Blue/Orange Ring of Life

So, it finally happened to me. That thing that I've heard and read so much about finally came around and bit me on the ass. I'm talking about the dreaded 'red ring of death.' Just like whispering the name of the Scottish play before a theatre performance, muttering those four words prior to switching on your Xbox 360 will only result in a bizarre grinding noise and a crimson halo emanating from your console's faceplate. But this is a Dreamcast site, so why do we care? Well, I just wanted to bring it up because in the four years I've had my (second-, and maybe even third-hand) Dreamcast, it hasn't died. Granted, there was the whole speaker wire/controller board incident but it still battles on nearly 10 years after the last units rolled off the production line.

All hail the Undead Console!

Incidentally, even though they are responsible for one of the greatest crimes to retro-gaming in the modern age, I'd like to give Kudos to the guys at Gamestation who effortlessly swapped my 360 for another one...and also sold me an extended 2 year warranty for twenty fucking quid.

Next up: Jeremy McGrath Supercross 2000 and an exclusive review of the McClaren Dreamcast pad. I realise how exciting this news is, but for the love of God CONTAIN YOURSELVES!

Roads? We don't need Roads(ters)

As I was driving my noisy, smoke belching, coal-powered, big-ass truck around the tranquil idylls of Southern England and flicking my fingers at church-going Women's Institute members t'other day, I spotted this:

It's an orange spiral that looks vaguely like an orange Dreamcast swirl! From America! Or Japan! Vaguely! OK, I realise that this is barrel scraping of the worst kind possible, but relax - I also bring news of Ebay-age, M'lud!

And before you groan and go back to your copy of Readers Wives and that mug of luke-warm tea you've got balanced on the arm of your battered couch/bed - I'm not doing a マーティン and trying to flog my (ill-gotten?) gains through the DCJY. No - I personally don't think this is the kind of place I'd get away with advertising a nearly-new PVC gimp suit and matching powder-coated dildo (although, email me if you're interested. Only light stainage). Ahem.

No, dear reader. I've been buying...

...this:

Roadsters

I remember Roadsters fondly from my pathetic pre-Dreamcast days. I used to have it on the N64 and to be fair it was a pretty solid game. It had cracking hi-res (for the N64) visuals, tight controls and was just a fun little game all round. So, forgive me for thinking the Dreamcast version would be just as good - if not better. Y'know, what with it being released much later and on a vastly superior console and all. Wrong. It's fucking hideous.

The first thing veterans of the N64 version will notice is that the visuals have hardly improved at all. Whilst the Nintendo version appeared to squeeze the very core of the N64's graphical heart until every last drop of rice pudding was drained from it (yes, N64s have rice pudding inside them. Strange, but true), the DC version looks like something running on a Speak & Spell. Spell 'crap.' C.R.A.P.

• Cardboard cut-out trees. Check. 
  
• Over sized sized track-side objects. Check.
  
• Bizarre scenery fade-in. Check.
• Static crowds. Check.
• Static vehicle drivers. Check.
• Badly pixelated 'real time' reflections. Check.
• Random bouts of slowdown. Check

These are just some of the problems Roadsters suffers from in the graphics department. I could go on, but if I do you'll still be reading me moan on about visual shortcomings until the coming of the next ice-age. So I'll moan about some other stuff instead. The sound. Where is it?! I don't know if it's just my SCART lead or my TV, or a combination of the two (Roadsters isn't VGA compatible, surprisingly), but the sound kept fading in and out seemingly at random so I spent most of my playtime sat there in silence. Shoddy programming. Check.

Next - the controls. Roadsters has the worst control model I have ever experienced in a game. On any console. Ever. Tap the analogue stick and your car will go careening into the nearest wall and then either just stop dead or be bounced along at super-sonic speeds. This effect appears to be random, for some wooden fences will grab you like some unnatural spectral magnet, whilst others seem to have been greased up with lube that sends you off up the track at the speed of light. The best bit though, is when you don't touch the analogue stick and your car still flies off at an angle and hits a wall! Oh how I laughed. Then switched the console off.

Roadsters is clearly a game that could've done with a few more months in development because even an imbecile like me can see that it's not a finished product. What the hell where the playtesters thinking when they gave this the thumbs up? Where they all pissed or something? What's even more annoying about this whole debacle is that there are some truly interesting ideas in Roadsters. For example, the developers decided that the straight road racing seen in the N64 version wasn't enough for Dreamcast gamers, so they added in a whole host of natural disasters to make the races more interesting. So, on one course, a volcano erupts turning the sky black and spraying magma onto the road, whilst on another an Earthquake hits and shakes the whole track violently and on the Docklands track a jumbo jet crashes, devastating certain parts of the circuit. All great ideas that where sadly tacked on to a virtually unplayable mess of a game. 

I was really looking forward to playing Roadsters (no, really) simply because of my experience with the N64 incarnation but this DC port has left me feeling massively underwhelmed. Quite how Player 1 and Titus managed to completely destroy the experience of racing convertables around exotic racetracks is a mystery even Inspector Clouseau would have trouble solving. 

So rather than waste your time playing through this piece of utter shite, here are some suggestions of other things you could do with Roadsters:

Microwave it

Toast it

BBQ it (well, it has been sunny recently)

Eat it

And finally, shit it out.

Oh well. Just got to wait for Jeremy McGrath Motocross to turn up now...

Ho hum.

The search for Arcade Boy.

"I found myself on a hunt to track down somebody I played at Street Fighter Alpha 3, 10 years ago, half way up a mountain range in India!" (Lee Bradley)

So the story goes, a British man was in India on his way to Tibet when he found a makeshift "arcade" in the Himalayan hill station of Darjeeling.

"When I say “arcade,” what I really mean is a collection of old televisions wired up to PlayStations, arranged across a battered formica tabletop. Covering the entire back wall was a massive cabinet stuffed to bursting with pirated PSOne games, complete with poorly photocopied boxart. For just a few rupees the young boy that ran the arcade would grab the game of your choice, pop it into a PlayStation and keep you topped up with cups of Darjeeling’s finest. After days of travelling, catching snippets of sleep on noisy, dusty trains, this was exactly what we needed." (Lee Bradley)

The best part of this story? If Lee Bradley finds the kid who ran the arcade someone is going to give him the best gift anyone can give. A Sega Dreamcast and games.

"As a result of that post a mysterious benefactor contacted the editors at Bitmob and offered to send a Dreamcast and a box of games to the arcade." (Lee Bradley)

I hope they find that guy so they can provide some awesome arcade gaming to travelers. Who wouldn't want to play some Marvel Vs Capcom 2 after traveling through the Himalayas?

Full Story

http://www.bitmob.com/index.php/mobfeed/The-Search-for-Arcade-Boy.html

Radilgy / Rajiruji / Radirgy

Radilgy or Radirgy, shortened from Radio Allergy, the proposed North American release (Rajiruji in Japanese ラジルジ) is a vertical shooter released late into the Dreamcast's official life; February 16 2006.

In addition to the game, which could only be bought through SEGA Direct in Japan in 2006 (how I ordered mine) is a phone card for use in Japan. This was quite frequent with releases in Japan through SEGA Direct, but seems more fitting in this game as you essentially play a girl (or boy) that has to rescue her father from terrorists so she (or he) can get the medicine for their radio allergy. Mental I know, but this is Japan!

So, how does it fair with the other Dreamcast shooters? (what shooters I hear you ask??). Well, it's pretty solid, but it's no Ikaruga - but what is. The styling of the game is pretty unique; cell shaded graphics (think Jet Set Radio) over VGA really make the Dreamcast seem like it was released in 2006. If you're a collector, or just into shooters; I would heavily recommend this game. There's a really fun soundtrack to the game as well - which is a refreshing change as many shooters decide to go down the 'dark and dismal' route.

There's a variety of button commands, including shoot, bomb and a like of sword attack. This adds hugely to the strategy of the game. The casing of the game shows off some of the attention to detail given within the game. It's hard to think a title of this quality was released so late in the [official] life of our beloved Dreamcast.

So sure that this would be a great title; I bought two. Yes, that's right, I have a sealed copy up for sale on eBay and you can bid on it here. I'll leave you with a little gameplay video. Enjoy!