STRYKIE said:
MikeRox said:
Yeah, going to have to disagree here.
Dreamcast had the best 2 years I've ever known a console have in 2000/2001. It was a relentless torrent of releases across a variety of genres.
PS2 was a let down in comparison, however the later years there was no contest and from 2002 the PS2 was by far the best format on the market in terms of releases.
Note: I'm talking more from a European perspective as that is the market I live in.
As for Shenmue, given it started development for the Sega Saturn, and was switched to the Dreamcast before the system had even launched, particularly in the West. I'm not sure what saying you need to sell more copies than your install base is really getting at. Surely any launch titles are showing you're not doing "fine" in that case? I mean Killzone Shadowfall needed to sell a gazillion times more copies than the total install userbase ;)
I think a lot of people forget just how short a time the Dreamcast was on the Market. I mean the Wii U has now enjoyed a longer life. In the US, the Dreamcast discontinuation was announced after the system had been on the market 16 months. In Europe 15 months. Now with that in mind, it's worth reconsidering the software lineup the console actually managed to muster.
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Bolded 1: Well, as a personal fighting game enthusiast, I can attest to this, but let's not kid ourselves, there were some genres on the Dreamcast where the entire total of titles (let me doubly clarify, I don't mean only the good ones, or the ones I prefer, or the ones that are Dreamcast exclusive, I mean THE absolute entirety) can be counted on one hand. Platformers and RPGs come to mind here.
Bolded 2: If you can find me a single calendar year that had a stronger commericially and critically acclaimed line-up of games that were only released for the PS2 in North America than 2001, I'm all ears. I mean, the guy I replied to was preaching that the PS2 didn't get going until 2003, which was probably the weakest year for the PS2 in terms of killer app exclusive games (not counting 2008 onwards which was just arbitrary annual sports games).
Bolded 3: I'm also European so I know the feels. But this thread isn't particularly pertaining towards the Dreamcast's European market perfomance.
Bolded 4: Not what I meant. (Although, given the circumstances, Shenmue cost around $47 million to develop, some even speculate $70 million including the Saturn build, go figure) Reason why I brought that up was because Sega were having big financial problems and essentially had to shoot for a Wii-effect, when in reality, then couldn't even muster a market as big as the N64's for the most part. I think they only ever outsold the N64 for what, 2 of the 16 calendar months that the DC was on the North American market?. And has grossly overstocked unsold inventory. i'm not exaggerating when I say there's still brand new Dreamcast hardware and games floating around relatively cheap on eBay even now, 14-15 years later. That's what I'm talking about when I call out the notion that the Dreamcast was "doing fine against the PS1" as extremely rose-glass tinted. Not to mention that the PS1 still had plenty of big guns coming out for it, a huge back catalog of low budget greatest hits/platinum titles and overall was still a very relevant platform in 2000/2001.
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