/vr/ - Retro Games

I swear, Dreamcast zealots are some of the most deluded bunch. Not to shit on the console, but whenever comparisons are brought up, the fanboys are quick to come up with bullshit reasons for its supposed superiority.
Take the tiled rendering. Its rasterization sorting step is labelled as its "opaque fillrate", which is so pathetically disingenuous. You can't render a scene just with that.
Segaretro is guilty of this.

>In 1997, 3dfx was working with entertainment company Sega to develop a new video game console hardware platform. Sega solicited two competing designs: a unit code-named "Katana", developed in Japan using NEC and Imagination Technologies (then VideoLogic) technology, and "Blackbelt", a system designed in the United States using 3dfx technology.[citation needed]

>However, on July 22, 1997, 3dfx announced that Sega was terminating the development contract.[12] Sega chose to use NEC's PowerVR chipset for its game console,[13] though it still planned to purchase the rights to 3dfx's technology in order to prevent competitors from acquiring it.[14]

Did this have anything to do with its downfall? What if they chose 3dfx instead?

How good was the texture compression of the Dreamcast? Which games do a good job of showcasing it against other formats?

>Sega quickly quashed 3Dfx's "Blackbelt" and used the NEC-based "Katana" as the model for the product that would be marketed and sold as the Dreamcast. 3Dfx sued Sega for breach of contract, accusing Sega of starting the deal in bad faith in order to take 3Dfx technology.[11] The case was settled out of court.

Who was in the wrong here? Did it really come down to xenophobia?

Can we have a Dreamcast thread? Preferably with a technical focus.

Was tiled rendering THAT good?

This is a thread for people who like Dreamcast and other retro PowerVR hardware like the PCX2

If you don't know what tile-based deferring rendering is, it's a super-efficient GPU technique in which only the final pixel which gets displayed on your screen gets textured, so very little wastage of time and bandwidth. It also allows perfectly depth-sorted polygons without needing a z-buffer, yet again saving memory and bandwidth.

This technique, combined with other ingenuity developed by the PowerVR engineers, gives the Dreamcast a few advantages over even new 6th gen hardware.

-Dreamcast's got texture compression, PS2 doesn't.
-Dreamcast's depth sorting is equivalent to a 32-bit z-buffer, Gamecube's maxes out at 24-bit.
-Dreamcast can do 8-bit destination alpha while maintaining a 24-bit color buffer, Gamecube is limited to 6-bit and it needs to lower the color buffer to 18-bit to do it
-Dreamcast supports normal mapping, Gamecube doesn't just bump mapping
-Assuming the 3D scene has *shitloads* of occluded opaque polygons, the Dreamcast can have a higher pixel fill-rate than the motherfucking Xbox!
-Dreamcast has the highest quality dithering (if required) of any console
-Dreamcast's PowerVR2 GPU is the only piece of 3D hardware *ever created* with automatic order sorting of transparent polygons. They actually dropped this feature in later PowerVR series.

Dreamcast is superior to PS2
Sonic Adventure is better than Poochie Bandicoot
Skies of Arcadia is better than Final Fantasy
Soul Calibur is better than Tekken
Sega GT is better than Gran Turismo
Rush 2049 is better than Twisted Metal
2k Sports games are better than EA crap.
Virtual On is better than Armored Core.
Crazy Taxi is better than every arcade racer on PS2.
Sega Net is better than shit PS2 online.

PS2 never had anything as innovative as Shenmue I&II.
PS2 never had anything as fun and unique as Seaman.
PS2 never had music games as good as Space Channel 5 or Samba De Amigo.

All 2D fight games are superior on Dreamcast.
All vertical and horizontal shooters are superior on Dreamcast.

PS2 was literally Baby's First DVD player so kiddies could watch their Little Mermaid DVDs.

All of these are irrefutable facts.

Didn't (almost) every single good game get superior ports on either PS2, GameCube or Xbox?

>go to Electronics Boutique Pacific Fair on launch day - November 30 1999
>$500 dollarydoos, first thing I bought with money earned at a job
>no first party games available so bought Ready 2 Rumble, few days later got Sonic Adventure, wanted House of the Dead 2 but guns were impossible to find so didn't buy for ages
>no VMUs available (had to wait two weeks to save games)
>no internet support available (eventually came months later, but exclusive to the worst ISP)
>console didn't even come with promised demo disc out of the box

But I loved it anyway. I had Sega Stockholm Syndrome.