As recently as 2018 we debated why, or more accurately if; there would be a market for third-party shells. And it would seem that finally there is 'a market' of sorts, in the sense that there are now at least 3 areas of purchase available should you want a shell in the great old year of 2021. ![]()
With this I am obviously talking about various sellers on eBay rather than the retro section of your local Jimmy Games Emporium R Us or whatever stores are left these days, but there are now options out there if you want a new shell for your trusted Dreamcast and you aren't Kayne enough for the Dreamcase Metal shell.
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Quite a lot of the variants look similar to the original seller mentioned so it's entirely likely they are both supplied by the same person, however, it's at least interesting to discover these are brand new units being made for production (note they don't include the screws), and whilst we haven't had or even seen any in-person ourselves to let you know about feel or build quality, or how easily they fit the DC innards and reassemble, it's intriguing they are based on the original molds. And it's certainly a positive step in the direction of the Dreamcast community and fanbase to at least have the option of new shells available.
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Sellers from China, Australia, and more importantly for the Euro types; Spain and the UK, now have stock of these newer shells. Whilst not completely newsworthy if I am brutally honest, is at least vaguely interesting I hope! These aren't the original official or repo shells from the Dreamcast era, but newly fabricated ones.
Over in the back channels of where the Dreamcast Junkyard’s finest minds and contributors hang out (and by hang out I mean occasionally mumble to each other about what we may write about, before Tom posts he already wrote about that in 1973 or something) we discussed the Australian-based ones at least a couple of year ago when we first spotted them but no one had ever taken the plunge due to shipping and import woes, but it's the wider spread of them that I am personally drawn too, purely from the slightly Grandma perspective of 'that's nice I didn't expect that' point of view.
Being the ever-sleuth that I am, I donned my best reporter’s hat and messaged the eBay UK seller 8bitmods, whose store and DC shells can be viewed here. He kindly not only answered my question but said I was fine to use his photos you see on this article. If you aren't an eBay type you can also get in touch with Mods on their Twitter and website. And you can see his full response below.![]()
"These shells are made in China. They're not new old stock or anything similar, it's made by an enthusiast in China where we bought them from. They are 1:1 copies of the original shell mold, so everything fits perfectly. We don't have a huge amount of them in stock, as we're trialling how popular they will be."
8bitmods
We'd love to hear your thoughts on these and any favourite designs or themes you feel should be considered, and obviously let us know if you do have one of these newer or a similar newer variant, and how it's gone since you fitted it out.
