It's Official. SEGA to pull out of the videogame hardware business.

This is unfortunate, but not surprising news. The death of the Sega Dreamcast is imminent, as Sega will cease production of the system by March 31st. Also, Sega is slashing the price of the DC down to $99, effective Feb. 4th, most likely in order to go ahead and get their inventory cleaned out. However, there are still games being planned for the DC throughout 2001, but 2002 and beyond? Who knows. Sega will become a 3rd party and as of right now already has titles in development for the PlayStation 2 and Game Boy Advance. They should announce their support for Xbox and GameCube very soon as well. Plain and simple, Sega needs $$$. It's a sad day for Sega as a hardware company, but the good news is that they are focusing on what they do best....games.

SOURCE: http://dreamcast.ign.com/news/30854.html

I would cut-n-paste the article, but that would make this post pretty damn long

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Dream34: Nope, no set date for the Xbox just yet...still just Fall 2001. Microsoft will probably reveal an exact date at E3 (May). I definitely understand your sentiment about getting the thing at launch...Microsoft has ALREADY started the hype campaign for Xbox and that should grow exponentially larger (fueled by their $500 million marketing campaign) as the year progresses. However, I don't think it'll be quite as bad (i.e. spending the night before launch at your local Best Buy) as the PS2 launch for two reasons: (1) GameCube will debut at roughly the same time....meaning competition of course, and (2) Microsoft has carefully analyzed the PS2 launch and will do whatever is necessary to prevent the problems that hampered the PS2 launch (i.e. shortages) from happening with the Xbox launch. As for preorders, I wouldn't be surprised if the major retail store are taking them now (in fact, I've heard rumors that some major online stores are taking 'em now), but I don't know for sure...I suppose you can call and ask them. Oh, and a final retail price hasn't been set yet for Xbox (that'll probably happen at E3 too). All of the places taking preorders now will adjust their prices accordingly once M$ reveals the official price.

Rockets03: Now that's the system I really want, since I'm a Nintendo fanboy As for preorders...like I was telling Dream34, I don't know if they are taking them now. Nintendo will reveal the final price of the GC at E3 (and it should be no more than $200). The system will come out in October 2001, and I can assure you that it will not be delayed (I seriously doubt Xbox will be delayed either).

I'm pretty sure that all of the major stores and online stores will start taking preorders for both GameCube and Xbox in a few months. Certainly by May.

Clutch: Yeah, it's true that Oddworld is Xbox bound.

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[This message has been edited by Cold Hard (edited January 31, 2001).]

 

ScreamingRocketJet: I also haven't discovered the "perfect" basketball videogame yet (but like Clutch, I haven't played NBA2k1 yet).

Dream34: Man, I got plenty to tell you about the GameCube, but right now I'm feeling overwhelmed with fatigue so I'll reply sometime tomorrow

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Sega of America just held their big teleconference this morning. Here are the details:

http://cgi.gaming-age.com/gaming/news/news.pl?y=2001&m=1&nid=31-180.db

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[This message has been edited by Cold Hard (edited January 31, 2001).]

 

Sorry I didn't get back to you sooner, Dream34....anyway prepare for a gargantuan post....haven't written a post this long in a long time

"Dolphin" was simply the codename for Nintendo's next-generation system (just like "Project Reality" was the codename for the Nintendo 64). It was just a placeholder name that Nintendo used until they officially unveiled the real name (which is "GameCube") of the system last August.

Nintendo has gone to great lengths to keep a lot of GameCube related-info secret, with heavy usage of the NDA (Non-Disclosure Agreement). NDA will be lifted at the Electronics Entertainment Expo (E3 for short) in May. There is a reason for all the secrecy....they don't want the competition (Sony and Microsoft) to steal their ideas. With that said, I know a good deal about the GC thanks to websites and word of mouth (although some of the really technical stuff is a bit beyond my realm of comprehension), but there is a whole lot more that I nor anyone else (unless you're a developer for the GC of course) don't know, and won't know until E3 in May (that's when Nintendo will reveal all in a great big flourish). Here's what I do know:

1) The GC is remarkably easy to develop for...much easier than the PlayStation 2. The Xbox has a similar advantage over the PS2. This will probably be most beneficial to smaller 3rd party development houses (i.e. those who don't have big budgets), because easier development means savings in both time and money.

2) Nintendo is ditching the cartridge format for the GameCube (thank goodness). Instead, they are going with a proprietary mini-disc format. Each disc holds about 1.5 - 1.6 GIGS of memory. In comparison, the Dreamcast GD-ROMs hold about 1 - 1.2 GIGS of memory, and DVD's (which PS2 and Xbox uses) hold about 4.7 GIGS. So to answer your question, no the GameCube won't use DVDs. Nintendo's decision to go with minidiscs has advantages and disadvantages. The main advantage is that their proprietary media will make GC games far more difficult to pirate than PS2 or Xbox games. This is the primary reason why Nintendo went with proprietary mini-discs in the first place....they are very particular about piracy. The main disadvantage is that GC discs hold less data than PS2 DVDs or Xbox DVDs. But this is a minor disadvantage because most games can easily fit onto a single GC disc....only large games or games with a hefty amount of FMV (full-motion video) may take more than one disc. And manufacturing GC discs should be quite cheap (good for 3rd parties), so multiple-disc games won't be a big deal. And there's always the possibility of double-sided or dual-layered discs...effectively doubling or even quadrupling the amount of data that a disc can hold.

3) I really can't comment too much on the really technical aspects of the systems' specs (because there's a lot of details being kept under wraps), except that GC's specs are definitely conservative whereas some Xbox's specs have been downgraded recently (examples: Xbox has NO DVD movie-playing capability out of the box, have to buy a DVD decoder instead...smart move on MS's part in my opinion; raw poly-count downgraded from 300 million polygons/sec to 125 million polygons/sec). I'll also say this: The GameCube will have the best texturing ability...which should lead to some truly beautiful, breathtaking-looking games. Overall, I think that both systems (GC and Xbox) will be similar from a technical standpoint....neither will dominate the other, but both will be superior to PlayStation 2.

4) Nintendo has NOT OFFICIALLY announced ANY games for GameCube yet, and won't until E3. That is part of their plan. But leaks do happen, and here are all the games that I know of that are in development (actual names may be different):

- Mario­³ (rumor has it that the game is ALREADY completed)
- Zelda³
- Metroid³
- Wave Race³
- Perfect Dark 2
- SSX: SE
- A Pokemon RPG
- 1080º Snowboarding 2
- Eternal Darkness (could be a potential Resident Evil killer..)
- Dinosaur Planet
- TWINE (The World is Not Enough)
- Turok 4
- Thornado
- Too Human
- Rogue Squadron 2
- Crash Bandicoot
- Your fair share of sports games...expect Madden, NBA Live, NHL, and a bunch of others.

There are some more games that I know of are in development but I can't recall them right now

5) The GameCube is scheduled to launch in North America this October, and I am one hundred percent convinced that it will not be delayed. The Japanese release (this July) could slip to August though. Expect a respectable number of games (between 6 and 12 would be my guess) to be available at launch. Which games, I don't know; but it's a safe bet that Mario and Pokemon will be part of the launch lineup. The price of the GameCube hasn't been revealed, but expect it to retail somewhere between $149 and $199. A clear advantage over both Xbox (a $299 launch is my prediction) and PS2 (even considering potential price cuts).

6) Nintendo has an online network strategy in the works. I don't know any details about it, but don't expect it to be executed until 2002. There will be a modem and a broadband adapter available for GameCube.

7) Here's a pic of the GameCube and its controller (go to the link and click on the image to the left):

http://www.nintendo.com/gamecube/index.html

- The system itself is very small. Stack six CD jewel cases on top of each other and the resulting shape is similar in size to the GC.

- The system (and controller) will come in multiple colors....purple, silver, black, gold, and pink. I don't think that's the final palette, though (hopefully they'll keep the silver one; that's the color I want).

- The controller design isn't finalized yet (some of the buttons may be moved around), but it's supposed to be really comfortable. Some of the buttons will be analog.

There's more, but that's all I feel like saying. But here are links to a couple of sites that keep up with GameCube-related info:

http://cube.ign.com/

http://www.nintendoweb.com

Also check out these MPEGs. The Rogue Squadron 2 one is an actual playable game, whereas the Zelda, Luigi's Mansion and Rebirth ones are just tech demos (for now). If you have a narrowband connection, the RS2 movie might be a bit too big of a download.

Luigi's Mansion (6.14 MB): http://www.nintendoweb.com/media/launchmovs/luigi.mpg

Rogue Squadron 2 (15.5 MB): http://www.nintendoweb.com/media/starwars/starwars.mpg

Zelda³ (3.44 MB): http://www.nintendoweb.com/media/launchmovs/zelda01.mpg

Rebirth (10.8 MB): http://www.nintendoweb.com/media/launchmovs/rebirth.mpg (although some of it is FMV, these are possibly the best visuals I've ever seen on a videogame console)

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[This message has been edited by Cold Hard (edited February 06, 2001).]