Dreamcast Presents Ozzfest 2000: The Official Event Programme

A while back, we featured an eBay auction for a Dreamcast console signed by none other than The Prince of Darkness himself, Mr John Michael Osbourne. You may know him better as Ozzy Osbourne. He's a Brummie musician who was quite famous in the 1970s, apparently. And he got so famous that he even had a music festival named in his honour: Ozzfest.

Back in 2000, Sega sponsored Ozzfest and supplied the eponymous superstar with a bounty of Dreamcasts that could be won by members of the public who competed against various headline acts in Dreamcast-related game challenges. One of these units was offered up for sale recently, although it doesn't appear to have fetched the $995 asking price. Can't think why. It'll take an entire bottle of nail polish remover to get that pen mark off. Tsk.

As you'd imagine, a touring music festival of this magnitude - sponsored by Dreamcast or not - generated a large amount of merchandise, and this post is about such an item: the official Ozzfest 2000 event programme. A gigantic book comprising 45 pages of interviews and band biographies, and made of high quality glossy paper; a book that feels like it is made from the forgotten dreams and weaved wigs of ten thousand 50-year-old men who used to wear skin tight silver trousers but who now wear beige slacks and drive their 12-year-old daughters to school in a Nissan Juke.

Taking place over the summer of 2000, Ozzfest took in numerous locations around the US and featured some of the biggest heavy metal and alt rock bands of the era. And I just happened to stumble across a mint condition copy of the aforementioned programme while browsing eBay...

Review: Ganryu

Ganryu resurrects legendarily unbeaten Japanese warrior Miyamoto Musashi for one final fight. The problem is, in this ugly, lazy, soulless, Frankenstein of game...everyone loses

What hurts most in playing this near-perfectly ported Dreamcast edition of Neo-Geo game Ganryu is that the original creators seemingly just didn't care. They didn't care that they were besmirching and cynically exploiting the name and legendary story of, Genji aside, arguably Japan's greatest historical hero. The bloody life of Miyamoto Musashi and his epic duel-of-duels with Sasaki Kojirō on Ganryū-jima, an island located between Honshū and Kyūshū, is literally the stuff of Japanese legend and here, in this side-scrolling 2D hack-and-slash, it is used as inspiration for what, simply put, is a poor and crassly unimaginative title.

Giant floating doll's head? Coming right up, sir!

A legendary tale

This duel, which has been dramatised many times in film - including in the final movie of an epic three-part series staring famous Japanese actor Toshiro Mifune as Musashi - is often seen as the greatest of Musashi's victories as Kojirō was a lethal swordsman himself, with his deadly use of a nodachi, a Japanese great sword, earning him the title of The Demon of the Western Provinces.

While his deeds have reached mythological proportions, Musashi was very much a real person and one who, arguably, perfected the two-blade fighting style. Musashi's Ni-Ten Ichi Ryu technique (two heavens as one), as detailed in his epic The Book of Five Rings (anyone with an interest in kenjutsu should read a modern a translation), was revolutionary for the time and, no doubt, a large part of how the greatest Japanese swordsman of all remained undefeated in over 60 duels.

The cutscenes are nicely drawn.

Musashi wasn't just the ultimate swordsman either. In his later life he mastered numerous arts and crafts - with arguably the finest being his beautiful broken ink pieces such as Shrike Perched on a Withered Branch. Simply put, Miyamoto Musashi is one of Japan's most well-known and beloved historical figures.

Why then would original creators Visco Corporation - a Japanese software house no less - use him and his most famous adventure as a vehicle to publish what is essentially a shoddy, cheap, bolted together Shinobi clone devoid of all soul?

The answer, of course, is money...

Alice Dreams Tournament OST Available For Pre-Order

Alice Dreams Tournament finally hit the Dreamcast earlier in 2017 and went down pretty well with the community. The frantic, multiplayer focused Bomberman homage also impressed this gamer (read the review here), and overall Julien Desquenne and Nicolas Pochet delivered what they promised with their admirable Kickstarter campaign. One aspect of Alice Dreams Tournament that was especially noteworthy was the music - anyone who has played it will know all about the ear worm tunes that accompany the explosive action.

Thanks to online store and publisher Côté Gamers, a brand new Alice Dreams Tournament OST music CD is coming in October 2017, featuring 27 tracks - two of which are original compositions not found in the main game. Priced at a very reasonable €13/£12/$15, the 'day one' edition of the Alice Dreams Tournament soundtrack is limited and ships with a numbered certificate of authenticity.

You can pre-order the CD from Côté Gamers here (site is in French, so diligent use of a translation tool is encouraged...unless you can read French, of course!), and international buyers can take advantage of the 'books and brochures' shipping option for reduced delivery costs.

Finally, if you haven't had the pleasure of playing Alice Dreams Tournament yet, or didn't back the Kickstarter, you can now buy the game from the Alice Dreams store here.

Tech Demo Video: Taxman's Sonic CD Running On Dreamcast

As Sonic Mania grips the globe, more than a few minds have pondered whether a Dreamcast port would be possible. We even did a stupid video editing the launch trailer to include the Dreamcast logo. No one can imagine that Sega would commission such an enterprise, but the question remains, would it be technically feasible?

How did Namco's lawyers not catch wind of the blatant plagiarism?

Tom reached out to Christian Whitehead, aka 'The Taxman', one of the key persons behind the Retro engine that powers Mania and the recent ports of Sonic 1, 2 and CD to Android and iOS devices. He was optimistic that a DC port would be possible.

And just yesterday, a new post on the Sonic Retro forums provides some videographic evidence of such a feat being achieved. Forum member 'sonicblur' has posted a video of Taxman's 2011 remake of Sonic CD running on real Dreamcast hardware. While this isn't Sonic Mania, it is in the same family of games, running on the same engine, or at least an earlier version of the same engine. While the video shows many glitches and graphical bugs, it is still an impressive technical achievement.

Remember, sonicblur is quick to point out not to make too big a deal about this. He has little time to work on it, so don't expect to be downloading a disc image any time soon. There are also some copyright issues to be wary of, as Sega is still profiteering from the 6 year old game.

So don't get too excited, just sit back and bask in the warm glow of the knowledge that Sega's last little white box is still full of surprises, and in small corners of the globe, talented coders can still produce magic from its rusty, two decade old hardware.

Trickstyle Now Available On ZOOM Platform

Trickstyle refuses to pass into antiquity quietly, it seems. Only recently we were being wowed by the awesome Trickstyle iOS stickers that somehow became a thing (no, seriously - look here). It appears the internet's insatiable thirst for Acclaim's futuristic hover boarding title knows no bounds though, and while it has been available on GOG for a while, the game has now also been added to online retailer ZOOM Platform's library. ZOOM Platform, for those not in the know, is a digital distribution service for PC and Mac games, and its mission is - and I quote - "to design, create, and publish traditional and interactive entertainment with a Generation X trans-media appeal."

Well, Trickstyle certainly has Generation X trans-media appeal, and it has it by the bucket load. Shame about the framerate in the Dreamcast version, but it's all about the Generation X trans-media appeal, so I'm prepared to overlook that. Anyway, Trickstyle is now on ZOOM Platform and as an added bit of Sega-related trivia, ZOOM's executive chairman is none other than Bernie Stolar. Yes, that Bernie Stolar. Cool eh?

Trickstyle for PC and Mac costs $6.99 and you can grab it here if you don't already have it for your lovely Dreamcast.

10 PC Games That Should Have Been Ported To Dreamcast...But Never Were

We've touched on this subject briefly in the not-too-distant past, but I thought it was worth revisiting with a proper article. What am I talking about? Why, PC to Dreamcast ports of course. It's no secret that the Dreamcast was held aloft as some form of chimera, a home gaming console that could host arcade-perfect conversions from the NAOMI cabinets, but also a console that could mimic a decent, medium specced gaming rig of the era.

Thanks to the inclusion of Windows CE elements, the Dreamcast was almost viewed as the perfect system to which PC games could be quickly and easily ported, and for a short time during the console's early life it looked like developers were lining up to complement their computer-based releases with a Dreamcast version as standard procedure. The addition of compatibility with Windows CE is quite an interesting subject in its own right, and as discussed in this CNET article from September 1999 Microsoft was hoping that the inclusion of the operating system would actually be a catalyst for more PC software being brought to the Dreamcast.

"Microsoft's new [Windows CE 2.0] development software may help get game developers back on track in bringing Windows CE-based games to Dreamcast. The toolkit is designed to simplify title development and conversions from other system platforms, Microsoft said. The toolkit also provides improved graphics performance and other multimedia effects.

"The suite provides faster data transfer between the development hardware and the Dreamcast console, while technology borrowed from web page development tools aids in the creation of customized games."

- CNET, September 1999

Granted, before the Dreamcast was even released PC hardware was technically a good deal more capable (Intel had already released a 450Mhz Pentium III processor by mid 1999, for example); but the power of Sega's fledgling system outstripped the contemporary consoles by several degrees of magnitude, and Windows CE compatibility hinted that uncompromised PC ports were set to be a reality for the first time.

"Equipped with a high-powered chip, modem, and other PC features, Sega's Dreamcast - like other gaming machines coming to market - can ostensibly duplicate, and even improve upon, many of the core functions of home PCs."

- CNET, September 1999

Initially this certainly appeared to be the case anyway, not least because of the keyboard and mouse peripherals, and a number of high profile PC games were given a decent crack of the whip on the Dreamcast. Titles like Hidden & Dangerous brought a level of strategy to consoles that hadn't really been seen before, and Speed Devils showed how close the new system could get to emulating high-end PC visuals for a fraction of the price. Later came games like Rainbow Six, Star Lancer, The Nomad Soul, Soldier of Fortune, Stupid Invaders and (to a certain extent) Half-Life - all titles that started life as PC games. Unfortunately, due to a number of factors, the floodgates never really fully opened and the deluge of PC ports failed to materialize.

The brevity of the Dreamcast as a fully supported system is the biggest factor in this, as many PC games that were odds on to have made the leap from the office to the living room were undoubtedly cancelled once the news of the Dreamcast's demise filtered through the industry. The history of the Dreamcast is littered with abandoned and half finished projects, many of which we're seeing come to light many years later.

However, with this post I wanted to explore some of the PC games from that halcyon era where consoles and PCs were pretty much level pegged when it came to graphical grunt; and explore some of the games that were rumoured to be on their way to the Dreamcast, but which never made it. To clarify/confuse things further, some of these games were actually in development for the Dreamcast before being cancelled, while others are simply titles I think would have been a good fit for the system. Let's get it on...

Dreamcast Riding High At Gamescom 2017

The annual Gamescom trade fair in Cologne, Germany is always a hit with developers and publishers of the latest and greatest new games and hardware. All the big guns have been in attendance at the 2017 show, with major players like Nintendo, Sony and Microsoft showing their wares, and the public have been lapping it up. But what's all this got to do with the humble Dreamcast? Well, believe it or not, the Dreamcast has been exceptionally well represented at Gamescom this year, with a glut of upcoming games on display for Sega's old warhorse.

Intrepid Izzy from Senile Team, Retroguru's Hermes, Xenocider from Retro Sumus, the recent releases from JoshProd, Saber Rider and the Star Sheriffs, and Alice Dreams Tournament have all been on display and fully playable. This is due in part to the sizeable displays laid on by Retro Spiel and German retro gaming magazine RETURN. It's pretty awesome to see the Dreamcast represented at such a prestigious event, even more so with all these new titles on display. Below you'll find an assortment of photos from Gamescom 2017 showing that the Dreamcast is far from dead - it's very much alive and kicking!