Dreamcast why did it fail

Tadashi Takezaki, these days, works at Sega in the position of "head of project implementation department, president's office," which doesn't describe very well the things he's been involved with since joining up in A veteran of Sega's marketing and PR department in Japan, Takezaki was involved with the launch of both the Saturn and Dreamcast — Sega's final two home game consoles.

He was also the man who wrote an emotional online message "to all Sega supporters" in January 31, to announce that Sega was halting Dreamcast production and becoming a third-party software company. That certainly wasn't the plan back in , when Sega launched a new system that did its best to learn from previous mistakes. So we fully fleshed out our libraries to make development easier.

Even today, the Dreamcast gets a lot of praise for its dev environment. The Dreamcast was more than dev-friendly, though — it was also casual-friendly, going completely away from the hardcore gamer-oriented trend they established with the bit Genesis and bit Saturn. As a result, we went with a compact, simple design with a warm color scheme, something completely different in look from older Sega systems.

I think it was the console that we took the most complete marketing approach with. So why did the system fail? Sony [whose PlayStation 2 came out March in Japan] was part of the team that developed the DVD standard, and they could develop a system around that completely internally with their own chips.

Sega, meanwhile, was buying everything from outside companies, so it was at a distinct cost disadvantage. We couldn't easily cut costs on manufacturing, the software wasn't selling the numbers it used to, and then we were forced to discount the system. The PS2 was touted as the next great machine, and many people focused on its technological power.

In short, it was seen as a far more powerful and robust machine than the puny Dreamcast. On top of that, the PS2 visibly looked like a slick new machine, complete with a black exterior, rugged edges, and an interesting horizontal landscape. The Dreamcast looked like a children's toy and had the goofiest controller in existence. Everyone wanted the new toy, not the Nintendo knockoff. Power is good and all, but it is meaningless if there isn't a quality lineup of games to back it up.

Fortunately, the PS2 had that in spades. It's an unbelievable lineup in such a short amount of time, and it gave the PS2 a boost it didn't really need in the first place. The Dreamcast had Yeah, it had a few good titles, but come on. Look at that PS2 lineup! Even those who bought the Dreamcast were left feeling disappointed due to the poor launch lineup. Perhaps the console could have thrived, or at least survived, if it made a good first impression, but it didn't.

All established games, but none the likes of which the PlayStation 2 offered. You can only play so much Mortal Kombat , ya know? It may not look like much now, but DVDs were once the coolest thing on the market.

There was a lot of buzz surrounding DVDs back in the late 90s and early s, as the technology was brand new and promised crystal clear images and bombastic sound the likes of which VHS could never accomplish. DVD players were expensive, but the PS2 served as a cheaper alternative. Sega attempted to brush these consoles aside with the revolutionary Dreamcast but it simply did not work.

There were gamers who enjoyed the Saturn and felt disrespected when Sega discontinued that system so early in its lifestyle. DVD playback was a novel feature at the time, as many households did not yet have a DVD player in their possession.

DVD players were still quite expensive, therefore purchasing a console that could both play games and play DVDs was enticing. The PlayStation 2 was a relatively inexpensive DVD player at the time even without accounting for its ability to play games. Unsurprisingly, the lack of a built-in DVD player was a dagger for Sega.

This was an odd release window, as the PlayStation 2 would release in Japan in March of and was announced around the time the Dreamcast released in North America. Had the Dreamcast launched in in all territories, they likely would have seen more success.

When consumers heard the popular PlayStation brand would receive an update — one that featured DVD playback, had the controller they preferred and more popular game series they were accustomed to — the Dreamcast suffered. Many consumers decided to wait to purchase their next console, as the later release date had many thinking the PlayStation 2 would be significantly more powerful than the Dreamcast in reality, it was actually pretty similar.

For those deciding not to wait, the PlayStation 1 and Nintendo 64 were being sold at budget prices and were an attractive proposition as consumers waited for their successors.

The Dreamcast was simply not released at a good time, as it arrived in-between console generations, which caused confusion and reduced its appeal. Colin Anderson. Advertising Sega ran television spots non-stop, advertising the Dreamcast in anticipation of its launch. Financial Woes After a successful North American launch, Dreamcast sales steadily declined despite several price drops. Colin Anderson DWitzman has been writing about video games, movies, tv and more for Goliath since