Feature: Keeping The Dreamcast Alive

Author: by Staff

In Gamasutra's latest feature, two teams of developers creating homebrew games for Sega's final console system speak out about what drives them. The Dreamcast was discontinued by Sega in 2001; the last licensed game release to hit the system shipped in 2007 in Japan. Why, then, do teams still create games for the system? Gamasutra decided to speak to developers to find out. Rene Hellwig, one of the founders of Last Hope and Fast Striker developers NG:DEV.TEAM -- which also creates games for the SNK NeoGeo CD, another dead system -- had this to say: "Making games for modern platforms sounds easy at first, but [then] you need to find a publisher that has faith in the quality of the product, and then we need approval by the hardware manufacturer which takes time. On the DC, however, we don't need to go through these hassles, which makes it easier for us get a game on [the] system quick." Of course, the Dreamcast is beloved by fans because of the vibrant and exciting software library it gained in the two short years that marked its heyday, and the fact that it was the last system created by Sega. These reasons -- and others -- bring hobbyists to the platform which was abandoned by its creator when it turned to others' platforms to develop and publish games. The full feature, which explores the mystique -- and the games -- further is live now on Gamasutra.