Take The Bullet Revealed

Take The Bullet is one of the more infamous cancelled games for the Dreamcast. Developed by Red Lemon Studios, it was an ambitious first person shooter in which you could also use the light gun to shoot onscreen enemies. This kind of thing had been done before (Resident Evil Survivor on the PlayStation is one such example), but nothing on the scale of Take The Bullet had been attempted.
The game was to feature a full on single player campaign, alongside a 4-player multiplayer split screen mode that also added bots into the mix. The solo game involved the player assuming the role of ex-marine and bodyguard Jack Travis, and it was up to you to protect Presidential candidate Kincaide through a varied series of missions (although evidence suggests they may have been mainly escort missions, Travis being a bodyguard and all).

I recently got to play a very early build of this mysterious game, and while I was unable to try it out with the light gun, I was able to capture footage from the first two missions.
While it is clearly very rough around the edges and has very little in the way of sound effects, voice acting or music, this early version of Take The Bullet was spread across several discs - one of which was the split-screen multiplayer death match (interestingly labelled as 'E3 Demo'). I managed to play this death match against an AI bot in single player but I recently had some pretty severe computer issues (basically a failed hard drive in my MacBook) and as such I lost all that footage.

Nikkei Dreams: Business On The Dreamcast

The Dreamcast is often described as a system that was ahead of it's time, and in many ways it was. You only have to look at all of the ingenious peripherals and add-ons; even the lowly memory card, the VMU, is a technical marvel when you think about it. The entire range of official and unofficial enhancements is as staggeringly large as it is diverse, but perhaps the most important of them all is the one many of us forget is even there these days - the little modem stuck to the rear of the system. While the modem and the internet services it allowed played something of a minor role in PAL territories, and online gaming was a huge success in the US, over in Japan the humble modem played a much more interesting part in the story of the Dreamcast.
While the Dreamcast is first and foremost an entertainment machine, the modem allowed Sega Japan to look beyond it's primary function and decide that the console should also be used for other, non-gaming purposes. For instance, the console was installed in Toyota car showrooms and a whole range of bespoke 'Doricatch Series' GDs were produced. These were little more than advertising demos for various Toyota vehicle models and are today some of the rarest examples of NTSC-J exclusive Dreamcast software on the planet.

Boku Doraemon: Bored Robot Cat Simulator 2001

Hello there, the Gagaman here! With the arrival of my copy of The Dreamcast Ultimate Collectors Book and due to having some spare time, I have for the last few days been playing a lot of Dreamcast games; namely ones I feel I haven't played enough of. With this in mind I want to get back to writing articles here as its been far too long, so I may as well start by talking about what I was playing last night - a Japanese exclusive that is not very well documented, based on a famous long running children's anime: Boku Doraemon. More after the jump...

Unknown Gundam GD-Rom Surfaces On eBay

Well this is interesting. A Katana development GD-Rom has shown up on eBay Germany, with 'Gundam' written on it. Is this a previously unknown PAL version of Gundam Side Story 0079, or something completely new and hitherto undocumented? Either way, The Dreamcast Junkyard fully intends to secure this disc and investigate it further. If it turns out to be something previously unseen, we will be releasing it to the Dreamcast community. We have reached out to the seller for further information, but the real mystery here is that it is a Katana GD-Rom not a regular Dreamcast one. The plot thickens.
Want to help us secure this and release it to the community? Any financial help in the form of  a doantion is welcomed! In other news, we are looking into the idea of launching a full Kickstarter project for a new hardback version of the Ultimate Collectors Guide, complete with artwork and full hardware section. Stay tuned!

Update: Unfortunately, we didn't win the auction. However, all is not lost. The winner of the disc has been in touch and assured us that this will be released to the community! Huzzah!

OST Your Heart

La la laa
Video game music. It's great, right? Very few genres of game feel complete without beeps, bops, or full-on symphonic orchestra behind them. In some instances, musical cues aid the player in being better at the game in general. It can emphasize moods, tell stories, etc...

But you're not here to hear all that.
Thanks to the wonders of disc audio, Sonic's music sounded the best it ever had. Especially thanks in large part to the involvement of Jun Senoue and Crush 40. Senoue had worked on Sonic games going back as far as Sonic the Hedgehog 3 on the Genesis. Crush 40, for whom he wrote music, would provide tracks for several Sonic games, including the Adventure series and later games in the franchise.

Sega Direct Trizeal Bonus CD

Triangle Service. Let that name settle in your mind for a few seconds. Do you recall anything they've ever created? No? Well, Triangle Service are the team behind vertical shooter Trizeal.
A pretty obscure and expensive Dreamcast shmup, with a silky smooth framerate and some great toe-tapping music, Trizeal was ported from the arcade to Dreamcast in 2005, so was a very late release. What you probably didn't know is that Triangle Service released a promotional music CD for the game in a similar fashion to Chaos Field, and it was only available through the Sega Direct online store. I somehow managed to snag this for next to nothing on eBay and I have to say I'm quite impressed with the quality of the tunes on the CD.

Sega Retro Adds Full List Of Widescreen Titles

The news broke recently that certain Dreamcast games are playable in full widescreen mode with the use of a Codebreaker cheat disc. We didn't really bother running the story because it was already being reported to within an inch of it's life on other sites, and to be honest I don't really care whether I play my Dreamcast games in widescreen, narrowscreen, or on a black and white portable CRT from 1987. True story - I used to play my Dreamcast on one of those tiny Casio LCD handheld TVs because I didn't have a proper TV in my bedroom when I was a teenager. School of hard knocks: graduated with honours.
Image source: SEGAbits
Some people do want to play in widescreen though, and that's cool. The good news if you fall into this camp is that our friends over at the awesome Sega Retro wiki have added a page detailing every game that makes use of this newly discovered 16:9 anamorphic widescreen mode, and it also lists the codes required. If you're sick of having those black boarders at the side of the screen when you play your DC on a widescreen TV (and you own a Codebreaker), it may be in your best interest to visit this link:

Sega Retro List of Widescreen Dreamcast Games

Interesting fact: this is the 1000th post here at the Junkyard. Go us!

128-Bits Of Cake

Do you know a Dreamcast fan with an upcoming birthday? If so, I suggest you put the Tesco Value trans-fat delivery shuttle and 15p fire-hazard candles back on the shelf and give yourself a slap across the face with a 1999 Arsenal shirt that's been soaked in yak vomit. And then, once you've cleaned yourself up and reassessed your (poor) life choices, head over to Pretty Cake Machine. Why? Well, because there you will find the person responsible for this amazing Dreamcast cake:

The Dreamcast Beer Tap

OK, this is clearly just a Dreamcast controller screwed onto a regular beer tap, but kudos to the creator for recognising that the only thing that could make beer even better...is adding some Dreamcast. It's currently listed on eBay here, although the pork scratchings must be sourced elsewhere. If you decide to purchase it, make sure you raise a glass to The Dreamcast Junkyard for keeping a) the dream alive; and b) encouraging your alcoholic tendencies.

Good Dreamcastic Morning Episode 2

YouTuber and Dreamcast fan Pcwzrd13 has released the second episode of Good Dreamcastic Morning, the world's only Dreamcast-centric morning show! This new episode has plenty of content and is a good deal longer than the pilot, and segments include a guest spot from Adam Koralik, a look at the Dreamcast unveiling in the August 1998 issue of GamePro, and a brief glance at the unreleased game reveals from this very blog. Also, if you're interested in reading more about the mentioned Jet Grind Radio/Milwaukee incident, be sure to check this article out. As always, please feel free to visit and subscribe to Dreamcastic Channel for regular updates and gaming content.


On the subject of the unreleased games mentioned in the episode, Take The Bullet will be coming very soon. Intrigued? You should be...

The Ultimate Collectors Guide Book

You asked for it, so here it is. The Dreamcast Junkyard Ultimate Collectors Guide is now available in an updated, physical form. Written by Mike Phelan and with a foreword conjured from my own pen (well, keyboard), this guide is packed to the gills with information on pretty much every single game ever released for our favourite system. You don't need to take my word for it though - check out the video preview below:


Renegade Racers Revealed

Developed by Promethean Designs (of Picassio fame), Renegade Racers looked set for a February 2000 release at the hand of almost-defunct outfit Interplay. A kart racer in the same vein as Crash Team Racing or Speed Freaks, but with overtones of Diddy Kong Racing (hovercraft are heavily featured), Renegade Racers was quietly pulled from Dreamcast release lists and the low review scores of the PlayStation game quite possibly had a hand in that. There is precious little information available online regarding the long lost Dreamcast port of this fairly generic racer, but The Dreamcast Junkyard is on hand to fill in the gaps with the following video. Enjoy...

Dreamcast Express Extra

A few months ago I managed to acquire an almost complete set of Dreamcast Express demo discs. You can read all about those here, but if you can't be bothered to click that link and you're wondering what the hell Dreamcast Express is, let me explain. Dreamcast Express was the name given to an exclusive set of demo and preview discs sent by mail to subscribers of Sega's Dreamcast Partners initiative. Subscribers were privy to content in the form of playable demos, videos and VMU saves that were stored on the discs and in some cases these playable demos differed drastically to the final product. The most glaring example of this is the Buggy Heat demo featured on Dreamcast Express volume one, in which the controls are completely different and you have the ability to 'free look' like you do in most modern racers. If you lived in Japan at the time of the Dreamcast and had the foresight to subscribe to the Partners service, you would also be treated to a rather brilliant welcome pack, and that can be viewed here, complete with English translation.
Now, at the start of this diatribe, I mentioned that I had an almost complete set of Dreamcast Express. That's because apart from the regular volumes (numbered 1 to 7), Sega issued another volume simply titled 'Extra.' I came to own this addition to the Dreamcast Express series through the kindness of reader and contributor James - the very same gentleman who recently submitted the Partners welcome pack images. James also sent me (for the price of postage alone) several volumes of the Japanese Dreamcast Magazine's cover disc series and I will be casting my gaze over those in a future post. For now though, let's delve into Dreamcast Express Extra and see what's hiding on the GD and in the booklet...

The Games of Star Wars

Man, I love Star Wars. It's so quotable. Who can forget the immortal line from Sergeant Apone when the space marines emerge from suspended animation aboard the USS Sulaco? It's simply awesome:

"Alright sweethearts, what are you waiting for? Breakfast in bed? Another glorious day in the Corps! A day in the Marine Corps is like a day on the farm! Every meal's a banquet; every paycheck a fortune; every formation a parade...I love the Corps!"

It just encapsulates everything great about George Lucas's epic space drama. I wasn't that keen when they detached the Enterprises's saucer section from the star drive - those effects were a bit ropey - but when it turns out that the Event Horizon actually went to Hell itself...well, I was simply blown away. Vaporised, even. But then I found the microfilm so it all turned out well in the end.
Sgt. Apone started as a lowly Storm Trooper, too.
If you're still still reading, well done. If you're already looking for the comments section, then you've already lost, my friend. Joking aside, the entire world (well, those sectors with internet access) seems to be gripped with Star Wars fever at the moment, and who can blame them/us/me? The trailer for the next instalment of the Star Wars saga looks positively stunning, and I for one cannot wait to see what Mr Abrams does with the series George Lucas managed to drag backwards through a hedge over the course of two and half terrible prequels.