Jet Set Radio Future Pre-Release | Early look into early development of the game

 Early Look is a series dedicated to looking at games long before they came out. This month is dedicated to Jet Set Radio Future and the coverage it gained over a year ahead of its Japanese release on 22nd February 2002. The game's development is truly a fascinating story and a great insight into one of Sega's most beloved titles.  

The game was originally planned for an Autumn 2001 release. 

PS3 Demo Disc Collection | Playable games which are now unobtainable

The UK Official PlayStation magazine (OPM) was the only PS3 based magazine that handed out game demos distributed via Blu-Ray. Many other magazines couldn't afford to use Blu-Ray discs such as PSW (Playstation World) and PSM3, both opting instead to use double-sided DVD's which they tried to make up for with their list of videos, themes, pictures, save files and more. 

What makes these particular demo discs even more interesting is the fact that only the UK and some selected European countries (from my knowledge) had exclusive access to these demo discs from their regional official magazine. Finding any information on what is contained on these discs is impossible due to the limited appeal, regional exclusivity and just a lack of coverage in general.

So it's time to scour through my complete collection of these discs and find out what's on them. Here's the list of games that you will never be able to get access to ever again and which never saw a PC release. Officially of course...

Sega's Lost Arcade Game - Jet Squad | Did it ever exist?

I'm a huge fan of lost media, the fact that something got released, or was shown in some capacity only to disappear forever is fascinating to me. There's a huge list of games which we're all well aware of, however one I had not heard of until recently was Jet Squadron by Sega. It's featured in a few YouTube videos after a post on Lost Media Wiki surfaced details it's partial existence. A Sega game? Shown in the Year 2000?  Sign me up

That time when Dreamcast outsold Xbox in Japan

Just a fun little story that captured a few headlines for a short period of time. For a brand new console that hit Japan, it's amazing to think just a short while later the now obsolete Dreamcast would be shifting more of it's left over stock than Microsoft's newest console...

Sega Saturn on PS1? | Sega's plans which never were

When Sega shocked the world by going third party, we all knew what this meant - Dreamcast games on competitors consoles, but Saturn games on PS One?...

The Hunt for Dreamcast 2 | A search for the truth [Intro]

So there's been a lot of talk about the Dreamcast 2, whether it is just hypothetical 'what if' scenarios discussed among fans or made up renders peddling Sega returning back to the console market. However not a lot of discussion, or research, has been made surrounding the possibility or mention of a Dreamcast follow up.

This is just the intro to a huge research project I started a few years back looking into whether the Dreamcast 2 existed. This isn't a fan wish list or a hypothetical look into Sega returning, this is everything or anything relating to an official Dreamcast 2 surrounding 1996-2002.

I started this project started around 3 years ago when I saw a post talking about a Dreamcast 2. In there, it linked to an IGN article back around mid 2000 reporting how Shoichiro Irimajiri had stepped down as president to work on a console successor to the Dreamcast.

This one news article opened the flood gates, and the more I dug, the more I found. I scoured easily over 150 hours on the way back machine, tonnes of game magazines in physical and PDF formats, books and more. As I started to catalogue and assess everything I found, I asked myself - why has no one ever done this before?

A lot of information discussed will also talk about the Dreamcast and Sega's business strategy. When you are looking at hundreds - if not thousands - of articles around business strategies, you start to see parallels with what Sega was doing, and wanted to do at the time. This helps to draw a bigger picture to how the Dreamcast 2 would fit in and what it would be.

So what did I find? Quite a bit...

TGS Autumn 2002 | Dreamcast's Last Trade Show Appearance

Whilst we are all well aware of Dreamcast and it's demise in the west, the Dreamcast continued getting official support in Japan until 2007. However with the console ceasing production in March 2001 I was wondering; when was the last time the Dreamcast hardware was represented at a trade show? Information was quite hard to find on this but after trawling through a few sites, the Dreamcast's last physical appearance seems to be in September 2002. 

Up until then, the last appearance of Dreamcast seems to be E3 2001 with it all but disappearing afterwards. Looking past TGS 2002, there definitely wasn't any representation from 2004 up until the Dreamcast's full discontinuation in 2007 - evident by going through the archived TGS's reports. 

2003 is rather ambiguous, whilst Puyo Puyo was shown at TGS and listed for Dreamcast - along with the other ports of the game, there's no evidence I can find which suggests it was played on a Dreamcast on the show floor. After trawling through countless videos, show floor plans, even finding any videos of Puyo being displayed is something I can't find. The official TGS website will list it as being a Dreamcast title, though this will also list this under the other available platforms also. 

So what was shown? Well there were 2 games shown, both of which were visual novels. First off, there was Ever Seventeen ~The Out of Infinity and then also Me and Our Summer. I haven't played either of these titles simply due to them being visual novels and them not being playable in English. The games were not massively prominent in Sega's line-up at the time with them being relegated to the kid booth of TGS.

Until proven otherwise, 2002 TGS was the last time physical Dreamcast hardware was represented on the show floor at a major event. It's not a spectacular send off for the console, but it does make you wonder what Sega ever did with these final consoles...

References:

http://tgs.cesa.or.jp/2002/release/release20020830.html

http://tgs.cesa.or.jp/2002/booth/booth17.html

http://tgs.cesa.or.jp/2003/english/imgs/r3_7.pdf

http://tgs.cesa.or.jp/2004/list.htm

http://tgs.cesa.or.jp/2003/release8.html