Hey, what's that you have on your shelf back there? Let's see, Fable 2, Shadow of the Colossus, The Orange Box.... Oh, I get it -- it's your pile of shame! I've got one of those, too. You know what, though? I'm going to laugh at that paltry pile and raise you a system of shame. That's right, put my biggest shame -- the decade-old Deamcast -- onto your tower and it will undoubtedly topple.
As various Bitmobbers talk about their candy-coated memories of inarguably the greatest system ever ("dude, Soul Calibur still looks amazing today, I swear!), I'm looking in from the outside, with certainly some jealousy brewing, but what has also put me in an introspective mood.
A few years before the Dreamcast launched Stateside, I had made my bed with the Nintendo 64, and that's where I was going to stay. During the late '90s, I was still of the age where saving up for a game system was a significant event. I managed to put aside enough for the N64 and Super Mario 64 and stuck with it, using what little discretionary income I could for the occasional accessory or game. The rest went toward college (where GoldenEye and Mario Kart 64 proved to be legends of their own).
It's not that I didn't want a Dreamcast. I was getting EGM back then and checking out gaming websites, and I was excited for it. The look of the system (compact, sleek, and modern) always drew me in, and that lineup of games had me yearing for the next gen.
But the idea of buying it never crossed my mind -- all the more odd since I was a huge Genesis fan. Part of the problem was its timing; it straddled the PS1/N64 and PS2/XB/GC generations. I simply couldn't make that large of an investment again. (The next year I would buy a PS1 on the cheap.)
Another problem was that no one I knew had a Dreamcast -- thus none of my friends in college or back home preached the system's virtues. So while a stream of games like Jet Set Radio, Seaman, Chu Chu Rocket, and Shenmue made editors orange-pumping hearts all aflutter, I read on with an interest that was tempered by my inability to partake.
In fact, I can only remember ever even playing the system one time! I was visiting a friend at another college, and one of his roommates had the system. We played a game of NFL 2K1. I liked it, but of course, 30 minutes of that wasn't enough to demonstrate just what I'd been missing.
At that point, I didn't realize it would be my only interaction with the system, but the industry soon moved forward, as did I. The next system I bought was the PS2 when Grand Theft Auto 3 came out, and I remember even then people talking of the Dreamcast as a wonderful but never properly recognized system -- like a sports superstar who spends his whole career on a perennial losing team. I can't help but wonder how many core gamers I represent who had similar stories and, inadvertently, a hand in the demise of the once-great gaming-console company.
Nowadays, it's hard for me to imagine not getting a major system. I may wait a while to pick one up (like with the PS3), but eventually the price value versus the number of great games works out and I catch up on the console's instant classics.
But the Dreamcast for me will always remain the ultimate gem on my pile of shame.
