Dreamcast

The very first console owned by me. The Games/PlayStation2 has more games and other consoles have better graphics, but the Dreamcast still features some of the best games I have played. Also, the Dreamcast was the very first console with real multi user online gaming. It started with a small game disc distributed for free: Planet Ring My friend Stephan and I had a lot of fun playing "Batteships" online. Stephan even wrote a small script to predict the next move of our combatant.

But the game I played most of the time and even bought the japanese version, since it was release much earlier, was Phantasy Star Online. Playing in teams of four or offline was a lot of fun. Through the game I found a friend in Japan who also has a little daughter.

I even programmed a demo for the memory unit of the Dreamcast, the Virtual Memory Unit. The VMU is actually a memory unit with a small processor and small screen. It almost looks like a Gameboy. Programming it is an adventure. At the time we started with it only an assember was available and to see something on the screen you have to cope with a strange memory layout. However, we did the first scroller for it. If you want to know more, see VirtuaMUnstaz.de.

Right now, apart from the games, I own about three Dreamcast consoles, one of which is part of a Dreamcast stand as seen on the picture to the right. Back when I had a small company we asked SEGA Deutschland if they had such a stand left over. Usually you only find them in ware houses or game shops. It was the time when Game/Publisher/SEGA decided to close down all single european divisions to form SEGA Europe. When asked how many of the stands we want we decided to take two. They would have sent us a whole truck full if we had wanted to, but where should we put them? After all it was a good decision.

A few weeks later a small truck stopped in front of our office and asked where to put two huge boxes on euro-pallets. These boxes were over two meters tall and did not fit into the elevator, so the truck driver decided to put them into the lobby and be with it. We had to remove the cardbord and out came what you see in the picture. A complete stand, including a TV monitor (no tuner!), a keyboard, one controller and a Dreamcast console under an acrylic glass dome.

We had never seen stands like that before. They were online demo stands. And the best of it: brand new. We had to take off the sign at the top and move them carefully into the elevator. I think there were about 1-2 mm of space at the top. We managed to move them into our meeting room where they produced funny looks from our guests.

At present both stands are still with us and one is in my office. I really don't want to move it again. Its much too heavy. Sometimes the child of a co-worker is using it when visiting my current employer Fraunhofer.