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Fighters and Arcade Sticks

July 10, 2014, 4:58 am
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One of the strongest pillars of the Dreamcast's software library is arguably its fighters. From the pure SNK goodness of Garou: Mark of the Wolves and The Last Blade series, through to the 3D extravaganzas of Virtua Fighter, Dead or Alive 2 and SoulCalibur, there is no doubt about it that Sega’s last home console was, and still is, home to some of the best fighting games ever made.


The thing is though, the official Dreamcast controller just doesn't cut it if you want any degree of fine control with these titles. That’s not to just pick on the Dreamcast of course, most consoles’ default gamepads are equally woeful - maybe apart from the Neo Geo AES, whose whole reason for existence was to emulate the arcade - however it does mean that if you want to really get the most out of the system’s library then you need to invest in a decent arcade stick.


Pulling off specials and supers becomes so much easier with an arcade stick.

As was typical for Sega’s last role of the dice, the Official Arcade Stick for the system - for a brief introduction check out GagaMan’s rundown of the hardware over at www.dcgaga.com - was robust, affordable and fitted with the exact type of microswitched joystick that really unlocks the precision and fluidity required to master any proper fighting game. It wasn’t perfect of course, with its square stick restrictor gate, non-microswitched buttons and garish green colour scheme taking a little of the sheen off the final product, but all things said it was a tidy piece of kit.


Today the Official Arcade Stick is still a tidy piece of kit, however its price has increased dramatically, with new units selling for north of £100 on eBay (it was sold for £34.99 new when released). There are nice alternatives to the official stick, such as the good Ascii Stick FT, however asides from that unit, which is now notoriously rare, things swiftly get bargain basement.


SoulCalibur's weapon-based combat is still as refreshing today as it was when first released.

So, what to do? The answer is to pick up the Official Arcade Stick second hand as cheap as you can and then mod it with some of the best arcade hardware currently available. This not only allows you to iron out those old failings, but also allows you a nice degree of customisation, allowing you stamp your own mark on the peripheral. I did this myself last year and, as you can see, things turned out pretty darn good.


Garish green stick and buttons begone! 

The case now features a microswitched Sanwa joystick with octagonal restrictor gate and Seimitsu bubble top handle, as well as six Sanwa microswitched arcade buttons. Overall the build took just over a day to complete, with only a little internal case modification and cabling necessary. Of course, I simply did a component replacement, however if you wished to get more creative, the case and its internal layout is very solid and spacious, allowing for all sorts of additional tweaks.


I won’t go into detail of the job here, as there are quite a few excellent step-by-step guides on the Internet already - this oneis particularly useful - however I will suggest you give it a go if you can as the finished product is definitely worth it. 


The Last Blade series has some of the best looking background and character art of any fighter ever.

Indeed, my experience with the project just seemed to reaffirm the legacy of the Dreamcast as being a very versatile and open platform on which to play games. From the still thriving indie scene, through the ease of system modification (region free bios, VGA, SD card slot, etc) and onto the broad range of accessories released, it is testament to Sega that even today, over 15 years since the Dreamcast’s release, extra quality and enjoyment can be squeezed out of its hardware with little effort.

Sega as a hardware producer may be gone, but it sure did go down fighting.
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Dreamcast & SEGA 64: A Visual Analysis

July 12, 2014, 8:30 am
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We featured the lesser-spotted SEGA 64 here at the Junkyard way back in 2006 (original post here), but that was little more than the publication of a few pictures. As stated in that original article, the SEGA 64 was first leaked in issue 8 of Saturn Power - a UK magazine that was the evolution of the awesome SEGA Power. Rather than just re-blog those pictures though, I thought it might be quite fun to actually compare the SEGA 64 to the final Dreamcast system design and have a look at how accurate these hoax console designs were. Back in 1997, access to the internet - for me at least - was very limited, so in that era there was no real way of knowing whether lo-res images leaked from 'sources in Japan' and printed in magazines were legitimate or not. With hindsight, we can deduce that the pictures of the SEGA 64 were very probably part of an elaborate wind up...but we won't let that spoil the fun! So first up, let us compare the way the systems themselves look:



The most obvious similarity between the two systems is the large round disk tray in the centre. Both feature a logo, but the final Dreamcast only features a tiny SEGA motif on the front above the controller ports. One would assume from the picture of the SEGA 64 that the round bit is a top-loading disk tray and that the two diagonal slices to the rear of the case are where the hinges would be. In this area, it is quite close to how the Dreamcast actually turned out. Similarly, the SEGA 64 features two buttons - one either side of the media door, however unlike on the Dreamcast they are labelled Power and Reset, while the Open button sits below. On the Dreamcast, we only have Open and Power, and they are on the opposite sides, while a hard reset button does not exist (you have to hold all four joypad face buttons and press Start to perform a soft reset). You could argue that the final Dreamcast shell and the SEGA 64 do look similar in some ways though - there's no denying at least a passing resemblance, especially with the large circular door and the placing of the buttons. The sides of the two machines do not really compare favourably apart from the large vents - both the SEGA 64 and the Dreamcast have these, but the Dreamcast's vents are on the front right, while the SEGA 64's are on the rear left. The fronts do not share many similarities though, as the Dreamcast features four controller ports and look nothing like the meagre two on the SEGA 64:


Speaking of controllers, here are the SEGA 64's compared with the Dreamcast pads we know and (for the most part) love:



There's a definite similarity here, as they both share some of the characteristics of the Saturn 3D pad. Both have a single analogue stick and d-pad located on the left, and do not have a right-hand analogue. The design of the analogue 'nub' on the SEGA 64 pad looks a lot more like that of the Saturn 3D controller than the DC one too. Interestingly, the SEGA 64 pad only has A, B and C buttons...although it does appear to have a Start button located in the centre. Due to the black and white nature of the images, we can only speculate at the colours used on the face buttons but the different hues of grey indicate that they were all different. Tellingly, there is also no hint of a VMU slot on the SEGA 64's pad, so probably the biggest hint that it is just a bastardised re-imagining of the Saturn 3D controller.

I guess we'll never really know if the SEGA 64 images were really leaked from SEGA Japan or whether they were the work of an overactive imagination. One thing is certain though - there are a lot of similarities in the design of both the console and the pad to the final design of the Dreamcast. Educated guesses and pot luck...or genuine blueprints for the Dreamcast...? The truth is out there. Somewhere. Probably at the bottom of this whiskey bottle. *Sob*
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Zombies, Zombies Everywhere

July 17, 2014, 8:37 am
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The End of Days is here. The dead are walking the streets and the zombie apocalypse is upon us...are you prepared?

Well you should be, because I am - I've had plenty of tuition; George A Romero, Simon Pegg, Woody Harrelson, and more recently Brad Pitt have all given me plenty of survival tips. It also feels like I've been killing zombies for years anyway thanks to current games that have zombie-themed modes, like Read Dead Redemption and Call of Duty Black Ops; and series like House of the Dead, Dead Rising, and Resident Evil. Which brings me nicely onto my favourite zombie game: Capcom's Resident Evil 2, or Biohazard 2 as it was known in Japan.


After the events of the first game, Chris and Jill barely make it out of the mansion alive, the T-Virus has been contained and the world is blissfully unaware that there was ever a crisis. Everybody will go about their normal routine and live in perfect happiness and harmony...yeah right. Thanks to those nasty people at the Umbrella Corporation, the virus is still around, mutating and growing stronger and is spreading rapidly across Raccoon City and beyond, and we are all still in deep trouble.

All is not lost though as this sequel introduces us to two new protagonists, Leon S Kennedy, a rookie cop and Claire Redfield, sister of Chris, whom she is looking for. After meeting in the opening sequence, they are separated and must now try to survive any way they can. Their paths cross at various times in the game and they will meet key people in the Resident Evil timeline along the way, like Ada Wong and Sherry Birkin, people who we see in later games.


There is a huge amount to do in the game, with zombies everywhere and mutated people and creatures to deal with, weapons to discover, puzzles to decipher and secrets to be found. This game will certainly challenge you as you play through the campaign, which is split into two separate stories on two separate discs, with decisions in one story affecting the other.

The defining moment in the first Resident Evil game is when you come across that first zombie, who is happily gnawing away at what is presumably his last victim, but what makes it particularly creepy is the little cut scene where the zombie slowly turns his head and then goes after you - fresh meat. There is an equally disturbing scene in Resident Evil 2 when you first encounter the Licker in the police station corridor which is preceded by it scuttling past a window. It gives you a sense of fear, you know something is coming and there is nothing you can do about it, your heart is racing, your palms are getting sweaty and you are struggling to hold onto the controller. This is survival horror at its finest and the best thing about this game is not knowing what is around the next corner.

So again I ask the question, are you prepared? No? Then go and play Resident Evil 2 on the Sega Dreamcast, the best training for a zombie apocalypse that I can think of.
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Crazy Taxi 2: A New-Retro Review

July 23, 2014, 8:13 pm
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One of my few games for the Sega Dreamcast is the arcade port racing game, Crazy Taxi. It was special for being one of those few games that at least two people in my household played. Recently, I looked into the sequel games produced. There are apparently portable versions, but I haven’t played a good hand-held racing game, besides Mario Kart. However, the second game in the series, Crazy Taxi 2, was also released on the Dreamcast.


“Hey, self!” I thought. “This is a great opportunity to review a game for the blog, and expand your pitiful Dreamcast collection!”

With those words in mind, I purchased the game. And, as a bonus, I have not read or watched any reviews on it (well, one video mentioned it in passing, but it was an offhand reference anyway.) Since I haven’t played the first game in a while, maybe I won’t apply as much “Nostalgia-Comparison” logic to it. Maybe.

Review
Starting off, I am reminded of the original. I can’t help it! I’ve got the [licensed?] music playing at me, the customers yelling for or at me, and an ever decreasing time limit to play under. This game, essentially, has three game modes: Around Apple, Small Apple, and Crazy Pyramid. The latter is a series of mini-games, like jump over things or pop balloons. Silly stuff.

Anyway, the main meat of the game occurs in the “Around Apple” and “Small Apple” modes. You can choose either to go by “normal rules” (presumably the rules used on the original arcade game. I haven’t played that version, so I’m just guessing here) or choose between intervals of 3, 5, or 10 minutes. Then it’s just a matter of choosing from one of the four drivers and burning some rubber!

What do I think of it?

Overall, it feels the same as the original. A fun, solid racing game. If I were comparing it to the original, I might say that it’s too much like the original. But I’m not. However, I found myself getting bored. Maybe it’s that the style of game doesn’t connect with me. Maybe it’s because I could never get more than a Class D license in most runs. Either way, it’s still a solid sequel, and if you’re a fan of the series or driving games in general, you should consider picking it up.

As it turns out, most reviews I saw of it were generally positive. Yay!
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Turning Japanese (And Possibly American)

July 26, 2014, 7:40 am
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My very first experience with a Dreamcast came in early 1999 when a friend who was earning suspiciously large amounts of money for doing a menial warehouse job decided he wanted a new games console. Tired of playing Buck Bumble and Rush 2 on N64 in his cramped bedroom, we took a trip to an import store in nearby Manchester's Chinatown district where my friend handed over several hundred pounds for a Japanese Dreamcast and a few games. The games were Virtua Fighter 3tb, Dynamite Deka 2 and Shutokou Battle - a game we had no idea was a racing title because there were no screens on the back of the case and no English text at all (time must have muddied my memory - all three apparently have screens). Since then, I have played (and obviously own) all three of those games in their PAL guises: Virtua Fighter 3tb, Dynamite Cop and Tokyo Highway Challenge...but you no doubt already guessed the English title of the first game mentioned there.

It was really cool getting to play on my friend's DC back before the PAL release, and even cooler because everything was covered in Japanese text and we really had no idea what we were doing in most of the menu screens. It was literally a case of 'push A until the game starts.' One other cool thing was the Project Berkeley video that came on one of the GDs, but I forget which one it was - possibly Virtua Fighter 3...but I digress. As a side note, it turned out that my friend had been fiddling the till at the warehouse/timber yard he worked at and that's how he'd been able to afford the Dreamcast in the first place. He was eventually rumbled and the police were involved...but that's a different story.

So, what's the point of this post you may be wondering? Well, since then I haven't really touched any NTSC Dreamcast stuff at all. Around 99% of my whole gaming collection is PAL, and I've never really thought to get involved in import gaming because it just seemed like such a sprawling and impenetrable sub-division of gaming: games you can't understand, problems with different plug adapters, will it work on my TV...all things that popped into my head when considering import gaming. A recent conversation with (amongst other people) The Gagaman got me thinking about import gaming again though, and there are some really cool looking games that we never got here in the UK. Things like Seaman and Roomania #203, and to a lesser extent Alien Front and...er...Tokyo Bus Guide. The thing is, I always felt like import gaming was a closed door to somebody like me who isn't particularly rich and doesn't earn a lot (and doesn't steal cash from work). It only became apparent that this simply isn't the case when I mentioned on Twitter that I'd quite like - but can't afford - an NTSC Dreamcast and was met with a cacophony of "use a boot disk you moron!"

And then the penny dropped. I say penny - I probably mean anvil. Right on my stupid head. All this time I'd been denying myself Japanese and US games (well, apart from the few self-booting burnt games I have) through pure ignorance. So off I went in search of a) some NTSC games and b) a boot disk.


The games I got off eBay for less than a pound each: Capcom Vs SNK Millenium Fight 2000, Pen Pen TriIcelon and Shutokou Battle 2. The prices were key when it came to acquiring these titles, but I also have them all PAL-flavoured and so I figured it'd be easy to navigate the menus should they turn up and be swathed in Kanji. There'll also all decent games (before you start - Pen Pen is fun!), so I knew I wouldn't be getting any nasty surprises.

Next - I needed boot disks, and these are the three different types I have amassed:

Utopia
I managed to burn this myself ages ago and forgot I even had it until I found a load of old Dreamcast boxes in my mum's attic a few months back. It's burnt onto a rather cheap CD-R and the foil is coming off so it is quite temperamental - sometimes it loads up...other times it won't. You can tell how ancient it is by the version number that pops up on the 'insert game' splash screen: version 1.1. I think it's now on some infinitely higher revision, but I don't know how well that version works as no matter what I try, I cannot get either my mac or my girlfriend's Windows laptop to burn a copy that will boot in my console. This version works great though (when it decides to load) - it's very basic and features a bizarre floating reindeer that turns chrome when you replace the Utopia disk with an NTSC game. Which is nice.



DC-IE Import Enabler
This disk was posted to me by a cool guy on Twitter (@ArchaicKoala) who responded to my appeal for help with burning a more up to date Utopia disk. Rather than send instructions, the guy just burnt several copies of DC-IE and posted them to me. And for that, I am truly grateful. DC-IE isn't a booter that I was previously aware of, and was totally expecting a more up to date version of Utopia to be on the CDs. The interface is very 'no frills,' consisting of two static splash screens and instructions to replace the disc with a DC game and press start. Works flawlessly.



Ultimate Cheats Collection
I bought this off eBay, again for a few pounds, as I had heard about a fabled cheats disc that had been given away with a magazine that inadvertently allowed for imported games to be played on a PAL Dreamcast. After a bit of research, it appears that this may have actually happened twice - once with a DC-UK cover disc and once with a disc given away with Paragon publishing's Dreamcast Magazine. This disc is the latter. It's actually meant to be a promo version of the Xploder DC cheats software, where you can select game-ruining cheats (why would you want 'all abilities' from the start in Soul Reaver, for example?!) but you can also completely skip the cheats and just put an NTSC game in and have it bypass the region lock-out. Works just as well as the others, with the added bonus of being able to start a match in Sega Worldwide Soccer with a 15 goal advantage.






So those are the three discs I have been using to play some awesome Japanese Capcom Vs SNK on my trusty old PAL Dreamcast. I'm sure there are lots of other variants on these discs and if you have any others, let us know in the comments. One thing I've noticed about Japanese games from the meagre three I currently own is just how much nicer the manuals and box art is, and I'm pretty excited to finally get the chance to play some of the more interesting Jap and US games that never made it to these shores. Be sure to report back to read my impressions as I get more. Lastly, here are a few screens from Shutokou Battle 2 for no real reason other than I took them:




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Doomcast

July 28, 2014, 9:44 am
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I'm a huge fan of the Doom games. I have played or own every single console release of the game, and know the ins and outs of each version with quite frightening detail - from the music-less Atari Jaguar version and the texture-less floors and ceilings of the SNES port, to the windowed 3DO and 32X versions and the sublime multi-coloured PS1 iteration. I've also played the PC originals to death and more recently the Brutal Doom mod on my mac...yet my personal favourite has got to be Doom 64. You can read about my love for that game here if you so wish, but let's get down to business - you've come to the Dreamcast Junkyard for DC-related prose, not N64 circle-jerking.

Sadly, the Dreamcast never got an official retail port of id Software's genre-defining shooter, which is understandable when you consider the timing of the console's release and lifespan. It was probably too late to put the original games out as an official release, and too early for Doom 3; plus the idea of semi-retro compendiums was quite new at the time and so a re-issue would probably have been derided as unnecessary, and a bit of an insult to those people who had shelled out for a 128-bit system. While retro collections are all the rage these days, back in the early 2000s they simply were not the de rigueur. That said, Doom 3 was years away from release and the game we all know today would have been far too much for the Dreamcast to handle with it's complex vertex shading and texturing techniques - even the original Xbox had to make do with a heavily compromised port of the PC game.

That's not to say the Dreamcast never got in on the Doom action though. Oh no - it got ports of every version you can care to think of thanks to the 'open' nature of the hardware and it's readiness to accept software constructed by talented modders. Of course, when I say the system got ports of the games, what I actually mean is that two programmers with bonafide mad skillz (crt0 and DCGrendel) created DoomDC - a port of the engine which runs the original Doom WAD files. There are also later Doom engine ports for the Dreamcast, such as nxDoom, and that is the one I've had the pleasure of sampling.

I played all of the following using a collection known, funnily enough, as DC Doom Collection - a self booting burnt CD that features a rather basic menu screen and WADs for all of the original games (Doom, Ultimate Doom, Doom II, The Plutonia Experiment and TNT: Evilution, and an added extra - Requiem. I posted a video of Requiem here at the DCJY a few months ago, as I thought it was an interesting fan-made mod where the enemy and weapon sprites are replaced with those from Doom 64, but the level design and visual style retains the dank gloom of the original series (I've posted it again below in case you missed it). Here are some images of the various titles in the series running on Dreamcast:








All of the games on the disc play really well and feature nice controls and - as you'd expect - a silky frame-rate. Movement is mapped to the analogue stick (although not true analogue control), while fire, sprint and action are mapped to the face buttons. Strafing is handled by the triggers and weapon changing and map views are handled by the D-pad.

Of course, due to the fairly elastic nature of the Doom engine, several other popular games from the genre have also made it across to our favourite white joy-block (that's the Dreamcast, folks!) - Hexen and Heretic are two of the most well known. They are both decent games in their own right, but for me they pale in comparison to Doom's bio-mechanical, demonic and frantic shotgun-blasting awesomeness. Granted, the hand-to-hand combat and mystical swords and sorcery gameplay could be considered more tactical due to the need to get in close to the enemies that litter the levels...but for me, unloading a double-barrelled shotgun through the business end into an imp's face is infinitely more satisfying than slashing an ogre with a magic sword. Swings and roundabouts people...whatever the frag that means.


It's probably not surprising that there are various iterations of the Doom engine freely available for the Dreamcast - the game has been ported to pretty much every electrical device with a video output and an microchip inside, and it continues to be a massively popular title with many gamers. The simple 'collect keys and kill stuff' gameplay is fairly timeless and universal in design - indeed the recent Doom 4 reveal at Quakecon 2014 is testament to the series' enduring popularity; and likewise the constant updating of the fantastic Brutal Doom shows just how far the original games can be modded and manipulated.


This is only a little taste of what people are doing with the Doom engine on the Dreamcast. I'm sure there are other projects out there that have either brought or are bringing a multitude of classic FPSs to our beloved undead console, and of course there's the awesome-looking Hypertension: Harmony of Darkness still to come. Naturally, if you know of any other kick-ass Doom-powered Dreamcast shenanigans, let us know in the comments and for further info on all of this stuff, consider checking out the following links:

http://doom.wikia.com/wiki/DoomDC
http://doom.wikia.com/wiki/NxDoom
http://dcemulation.org/?title=Doom_for_Dreamcast
http://www.dcemu.co.uk/vbulletin/threads/106657-Law56kers-Nxdoom-Collection-over-220-mods!
http://www.thedreamcastjunkyard.co.uk/2008/04/law56kers-nxdoom-collection-homebrew.html
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The Trouble With Lists

July 29, 2014, 5:19 am
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When Tom very kindly invited me to write for the Junkyard, he asked me for a quick list of my top three Dreamcast titles. Its funny, but despite writing about video games and the industry for many years now, I’d never really sat down and made a real list. You know, taken time out to carefully and methodically try to ascertain what were the titles that spoke to me, the few games out of literally hundreds that I would choose. In the end I did manage to narrow it down, however it was no easy task.

And that got me thinking about the entire mechanism of listing, how in video game culture creating that ideal, definitive list is seemingly so important. How placing down games in a rigid numerical order is not only revered so much by gamers, but is a kind of active, self re-affirming process for both individuals and the wider gaming collective. After some thought, I feel the process has both a positive and negative bearing on the culture.

So what about that listing process? Well, firstly what strikes me is that essentially the entire concept is deeply flawed. To create any list, say, such as the top five games ever made on Dreamcast, firstly you need criteria. The important pillars of quality that your potential list is to be based on. And it is here that you hit your first issue. What are the criteria to be? Should a game be ranked according to its graphical fidelity or its plot? Should a title be scored on the tightness of its control mechanics or on the professionalism of its voice acting and soundtrack? You can of course select a variety of criteria, score the games, and aggregate a final list from that, however that handily assumes that the criteria chosen are definitive. It also raises issues such intra-criteria quality definition - for example, should Street Fighter 3: Third Strike score lower than Dead or Alive 2 in the graphics criteria because it is 2D rather than 3D, or does its superb animation make up for that?
Should all 2D fighters score less in a 'graphics' criteria as they are only 2D?

If the rigidity and strict definition of that form of listing process is its downfall, then how about a process built around vaguer and more loose concepts? If we drop hard criteria such as ‘graphics’ or ‘sound’ and use things like ‘fun’ and ‘longevity’, do we get a clearer system of ranking? Unfortunately, this system is also flawed for the primary reason of falling too far into subjectivity. The criteria of ‘fun’ sounds like a great idea to base a top ten list on, but then how do you even go about defining it? Just because I think exploring Yokosuka for hours on end in Shenmue is the last word in fun, that doesn’t mean the next gamer does. To them the lack of narrative pace and game progression may see it classified as boring. From too rigid to too loose, both these listing systems seem to fall down pretty quickly as soon as their surfaces are scratched.

Would all gamers agree that Shenmue is 'fun' to play?

Progression however I think can be made by re-evaluating the importance of lists, and it is here where what I see as the empowering part of list making can be salvaged. If lists are seen less as a tool for making definitive, rigid rankings of titles - rankings that will always be negatively fought over due to the aforementioned issues - but more as a type of mechanism for individuals and the gaming culture in general to hold some, albeit ill-defined, image of what the best of the industry can be, then not only can an elevated level of consensus be reached, but gamers themselves can help reaffirm the legacy of the best games of all time.

In many respects I think what I'm trying to say is that by not thinking about games in the strictest, most black and white terms, but more in a loose and intangible manner, I end up arriving more naturally at a list that I agree with subjectively, and has the possibility of being true objectively.

N.b. That all said, anyone who says that Shenmue is not the best game on Dreamcast should be automatically fired out of cannon into a pool of enraged wasp-piranha hybrid mutants.
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The Elysian Shadows Kickstarter has launched, bringing a new RPG to the SEGA Dreamcast!

August 1, 2014, 11:44 am
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The Elysian Shadows Kickstarter has officially launched. Dubbed a “next-gen” 2D RPG, the game is slated to hit a number of platforms including our beloved SEGA Dreamcast. The Dreamcast release starts at the $49 level in the Standard Edition which comes in two flavors, signed and unsigned. The signed edition is limited to 100 copies. The $125 level features a Collector’s Edition of the game with several physical goodies that are only digital in the lower tiers.

As far as stretch goals, should the project hit $400,000, the team plans to create a monster training VMU mini-game, while $500,000 will open to game up to the modding community (Dreamcast included).

Make sure to check out the project, and if it appeals to you, show your support!
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Xump Your Dreamcast

August 2, 2014, 12:52 pm
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Xump. How do you pronounce a game called Xump? I'd go for "Zump" personally, but to be honest it really doesn't matter. It doesn't matter because Xump is yet another homebrew game that's totally free to download, burn to CD-R and pop in your Dreamcast to play. Here's the jargon from the rather lovely retro-themed, pixel-art Xump website:

Xump - The Final Run is a simple multi-platform puzzler by Retroguru. Initially released by Psilocybin Development in 2005 the game has been improved in almost every aspect you can imagine. New graphics, new levels, new music, new options, new everything...

Help Holger to clean up deserted space fields. As this is a very dangerous task for a human being a headbot named Xump will be the one who has to suffer.

Your main task is to clean all dissolvable tiles on several single-screen levels by simply stepping on them, one by one. Few fields are secured with mines and need a double tap. Mines can be blown up when passing by or de-mined by Xump when staying on this specific field for a short moment. Certainly the mission sounds easier than it will be.








I've been playing Xump for a while and I must say it's a pretty nice little puzzle game. There are some impressively drawn visuals and the music is fantastic, and the best bit is that it's totally free. If you head over to the Retroguru site you'll also find that the game is available for pretty much every format you could care to mention, and that they thought to include the Dreamcast on that list is highly commendable. Xump is a great addition to the DC's already highly impressive homebrew library...go there and download it now!

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Once Upon A DreamShell

August 4, 2014, 2:17 pm
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I bought a DreamShell SD card reader for about £5 from an eBay seller some time last year. After a few days, it turned up in the post (in surprisingly good condition too, considering it was sent wrapped in a folded piece of A4 lined paper) and I had a quick glance at some forum posts regarding ways to use the thing. All I could fathom was that I needed to burn some disc or other, and put some files on the SD card that should be inserted into the device before implanting it into the serial port on the back of the Dreamcast. And I won't lie - it looked like too much work; my mac wouldn't burn discs that the Dreamcast would see as anything other than a music CD and I couldn't really see what the point of the contraption was anyway. And so, the SD reader went into a box and was never thought of again...until now.

The main issue I had with using the SD reader back then was that (as I just mentioned) I had no way to burn CD-Rs that the Dreamcast could read. I primarily use a Macbook to write all this shit and as amazing as Mac OSX is, there doesn't appear to be a software package available that will let you burn a Dreamcast-compatible disc with it. This changed somewhat a few weeks ago when my girlfriend bought a new Windows 8 laptop, and regardless what you may think of that operating system, it has a major advantage over Mac OS in that it allows the use of a package called Boot Dreams. And so, armed with the new hardware and a freshly installed copy of Boot Dreams, I was ready to re-visit the SD card reader...and I'm sure glad I did: Boot Dreams has single-handedly changed my opinion of the SD card reader from useless tat to amazing peripheral that no serious Dreamcaster should be without.

Apologies for my carpet
I went back to those forums I had previously dismissed and this time actually read what people had posted. I watched some youtube videos and I digested a few 'step by step' guides. I downloaded the DreamShell software package and carefully extracted the SD reader files into the root of the SD card (after formatting it in FAT32, of course). I then employed Boot Dreams and attempted to burn a DreamShell CD-R. The disc burner roared to life and white text spewed across the black DOS-style dialogue box on the Windows desktop in front of me. After a few minutes, the CD tray snapped open and I took the warm CD-R and carefully placed it into my Dreamcast while simultaneously inserting the SD reader, replete with memory card containing the necessary files, into the serial port. I turned the Dreamcast on. I held my breath and fully expected the 'Music CD' screen to pop up on the TV screen. I waited. The startup animation died away and the familiar grinding of the GD drive started up like an orchestra. Then it happened...the Dreamcast was actually reading the disc. It was actually reading a CD-R that I had burnt myself! The initial Dreamshell menu appeared and I clicked on the 'SD Card' option. And then I fainted through sheer shock that I had actually burnt a working CD-R. About an hour later, I came to and continued - I was met with this screen next:


A thing of beauty. I'm sure you'll agree. Looking something like an ordinary PC desktop, this is the Dreamshell 'desktop' view - and those images down the left hand side are the standard system icons. They are:


  • Console
  • Region Changer*
  • DSN
  • ISO Loader
  • DSInstall*
  • File Manager


And here's a look at each one:

Console
As you'd imagine, this is for those with a more advanced knowledge of command prompts than yours truly.


Region Changer*
For changing the region of your system I would imagine - I haven't tried messing with this personally as I'm not overly confident and can't really afford to brick one of my consoles just yet!


DSN
For doing network-based stuff I guess. Again, not something I've messed with much. Mainly because my Dreamcast isn't connected to anything other than the TV or my capture device.


ISO Loader
This is where things get interesting - ISO Loader does what it says on the tin...more on this later.


DS Install*
This utility allows you to install the DreamShell software into the BIOS of your Dreamcast. I imagine this would negate the need to use an SD card and the DreamShell CD-R in order to get to the Dreamshell 'desktop,' but again this isn't something I'm confident exploring just yet. Maybe once I've got a few more expendable Dreamcasts cluttering up the living room.


File Manager
As the name suggests, File Manager lets you explore whatever software you may have on your SD card. Interestingly, it also lets you poke around in your VMU and a few other locations too.


There are a few other interesting facets to the DreamShell OS, such as the multiple desktops, but - and I have no problem admitting this - I am a total n00b in this department so I'll hang fire before I write more about the functionality of the package lest I be trolled a billion times over by the worst scummVM of the interwebs for all interneternity. What I'm saying here is that I'm writing this just as a bloke who does not profess to be any sort of expert when it comes to the higher functions of Dreamcast homebrew, hacking or any of that stuff. I'm just an average dude with a love of the Dreamcast, a thirst for knowledge and maybe a bit too much free time. Now that's out of the way, what exactly have I been doing with DreamShell? Well...playing games of course!


Using the ISO Loader bit of DreamShell, it is possible to execute specific Dreamcast-compatible .iso files and play some pretty awesome games. I would recommend visiting the Dreamcast SD Iso section of The Iso Zone and grabbing some of the files on there. Naturally I was only doing this for the experimental purposes of writing this little blurb, and a few of the files I downloaded happened to be Neo Geo CD games. The Neo Geo CD is a console I have lusted after for quite some time, and is one of the few consoles from the 1990s that I do not own on account of its high price; and the reason for my desire to own one stems from the amazing-looking 2D sprite-based titles available. Not necessarily the fighting games - more the other titles such as Neo DriftOut and Super Sidekicks for example. Guess what? With Dreamshell, playing these games - albeit in emulated form - is now a reality for me. Simply locate the .iso file on the SD card using the ISO Loader, execute the file, and voila...





Of course, it's not just Neo Geo titles that can be emulated using DreamShell. There are a multitude of homebrew titles out there that are begging to be played, and lots of other interesting applications too.

My advice for anyone toying with the idea of getting involved with DreamShell but feeling a bit put off by the daunting prospect of locating software/burning booting CD-Rs is this: give it a go. I'm a complete knob when it comes this type of thing (see a few paragraphs above) and the fact I have managed to get some fun from this device is testament to how easy it really is if you're willing to spent a few hours educating yourself.

I'm not sure if there have been later versions of DreamShell released - there might well have been - but the one I have used (4.0) seems to work great. Here's a really useful guide to getting set up, and here's a link to the software you require.

Oh, and here's the official DreamShell website.

*It's been brought to my attention that the Region Changer and DS Installer can only be used if you have a modded Dreamcast with a flashable BIOS. Thanks to @pcwzrd13 for that!
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All The Lights That Light The Way

August 11, 2014, 2:09 pm
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Are blinding. There are many things that I would like like to play on my Dreamcast. But that's another story (morning glory). Where was I? Oh yes...Driving games! The Dreamcast has lots of them. Some of them are total shite, and some of them represent the very zenith of their respective sub-genres. Ferrari F355 Challenge and Le Mans 24hrs for example, are two of the most impressive track-based racers of their generation. But I'm not here to talk about the quality (or lack thereof in some cases) of the Dreamcast's racing stable. What I'm here to talk (write?) about is a minor part of some of the Dreamcast's racers that I find quite intriguing: headlights! More specifically: which Dreamcast racing game has the most impressive digital rendition of light particles being thrown out of the front of a vehicle as it careens around a course in the pitch black? Before I set off on this journey, I want to be clear here - what I'm looking at is the overall headlight effect, whether it is beneficial in-game and well, how nice it looks. There are quite a few DC games that feature night races but do not really have any dynamic lighting so I've left those off this list. Most notable is probably the aforementioned Le Mans as even though it features a 24 hr race, complete with changing light conditions, the cars themselves do not have any dynamic lighting effects that actually illuminates (or appears to illuminate) the environment. Furthermore, the games listed below do not all necessarily feature real-time headlight effects, but they at least try to give the impression that your car has a working set of bulbs installed. So without further ado, let's have a gander...

V-Rally 2
What kind of rally game would be complete without some good old-fashioned night stages? Driving ran, mud splashing everywhere...smashed headlights and no clue where you're going. All part of the appeal of rally for me. V-Rally 2 indulges this by featuring night stages and real-time headlight effects aplenty. The thing about V-Rally 2's stages though, is that they are never really ever dark enough for the headlights to actually be useful. There are random splashes of light everywhere, which is understandable if you're driving through a village or something...but more often than not you're just out in the countryside and there'll be blobs of light just there. That aside though, the real-time lighting is OK, even if it does look a little odd in action. It's hard to explain, but the cone of light from the front of the cars appears 'artificial,' as if the different polygons making up the floor are just switch for a lighter version whenever the 'light' is meant to be shining on them. Quite noticeable what I mean when you're whipping along at a fair pace, but the effect at least looks like real-time lighting so I'm happy with it.




Rush 2049
There is only one night time track in Rush 2049 - you can't change the time of day so the headlight effect is only visible on the one track. It isn't real-time either, but is instead a fairly clever trick where light-coloured sprites are drawn over the environment whenever you get close to a wall or your car approaches the ground at an angle after a jump. Sometimes the game gets it wrong and the effect looks a bit odd (for example a whole 'round' light beam occasionally continues off the edge of a building like in the bottom screen down there), but it is a unique way of representing real-time lighting on the cheap. Building a whole lighting technique into a game with only one night track probably wouldn't have been cost effective, but top marks to the devs for trying - and this effect is absent from the N64 port of Rush 2049 too.




Tokyo Highway Battle 1 & 2
Tokyo Highway Battle/Shutokou Battle/Tokyo Extreme Racer (why has it got so many names?!) is a bit of an odd case. It is a racing game that is entirely based on night-time street races through the neon-lit metropolis of Tokyo...but features some pretty half-arsed lighting effects. Sure, the highways are impressively lit and every single light in the game has either a lens flare or a trail just waiting to spill from it...but it has no real-time headlight effects. Well, it does...sort of. Let me explain. In THB/SB/TER you initiate illegal street races with rival boy (and girl) racers by flashing your high beams at them...only the environment is totally unaffected by your lights. You get a nice little 'halo' effect around the front of your car and the little 'light' sprite on the floor grows a bit, but it doesn't actually illuminate the walls or anything. However - and this it the weird bit - the lights illuminate other road users' vehicles! So at least there's that.





4x4 Evo
4x4 Evo features muddy racing where you can literally drive anywhere you like around the map, and also has some pretty extensive race customization options...including the time of day the race takes part in. Weirdly, you also have the choice of 'night' and 'pitch black,' but to be honest there's not really a great deal of fun to be had in either mode. This isn't just because 4x4 Evo is about as much fun as a family funeral (before the traditional pub wake, I mean), it's because the headlights fitted to the trucks are about as bright as a the candles on a birthday cake. The shots here were taken in 'night' mode and the terrain is light enough that the headlight effects don't really come into play, but in 'pitch black' you literally can't see anything - it's pretty much a black screen with the slightest hint of illumination. The effect used in 4x4 Evo also seem to be of the same ilk as those in V-Rally 2 - the floor tiles seems to just 'swap' for a lighter version of themselves, or at least thats what it looks like.




Metropolis Street Racer
MSR is one of the best racers on the Dreamcast. The visuals are great and the representations of real-life locations was unprecedented at the time of release. That the game utilises the Dreamcast's internal clock to change the time of day in the three cities that the races take place in also means that it features some kick-ass real time lighting effects right? Well...not exactly. The night-time variants of Tokyo, London and San Francisco are all suitably well lit (as any modern city would be), but the cars themselves do not have true headlights. Much like Tokyo Highway Battle, MSR's engine simply places a patch of fake light down on the ground in front of your vehicle that disappears into walls if you get too close. To be fair to MSR, the game is so highly detailed in pretty much every other area of aesthetic design that to also have full-blown real time lighting would have been asking a little much. On the plus side, the actual headlight effects themselves are very impressive - the lens flares are wonderfully down-played and the glare alters depending on the angle and how far away the vehicle is from the camera.




Speed Devils
This was the first full game I ever owned for the Dreamcast - I actually bought it the week before I got my console so read the manual cover to cover and ogled the screenshots on the back cover an untold number of times before I got to play it. Halcyon days in 1999. Anyhow, one of the things that will always stick in my mind about Speed Devils is that the headlight effects are bloody fantastic. The cone of light that the cars project on night stages is - while not the most realistic - definitely one of the most interesting and useful. The lights actually light the way, and the environment outside of that precious area of illumination is pretty much hidden by the darkness. The lights can also be broken if you crash, and the races become much more difficult to compete in if you do end up going down to one bulb...and if you lose them both then you're pretty screwed. Most of the courses do have street lighting and other light sources dotted about so you're not totally lost without your lamps, but there are areas of total rural darkness in places and traversing these places is much more difficult without your hallowed bulbs intact.





As I stated up there in the intro, there are other games that do feature night stages, but the effort to simulate real-time lights (or indeed have them) was lacking for whatever reason. Sega Rally 2, Buggy Heat and 4 Wheel Thunder all spring to mind, but these games listed are your best bet if you're a weirdo like me and find fascination in the most mundane of subjects.

And with that, I'm off to stare at a candle for a few hours. Night.
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Mighty Morphin' Power Boards

August 14, 2014, 3:06 pm
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Last weekend was amazing. Really, really amazing. For several reasons. The first - and most important - was that it was Revival Events' self-titled Revival 2014, a massive retro-gaming event held at Dunstall Park racecourse in Wolverhampton. I was there as part of the RetroCollect team, running loads of gaming challenges and just generally chatting to gamers and acting the fool. Another reason it was amazing was that I got to meet, chat with and actually touch the flowing hair of John Romero:
The photographer wasn't happy with the focus
In case you're unfamiliar with what the genius behind Doom looks like, that's him on the right. Not the grinning fool on the left - that's me. To be fair I was grinning like that because Mr Romero had just whispered the secret to his flowing mane into my ear, and as you can see this was greatly received as my hairline is receding faster than the Norfolk coastline. He also signed my boxed copy of Doom for the Atari Jaguar, so there was that too. But let's get back to the reason you're here: I also bought a Dreamcast. Yes, another Dreamcast. but unlike all of the others I now have clogging the entrance to my bathroom, this one is different. It came in a box...with an orange swirl:


Yes, I bought my first NTSC-J system for the bargain price of £50 from a trader called Sore Thumb Retro Games. And to say its in great condition is an understatement. The console has no signs of yellowing at all, and has all of the documentation including the Dream Passport (sealed) and manuals. Naturally, being a Japanese system the plug adapter ends with two prongs and simply will not fit in a UK power socket. And even if it could, the power coming out of the wall would likely travel down the wire, into the console and instantly transform the immaculate white box of fun into a large ball of flame, simultaneously causing untold collateral damage to any curtains, throw cushions and random empty beer tins in the vicinity. And in my gaff, there's always a high probability that empty beer tins could also be hidden inside the throw cushions, so the damage bill - in this hypothetical situation - could easily be triple that caused inside your average residential shit-hole. In order to prevent the aforementioned cataclysm, I employed the services of one of these things in order to play on my newly purchased NTSC-J machine:


That's a converter thingy. You put the foreign plug in one side and the UK three-pronged side into the wall socket, and by some kind of magical process no doubt involving a tiny wizard living inside the device, the horrid nasty UK electricity transforms into Japanese Dreamcast-friendly power! See - magic! So anyway, I played the DC for a bit, mucked around with the menu and changed the language to English and marvelled at Sega Rally 2 running a bit quicker...and then I went to do some other menial task that life dictated I must do. It was probably the washing up or something...to be honest I've totally forgotten. Actually, it could have been folding some towels up. Or was it some ironing? Fuck it - I can't remember.

Anyway, I totally forgot (there's a theme here) that I'd left the Dreamcast plugged in to the step-down transformer. It wasn't until a few days later that I went to turn on the Dreamcast again that I discovered it would not turn on. I was pretty stumped until I deduced that leaving the transformer plugged into the mains must have damaged it in some way - indeed, the smell of burning wizard flesh coming from the vents on the side of the thing added weight to my hypothesis. So there I was, left with a Japanese Dreamcast and a dead step-down transformer. I looked on eBay for another one, but being a bit strapped for cash having spent all my money buying the secret ingredients to concoct John Romero's Magical Hair Serum™, I decided that I would investigate an alternative remedy to getting my NTSC system up and running again. I took to Twitter and asked the question - is it possible to put a UK power board inside a Japanese or US Dreamcast in order to use a standard UK plug with it, thus negating the need for a converter. Amongst others, The Gagaman himself answered my call - the answer was a resounding "yes!"

Knowing I had a load of spare PAL Dreamcast bits knocking about, I decided to give it a go - putting a UK power board into an NTSC Dreamcast. Here's how I got on:


And there it is! An NTSC-J Dreamcast happily humming away with a UK plug adapter attached to it, with nary a step-down converter in sight. It's a really easy operation to carry out providing you have the parts handy, and I've also kept the original board and plug in the box just in case I ever move to Japan and feel the need to take a native console back there with me.

I'm off to apply some of my hair serum now. If I end up looking like a Cacodemon, I'll be writing a strongly-worded email to my old pal John.
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Welcome To Warp Zone!

August 15, 2014, 1:20 pm
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I appreciate that a lot of people who either follow me (@Tomleecee) or the Junkyard's main account (@SEGAJunkyard) on Twitter will have already seen this, and likewise for those of you who have done the right thing and 'liked' the DCJY on Facebook; but I thought it was only right that I dedicate a full-blown post to here to my recently customised Dreamcast. The job was done by a very talented modding outfit called Warp Zone, and their usual console of choice is the Nintendo Entertainment System:

I, however decided to try my luck and ask if they could do a custom job on a Dreamcast. I didn't want much - just a nice blue shade on a console shell and a matching pad. Nowt fancy -  I'm an advocate of the old 'less is more' mantra. They accepted my challenge and so I dismantled a rather disgusting-looking yellow Dreamcast, put it in a bin-bag full of empty gin bottles and sent it off to the dudes at Warp Zone.

Less than a week later, they sent me these images:


And some time later...this arrived (well, the shells did - I had to employ my 'engineering' skills to re-assemble the console and the joypad)...


Frankly, it looks awesome. I even took it to Revival 2014 to display (see above), and was offered hard cash for it by a member of the public. Naturally, I turned him down but I can totally see why - I can't praise the finish enough...this system looks like it was always meant to be electric blue. I've toyed with the idea of changing the orange LED for a blue one to match the paintwork, but I think the orange original actually works better due to the contrast.

If you'd like to have your Dreamcast 'seen to' in the most positive way, visit Warp Zone's website and drop them an email. Prices are very reasonable, and you won't regret giving your tired-looking console a fresh new look. You can also find them on Facebook here, and while you're there - give us a 'like' too, you barsteward!
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Shenmue In HD Remake Shocker! (Sort Of)

August 18, 2014, 11:15 am
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OK, so the chances are you've already seen this by now as it's pretty much a day old, but images have surfaced online of a fan-made HD remake of Shenmue. I'm not going to say a great deal because I'm honestly not that bothered about Shenmue. It is a vastly overrated game in my opinion and while I thoroughly appreciate the scope of the story and the graphical splendour of the franchise, I just think its almost mythical status has gotten a little bit out of hand. Every two minutes there's some new 'Save Shenmue' guff doing the rounds on the social media networks...and I really have my doubts as to whether the majority of the people supporting these campaigns have even played the original games...or if they just have extremely thick rose-tinted spectacles on. Anyway, I'm going to stop there before I cause a schism in the DCJY readership - I know there are plenty of people out there who genuinely love the games; but for me they are nothing if not a lesson in tedium. And that's fine...because everyone is entitled to an opinion, right?

Regardless - my humble opinion shouldn't detract from the hard work that has clearly gone into dragging the original Shenmue right up to date in the graphics department, and here are some rather lovely-looking images images courtesy of Korean Shenmue fan Ncoonkid:


For further info, be sure to check out RetroCollect's article here, SEGAbits'piece here, and CVG's feature here.
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The Dreamcast Premiere Press Kit

August 19, 2014, 1:03 am
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I was looking around on eBay a few weeks ago and stumbled across a rather unusual article from the Dreamcast's history. There were no bids and only a couple of days left, so I stuck a cheeky bid of a few pounds on said item. As the timer counted down, I thought I was going to score a massive win and acquire a piece of memorabilia I had personally never heard of before. I was wrong. Within the last few minutes, the bids came in thick and fast and even though I threw caution to the wind and put a whopping £35 on such a frivolous item...the auction ended at almost £60! What is this mystery object?  This:


The Dreamcast Premiere Press Kit. From the blurb in the auction and from the text shown in the photos I have cunningly deduced that the Premiere set comprised of a music CD, a booklet detailing Dreamcast peripherals and upcoming games, and also a copy of Dream On 3. The set appears to have been given away to members of the gaming press to celebrate a year since the Dreamcast's UK launch, and is a really nice-looking little curio. Alas, there were collectors out there with deeper pockets than mine - which isn't hard, to be honest - and it would have been cool to actually own this item and do a proper feature on it...but cest la vie.
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Confidential Mission

August 20, 2014, 12:02 pm
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The name's Gibson, Howard Gibson and he's on a mission, a Confidential Mission. This hasn't quite got the right ring to it, but take one look at the cover art of the Sega Dreamcast game Confidential Mission and it just screams James Bond 007 at you; the slick black suit and bow tie, the silenced pistol, the pretty girl, the one-eyed antagonist and his chief henchman. Maybe this game would have been more popular if it had been tied to Ian Fleming's famous spy.


Originally an arcade release in 2000, this port came to the Dreamcast a year after that, but never really gained the acclaim or success of its predecessors, Virtua Cop and House of the Dead. The story follows Howard Gibson and his partner Jean Clifford, agents for CMF who are thrown into action to save the world, as predictably the bad guys have done something devious and nasty. This time they have stolen a satellite and plan to use it to destroy CMF and try to take over the world. This reminds me of a certain mouse called The Brain and his trusty sidekick, Pinky.


Cartoon mice aside though, this game is much the same as other light-gun shooters: kill or be killed - simple really. You and your cohort will be tasked with saving CMF and defeating the bad guys, and along the way you'll play through various scenarios, like the museum and train, during which you will encounter dangerous foes and end of level bosses. Make sure you make use of pickups and special weapons to aid you in your fight.


The only downside is really my fault and that's because I had to play this game on a poxy little 14" screen. I can't help but think that my experience would have been magnified tenfold if I'd have played on a screen with a bigger surface area. Confidential Mission is definitely worth a play and to enhance your experience make sure you use the Dreamcast Gun. Get a friend round as well as a shared gaming experience is always a better one, but if you have no friends or they are out of town and you have the urge to play, knock on your neighbour's door and invite them round for some fun and games.
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Dream Art

August 21, 2014, 6:36 am
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Can games be art? I’d like to say that it’s an age old question, but to say that would make me a complete liar as games are not an ‘age old’ medium. I guess computers, which is essentially what games consoles are at their core, could be described as ‘age old,’ but as usual I’m side tracking myself in a quagmire of completely irrelevant horse crap before I’ve even started to get to the point.

Can games be art? Well, I suppose they can. How is an amazing and emotionally-charged still image rendered on canvas with oil paints any different to a similarly powerful image created on a screen with polygons and pixels? Without getting too bogged down in my own half-cooked philosophizing, there are many, many examples of games and art in a traditional sense crossing over – just take a look at pixel art or bead art in the physical sense, and games like Okami in the gaming sense. But what about gaming hardware? What about the physical machines that we as gamers, all employ as tools to enjoy our favourite pastime? Can consoles themselves be considered as pieces of industrial design art? I’d like to say that yes they can. There are some really good-looking games machines, controllers and removable media out there and they have all undergone a complex system of internal design before being finalised and released to the public. Some games machines do look better than others and their physical forms have cemented themselves in the minds of many gamers, sometimes for better and sometimes for worse.


Everyone knows what a Sony PlayStation looks like for example (if you don't, then apologies - there's one just up there). Likewise with a Sega Mega Drive. The designs of those systems have embedded themselves in popular culture. On the flip side, the Atari Jaguar with a CD unit on top is often referred to as looking like a toilet, regardless of the fact that the Jaguar base system (minus the CD drive) is one of the better-looking games consoles from the past. Why am I rambling about all this though? Well, I’ve created a nice piece of art myself. Dreamcast art, in fact. Dream art. Hmm. Not sure if that works…but look here, me laddo:


These are images of my tiny Dreamcast in an egg that I got off eBay a few years ago. I did a post about it here. It’s been sat in a box in a cupboard for a while and only the other day did I think to myself – why don’t I do something with it?! So I did. I went down to Wilkinson and bought a deep picture frame – this one, in fact:


And then I pillaged a bit of promotional guff from one of my NTSC-J DC games; in this case it was a square flyer out of the Virtua Fighter 3tb box. I then combined the items together as if I was a regular Jill Valentine and came up with this rather lovely piece of post-modern, neo-classical, baroque, brutalist awesomeness:

Same size as the Mona Lisa. True story.
I was toying with the idea of putting a little light in the top of the frame and having it lit up, but for now it looks just great on the mantelpiece. And there it shall stay until I can afford to have a full-size bronze statue of myself constructed and erected instead.
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Kojiroh’s Female!?

August 21, 2014, 5:55 pm
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One of my favourite characters from any fighting game ever made is Kojiroh Sanada, the Shinsengumi captain who was tasked with taking down the crazed Shikyoh in The Last Blade. I mean, that guy just radiated cool in everything he did in that game and, as well as being a great all-round choice for the novice player, had enough depth in move-set to be useful at the high end too. Looking back, I think my allegiance to him paid off too, as when my friends and I used to play I normally ended up with a half-decent win ratio.
Kojiroh's nemesis Shikyoh, the crazed ex-member of the Shinsengumi.
I mean, seriously, why wouldn't you choose the lethal, expert swordsman who was trained in the most prestigious sword school of Japan? A guy who, legend has it, was based on Saitō Hajime, the real life Samurai warrior who rose to prominence during the numerous wars of Japan’s Bakumatsu period. A warrior who, in that most beautiful of SNK fighters, can finish you at anytime with a single sword strike. Exactly! You’d have to be pretty mental not to. As such, Kojiroh has always been my man in the series, with the nearly-as-awesome Setsuna my second.
Kojiroh is a great all-round fighter, balancing good offence and defence.
Therefore, upon seeing the same character in the awesome sequel The Last Blade 2 on Dreamcast a few years later, it was a no-brainer that I would simply graduate along with him. It didn’t take long either for me to fall back into the groove, wielding that razor-sharp katana with deadly precision. And there things remained for years.


Until about a week ago.
Every time I see The Last Blade 2 in action its animation seems even better.
That’s because a week ago I was abruptly informed by an associate that despite my man being named Kojiroh Sanada, looking like Kojiroh Sanada and sounding like Kojiroh Sanada in The Last Blade 2, that character ain't Kojiroh Sanada. No, apparently its his sister Kaori Sanada, dressed as Kojiroh who - by the time of the second game - has now died. When I first heard this I thought the guy was just plain wrong, however after consulting the almighty Internet, he was proved correct and years of my thinking was obliterated in one fell swoop.


What’s the point of this post? Nothing really, asides from the fact that, after some serious consideration, I now think Kojiroh Sanada is even cooler as a woman than a man.


Sorry Setsuna, you’ll always be second best.
I don't know who is scarier, Setsuna or his owl.

N.b. Seriously, have you seen Setsuna? Even if you did manage beat him somehow in real life then that devil owl of his would be sure to take your eyes out in no time.  
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HP Lovecast

August 25, 2014, 9:58 am
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As well as playing, collecting, discussing and writing about games in all of their guises (both retro and current), I also enjoy a good book. Granted, my most recent book purchases have been books about games: The History of Nintendo 1889-1980 by Florent Gorges and Masters of Doom by David Kushner, but I also enjoy reading the works of another author: HP Lovecraft. Lovecraft's most famous creation is arguably the whole Cthulu mythos, and the fear and dread that is encapsulated by that entire sub-genre hinges on the unnerving threat of inter-dimensional beings that possess ageless knowledge beyond human comprehension; and a running theme that being privy to this level of all-knowing consciousness would lead the frail human mind to total breakdown and madness. Personally, I much prefer Shadow Over Innsmouth and The Colour Out of Space to The Call of Cthulu, but that's just my personal preference.

There aren't many mainstream film adaptations of Lovecraft's work (although a Guillermo del Toro adaptation of At the Mountains of Madness is never too far from the rumour mill door), and even fewer console games based on his books. There was The Call of Cthulu: Dark Corners of the Earth for the original Xbox...but there are few other console titles I can think of that specifically reference Lovecraftian horror and the particular brand of ancient, eldritch terror associated with his novels. There is one game on the Dreamcast however, that whilst not being truly based on a Lovecraft tale, takes lots of cues and plot points from his canon. There are interdimensional monsters, ancient other-worldly horrors, tales of madness and an overwhelming sense of dread that permeates every location - a dread that cannot be pinned on one particular source. That game is Alone In The Dark: The New Nightmare.
Developed by DarkWorks and published by Infogrammes in 2001, Alone In The Dark: The New Nightmare (or Alone In The Dark 4, as some prefer to call it) is a 3rd person survival horror adventure in a similar vein to the first three Resident Evil games - you control a polygonal character who can move freely around in pre-rendered locations viewed through a static camera. In the case of AITD4, these locations are set on the mysterious Shadow Island, a small craggy enclave jutting from the sea off the coast of Massachusetts. The plot of the adventure is key to my love of The New Nightmare as it has the hallmarks of a great detective story with paranormal and Lovecraftian undertones: set in 2001, you play as either Edward Carnby or Aline Cedrac and travel to Shadow Island to investigate the death of Carnby's friend and partner Charles Fiske. At the time of his untimely and unexplained death, Fiske was investigating the existence of three ancient stone tablets said to be located on the island, and Carnby and Aline make it their mission to find out the significance of the tablets, and find Fiske's killer.

Of course, things get a little bit more complicated when the plane they are travelling in is sabotaged by creatures unknown and the protagonists are forced to bail out. Naturally, they are separated and this is where the game begins - you can choose to play as either Carnby or Aline, and they each start from a different location on Shadow Island, each with a different set of initial equipment items and with a different style of game. Their paths cross on multiple occasions throughout the game, and they do stay in contact throughout via two-way radio. Rather than simply represent 'easy' or 'hard' styles of play, as in the original Resident Evil, both characters games differ significantly in terms of gameplay - Carnby's game is more of a shooter, while Aline's adventure focuses more on puzzle solving. That's not to say there is no gunplay at all in Aline's game, but if you want all-out shooting, then Carnby's the best character to go for initially.

"The enigmas of the adventure are so incorporated with the story that if you reveal the story, you reveal the game."
- Antoine Villette, DarkWorks CEO speaking to EDGE Magazine, Feb 2000
The torch is your best friend
While I have mentioned Resident Evil and drawn comparisons several times, to compare the two is a little inaccurate. The survival horror genre in the style illustrated here was pretty much invented by Alone In the Dark, and all Resident Evil did was run with the original premise (and arguably Capcom's series improved it, too), but the two franchises cannot truly be correlated - in my opinion - because one game is more about blasting zombies to bits with ever more powerful weaponry and trying to stay alive, while the other is much more interested in the mystery of the plot; you aren't really told anything about what is going on, where the creatures that are stalking the island are coming from...what they are, even. It is only through reading manuscripts and diaries that you start to piece together the years of research and almost obsessive devotion to an ancient mystery that has lead to the summoning of Alone In The Dark's antagonists. While the same is true of Resident Evil to a point, there is less emphasis placed on the back story and more on the notion of finding more bullets because zombies are coming to eat your face.

It is true that Alone In The Dark features a mansion, but for me the comparisons to Resident Evil should really end there. There are other mechanics at play in DarkWorks' game that give it an individuality that should be recognised - the use of light and darkness is a massive part of the combat system and you are encouraged to use your torch to beat back the creatures stalking you from the shadows. Likewise, most of the weaponry employs ammunition that will create flashes of light (magnesium bullets, anyone?) as a means of lethality. This also bleeds into the control method which enables you to freely move and also shine your torch around simultaneously. It can be a little cumbersome on a Dreamcast joypad that simply didn't have dual analogue sticks, but it's a nice idea nonetheless. As you can appreciate with the style of game, you do encounter the usual stock puzzles such as locks that need to be opened with combinations that you'll find in old notebooks, and ornaments that need to be pushed around to open hidden doors, but there are also some nice scare tactics used - for instance when creatures flash in and out of existence in time with cracks of lightning and thunder, and the sound design is masterful - lots of howling wind and echoing footsteps on floorboards.

"There have always been movies in the horror genre and there will always be horror games. Fear is one of the most powerful emotions you can feel. There is love and fear - and what else is there?"
- Guillaume Gouraud, DarkWorks Art Director speaking to EDGE Magazine, Feb 2000 
Some of the locations are stunningly rendered
You can probably tell that I really hold Alone In The Dark: The New Nightmare in fairly high regard, and yes - I do. There are better survival horror games on the Dreamcast sure, but there is no other game that captures the essence of Lovecraftian horror in the same way. Games like Shadowman, Code Veronica and Soul Reaver are all fine games, but none of them capture true eldritch terror in the same way as DarkWorks' effort does...and for all the flaws the game has, the storyline and the atmosphere are areas in which The New Nightmare does everything right.
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The Land Before DLC: Toy Commander

August 28, 2014, 12:44 pm
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Toy Commander is one of the Dreamcast's best games in my opinion. Not only is it an original take on the traditional 3D shooter in that you fly toy aircraft and drive ground units around a fully realised 3D house (toys which are actually being played with by a kid - the titular Toy Commander), but it really is an enjoyable experience. Missions are well balanced and varied in design, and on top of all that it has a great sense of humour. Oh, and it looks bloody fantastic even by today's standards. Yes, No Cliche really did pull a rabbit out of the hat when they put Toy Commander out as a launch title. It looked like something that was truly next-gen and played a mean game as well. Sadly, Toy Commander never recieved a true sequel and it remains a game that was born and died on the Dreamcast; the semi-sequel Toy Racer was little more than a mini game and was only playable online anyway, so those of us who either couldn't afford the dial-up tariff or simply weren't allowed to hog the only phone line in the house to play online games (like me!) missed out on the full experience. 
Interestingly though, and the reason for this post, is that Toy Commander received some interesting pseudo DLC (that's Downloadable Content, EA fans) in the years following its release. I say 'pseudo,' because it wasn't really DLC at all, and didn't even require the original game to play...but it's another way in which the Dreamcast was well ahead of it's time. The 'DLC' I'm referring to is in fact the special 'add-on' demo levels that were released exclusively on the Dream On demo disks that came with the Official Dreamcast Magazine in the UK and US. One of these was a special single-level Christmas-themed demo (titled Christmas Surprise) in which you played as a rocket-pack enabled Santa whom, with the help of a fighter plane and a heavily armed Jeep, was tasked with tracking down errant presents and returning them to their rightful place under the Christmas tree.
The second such exclusive demo, called Summer Special, was released on Dream On volume 11 in the UK and featured a brand new stage in which players were given the task of clearing a beach of rubbish, sharks and cockroaches so Barbie and Ken (or...er...Matt and Jenny for obvious reasons) could go skinny dipping without the worry of either having their heads chewed off or cutting their plastic feet on shards of glass...presumably left in the jacuzzi by the 8-year-old Toy Commander's alcoholic dad. It's a fun level and allows full exploration of another section of the house the main game is set within, and you can either take to the sky in a bi-plane and just blow the hell out of everything with biro-lid missiles, or you can play a slightly more tactical game by using the truck to transport the rubbish to the trash compactor in the kitchen. Which is located behind a mini bar, adding further fuel to the theory that the Toy Commander's dad likes a bit of a drink. Either that, or the Commander himself has been at the brandy...which would explain all these outlandish war games with his matchbox toys. The other variant on the Toy Commander formula included on Dream On 11 in a race around the house with toy cars, but this is pretty forgettable due to the twitchy controls...and is clearly the original blueprint for the later (and yet aforementioned) Toy Racer.
While these single level demos are quite short lived in practice, they do a great job of showing off the mechanics and visual splendour of the full game. But more than that, they are a fantastic glimpse of what was to come in the future. Extra content for titles we already own is a relatively normal part of gaming nowadays - all of the major franchises have multiple extra mission packs and levels released as DLC on an almost weekly basis; and while these demo missions are hardly comparable, it shows that Dreamcast developers were looking at the bigger picture. The Dreamcast was by no means the first system to offer this kind of content (even the SNES offered true DLC, with the likes of F-Zero 2), but I can't help but imagine how far this could have gone, and if the Dreamcast had managed to weather the onslaught of the PS2 and the cold shoulder of EA...and the broadband adapter had been a mainstream add-on given a proper release; we might have seen new maps and skins for Quake 3 Arena, new tracks for Daytona and even extra characters for Soul Calibur. As it is, these Toy Commander missions serve merely as a taster of what could - and should - have been.
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