excluding a minimalist early-stage demo from PC Wizard), I haven't actually played it a great deal. However, having a Diablo-esque dungeon clearing RPG as an alternative to
Phantasy Star Online
would undoubtedly be welcome.
* * *
OK, if you've made it to this point, then no doubt you're absolutely livid that
Propellor Arena
or the bizarro-culture-shocking horse race betting game (
Derby Tsuku 2
) haven't been afforded some column inches. I'm wrong, aren't I? Tell me as much in the comments section below! We'd love to hear what our readers want back online and why...
