The History of Sega Console Hardware
Hideki Sato – 1998 Developer Interview
“If I had to sum up succinctly what makes the Dreamcast special, I would say it’s connectivity. As you know, every unit comes equipped with a modem. However, this isn’t our first experiment with using modems. It’s actually our third try (after the Mega Modem for the Genesis and the Sega Saturn modem).
I’ve been told there are many Sega fans in Japan alone, and I’m very thankful for that fact, though I sometimes wonder if they aren’t just rooting for the underdog. (laughs) Or perhaps they are drawn to Sega’s forward-thinking posture, as we have always tried to stay on the cutting edge of technology. I can only guess at the exact nature of our fan’s mentality, but in any event, I am truly grateful.
The Dreamcast, therefore, is a challenge to us: to take our already wide userbase, and see if we can enlarge it further. In that sense, the Dreamcast represents a recapitulation for us of 20 years of determination, and a commitment to challenge ourselves and move forward in the home video game console market.
The keyword for the Dreamcast development was “play and communication.” The ultimate form of communication is a direct connection with another, and we included the modem and the linkable VMUs for that purpose. We had also planned to have some sort of linking function with cell phones, but we weren’t able to realize it. Consumers were now used to the raging “bit wars”, so even though we knew it was a lot of nonsense, we needed to appeal to them in those terms with the Dreamcast. And so we marketed it as having a “128 bit graphics engine RISC CPU”, even the SH-4 was only 64-bit. (laughs) On the other hand, we extensively customized the original SH-4 for the Dreamcast, to the point where I think you could almost call it something new.
The modem in Japan is 33.6kbps, and in America it’s 56kpbs, but we designed the Dreamcast’s modem to be removable and upgradeable with advances in hardware and infrastructure. This cost a lot, but we were thinking about the future. We also had the idea of making the GD-ROM drive front-loading and even made several prototypes in that style. Personally, I wanted a more cube-shaped design like the Nintendo Gamecube, but we ultimately ended up with what you see today. One thing I truly wanted was wireless controllers. Those long cords are annoying. Next time, it will be wireless for sure! (laughs)”
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