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Currently, MESS supports the following Sega Dreamcast versions:
* dc [Dreamcast (US NTSC)]
* dcjp [Dreamcast (Japan NTSC)]
* dceu [Dreamcast (European PAL)]
* dcdev [HKT-0120 Sega Dreamcast Development Box]
===== Known Issues =====
The emulation of this system is still Preliminary.
===== History and Trivia =====
The Dreamcast (code-named White Belt, Black Belt, Dural, Dricas, Vortex, Katana, Shark and Guppy during development) is Sega's final videogame console and the successor to the Sega Saturn. An attempt to recapture the console market with a next-generation system, it was designed to supersede the PlayStation and Nintendo 64. Originally released sixteen months before the PlayStation 2 (PS2), and three years before the Nintendo GameCube and the Xbox, Dreamcast was widely hailed as ahead of its time, and is still held in high regard for pioneering online console gaming. Nevertheless, it failed to gather enough momentum before the release of the PlayStation 2 in March 2000, and Sega decided to discontinue Dreamcast in March 2001, withdrawing entirely from the console hardware business. However, support continued in Japan where consoles were still sold and (few) new games were produced and shipped until 2007.
== Design ==
When the time came to design the successor to the Sega Saturn, the new President of Sega, Shoichiro Irimajiri, took the unusual step of hiring an outsider, Tatsuo Yamamoto from IBM Austin, to head a "skunk works" group to develop the next-generation console. It soon became apparent that the existing Japanese hardware group led by Hideki Sato did not want to relinquish control of the hardware department, bringing rise to two competing designs led by two different groups.
The Japanese group led by Hideki Sato settled on an Hitachi SH4 processor with a PowerVR graphics processor developed by VideoLogic (now Imagination Technologies) and manufactured by NEC. This was originally codenamed "White Belt". The first Japanese prototype boards were silkscreened "Guppy", and the later ones "Katana".
The U.S. skunk works group (11 people in a secret suite away from the Sega of America headquarters) led by Tatsuo Yamamoto settled on an Hitachi SH4 processor with a 3dfx Voodoo 2 graphics processor, which was originally codenamed "Black Belt". The first U.S. prototype boards were silkscreened "Shark" and later "Dural".
When 3dfx declared its Initial Public Offering (IPO) in April 1997, it revealed every detail of the contract with Sega. Sega had been keeping the development of its next-generation console secret during this competition, and was supposedly outraged when 3dfx publicly laid out its deal with Sega over the new system in the IPO.
In July 1997, perhaps as a result of 3dfx's IPO, it was decided that the Japanese "Katana" would be the chosen format, renamed Dreamcast. In September 1997, 3dfx filed a lawsuit against Sega and NEC (later including VideoLogic), stating "breach of contract", and accusing Sega of starting the deal in bad faith to take 3dfx technology, although they later settled.
== Launch and Competition ==
The Sega Dreamcast was released on November 27, 1998 in Japan; on September 9, 1999 in North America (the date 9/9/99 featured heavily in U.S. promotion); and on October 14, 1999 in Europe. Dreamcast was the first console to include a built-in modem and Internet support for online gaming. Dreamcast enjoyed brisk sales in its first season, and was one of Sega's most successful hardware units.
In April 1999, Sony announced its PlayStation 2. The actual release of the PS2 was not until March 2000 in Japan, and late-October 2000 in the United States. Sony's press release, despite being a year ahead of the launch of the PS2, was enough to divert a lot of attention from Sega. With the looming PS2 launch in Japan, Dreamcast was largely ignored in that territory. Dreamcast had great initial success in the United States, but had trouble maintaining this momentum after news of the PS2's release.
In 2000, the announcements of the Microsoft Xbox and Nintendo GameCube were widely regarded as the last straw for Dreamcast, which fueled speculation that Sega did not have the resources for a prolonged marketing campaign.
On January 31, 2001, Sega announced that production of Dreamcast hardware was to be discontinued by March of that year, although the 50 to 60 titles still in production would be published. The last North American release was "NHL 2K2", which was released in February 2002. With the company announcing no plans to develop a next-generation successor to Dreamcast, this was Sega's last foray into the home console business.
On February 24, 2004, Sega released their final Dreamcast game, "Puyo Pop Fever". A small number of third-party games were still being released, such as "Chaos Field" released in December 2004, "Trizeal" released in April 2005, "Radilgy" released in February 2006, "Under Defeat" released in March 2006, and most recently "Radium", "Last Hope" released January 2007, "Trigger Heart Exelica" released February 2007, and "Karous" released March 2007.
Visual Novel games were still released even when the Dreamcast was discontinued. There was a big support until 2004. The last Visual Novel game released on Dreamcast was "Angel Wish", in early 2005.
Despite its short lifespan, as of 2007, Dreamcast is still a popular and highly-regarded console among many fans due to its impressive library of both mainstream and more offbeat titles. It is even starting to gain a cult following, as the system is becoming harder to find.
== Hardware ==
The standard Dreamcast unit was made of white and grey plastic. The power light, like the Dreamcast logo in NTSC regions, was orange (this color was chosen because the Japanese consider it to be lucky). Games were sold in jewel cases. In North America, these initially had the Dreamcast name and logo on a white background, but later games used a black background, similar to the PlayStation's. Japanese games used an orange-and-white scheme, and European and Australian games used blue.
The unit was packaged with a video cable which supported composite video and stereo sound. Available separately were an RGB SCART cable, an S-Video cable, an RF connector (included as standard in the UK, Germany and Portugal), and a VGA adapter (see accessories below).
Although there was no reset button on the Dreamcast system itself, there was a way to reset a game during play. If the player wanted to reset a game, they would have to press the A, B, X, and Y buttons altogether and then press the start button. This would then take them to the game's main menu. If repeated, it would take players to the Dreamcast menu.
In North America, a black Dreamcast was released in limited numbers with a sports pack which included two Sega Sports titles. This was the same as other models except for the black casing and the Sega Sports logo located directly below the Dreamcast logo on the lid. Electronics Boutique offered a blue Dreamcast through its website. Similar offerings were sold through the Lik Sang website. Cases of different colors like blue, red, orange, and green were sold for replacements of the original casing. In Japan, Sega released many varieties of the system, including a limited edition Sonic anniversary version, a pink Sakura Taisen version, and a Hello Kitty version released in 2000 in Japan which, due to its limited production, has become an extremely rare collector's piece. The package contains a keyboard, controller, VMU, mouse, and a Hello Kitty trivia game. The console and accessories came in both translucent pink and blue in color with some printed designs.
The Brazilian version, manufactured by Tec Toy under license, was essentially the same as the North American version, but its video output was converted to the PAL-M standard and did not come with the modem, which was available separately.
Dreamcast in Europe had a blue spiral logo, similar to the logo on earlier Sega systems. This change is thought to have been for copyright reasons. A German company, Tivola, had been using a similar swirl logo years before Sega branded Dreamcast with the orange swirl.
As well as the VGA mode to connect to a PC monitor (again using an adapter), the European Dreamcast supported PAL video, in both 50 Hz and 60 Hz modes. This was a first for game consoles, as no previous PAL console had offered the option to play games at full speed, using the ability of many PAL televisions to operate at 60 Hz. This feature was exploited in previous consoles but only by modifying the console with a chip to allow it to run NTSC games (e.g. Sony's PlayStation), or by adding switches to the internal circuitry to manually select between 50 Hz and 60 Hz (e.g. SEGA's Master System, Megadrive or Saturn). Although the 60 Hz code had to be enabled on the disc, doing so was a simple matter, and only a small number of games lacked it. The 60 Hz feature has become standard on all major consoles released since.
A third-party company from China named Treamcast released a portable modified Dreamcast which used the original first-party Dreamcast components with a custom made plastic casing. This small system with its fold-down display resembled the later PS One. Many companies included software and a remote with the unit that enabled it to play MP3s and Video CDs. When the Internet import video game store Lik Sang contacted Sega to ask permission to sell a modified version of the system with Sega trademarks on the system, they were told that Sega did not approve of the unit, and felt that it violated their trademarks. In reality, this system is no different from a Dreamcast pre-modified with a third party shell, as the system's internals still use first party hardware, and the only modifications are the outside casing and internal sound and video adjustments.
In 2005, the internet import store Lan-Kwei started selling a "Treamcast" portable modified Dreamcast with a 16:9 widescreen LCD. Aside from the cosmetic differences in the case to accommodate the larger screen, there are no differences between the original Treamcast and the newer widescreen model.
== Accessories ==
* Visual Memory Unit, or "VMU": It was the Dreamcast memory card. It featured a monochrome LCD screen, a D-Pad, and two gaming buttons. The VMU could play mini-games loaded onto it from certain Dreamcast games, such as a Chao game transferable from Sonic Adventure. It could also display a list of the saved game data stored on it, and two VMUs could be connected together end-to-end to exchange data. Standard memory cards could also be purchased without the additional features of the VMU. Most of these were manufactured by third-party companies, (such as the Nexus Memory Card), although Sega eventually released a 4X memory card. The 4X cards did not have the VMU screen or stand-alone abilities, but they had four times the space thanks to the ability to switch between four 200-block sectors. The VMU design cannot be considered a full success, as it was fairly power-intensive, draining the two watch batteries at an alarmingly fast rate, and the architecture could not be expanded.
* Controller and Rumble Pack: Most Dreamcast games supported a rumble pack, or "Jump Pack", which was sold separately and could be plugged into the controller. In Japan, the Jump Pack was named the "Puru Puru Pack". The Dreamcast controller featured a similar design to the Sega Saturn's analog controller, offering an analog stick, a D-pad, a Start button, four action buttons (labeled A, B, X, and Y, two buttons less than the Saturn), and two analog triggers on the underside. It also contained two slots which could hold memory cards or the rumble pack, with a window on the front of the controller through which the VMU's display could be seen. The Dreamcast controller was somewhat larger than many other controllers, and some players found it difficult to hold.
* VGA Adapter: Unique to Dreamcast was a VGA adapter for output to a computer display or HDTV compatible sets, providing much better quality than a standard television set. Not all games were compatible with the VGA adapter, but work-arounds existed to trick all but a handful of games into working with it.
* Dreamcast mouse and keyboard: Dreamcast supported a mouse as well as a keyboard, which were useful when using the included web browser, and also supported by certain games such as The Typing of the Dead, Quake 3, Phantasy Star Online and Railroad Tycoon 2. Other games such as REZ offered undocumented mouse support.
* Fishing Rod: A motion sensitive fishing rod was released for the few fishing games on the system.
* Microphone: There was a microphone peripheral used for version 2.6 of the Planetweb web browser (providing long distance calling support), the European Planet Ring collection, "Alien Front Online", and "Seaman", the first console game to use speech recognition in the U.S.
* Lightgun: Sega also produced a light gun for the system, although this was not sold in the United States, possibly because Sega did not want its name on a gun in light of recent school shootings (the Columbine High School massacre). American versions of light gun games even blocked out using the official gun. Several third parties made compatible guns for the few light gun games released, including "The House of the Dead 2" and "Confidential Mission". The only other light gun compatible games were "Death Crimson OX" and its Japanese prequel "Death Crimson 2", "Virtua Cop 2" on the "Sega Smash Pack", and a light gun minigame in "Demolition Racer No Exit".
* Arcade Stick: A heavy-duty Arcade Stick was put out by Sega, featuring a digital joystick with six buttons using the same microswitch assemblies as commercial arcade machines. Although it could not be used for many Dreamcast games due to the lack of an analog joystick, it was well-received and helped cement Dreamcast's reputation for playing 2D shooters and fighting games. Adaptors are now available to use the Arcade Stick on other hardware platforms. Third-party sticks were also made, like the ASCII Dreamcast fighting pad, which some regard as having a more comfortable 6-button configuration and a more precise digital direction pad.
* Twin Sticks: A twin stick peripheral was released specifically for use with the game "Virtual-On". This add-on mimicked the original dual arcade stick setup and made gameplay much more precise. They are extremely rare and often quite expensive.
* Dreameye: Sega developed the Dreameye, a digital camera for Dreamcast, but it was only released in Japan.
* "Samba de Amigo" controller: Sega developed a special maraca controller for the music game "Samba de Amigo".
* Canceled Accessories: Toward the end of Dreamcast's lifespan, Sega created and displayed prototypes of a high-capacity VMU/MP3 player, DVD player, and Zip drive peripherals. None of these items became available to the public.
//(info from Wikipedia)//
===== Links =====
* Dreamcast Scene -- http://www.dreamcast-scene.com/
* Dreamcast Games at Sega of Japan -- http://www.sega.co.jp/dc/
* [[wp>Dreamcast]]
===== Other Emulators =====
* Chankast -- http://chanka.emulatronia.com/
* NullDC -- http://www.emudev.com/forums/index.php
* Makaron (Polish) -- http://dknute.livejournal.com/