Tak Hirai interview regarding Shenmue development

Amir

Amir

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Shenmue II
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There's a great piece on GamaSutra for the 20th anniversary of the US launch of the Dreamcast with many devs, including Tak Hirai: https://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/Bra...t_20th_anniversary_interview_extravaganza.php

I liked this part from the interview especially:

I was developing the game with early-stage hardware for a long time. The final spec of the Dreamcast was still a theoretical value to us - and in fact we expected it to have three times the performance, during the development stage!

When we got the final specs we were a bit disappointed, but we figured it would happen. Then we saw assets placed onto the map, and of course the map was three times slower. I was told to get the speed up to 30 FPS. So I spend my days optimizing.
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Madness.
 
The Dreamcast was amazing console for sure. Thanks to VGA games still look great today, unlike some other consoles out there. The PS2 is a joke on modern day television, the gamecube is nice if the game uses progressive scan, but I still think that DC has a edge over the Cube. Sames for the Xbox although it was the most powerful in the pack.

Maybe I am a bit biased because I have to admit that I am real DC Fanboy, but I think the Dreamcast was the most future proof console. It can still be enjoyed up to this day easily.
 
Even after 20 years, Dreamcast is still a unique console and not many have managed to capture its distinct identity. As for Hirai saying Sega’s consoles were all black, that’s actually wrong. Saturn in Japan was white, or you could get it gray or blue (I have both of them and my American one). Does he remember the Mark III, the Japanese version to the Master System? That was a white console!
 
Sega should of kept the Dreamcast going in the west. It had potential to stay afloat since it was doing stellar, even if they repurpose the devs studio into catering to western gamers for the time being. Xbox manage to do well in the west regardless of it's non-existent market share in Japan. Even sony is shifting focus to the west.
 
Just read this. Great interview. He sounds like an absolute low-level coding machine.
 
高野和泉 said:
Sega should of kept the Dreamcast going in the west. It had potential to stay afloat since it was doing stellar, even if they repurpose the devs studio into catering to western gamers for the time being. Xbox manage to do well in the west regardless of it's non-existent market share in Japan. Even sony is shifting focus to the west.
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Though Saturn fans are going to hate me for this, but Im sure if Sega didn’t fire Bernie Stolar, Dreamcast in America probably could’ve lasted until 2003 or 2004. I know Stolar wouldn’t have given up on the Dreamcast considering he made the North American launch a success. Considering that Sega was losing money, going out of the hardware business was their best solution in the long run which is equally great and tragic.
 
RyoHazuki84 said:
Even after 20 years, Dreamcast is still a unique console and not many have managed to capture its distinct identity. As for Hirai saying Sega’s consoles were all black, that’s actually wrong. Saturn in Japan was white, or you could get it gray or blue (I have both of them and my American one). Does he remember the Mark III, the Japanese version to the Master System? That was a white console!
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He most-likely meant outside of Japan.

RyoHazuki84 said:
Though Saturn fans are going to hate me for this, but Im sure if Sega didn’t fire Bernie Stolar, Dreamcast in America probably could’ve lasted until 2003 or 2004. I know Stolar wouldn’t have given up on the Dreamcast considering he made the North American launch a success. Considering that Sega was losing money, going out of the hardware business was their best solution in the long run which is equally great and tragic.
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And that's exactly it.

Either; keep going in hardware and you go out of business or get out of hardware and continue to work as a software/arcade dev., with the chance of growth in the future.

Damned if you do, damned if you don't. Personally, I'm glad they went with the decision they chose, though in hindsight, had we known then what we know now, the DC would've stuck around.

And Stolar can go kick rocks; shrewd as he may have been, he was (from all accounts I've read), a POS human being.

EDIT*: POS wasn't what I meant; I meant not the nicest guy; Kalinske and Moore were nicer people.
 
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