A couple of years ago, we humble bloggers at The Dreamcast Junkyard released a physical
collector's guide for the Dreamcast. It wasn't much - basically a 'trainspotter's guide' to the Dreamcast library that featured no images or any Sega or Dreamcast logos and which was intended as a handy chaperone for Dreamcast fans to keep a physical track of their collecting. It went down quite well, and we still get emails to this day asking if the book is available. It isn't (at least in physical form), because Sega Europe told us to stop selling it.
We were a little confused at the time, as to why a behemoth like Sega would care about something that amounted to little more than a printed list of Dreamcast games (the
PDF is still available here). We asked about working with them to produce an official guide, but they simply ignored us...and now we know why. They had commissioned French publisher Pix 'N Love Editions to create an officially licensed Dreamcast history book...
To be honest, we've known about this for ages as Pix 'N Love have been posting teaser images on their social media for a while now. However they have now released the first images of the actual tome istelf, and to be honest...it looks pretty damn awesome. Titled
L'Histoire de la Dreamcast (that's
The History of the Dreamcast for the Anglophones in the room), the book appears to track the history of our favourite console from conception to death (and beyond, hopefully); and looks to be something every Dreamcast owner will want to get their hands on. Pix 'N Love have a long history producing some exceptional games-related books, and I own several of them - the
Sonic the Hedgehog history book is a particular favorite of mine. If anyone can do the Dreamcast justice, it is surely Pix 'N Love.
So far there's no definite release date and the book appears to only be available in French, but if an English language version follows then we'll no doubt be snapping these up left, right and Chelsea. Weighing in at 350 pages and in full colour,
L'Histoire de la Dreamcast looks like it could be a worthy purchase. It also appears that Pix 'N Love will be releasing some rather spectacular Sonic and Shenmue branded limited editions, complete with bespoke artwork and extras for each:
Priced at €80 for the limited editions and €38 for the standard, the pre-order price isn't cheap, but the book is likely to be full of info and is available to pre-order at the
Pix 'N Love website here.
Such a shame this will most likely stay french like the history of Shenmue book...
ReplyDeleteThey've already stated on social media that an English version is coming too.
ReplyDeleteI don't think SEGA has "commisioned" Pix'n'love to write this book, it's probably a project that the French publisher created himself, then asked for SEGA's approbation directly in Japan.
ReplyDeleteSince they are known there and have good a network in Japan and have been publishing quality works about other editors/games for years,they must have obtained a positive answer and received unseen before documents to publish, like in their other books.
You don't have that kind of connection with SEGA or this industry and sadly even without this pix project they probably would have told you to stop selling your book. I don't know their reasons and wish they did not but you need to have some self-awareness.
Maybe you could try to associate yourself with a more known British publisher.
Thanks Micheal. I'll be sure to go get some self awareness. Thanks for the advice.
Delete