DCJY welcomes Peter Moore

After almost 6 years, our podcast DreamPod has finally reached the magic number of 100 episodes. Every single one of the previous 99 has been a pleasure to produce, but for episode 100 we thought we needed a guest that could help us really celebrate reaching this not insignificant milestone. First and foremost we invited you, our valued listeners to send in recorded voice messages and email questions that the DreamPod crew could answer with varying degress of idiocy authority. 

However, to really mark this momentous episode, we knew we also had to invite a Dreamcast related special guest onto the show; someone with real stature in the storied history of the Dreamcast to come and tell us their story. In this case, we welcomed former Sega of America president Peter Moore onto the DreamPod to chat all things Dreamcast with us.

It was a real pleasure speaking to Peter and we would like to thank him for taking the time to answer Tom and James' questions. We would also like to thank our listeners for downloading our previous 99 episodes and making the DreamPod the success we like to think it has been.

You can either listen to DreamPod 100 using the embedded player above, or you can watch the recorded video call with Peter on our YouTube channel or by simply clicking play on the YouTube video embedded. You might want to watch the video all the way to the end too, lest you miss the reveal of the greatest piece of Dreamcast branded attire you're ever likely to see...

The must-have outfit this season...

As ever, all of our previous podcast episodes can be found on your favourite podcatcher by simply searching for 'DreamPod.' Once again, a huge thanks to those involved and here's to another 100 episodes! 

Oh, and if you like interviews with former presidents of Sega of America, you can find our interview with Bernie Stolar here.

Xenocider 'next-gen' demo now available

Remember Xenocider? We do - Retro Sumus' excellent Dreamcast shooter burst onto the scene in early 2021 and wowed us with its lovely graphics, challenging gameplay and incredible amount of unlockable content. Check out our review here. 

The good news is that Retro Sumus are bringing Xara's adventure to modern gaming platforms in 2022, with PlayStation, Nintendo Switch and Xbox One / Series gamers all being given the opportunity to engage in a friendly bit of interstellar planetary genocide. Of course, alongside the consoles, there's also a PC version planned and you can try a demo of Xenocider's non-Dreamcast remaster on Steam right now.

Xenocider was - and still is - a great looking Dreamcast game, and is probably the best looking 3D indie title we've yet seen on Sega's console. Naturally though, the modern remaster takes advantage of the more powerful hardware offered by contemporary consoles and gaming rigs, meaning everything has a rather nice visual upgrade. No floating Dreamcast power-ups though, which will no doubt mark it down in our view.

The updated version of Xenocider is being published by Eastasiasoft and no doubt once the game is released in 2022 we'll cast an eye over it and see how it compares to the Dreamcast original. Grab the Steam demo here, follow Retro Sumus here and buy a digital copy of the original Dreamcast version of Xenocider here.

A Dreamcast port of Postal appears!

Back in 2016 Postal developer Running With Scissors released the source code for their blood-soaked isometric shooter. Alongside this release, an appeal was made for a developer to step forward and create a Dreamcast port, should anyone be so inclined. Fast forward to December 2021 and a beta version of Postal for Dreamcast has now been released.

Coming from developer Dan Redfield, with a little help from fellow Dreamcast developer Ian Michael and members of the Simulant Engine Discord and Dreamcast-Talk forum, Postal for Dreamcast is free to download and play on actual hardware...and it runs really well.

Before booting this beta, I had never previously played Postal. I was familiar with the game's rather unsavory premise, reputation and legacy (and the fact that there's an Uwe Boll movie based on the franchise), but I was pretty much going in blind. What I discovered though, is a fairly playable isometric shooter with a definite leaning towards the 'mindless running around with the trigger held down' gameplay style. And gore. Lots of gore. And shooting. And explosions. 

The Dreamcast port, as stated, is a beta; and the intro does say to expect crashes, although I didn't experience any personally (I'm using a GDEMU enabled console with a DCHDMI fitted). Controls are well mapped to the Dreamcast controller and other than when the screen is absolutley filled with characters running around in terror (understandable, considering the nature of the game), there's hardly any noticeable slowdown or hitching. Here's some gameplay I grabbed while playing the first three levels (badly):

Thanks to Dan Redfield and the other community members who contributed to yet another Dreamcast release. The full version of Postal for Dreamcast is pencilled in for an early 2022 release and we'll no doubt have a full review of the game once it lands.

Dowload the Dreamcast Postal beta here, and be sure to follow both Dan Redfield on Twitter here and Running With Scissors on Twitter here.

The Dreamcast Junkyard's choicest cuts and hottest takes of 2021

We close our eyes, and the world has turned around again. We close eyes and dream, another year has come and gone. So wrote the talented 16th century poet Allister in his priceless first folio. Ancient as these words may seem, they ring true even today, and here we are. It's approximatley 365 days since our last review of the year 2020 and we are back once again for the renegade master with another review of the past twelve months here at The Dreamcast Junkyard. 

Twelve whole months of reviews, news, podcasts and features; and we thought it only right to round them all up for your ease and enjoyment, just in case you missed some of them. We know you have busy lives, San Diego. Personally I'd like to say a huge thanks to the entire team here at the 'Yard, to the developers and community that still endeavours to create really awesome Dreamcast software/news content; and also to you - our readers - for continuing to visit and make what we do here worthwhile. Anyway, here's some curated highlights from 2021...

Reviews

• Intrepid Izzy - Lewis took a look at Senile Team's awesome action-platformer, declaring it a rather special experience that all Dreamcast owners should own.
• Xenocider - Tom cast a critical eye over Retro Sumus' years-in-the-making 3D into-the-screen shooter, decreeing it to be the Sin and Punishment homage we all deserve.
• Drascula: The Vampire Strikes Back - Mike took a look at this less than spectacular release that seemed to slip under many a radar.

Retrospectives

• Surf Rocket Racers - James dipped his toe into the waters of Crave Entertainment and CRI Middleware's jet-ski racer, and found it to be quite a pleasant experience if not a Wave Race beater.
• Stunt GP - RC vehicles tearing around locales strangely devoid of any human life? That's Stunt GP and Tom rather liked it.
• Bang! Gunship Elite - Some see it as Starlancer's poor relation, but Bang! Gunship Elite is a decent space shooter in its own right. Find out why here.
• Q*Bert - One of gaming's most well-known and foul-mouthed characters made an appearance on the Dreamcast, but was it really worth the effort?
• Taxi 2 - Derek Pascarella released an English language translation of the French exclusive Taxi 2 earlier in 2021, and James decided it was time to take a fare in this elusive movie tie-in.

• Wetrix+ - Earthquakes and torrential rain are the name of the game (poetry?) in this Dreamcast remaster of the Nintendo 64 puzzler...but is it worth a punt?
• European Super League - One of the Dreamcast's numerous PAL-exclusive soccer titles, we thought it was a good time to take a look at Virgin's poor effort in the wake of the collapse of the real-life Super League.
• F1 World Grand Prix II for Dreamcast - Tom did a few laps with Video System's Dreamcast F1 sequel, and included a potted history of the series too.
• Sega Extreme Sports - James decided it was high time to catch some radical air with Innerloop's extreme sports title, and found the time to chat with the studio's CEO Henning Rokling, too.
• UEFA Dream Soccer - At the other end of the footballing spectrum to European Super League, UEFA Dream Soccer is perhaps the finest recreation of the beautiful game on Dreamcast...for now at least.

Features and News

• New Year's Resolutions 2021 - The Junkyard team set out their resolutions for 2021. How many did we stick to before chinning them off mere weeks into the new year?!
• In White 1999: The Time D2's Laura Appeared as a Model in a Japanese Fashion Magazine - Lewis wrote a fantastic deep dive article on the strange tale of Laura from Warp's D2 appearing as a model in a Japanese fashion magazine.
• Shenmusings of Ryobots, Niaowu, and Shenmue III's Uncertain Legacy - Brian pondered the eternal question - is Ryo Hazuki an android; or does he prefer the term 'artificial human'? 
• Lost Atomiswave fighter KenJu ported to Dreamcast - Tom got to grips with KenJu, one of the long lost Atomiswave titles that was ported to Dreamcast by megavolt85 in 2021.
• Bounty Hunter Sarah: The Capcom Dreamcast Game You Never Knew About - Capcom are well known for their Dreamcast fighting games, but what of Bounty Hunter Sarah? Lewis investigated, and also spoke with the actress who stars in the game.

• The Great MSR Missing Persons Poster Hunt - Part 2: We Found Them! - Last year we investigated the mysterious 'Missing' poster found in MSR. This year, we finally found the other two posters hidden in the game.
• Trailer for unreleased horror game 'If It Happen' found - Aaron looked into the unannounced and subsequently cancelled If It happen - a game none of us even knew existed!
• Typing Jet: The lost Jet Set Radio game? - Tom goes on a trip down the rabbit hole looking for the enigmatic and presumed lost mobile version of Jet Set Radio - Typing Jet.
• Upcoming Dreamcast Indie releases - 2021 and beyond! - Mike looks forward to the indie games heading to the Dreamcast in 2021 and beyond. Some made it, others are still to come...
• Channelling Dreamcast: 3 games doing what Sega won't - A cursory glance at some contemporary game releases that try (and in some cases fail) to capture the essence of the Sega of the Dreamcast era.

• A homebrew Dreamcast MIDI Interface Cable appears! - A talented chap called Ben Ryves took matters into his own hands and created a homebrew version of the elusive HKT-9200 Dreamcast MIDI Interface Cable. He then made some music on a Dreamcast with it. What a legend.
• Dee Dee Planet: Beta of Cancelled Dreamcast game Released Online - Lewis reported on the discovery of yet another lost Dreamcast title - Dee Dee Planet courtesy of Pcwzrd.
• The original Rez website has been fully restored - A look at the fully restored Rez website, and a few words with the man who did all the leg work.
• I mode! You mode! We all mode for i-mode! - Scott went on a trip back through time to investigate the i-mode functionality Japanese mobile gamers enjoyed back in the day, and also checked out some of the Dreamcast-derived software that appeared on the platform.
• Dreamcast console shells in 2021 - Kev pondered the viability (and cost) of new Dreamcast console shells for a modern audience.

• Petrol Panic! 6 of the best gas stations in Dreamcast games - Plenty of Dreamcast games feature gas stations, and during the height of the UK's fuel shortage, Tom reviewed some of the best (and worst) filling stations to be found in the Dreamcast's library.
• Watch the Sega shareholder meeting that ended the Dreamcast - A livestream of the Sega shareholder meeting that heralded the end of Dreamcast production was captured by one savvy gamer and preserved online for posterity.
• Preview - Non Casual Encounter - SEGASaturno Productions returned with a proof of concept demo for their next title, Non Casual Encounter. You can now order one of only 100 copies of this intiguing visual novel, but be quick!
• 5 Dreamcast Fan Translations You May Have Missed - Fan translations of Dreamcast games have exploded in popularity in 2021, and Lewis took a look at some you may have missed.
• Let's take a look at Shenmue World from Shenmue Dojo - Shenmue super site Shenmue Dojo released Shenmue World earlier in 2021. Tom took delivery of a copy of this weighty tome and put his thoughts on the blog.

• New Dreamcast Prototype Found: Panic World - Veteran developer Mike Mika revealed some details about a lost Dreamcast title he had previously worked on - Panic World.
• Bokomu No Tatsujin Translation Project Released! - Aaron reported on yet another fan translation that came to the Dreamcast in 2021 - this time Bokomu No Tatsujin.
• Previously unseen prototype Dreamcast logo discovered - An eagle-eyed Redditor discovered a previously unseen prototype Dreamcast logo on the Japanese patent office website. Hidden in plain sight for all these years...chimpanzee that!

Interviews

• Out of Print Archive - Andy and Neil, curators of the Out of Print Archive dropped by the Junkyard to discuss all things gaming magazines of yesteryear. In this revealing interview we covered the origins of the Out of Print Archive, the ingestion process and how the team decides which magazines should be preserved digitally.
• WAVE Game Studios - Daniel from WAVE Game Studios stopped by to tell us about the origins of the newest publisher of indie Dreamcast games, and how they hope to kickstart a renaissance of Dreamcast physical game releases on store shelves.

DreamPod episodes

All of our podcast episodes can be found on your favourite 'podcatcher,' or simply by going to our Buzzsprout site here. Alongside our usual chaos, we did have some great guest epsiodes in 2021 and those are detailed below.

• DreamPod Episode 87: Caspar Field - Former editor of Dreamcast print magazine DC-UK Caspar Field joined the DreamPod team in January to speak about his memories of the magazine and how it all began; the short lived Mr Dreamcast magazine project; and Caspar also recounted his experiences working in game development.
• DreamPod Episode 88: Video Game Esoterica - Game preservationist extraordinaire Anthony Bacon, of YouTube Channel Video Game Esoterica, joined the DreamPod to speak about Dreamcast oddities, Kenji Eno's D2, and his own quest to educate the world on the fate of the 3DO M2.
• DreamPod Episode 90: Dreamcast in 1999 - The Dreamcast Years podcast crew joined the DreamPod for the first of 2021's crossover episodes, this time to talk about the Dreamcast scene in 1999.

• DreamPod Episode 91: Dreamcast in 2000 - Once again co-hosted by the Dreamcast Years crew, the second crossover episode of the year focussed on Dreamcast and wider pop culture in the year 2000.
• DreamPod Episode 93: Dreamcast translations - The DreamPod welcomed stalwarts of the Dreamcast fan translation scene Derek Pascarella and Burntends to talk all things Sakura Wars Colmuns 2 and the wider efforts by the translation community.
• DreamPod Episode 100: Peter Moore & Listener Questions - For the momentous occasion marking 100 episodes of DreamPod, the crew answered listener questions; but also welcomed former SEGA of America president Peter Moore onto the show to talk about his history with the Dreamcast.

Videos

You may already know that we have a YouTube channel, but we also have a Twitch channel too so be sure to check that out. On our YouTube we regularly hold livestreamed discussions (lovingly titled 'bookclubs'), and below you'll find links to some of these Kev-hosted video chats.

• Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 1 & 2
• Virtua Tennis 1 & 2
• Zombie Revenge
• Power Stone 1 & 2
• ESPN Track & Field, Virtua Athlete 2K and Sydney 2000

Things we were asked not to feature because we're 'content thieves, and everybody in the Dreamcast community knows it'

• Castlevania Resurrection

Once again, thanks to you for reading, listening to and watching our Dreamcast related nonsense over the past year (well, past 16 years!). If you'd like to support what we do, you can do so at Buy Me a Coffee. Please also feel free to join our Discord and get involved in the chat.

Remember to stay safe, stay cool, keep Dreaming and stay tuned in 2022 for even more of the same.

Blue Stinger: On a Hello Market Slay Ride

"And when those blue snowflakes start falling

That's when those blue memories start calling

You'll be doing all right

With your Dreamcast of white

But I'll have a blue, blue, blue, Blue Stinger"

- Elvis Presley, or a Vegas impersonator thereof

Every year, I must indulge in a series of holiday rituals before I can even think about getting into the Christmas spirit. First, I’ll string up multicolor lights around my living room. Then I’ll help bring cheer to the folks of Twin Seeds City with a couple runs through Christmas NiGHTS into Dreams. Inevitably, I’ll watch Clark Griswold be an asswart to his neighbor Julia Louise-Dreyfus in National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation. It’s a process.

With those nostalgic boxes checked, I’ll then turn to more subtle, personal ways of rediscovering the holiday magic. I'll take a simple reprieve from the stressful work season with my puppy. And stuff my gullet with my mom and aunt’s dueling cookie platters. My girlfriend and I also tried hate-watching Lifetime holiday movies until we realized we were just normal-watching them. Shout out to the one about the family's struggling fruitcake company and the one with Reba McEntire, btw. By this point, I’m really starting to feel the Christmas spirit.

Then – when the time is just right – I’ll pop the star atop the proverbial tree: Climax Graphics’ Christmas-adjacent Dreamcast classic, Blue Stinger.

Here comes Santa Dogs, Here comes Santa Dogs...

Whether the Dreamcast fan community regards it as a brilliant cult classic or a survival horror(ible) jankfest, Blue Stinger doesn’t much give a fuck what we think of it. All told, it's an absurd and campy holiday action game that makes my cup runneth over with Yuletide joy.

Driving Strikers announced for Dreamcast!

In a rather unexpected announcement, Luke Benstead and David Reichelt have premiered their upcoming homebrew Dreamcast game Driving Strikers to the world, via a short reveal trailer on YouTube.

Made with the Simulant engine over a period of just six weeks, Driving Strikers very much looks like something Rocket League fans will enjoy when the demo becomes available. As you'll see from the trailer below, the gameplay shows teams of two cars battling to score more goals than the other.

I spoke to Luke briefly to find out what Driving Strikers was all about: "The demo has a single stadium and fixed teams and it's 1-4 local multiplayer. You can choose which side to play for and decide whatever mixture of real players and AI you'd like! You can boost and jump, and matches are currently fixed at 3 minutes for the demo."

This is just the beginning for Driving Strikers however, as the team have more exciting things planned for the full release: "When we expand the demo into a full game we hope to have various game modes and options". Something to look forward to in the first half of next year, for sure!

With the help of other community members, Luke expects the demo will be available to download before Christmas, so Dreamcast gamers can plug in four controllers and settle those family disputes from Christmas dinner with a friendly match or two.

The game looks great and as you can see from the visuals, the stage available has a distinctive festive theme - this really is an early Christmas present to the community and we couldn't be more thankful! Driving Strikers looks like another fantastic example of what Simulant can do after the recent Tunnels demo, and hopefully we'll see plenty more homebrew games take advantage of the engine in the future.

You can watch the full YouTube reveal trailer below:

As soon as we have the download link for the CDI of the Driving Strikers demo, we'll update this article. Thoughts? Follow Luke on Twitter here and be sure to let us know in the comments!

Retrospective: UEFA Dream Soccer

If at first you don't succeed, try, try again. So goes the age old mantra; and try, try again Silicon Dreams did with its Dreamcast reimagining of the World League Soccer franchise. See, Sega Worldwide Soccer as it exists on the Dreamcast is not Sega Worldwide Soccer at all - it is in fact World League Soccer - a totally different game rebranded at the behest of Sega Europe desperate as it was to get a semi-decent footy title onto the Dreamcast. You may be confused as to why I mention Sega Worldwide Soccer here in a retrospective focussed on UEFA Dream Soccer, and this is because UEFA Dream Soccer is the threequel in the Sega Worldwide Soccer trilogy on Dreamcast. Clear as mud, no?

As a follow up to Sega Worldwide Soccer 2000 and Sega Worldwide Soccer 2000: Euro Edition then, UEFA Dream Soccer had a fairly steady, if not spectacular platform to build upon. Those previously mentioned titles were - as alluded to - remasters of sorts of the World League Soccer games from the PlayStation, Saturn, Nintendo 64 and Windows. As standalone titles, they were passable but not really in the same league as the original Sega-developed Worldwide Soccer games from the Saturn. The Saturn titles were an evolution of the Victory Goal series and completely unrelated, and I dare say if Sega had continued this franchise onto the Dreamcast instead of charging Silicon Dreams with taking the baton, then things could have been totally different. But I digress.

Released in 2001 (and previously known as Sega Worldwide Soccer 2001 during development), UEFA Dream Soccer arrived on the Dreamcast to relatively little in the way of fanfare. The stable of pre-existing football games on the platform boasted very little in the way of competiton to the FIFAs and the PESs of the world, and so there wasn't really much buzz around Dream Soccer. The fact that it was released exclusively in PAL territories probably didn't help, either.

The Dreamcast is often cited as a console that has no good football games, and EA's reluctance to bring FIFA to the platform (or indeed support it at all) is usually mentioned when reasons for its failure to gain mass market appeal are discussed. Likewise, the lack of a Pro Evolution Soccer/International Superstar Soccer game is somewhat puzzling when you consider that Konami did offer some decent support to the Dreamcast. So what you're left with if you want some kick-ball action on Dreamcast is a rather threadbare lineup consisting of a collection of titles that range from utterly dire (90 Minutes, European Super League) to average at best (everything else). 

But allow me to contradict my previous statement, because after spending some considerable time re-playing UEFA Dream Soccer and learning its foibles and accepting its flaws, my opinion on it has changed somewhat; I'd probably now go as far as saying not only is UEFA Dream Soccer the best football game on Dreamcast...it's also actually a pretty damn good game of footy in its own right.

Retrospective: Sega Extreme Sports

Sega Extreme Sports, released in 2000 and published by Sega in Europe and Japan as part of their “Sega Sports” series, was one of a multitude of titles in an ever-increasingly popular genre on the Dreamcast. The game’s title clearly wasn’t edgy enough for the US-audience however, and was instead published by Infogrames and simply called “Xtreme Sports” - with an X just to sound gnarly!

As part of this retrospective, I was fortunate enough to have Henning Rokling, then-CEO of Innerloop Studios who created Sega Extreme Sports, provide some fantastic insight into the production of the game. Henning kicked off by saying how impressed they were with the Dreamcast hardware in general, the first console they’d worked with: “As we learned more and more from Sega, we were very impressed with the specs of their platform. We received dev kits prior to the console’s release, and worked closely with Sega Europe and Sega of Japan.”

There are six different disciplines included in Sega Extreme Sports: ATV, Snowboarding, Mountain Biking, Bungee Jumping, Sky Surfing and Speed Gliding. What’s interesting in this game over other similar titles is that each course sees players transition from one discipline to the other. This basically means that after driving your ATV down a muddy or snowy track, you have to smash the A button as frantically as you can as your character runs from the ATV to their snowboard or hand glider to start the next section.

I really liked how this worked and it meant you had a good amount of variety in each course that you played, as each course uses a mix of disciplines coupled together with the transition phase each time. Things can get pretty frantic as you see your 5 second advantage slip away as you fumble your transition onto your mountain bike!

It is fair to say that some disciplines are a little more enjoyable to play than others. Driving the ATV is great fun and I honestly think they could’ve made a game just from this mode with some longer tracks. But I think it’s snowboarding that gets my ultimate seal of approval. It looks gorgeous and is great fun to rack up the tricks along the way down the slope as you race to the finish, which in turn give you a replenishment on your turbo meter. None of these different disciplines are perfect by any means and some, like bungee jumping do feel a little tacked on, but it’s nice to have quite a bit of differentiation between them.

Graphically, Sega Extreme Sports is a smart looking title. Both the terrain and character models are all very detailed and it is certainly one of the better looking, more realistic games on the Dreamcast. Despite this, I have to comment on the strange texture-warping that goes on as you make your way through the stages. It’s not something I’ve seen in many other Dreamcast games but it can be pretty distracting when you’re in a cave and it looks like all of the walls are moving!

WAVE Game Studios – an interview with the indie publisher keeping the Dream alive

WAVE Game Studios is a name you will be familiar with if you recently bought a copy of Senile Team's excellent Dreamcast platformer-cum-beat 'em up Intrepid Izzy, and has recently announced that they will also be publishing Yeah Yeah Beebiss II in Europe. The UK-based outfit has been busy establishing itself as the hottest new label in Dreamcast indie game publishing, and we thought it would be cool to catch up with WAVE as they start to make a splash in the community. Splash? Wave? See what I did there? I almost went for 'dipping a toe in' but pulled myself back from that particular cringeworthy literary cliff edge with mere keystrokes to spare.

Anyway, if you're not familiar with WAVE Game Studios, their history, and what they have planned for the future; hopefully you will be by the end of this interview. Furthermore, if you're an independent developer working on a Dreamcast game and you have dreams of putting your game in a physical case and into the GD-ROM drives of Dreamcasts the world over, then read on...

DCJY: Hi, thanks for agreeing to talk to us about WAVE Game Studios. Before we begin, can you give us little bit of background about who makes up the team?

WAVE Game Studios: It’s our pleasure! WAVE is primarily made up of two brothers, Daniel and Nick. We’re based in Norwich, Norfolk, UK.

Norfolk, known for Alan Partridge, mustard...and now WAVE Game Studios! So, when was WAVE Game Studios established and what was the reasoning being the creation of the label?

WAVE has a fairly long history, but the most recent incarnation stems back to 2015 which is when we started distributing games to UK based retailers. We really started to ramp up our efforts this year, which is when we began publishing games in addition to just distributing them.

That’s interesting – this might sound like a daft question, but what is the main difference between distributing and publishing a game?

It’s a very good question. The role of a publisher is to, in short, take a game and turn it into a saleable product. Usually the publisher will help with artwork, marketing, production, and various other tasks such as providing review copies to magazines and influencers.

The distributor, on the other hand, deals primarily with ensuring the product is available for sale in as many appropriate places as possible. In the indie games world, these two roles are often (but not always) filled by the same company or person.

Shadow Gangs (Dreamcast Edition) hits Kickstarter!

Good news! Everyone's favourite 80's inspired side-scrolling beat 'em up Shadow Gangs has finally hit Kickstarter! I say finally, because Shadow Gangs for Dreamcast has been a long time coming - news of it coming to the Dreamcast can be found as early as 2016. Since those first murmurings of a Dreamcast port, Shadows Gangs released to Steam and Xbox in 2020, with a Switch port following at the beginning of 2021 - to almost universally positive reviews. 

More recently, developer JKM Corp teased us with a clip of the port we've been waiting for running on a Dreamcast, with news that the Dreamcast version was pretty much finished, and a Kickstarter would be on its way soon. Well it's now here, with options for both digital and physical editions available.

But JKM Corp isn't just giving us any old version of Shadow Gangs, oh no. Considering the game's pretty obvious Shinobi influence, it is only right that Shadow Gangs would come to a Sega console with a bang.

According to the Kickstarter campaign, the Dreamcast version will have 7% more vertical resolution compared to other versions, and will also feature controller rumble - a feature exclusive to Dreamcast. The game will also benefit from its later release date in the sense that certain features will be tweaked in this version thanks to the feedback of fans who played the PC and console original, making it more accessible to everyone. Listening to fan feedback will always get a thumbs up from us.

For those looking for a more ass-kicking experience though, multiple difficulties will be available, including the absolutely ridiculous Crimson Ninja mode. Shadow Gangs may well become the Dark Souls of Dreamcast beat 'em ups. Dark Gangs? Sorry.

 

There are many perks for backing at different tiers, including a hefty collector's edition that comes with an artbook and a shirt, as well as a load of other collectable items. To get a physical Dreamcast release though, you'll need to stump up £45 or higher.

There are also some stretch goals, including a re-recorded soundtrack with a full band, PS4 and PS5 versions, and the promise of a sequel if the funding reaches the required levels.

Regardless, we're excited to see yet another new game come to the Dreamcast, and that it is one with such a pedigree is hugely exciting. Head over to the Shadow Gangs Kickstarter here to pledge your support.

Bounty Hunter Sarah: The Capcom Dreamcast Game You Never Knew About

Ask any Dreamcast fan about Capcom's legacy on the console and you'll be told that good old Cappy are probably as synonymous with the box of dreams as even Sega themselves. Then, if you asked those same fans what kind of games they'd associate Capcom's mighty stint on the Dreamcast with, they'd most likely tell you "fighters", maybe even shoot-em-ups or survival horror. No one, and I repeat, no one would respond: "a text-based near future crime thriller featuring a digitised actress".

Bounty Hunter Sarah: Holy Mountain no Teiō was released onto the Dreamcast and PlayStation on the 24th of May 2001. Published by Capcom, this Japanese-exclusive "sound novel" (more on that in a moment) was developed by Flagship, a fresh-faced independent studio founded by ex-Capcom developer Yoshiki Okamoto. With funding from Capcom, Nintendo and Sega, Flagship would develop or assist with the development of games from huge franchises such as Resident Evil, Kirby and The Legend of Zelda, before sadly closing its doors in 2007. Bounty Hunter Sarah was Flagship’s first and only original IP, with its big selling point being that its plot was written by the same scenario writer as Resident Evil 2, Noboru Sugimura, who had also left Capcom to be part of Flagship.

The staff of Flagship at a 2001 presentation

The game's plot takes place in the year 2060, and revolves around Sarah Fitzgerald, a bounty hunter who roams the crime-ridden Neo Tokyo with the goal of assassinating a notorious mafia boss known as the "Lord of the Holy Mountain". The game's action-packed opening cinematic sets this all up really well, with plenty of flashy stop-motion spy stuff and enough explosions to make Michael Bay blush. But then when you start a new game, all that energy witnessed in the intro suddenly takes a turn as you soon realise that Sugimura's plot is told in the form of a "sound novel," a type of game fairly similar to a visual novel. For those not in the know, visual novels are...well, novels that are visual. 

Some would argue that they aren’t really games due to them essentially being flashy reading exercises, with little interaction required from the player other than to progress countless paragraphs of text with a single button and, in the case of the most common type of visual novel, have them occasionally select a choice. Despite their text heavy nature, they still include plenty of varying background scenery and colourful characters (usually anime-style) to accompany the stories being told, and often feature plot lines that can devolve down branching paths to multiple endings, leading some to liken visual novels to interactive choose your own adventure books. Sound novels, on the other hand, while still including a decent helping of artwork, often have it serve as a backdrop to screens filled with text, with the game instead relying more on sound effects and music to immerse the player into the plot taking place (source). 

Yeah Yeah Beebiss II now available for Dreamcast

If the title Yeah Yeah Beebiss I means anything to you, you'll love this little news snippet. If you're wondering what the hell I'm blathering about, the mystery of Yeah Yeah Beebiss I is a totally fascinating trip down a rabbit hole of copyright traps, misunderstood language translations, fabrications of the truth...or all of the above. 

In a nutshell, it's the story of a strange Nintendo Entertainment System game which is considered to represent one of the greatest gaming mysteries of all time, and which prompted a years long search for a title that many people were convinced didn't exist. I would implore anyone with even a passing interest in this flavour of gaming oddness to visit YouTube and watch any of the amazing videos on the topic, including this one from LSuperSonicQ, or this one from All Things Lost which does a damn fine job of explaining the whole saga as well as offering a solution to the mystery.

In a rather excellent twist on this strange tale, YouTuber and retro gaming tinkerer John Riggs has released a 'sequel' to Yeah Yeah Beebiss I - titled Yeah Yeah Beebiss II - for both the NES and the Dreamcast. As announced over on his Twitter account, you can purchase a limited edition copy for the Dreamcast by visiting John's store here. 

There's not a great deal of info on the game available at the time of writing, with only a single screenshot released; but once John releases a video on it (or one of us here at the Junkyard manages to get hold of a copy) we'll update this news piece or post a full review. To be honest, it would be a brilliant meta twist if this whole thing is a complete hoax and Yeah Yeah Beebiss II turns out to be just as mysterious and nonexistant as the prequel. It's more likely that Yeah Yeah Beebiss II does exist though (is there such a thing as being too meta?), and it's great to have yet another new title released for the Dreamcast.

Check out the Yeah Yeah Beebiss II store page here, and visit John Riggs' YouTube channel here.

Update - looks like it's now sold out for Dreamcast, which makes the title of this post fake news. Sorry folks :/ 

Update 2 - Yeah Yeah Beebis II will now be published by UK publisher WAVE Game Studios and is available for pre-order now, priced at £24.99. It is expected to ship in January 2022, which is awesome!

Retrospective: F1 World Grand Prix II for Dreamcast

For a console that lived and died in such a relatively short span of time, the Dreamcast sure did rack up a veritable bounty of top class racers. No doubt if you're a fan of either the genre, the Dreamcast, or both - as I am - then you don't need me to list the big hitters here. If you're not au fait though, rest assured that if you're new to the Dreamcast and you're partial to navigating large, wheeled boxes down tarmac lanes at wholly ridiculous speeds, then you're in for a treat.

As a sub-genre of racing games then, the Formula 1 fan is equally well catered for when it comes to the Dreamcast library. There are no less than 5 separate F1 titles on the platform (well, 6 if you count Spirit of Speed, but in truth that's barely a game; and 7 if you count Super Speed Racing / CART Flag to Flag), each offering its own unique take on the real world motorsport and we have covered them all - albeit briefly - here at the Junkyard in the semi-distant past. But in this retrospective I wanted to focus on the game many aficionados consider to be the pinnacle of F1 racing on the Dreamcast, and also a title - it turns out - which has a fairly interesting origin story and an equally curious legacy: F1 World Grand Prix II for Dreamcast.

Before we even attempt to discuss the game's many positives and numerous failings, I think it is worth investigating the history of the F1 World Grand Prix franchise, and the enigmatic firm behind it - Video System. Video System Co Ltd was a Japanese developer and publisher that began putting out games in the 1980s in both the arcades and on home consoles such as the TurboGrafx-16 and Nintendo Entertainment System. Video System's foray into the world of F1 games began in 1991 with F1 Grand Prix on the Super Nintendo and in arcades; and this game spawned two sequels - F1 Grand Prix: Part II and Part III in 1992 and 1993 respectively.

F1 Grand Prix: Part II is playable on MAME

It was in 1998 that the series was rebooted as F1 World Grand Prix for the Nintendo 64, a game which was developed in partnership with a studio called Paradigm Entertainment. It's here where things start to get interesting, as the Nintendo 64 game and its 1999 sequel (F1 World Grand Prix II) are completely separate titles to the games that made an appearance on the Dreamcast, and they share very little other than a name. The Dreamcast version of F1 World Grand Prix was developed in-house by Video System, and received the suffix 'for Dreamcast,' simply to differentiate it from the Nintendo 64 version.

The N64 version of F1 World Grand Prix

Likewise, that game's sequel - the subject of this very article - was developed by Video System in a silo away from the Nintendo 64 version of F1 World Grand Prix II and comparing the two titles side by side demonstrates just how different they are in almost every way. If they didn't share a title and a publisher, you'd be forgiven for thinking they were from totally separate franchises that featured an FIA license. It gets even more curious when you learn that neither sequel was given a US release (though the prequels were), and the Dreamcast game was distributed in Europe by Konami.

Distributed exclusively by Konami...for some reason

There's precious little information available online about why this was, as Video System was still in a position to distribute its own games in the early 2000s; so why Konami - of all firms - was engaged to distribute F1 World Grand Prix II for Dreamcast in European markets is something of a mystery. Are you still with me here? OK - it gets a bit more interesting now. According to recently published information over at the Lost Media Wiki, a third game in the Nintendo 64 series - imaginatively titled F1 World Grand Prix III - was around 80% complete and fully playable before it was cancelled due to the console's waning popularity.