It was 10 years ago today that the Sega Dreamcast washed up on North American shores. Japan had been reveling in in the Dreamcast’s glory for a full year before we could finally experience true gaming joy. Until the introduction of the Nintendo Wii, the hardcore gaming community agreed in unison that the Dreamcast was the last true video game console.

The Dreamcast debuted at the height of the great era of arcades. Sega ruled the arcade industry, as it continues to do so in Japan. With the phenomenal creative resources in electronic entertainment at their disposal, they were able to seamlessly translate the arcade experience into the home. This meant that we not only got faithful ports of our favorite arcade titles, but also unique, innovative games that were beautifully tailored for the home gaming environment.

Being an arcade rat myself, the majority of my Dreamcast game library consists of its fantastic arcade ports. Most of all, I loved the Capcom fighters, like Street Fighter Alpha 3 and Marvel Vs. Capcom 2. Being able to practice at home with my friends was a great way to experiment and train for when we’d face the real competition in the arcades.

One thing that made the Dreamcast great was that some of its ports (like Soul Calibur) were in fact superior to their arcade counterparts. Until its recent release on XBLA and PSN, the Dreamcast version of Marvel Vs. Capcom 2 (whose source was used for the new ports) was the official version for fighting game tournaments.

Other arcade-style games that are in the class of “must-have” are House of the Dead 2 (shoot zombies!), Zombie Revenge (punch/burn/dismember zombies!), Ikaruga (top-tier shmup), Crazy Taxi (who needs roads?), and Virtual-On Oratorio Tangram (giant robots!).

I didn’t just live in the arcades; heavens no! The Dreamcast had a slew of awesome home titles, most of which carried on to other consoles, once the Dreamcast ceased production. There is of course, the cinematic Shenmue series, which tragically will never be completed. The Sonic Adventure games have been unanimously declared as the last decent Sonic the Hedgehog titles. Phantasy Star Online was the first console-based MMORPG and new episodes are available on current-gen platforms. Other games like Jet Grind Radio, Space Channel 5, Seaman, and Chu Chu Rocket never really grew beyond cult favorites; arguably because they were way ahead of their time.

It’s been a good decade, Dreamcast. So long as there is breath in my lungs, you will not be forgotten! I still fire mine up from time to time to play some of the games that made you so great. There may never be another console like you again.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, September 9th, 2009 at 9:00 am and is filed under Games. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.