Fourteen years ago today, in Japan, the final SEGA console released: the Dreamcast. Of course, being an English speaking blog, we tend to put more emphasis on 9-9-99. Still, 11-27-98 is just as, if not more, important than any other Dreamcast launch date simply because it was the first. Also, it is the day before my birthday. A-hem! Anyway, Japanese launch titles included: Sonic Adventure, Pen Pen TriIcelon, Godzilla Generations, July, and Virtua Fighter 3tb. July and Godzilla Generations never made it outside Japan. Considering Famitsu gave Godzilla Generations a 20 out of 40, and Western import reviews were even worse, it seems those outside Japan weren’t missing out on Godzilla.
To celebrate, enjoy the hilarious Japanese Dreamcast commercials starring Senior Managing Director of SEGA Hidekazu Yukawa. The man truly was the Segata Sanshiro of the Dreamcast era, though he acted the complete opposite. Yukawa appeared on the Japanese Dreamcast box, he had his own game, his own merchandise including a cell phone charm, and even appeared in a cameo in the Shenmue demo “What’s Shenmue?”. You can see a complete playthrough of that after the break. Happy 14th Birthday, SEGA Dreamcast!
To commemorate today, I’ve created a special header image that will join our rotating banners. If you don’t want to wait for it to show up, here is how it appears:
You see? You see what happens when Segata Sanshiro gets exploded in space? You have a meek CEO who has to do all the legwork!
Those commercials were awesome.
At 20 seconds in, its like he walked into a Yakuza game.
HA I thought the same thing when I saw that. Foreshadowing!
I imported Godzilla Generations, Godzilla Generations: Maximum Impact, and the Godzilla VMS.
…Western gamers aren’t missing anything. I read a list of games coming to the US back in early 99, and Godzilla was planned for release “beyond 2000.” I’m not surprised they dropped their plans to bring it here. Sadly, the sequel is only a fraction as good as the first game. X(
I do remember the memory card, had a chance to buy it on ebay years back, but price went too high. Love the packaging for it: http://4u.pacn.ws/640/6j/pa.117861.1.jpg
Happy birthday dreamcast 😉
The Godzilla game is complete poop. Stomp around slowly brushing against cardboard buildings for half an hour every level. Sooooore.
The Japanese DC launch was a bit of a botch job really, should have released it a month later with Sega Rally, Sonic and House of the Dead 2 ready.