What if Sega didn’t fire Bernie Stolar?

Dont get me wrong. I am Happy New fans were able to get into the series brand new on the Xbox. I just wish maybe we still could have gotten the Dreamcast release in North America with the subtitles and all and THEN if they still wanted to do an Xbox version, fans could double dip and buy again because it then contained the English dub.
 
thefavoriteplay said:
There seemed to be quite a few great exclusives that just got flat up cancelled for the North American Dreamcast fans. Shenmue II and REZ to name a few. WE. GOT. SCREWED. I just wished we got the major final titles other regions got. I absolutely would have preferred the XBox Shenmue II was never released if that meant we could get it on the Dreamcast in North America proper. I mean, if the dummy Peter Moore was going to bring Shenmue II over to the XBox why not bring both games? It's just a disjointed release: DVD movie of the first game and the playable 2nd game... WTF? But yeah, I wish the Dreamcast had at least 1 year longer of a lifespan.
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I did find it a bit odd that Shenmue 2 on the Xbox got the whole "Shenmue the movie" thing rather than the first game. They should have just spent the extra cash and bundled both games together. It was also a shame that Shenmue skipped the Xbox 360 & PS3 entirely, almost like they just didn't care enough to do a collection of sorts.
 
KidMarine said:
I swear to God if someone bashes the SEGA/Mega CD again I'm going to bite them. It's a really awesome piece of hardware with some excellent games on it. The only problem was that SEGA of America chose to put all their advertising budget behind the few crappy FMV games.
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Was just about to comment on the same post you did, with the same comment; wonderful piece of hardware with some of the best 16-bit games ever crafted, on it (and exclusive as well!).

AXM said:
I think reglardless, the PS2 would have launched and still crippled the market for Dreamcast. The DC would have just died a year or two later. Maybe we would have seen Shenmue 2 come to DC in North America but then not come to Xbox.

That would have been quite a shame. Imagine how many less people would have played Shenmue 2 because of that.
And face it, (unlike myself) a lot of Shenmue fans out there only got into the series because it was a bargain bin Xbox game for $5. Not because of Dreamcast. A lot of Shenmue fans out there are now admitting with this new HD release, it will be the first time they play Shenmue 1..

I still hate Peter Moore though. Not for bringing Shenmue 2 and other Sega games to Xbox, but for simply NOT allowing Shenmue 2 to come to DC in America prior. A selfish move to sweeten the pot on his transition to Microsoft.
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Without Moore, Sega would most-likely not be around today, which means:

- No Yakuza (biggest one)
- No Valkyria Chronicles
- No re-releases

And let's be honest, there probably wouldn't have been any Shenmue-related things either... or, we would've gotten re-release but no continuing game.

Hate Moore for what he did to literally a handful of titles (because it was only 5-6 games that the DC was denied), but he threw SOJ a bone for the foolishness and Sega is still alive today, because of that.
 
Yeah, I am aware of a dispute that Moore had with Yuji Naka. But after Moore left, Sonic was in a major slump anyways, but not like that was his fault. I don’t hate Moore, just strongly disagreed with what he did by only looking out for himself but I’m not sure if he saved Sega.
 
Truck_1_0_1_ said:
Was just about to comment on the same post you did, with the same comment; wonderful piece of hardware with some of the best 16-bit games ever crafted, on it (and exclusive as well!).



Without Moore, Sega would most-likely not be around today, which means:

- No Yakuza (biggest one)
- No Valkyria Chronicles
- No re-releases

And let's be honest, there probably wouldn't have been any Shenmue-related things either... or, we would've gotten re-release but no continuing game.

Hate Moore for what he did to literally a handful of titles (because it was only 5-6 games that the DC was denied), but he threw SOJ a bone for the foolishness and Sega is still alive today, because of that.
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This is interesting what you say here. What do you mean only 5-6 titles that the DC was denied? Do you mean like what I am talking about with North America not getting the ports of Shenmue 2, REZ and Headhunter etc. that other territories got or do you mean that a lot of those Xbox exclusives were designed to come out on the Dreamcast but were released for the Xbox? The latter topic has always fascinated me. I have always wondered if a lot of those exclusive Xbox Sega titles could have been released on the Dreamcast. For instance, we know that a Toe Jam & Earl 3 working prototype has been found for the Dreamcast so how far did titles like Crazy Taxi 3 and JSRF get in development for the Dreamcast.
 
thefavoriteplay said:
This is interesting what you say here. What do you mean only 5-6 titles that the DC was denied? Do you mean like what I am talking about with North America not getting the ports of Shenmue 2, REZ and Headhunter etc. that other territories got or do you mean that a lot of those Xbox exclusives were designed to come out on the Dreamcast but were released for the Xbox? The latter topic has always fascinated me. I have always wondered if a lot of those exclusive Xbox Sega titled could have been released on the Dreamcast. For instance, we know that a Toe Jam & Earl 3 working prototype has been found for the Dreamcast so how far did titles like Crazy Taxi 3 and JSRF get in development for the Dreamcast.
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Indeed, I meant the Xbox exclusives; AFAIK, they consisted of:

- JSRF
- Sega GT 2002
- PDO
- TJ&E III
- Gunvalkyrie

CT3, I'm not sure if it ever reached any part of it's development while the DC was being developed on, so can't really say, but the other titles were ALL going to be on the DC, then switched.

Me personally, the only one I really had a burning desire to play, was Gunvalkyrie, as it was something different (have never been a TJ&E fan).
 
Truck_1_0_1_ said:
Indeed, I meant the Xbox exclusives; AFAIK, they consisted of:

- JSRF
- Sega GT 2002
- PDO
- TJ&E III
- Gunvalkyrie

CT3, I'm not sure if it ever reached any part of it's development while the DC was being developed on, so can't really say, but the other titles were ALL going to be on the DC, then switched.

Me personally, the only one I really had a burning desire to play, was Gunvalkyrie, as it was something different (have never been a TJ&E fan).
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Interesting, thanks.

To tell you the truth, I was never a fan of TJ&E either. But I did get the Xbox game and I really enjoyed it. It kind of reminds me of Banjo Kazooie - kind of like a collect-a-thon game.
 
xatruio said:
And the original Super Monkey Ball, pretty sure. Don't quote me, though.
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Was going to mention that too; AFAIR, that one was too, but I don't remember reading it in ODCM, whereas the others were featured, some extensively.

thefavoriteplay said:
Interesting, thanks.

To tell you the truth, I was never a fan of TJ&E either. But I did get the Xbox game and I really enjoyed it. It kind of reminds me of Banjo Kazooie - kind of like a collect-a-thon game.
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No problem!

Not a fan of BK either lol :$
 
@Truck_1_0_1_

Like I said, I don’t hate him for bringing Shenmue 2 and other games to Xbox in and of itself. It brought tons of fans to Shenmue 2 eventually via bargain bin prices at game stores. BUT THAT is also a problem aswell..

What hate about him is he denied Shenmue 2 a DC release. This is confirmed himself that he did that. He took the slow death of the DC as an advantage to keep the portfolio of games as a bargaining chip in his transition to Microsoft. He denied millions of Shenmue 1 buyers on DC to buy Shenmue 2 on the same console they already have. Tearing its potential sales away from the average consumer in favor of forcing only the hardcore fans to be substainable with the series. U.S fans, undoubtedly the largest market, forced to import from U.K or eventually spend hundreds to buy an Xbox which was stumbled out the gate and most people didn’t know if the system would be a failure or not yet. Especially Japanese fans would never buy the Xbox.

The biggest take away from all of this is Shenmue 2 lost possibly millions of sales on the DC. Furthering Segas eventual take on Shenmue 2 as a failure. Peter Moore CRIPPLED the potential of the series while seemingly advancing it on a system nobody owned.
 
I do agree that regardless, Shenmue 2 in North America did have a slightly better chance on the DC as opposed to the XBox, but I don’t know how it would influence its future. I remember the pre-orders were relatively high and I had a North American copy pre-ordered.

As for Japan and XBox, as far as I’m aware, Shenmue II for XBox was never released in Japan. Anyway, all xbox consoles have been failures in Japan. XBox Ones in Japan might as well get treated like ET on Atari.
 
It's really quite simple math right? Say you have played Shenmue 1 and walk into a game store in North America looking for Shenmue 2. You either
A) Don't find it on the system you already own.
B) Someone knowledgable on the subject (which was extremely rare even for the time) informs you that you can import it from the U.K. (Most likely you've never imported a game before making it an immediate turn off)
C) Spend nearly $400 on the XBox system and Shenmue 2.

How many NORMAL people actually choose C? How many were even knowledgeable enough to choose B? and how many millions chose A?

Peter Moore fucked us while putting a cherry on top called Shenmue 2x.
I will never forgive that.
Anyone who latches on to that move as a positive clearly doesn't remember the feeling when you heard the game was being canceled in North America.
Shenmue 2x was brilliant in its own right and it did EVENTUALLY bring more bargain bin fans into the series but that overall hurt us in the end because we lost so many original DC fans in the process.
 
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Yes, I do think Shenmue 2 on dreamcast in the US did have some momentum and the cancellation totally killed it. Plus, Shenmue 2 on Dreamcast had the option to use your saves from Shenmue 1 as a continuation.

While 95% of my support for Dreamcast was buying import games, I still respect what Stolar did for the console and I know he wouldn’t have cancelled Shenmue 2 for Dreamcast. But we don’t know how it would have influenced the outcome of getting a Shenmue III game between 2001 and 2015.
 
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