If there's a knight in shining armor for the Dreamcast
launch, I bet it's NFL 2K, Sega's absolutely stunning football game.
Although I will readily admit to not being a hard-core football fan
– I just casually play Madden and Gameday – NFL 2K just makes you want
to play football time and again. Visually,
the game is mouth-watering, so much so that if you look at the screen from
a distance, it literally looks like a TV broadcast…the graphics are that
crisp with an incredible frame rate.
Best of all, although the game is a looker, it also has the
playability to back it up. Luckily
for sports fans, NFL 2K is only the tip of the iceberg as NBA 2K is due
out this October and it looks just as good.
Sporting unique features such as a player creation screen where you
can actually alter the player's jersey, nose size, and cheek-bone
structure – and it actually changes the character on the court – NBA
2K is another sports game that is going to appeal to non-traditional
sports fans. If anything, EA Sports is no doubt sweating bullets
about now. Put Madden
2000 up against NFL 2K and just about any serious gamer would put a second
mortgage on their house to get a Dreamcast.
Sega Sports is back in a big way.
Online
Gaming
The big news coming out of this year's E3 about Dreamcast was the
announcement that the hardware would ship with a 56K modem at launch.
Unfortunately, there won't be any multiplayer games at launch, but
rather just access to the Dreamcast network for news, game tips, Internet
surfing, etc. Sega spent copious amounts of time at Gamer's Day trying to
help the press understand that doing multiplayer gaming on Dreamcast is a
huge undertaking, and that's why it won't be ready until "within the
next 12 months." Still,
it's disappointing that not one of the launch games can be played online.
I have no doubt that making Soul Calibur work at 60 frames per
second over the Internet is a daunting task (indeed I am still very
skeptical whether Sega can pull it off), but why not offer gamers direct modem
play? I'd be happy to
call up my friend down the street and have a direct modem game
head-to-head. In my opinion
multiplayer gaming is where Sega can really entrench itself over the next
twelve months before Playstation 2 comes out, but from the sounds of it,
we're going to be waiting quite a while before we even know if the
multiplayer aspects of games like Sega Rally 2 are going to work over the
Internet TCP/IP protocol.
So Overall...
So, what the verdict on Dreamcast? You have to hand it to Sega for delivering such an incredibly
powerful machine for a virtually unheard of launch price of $199.
After seeing games like Rage's Expendable running on the machine, I
can say with some degree of certainty the Dreamcast can match the gameplay
experience PC gamers get with a top-of-the-line $3,000 3D accelerated PC.
It's just mind numbing to think this console is that powerful.
Couple Dreamcast's power with an impressive
launch lineup of games and the result should be a very solid and
prosperous Christmas for Sega of America and Peter Moore, the polished
former Reebok executive who seems destined to become Sega's new U.S.
frontman in light of CEO Bernie Stolar's abrupt departure only a few
weeks ago. But
business politics aside, Dreamcast has a lot of momentum going for it.
My only question is whether the machine can sustain itself
long-term. So far, I remain
unconvinced the software for Dreamcast is as strong as it should be for
the first 12 months after launch, but at the end of the day, if you're at
all into the next generation of gaming on consoles, plucking down $199 on
a Dreamcast is probably a very wise purchase decision – even if it's
only going to tide you over Sony unleashes the PlayStation 2 next
Christmas and the real 128-bit battle begins.
Your Comments?
Agree or disagree? I'd
love to hear your opinions.
Next week I'll be
back with an update on the Dreamcast as it approaches launch and details
on the Descent 3 tournament in Las Vegas.
Thanks for reading!
Geoff
Keighley
Editor-in-Chief
GameSlice
