Dan Marino

Dan Marino for never winning a Super Bowl." Their reasons why #13 should not be made the scapegoat for never winning the big one:. The Dreamcast features games with the following ratings from the ESRB:. On January 24, 2006, ESPN Classic aired "The Top 5 Reasons You Can't Blame.. The Sega Dreamcast currently has over 276 games available in its library.[5]. Though a Heat jersey with his name and #13 was unveiled, this did not constitute retirement of his number by the Heat.[1]. Sega also developed the Dreameye, a digital camera for the Dreamcast, as well as a Zip drive for the console, but these products were never released to the public. On November 7, 2005, the National Basketball Association's Miami Heat honored Marino's charitable works and recognized his service to South Florida with a halftime tribute, including a large donation to the Marino Foundation. The Arcade Stick itself has lived on beyond the Dreamcast, and adaptors are now available to use it on other hardware platforms.

Marino has teamed with other celebrities to raise awareness about autistic spectrum disorders, including fellow NFL great Doug Flutie, whose son also has an autism diagnosis. Although it could not be used for many Dreamcast games, due to the lack of the analogue joystick, this helped cement the Dreamcast's reputation for 2D shooters and fighting games. The center saw more than 48,000 children last year alone. Sega also released the extremely heavy-duty and well-regarded Arcade Stick, a digital joystick and six buttons using the same switches internally as an arcade machine. The Dan Marino Center, which opened in 1995 along with the Miami Children's Hospital, is an integrated neurodevelopmental center specializing in the diagnosis and treatment of children at risk for developmental and psychological problems. The only other light gun compatible games were Death Crimson OX and its Japanese only prequel, Virtua Cop 2 on the Sega Smash Pack, and a light gun minigame in Demolition Racer No Exit. The foundation has distributed over $7 million to research, services and treatment programs serving children with neurodevelopment disabilities. Several third parties made compatible guns for the few light gun games released, including House of the Dead 2 and Confidential Mission.

The Dan Marino Foundation, was established in 1992 by Marino and his wife, Claire, after their son, Michael, was diagnosed with autism. American versions of light gun games even blocked out using the official gun. He even guest-starred as himself in The Simpsons episode "Sunday, Cruddy Sunday" (first aired January 31, 1999). Sega also produced a light gun for the system, although this was not sold in the US presumably because Sega did not want its name on a gun in the light of recent school shootings. He also acted in the 1994 comedy Ace Ventura: Pet Detective alongside Jim Carrey and Courteney Cox, as well as made a cameo appearance in the Adam Sandler film Little Nicky where he asks Satan for a Super Bowl ring. Steering wheel controllers and dance pads were also available. During the football season he is a commentator for both CBS's The NFL Today show and HBO's Inside the NFL. Other peripherals included a fishing rod controller (used for all Dreamcast fishing games) and the maracas for Samba de Amigo.

Presently, he lives with his wife, Claire, and six (four by birth, and two by adoption) children in Weston, Florida. There was a microphone peripheral used for Alien Front Online, version 2.6 of the Planetweb Web browser (long distance calling support), the European Planet Ring collection and Seaman. During his induction speech, Dan threw "one last pass" to former teammate Mark Clayton, who was sitting in the audience. The Dreamcast supported a mouse as well as a keyboard which was useful when using the included web browser, but was also supported by certain games such as The Typing of the Dead, Quake 3 and Phantasy Star Online. He was inducted into the Hall of Fame on August 7, 2005 and was introduced by his oldest son, Daniel. Unique to the Dreamcast among current console gaming systems, it could use a VGA adapter for output to a computer display and HDTV compatible sets (which provided much better quality than a television set). Dan Marino was a first-ballot selection to the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 2005. The Dreamcast controller was somewhat large and a few players found it difficult to hold.

In early 2004, Dan Marino briefly returned to the Miami Dolphins as Senior Vice President of Football Operations, but resigned from the newly-created position only three weeks later, saying that the role was not in the best interest of either his family or the Dolphin organization. It also contained two slots which fit memory cards or the rumble pack; the uppermost one had a window through which the VMU's display could be seen. In 2003, Marino was honored for his outstanding NCAA career at Pitt with an induction into the College Football Hall of Fame. The Dreamcast controller offered an analog stick, a D-pad, a Start button, four gaming buttons (labeled A, B, X, and Y), and two analog index finger triggers on the underside. In a year of accolades from the franchise he led so long and so well, the Dolphins also installed a life-size bronze statue of Marino at Pro Player Stadium (now Dolphins Stadium) and renamed Stadium Street, Dan Marino Boulevard. In Japan, the Jump Pack was named the "Puru Puru Pack". Marino joined the Dolphins Honor Roll the same day. Most Dreamcast games supported a rumble pack ("Jump Pack"), which was sold separately and could be plugged into the controller.

Since then 39, Larry Csonka, has been retired as well. The 4X cards did not have the VMU screen or stand-alone abilities, but they had four times the space by switching between four 200-block sectors. The only other Dolphins jersey number retired at the time was 12, Bob Griese. Most of these were manufactured by third-party companies (such as the Nexus Memory Card), although Sega eventually released a 4X memory card. On Sunday, September 17, 2000, at halftime of the Dolphins-Baltimore Ravens game at Pro Player Stadium, Dan Marino’s jersey number, 13, was retired. Standard memory cards could also be purchased without the additional features of the VMU. Playoffs:. It could also display a list of the saved game data stored on it, and two VMUs could be connected together (end-to-end, needing no other hardware) to exchange data.

Regular Season:. It could play minigames loaded onto it (a Chao game was obtainable in Sonic Adventure, for example). He was selected to play in nine Pro Bowls (1983-87, 1991-92, 1994-95), seven times as a starter, but due to injuries he only played in two of the games (1984, 1992). It had a monochrome LCD screen, a D-Pad, and two gaming buttons. He was the 1994 NFL Comeback Player of the Year after having a Pro Bowl season when he returned from a season ending achilles tendon injury at Cleveland in 1993. The Visual Memory Unit, or "VMU", was the Dreamcast's memory card. He has the second most fourth quarter comebacks (37) in the history of the NFL, and second most victories (147, John Elway is first in both categories). Aside from the cosmetic differences in the case to accommodate the larger screen, there are no differences between the original Treamcast portable modified Dreamcast and the newer widescreen model.

Also, despite the fact that he was not known for his scrambling ability, Marino possessed an uncanny awareness in the pocket, often sliding a step or two to avoid the pass rush. Recently, in 2005, the internet import store, Lan-Kwei, has started selling a "Treamcast" portable modified Dreamcast with a 16:9 widescreen LCD. He was known for having the quickest release in the sport, throwing dead-on 'bullets', and completing the most miraculous passes; often between defenders. In reality, this system is not any different than selling a Dreamcast pre-modified with a third party shell, as the system's internals still use first party hardware, and contain no modifications whatsoever aside from the outside casing and modifications for internal sound and video. During his professional career (1983-1999) in Miami he was one of the most skilled and revered quarterbacks in the game. When the internet import videogame store, Lik-Sang, contacted Sega to ask permission to sell a modified version of the system with Sega trademarks on the system, they were told that Sega did not approve of the unit, and felt that it violated their trademarks. Marino decided to retire with that season, after being subtley pushed out of Miami by new coach Dave Wannstedt, and declining offers from Minnesota Vikings and Pittsburgh. Many companies included software and a remote with the unit that enabled it to play MP3s and Video CDs.

In the next round on the road, Marino and the Dolphins utterly collapsed in a 62-7 loss to the Jacksonville Jaguars. This small system with its fold-down display resembled the later PS One. Marino's final win was Miami's first win in a playoff road game in his career, as he led the 37th and final comeback of his pro career. A third-party company from China named Treamcast released a portable modified Dreamcast which used the original first party Dreamcast components with a custom made plastic casing. Kelly's Bills knocked Marino out of the playoffs three times between 1990 and 1995. Games in Europe were sold in jewel cases exactly twice as thick as their US counterparts, possibly to enable the inclusion of thick instruction booklets containing instructions in multiple languages. In 1992 he made his final appearance in a Championship Game, losing against arch-rival Jim Kelly and the Buffalo Bills. The 60Hz option had to be enabled on the game disc, however, but only a small number of games lacked it.

With Marino at the helm, the Dolphins were a perennial playoff contender, reaching the post-season in 10 of Marino's 17 seasons. This was a first for games consoles, as no previous PAL console had offered the user an option to play games at full speed, using the ability of more modern PAL televisions to operate at 60Hz; and is a feature of all major consoles released since. He also brought the Dolphins back to the AFC Championship game the following year, losing in Miami to New England in another game in which wet conditions made the Dolphins turnover prone. As well as the VGA mode (again using an adapter), the European Dreamcast supported PAL video, in both 50Hz and 60Hz modes. On December 2, 1985 Marino completed 14 of 27 passes for 270 yards and triumphed over the 12-0 Chicago Bears in the highest rated Monday Night Football telecast in history. A German company, Tivola, had been using a similar swirl logo years before Sega branded the Dreamcast with the orange swirl. After the Super Bowl loss, Marino's Dolphins went 12-4. This change in logo is thought to have been for copyright reasons.

The 38-16 loss would be Marino's only Super Bowl appearance; as was the case for most of his career a sparse running attack and average defense would cost the Dolphins. The Dreamcast in Europe had its spiral logo in blue, similar to the logo on earlier Sega systems. Unfortunately, two of his passes were intercepted deep in 49ers territory and he committed the game's lone fumble. Units manufactured with the version number of 2 would not read CD-R media and therefore could not be used to play pirated games, and also had the unfortunate side effect of not being able to play independent games such as the three bleemcast! discs, Feet of Fury, Inhabitants, or Maqiupai. Marino was above average, completing 29 of 50 passes for 318 yards and a touchdown. The Sega Dreamcast Hello Kitty special edition was also available in a blue with all the same accessories. The Dolphins, who had 74 rush attempts in the previous two weeks, called only 8 handoffs, placing their chances squarely on Marino. The console and accessories are translucent pink in color with some printed designs.

In Super Bowl XIX Marino and the Dolphins met Joe Montana and the 49ers. The package contains a keyboard, a controller, a VMU, a mouse, and a Hello Kitty trivia game. Marino had another 8 touchdown passes in the post-season, four of which came against his hometown Steelers in the AFC Championship Game. Due to its limited production, it has become an extremely rare collector's piece. The '84 Dolphins scored an NFL record 70 touchdowns and posted a 14-2 record. The Sega Dreamcast Hello Kitty was released in 2000 in Japan. He would go on to win the NFL Most Valuable Player award in 1984. In Japan, Sega released many varieties of the system, including limited edition Sonic anniversary editions, and Hello Kitty outfits.

Neither record would be touched until Peyton Manning topped the touchdown mark with 49 in 2004. Cases of different colors like blue, red, orange, and green were sold for replacements of the original casing. He threw for 48 touchdown passes and 5,084 yards, both of which shattered previous records. Similar offerings were sold through the Lik-Sang website. The following season would be Marino's best. Electronics Boutique offered a blue Dreamcast through its website. His Pro Bowl rookie year ended in disappointment, as the Dolphins were upset by the Seattle Seahawks in a rainy game full of Dolphin turnovers. In the United States, a black Dreamcast was released in limited numbers with a sports pack which included two Sega Sports titles.

He brought Miami the division title in 1983, and would also do so in 1984, 1985, 1992, and 1994. Available separately were an S-Video cable, a RF connector (included as standard in the UK) and a VGA adapter (see accessories below). He posted a 96.0 passer rating which was a rookie record until 2004. The unit was packaged with a video cable which supports composite video and right/left stereo audio. Being drafted by the defending AFC Champions placed Marino in an ideal situation, where the strong armed rookie could succeed immediately. (This color was used as it is considered to be lucky in Japan.) Games were sold in jewel cases which initially had the Dreamcast name and logo on a white background, but later games used a black background (blue in Europe). Five other quarterbacks, including Hall of Famers Jim Kelly and John Elway, had been taken before Don Shula and the Miami Dolphins grabbed Marino with the 27th pick overall. The power light, like the Dreamcast logo in NTSC regions, is orange.

With the down season of his last year at Pitt and unsubstantiated rumors of drug abuse, Marino's selection status in the 1983 NFL draft plummeted. The standard Dreamcast unit is made of white and grey plastic. In 2002, he was voted into the College Football Hall of Fame. Phantasy Star Online, Quake III Arena, Unreal Tournament , Outtrigger, Bomberman Online, and POD Speedzone included support for this device. Marino left Pitt with 7,905 passing yards and 74 touchdown passes. The modem module in the Dreamcast could easily be replaced with a broadband module to allow networked gaming over Ethernet. In his final 2 seasons, Marino lead his team to a 22-2 record, and he lead the nation in touchdown passes(34) as a junior. As the DreamKey web browser was customised to only work with Dreamarena, Sega subsequently offered a free replacement version which would allow connection with the user's own Internet service provider.

Still his college career was impressive. Dreamarena ran until the beginning of March 2002. His team lost the Cotton Bowl to SMU. The service was free, and the game servers hosted within it could not otherwise be accessed from the Internet. The next season (his senior year) was considered a disappointment with regard to the pre-season Heisman Trophy and National Championship hype. This was created and operated for Sega Europe by a partnership between ICL and BT (ICL developed the web sites and software, with BT providing the dial-up capabilities and network infrastructure). After a stellar high school career, Marino played college ball at the University of Pittsburgh from the 1979 to 1982 seasons, leading the Panthers to a Sugar Bowl triumph over the Georgia Bulldogs in January 1982. In Europe, the online service was known as Dreamarena.

He was drafted by the Kansas City Royals baseball team in the 1979 amateur draft, but decided to play college football instead. The games still playable online are Quake III Arena, Starlancer, 4x4 Evolution, Phantasy Star Online, Maximum Pool Online, and Sega Swirl, which still have dozens of players online. Dan attended Pittsburgh Central Catholic High School in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, where he also starred in baseball, and won Parade All-American honors in football. Fans have developed servers for playing Phantasy Star Online; the North American version of Quake III Arena can still be played online by finding or setting up a server using software and a map pack released by Sega. . Although the online features of most commercially-released online-capable Dreamcast games are no longer supported, some games are still playable online[4]. He holds almost every meaningful NFL passing record and is widely recognized as one of the greatest quarterbacks in football history. Other major online games include 4x4 Evolution (first crossplatform online game), Starlancer, and Ferrari F355 Challenge.

Daniel Constantine Marino Jr. (born September 15, 1961 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania) was an American football quarterback who played for the Miami Dolphins in the National Football League. About twenty-two games, including Quake III Arena and Phantasy Star Online, supported SegaNet. They also could have selected Herschel Walker, Bo Jackson, Emmitt Smith or Curtis Martin. The SegaNet online dial-up service (US$29/month membership) attracted 750,000 subscribers in America alone. Miami had passed up on both Davis and Thurman Thomas in the NFL Draft. The Dreamcast was one of the first home console systems to offer online gameplay with the game ChuChu Rocket! (which was distributed free to Dreamcast owners in Europe). This lack of a running game had also prevented John Elway from winning a Super Bowl until Terrell Davis's arrival in Denver. In Europe, the final version of DreamKey was 3.0.

During Marino's career, the Dolphins drafted 25 running backs, of whom only Karim Abdul-Jabbar rushed for 1,000-plus yards (1116 in 1996). Version 3.0 of Planetweb included broadband capabilities, Java, Flash, and mouse support. Shula relied exclusively on Marino and his arm in the Miami offensive game plan. Dream Passport was the Japanese browser, Planetweb was used in America and DreamKey in Europe. The Dolphins let Marino down. Dreamcast consoles came packed with a disc containing web browser software allowing dial-up Internet access. 1. Other well known implementations in graphics started on Sega's console by developers were cel-shading and bump mapping.

They were more balanced offensively than Miami, with running back Thurman Thomas posing their biggest threat. Also, a few notable games were not compatible with this mode, including certain Capcom fighting games and 2D shoot-'em-up games. In Marino's last 13 NFL seasons, the Bills won 21 of 30 contests against the Dolphins. This was likely due to lack of knowledge on the subject. The Buffalo Bills. However, the feature was underused by the public despite the potential for improved video quality with the use of a PC monitor. 2. The system, when combined with the VGA adapter accessory (mentioned below), switched to the mode for the high-res, non-interlaced picture.

He vowed to run the ball more, but in so doing, also alienated Marino. The Dreamcast is also able to output true 640x480 VGA, which set it apart from other consoles of its day. After building the Dallas Cowboys dynasty, Johnson became the Dolphins' new coach upon the legendary Don Shula's retirement. However the DC has less memory, and all of it´s games are on G-Rom format. Jimmy Johnson. The Sega NAOMI arcade game hardware platform uses the same technology as the Dreamcast, and therefore NAOMI-based games such as Crazy Taxi were easily ported to the Dreamcast. 3. The only Windows CE application most users saw was the pack-in CD containing a CE-based dialer and web browser.

It constantly ranked in the lower half of the NFL during Marino's tenure. When developers took advantage of the easy development time offered by Windows CE, the resulting games (e.g., Sega Rally 2) lagged in performance and framerate. The Dolphins' defense. Windows CE offered easy porting to the Dreamcast of existing PC applications on the Dreamcast, but offered limited capabilities relative to the Dreamcast's native operating system. 4. Microsoft co-operated with Sega in hopes of promoting its Windows CE operating system for video games. Marino never had a true playmaker after the departures of Mark Clayton and Mark Duper. Many emulators and other tools such as MP3 and DivX players and image viewers have been ported to or written for the console, taking advantage of the relative ease with, which a home user can burn a CD which is bootable by an unmodified Dreamcast.

Replacing the Marks Brothers. A homebrew minimal operating system named KallistiOS offers good hardware support (though does not provide multitasking, which is generally unimportant for games anyway). 5. The availability of Windows CE software development kits on the Internet, as well as ports of Linux [2] and NetBSD/Dreamcast [3] operating systems, gave programmers a selection of familiar development tools to work with. Threw at least one touchdown pass in 16 of his 18 playoff contests, throwing a TD pass in his first 13 postseason contests. The Dreamcast continues to have a modest hacking enthusiast community. Passed for 4,510 yards over career in playoff games. Rather than downsampling the audio and video the hackers compressed the video game data on the disc and wrote a small program to decompress the data on the fly.

Tittle). Some even denote a high amount of hardware and software knowledge, like the method used on the Echelon release of Skies of Arcadia. A. However, downgrading or removing audio and video streams wasn't the only method used by release groups. One of only six quarterbacks in NFL history that have achieved two consecutive (back-to-back) 30-touchdown passing seasons at least one time in their careers (the others are Steve Bartkowski, Brett Favre, Dan Fouts, Jeff Garcia, and Y. "Ripping" in the Dreamcast piracy context means to completely remove some parts of game audio and video, since they are simply too large to downgrade with any success. Played in 18 Playoff Games and Held a 8-10 Record in the Playoffs. This may be due to the process of "ripping", different from the alternate definition of copying the contents of a CD to a hard drive.

Started 240 Regular Season Games and Held a 147-93 record as a starter ( Second to John Elway's NFL Best 148-82-1 Regular Season Record ). Although this method is usually successful, a few games, most noticeably Shenmue II and Sonic Adventure, are missing sound and sometimes video on pirated versions. Won the AFC Offensive Player of the Week honor 18 times in the regular season (and 20 times overall, including playoffs). Games that did take advantage of the GD-ROM's extra capacity required some tinkering from hackers; the most common method was to downgrade the video and audio portions of the disc to a lower bitrate, so they would take up less space. Had 116 wins under Don Shula – the most by a head coach - quarterback combination in NFL history. The curious thing about how pirates managed to copy games stored on a GD-ROM, which can supposedly hold about 1.2 gigabytes of data, to a CD-R, which commonly holds 700 megabytes of data (though 870 megabyte discs exist, they are extremely uncommon) was that many games simply did not use the maximum capacity of a GD-ROM, and therefore fit on a standard CD-R with no modification. Holds Dolphins team record for most seasons played, 17. Some pirated games do not have this trait, presumably because they need the empty space, and therefore have longer loading times and choppy music and video (because the data cannot be loaded fast enough).

Led 37 fourth-quarter comeback victories, second only to John Elway. Therefore, the data should, optimally, be as close to the outer edge of the disk as possible, for the fastest loading times. First QB in NFL history to have six 4,000-yard seasons (1984-86, 1988, 1992, 1994). This practice is called "dummying." They do this because CD-Rs are written in CLV mode, and the Dreamcast will not read data from them very fast if the data is close to the inner edge. Threw 252 interceptions in his career. Therefore, when burned, the data would be pushed further outward on the disc, mimicking the layout of an actual GD-ROM. Career passing efficiency rating is 86.4. But since the Dreamcast works in CAV mode, occasionally, when there was space to spare on the CD-R, Dreamcast game pirates would fill the disk image on which the game was distributed with empty space at the beginning, so the disk image size would be about 700 MB.

Career completion percentage of 59.4%. Therefore, to receive the data at a constant speed, the drive must slow the disc down as the data ring enlarges. Played 242 games, starting 240 of them. CLV exists because the diameter of the data ring on the disc becomes wider as the disc progresses, and the data moves past the laser at a faster rate than inner rings. Named NFL Most Valuable Player (1984). This is different from a normal CD-ROM drive, which spins the disc in CLV (Constant Linear Velocity) mode, where the disc spins progressively slower as the laser moves further away from the disc's center. Most Seasons, 4000 or more Yards Passing: (1984-86, 1988, 1992, 1994) with Peyton Manning (Indianapolis, 1999-2004). The optical drive in the Dreamcast works in CAV (Constant Angular Velocity) mode, which spins the disc at a constant speed regardless of the laser's position.

Giants, 1985). Sega's decision to implement a "CD-ROM" (the common public reference to the GD-ROM) was also an effort to save costs, but this disappointed potential customers who had expected DVD support; the rival PlayStation 2 sold well partly because of its support for DVD media. Most Consecutive Games, 400 or more Yards Passing: 2 (1984) with Dan Fouts (San Diego, 1982) and Phil Simms (N.Y. Mil-CD support was removed from the final Dreamcast revisions toward the end of the console's life, but rampant piracy is often cited as one of the major reasons for the failure of the Dreamcast. Most Consecutive Seasons Leading League, Completions: 3 (1984-86) with George Blanda (Houston, 1963-65). The primary reason this was possible was the existence of regular-CD booting code in the Dreamcast BIOS to enable multimedia functions (called Mil-CD) for music CD releases on the Japanese market; this was eventually discovered and exploited by pirates. Most Seasons Leading League, Yards Gained: 5 (1984-86, 1988, 1992) with Sonny Jurgensen (Philadelphia, 1961-62; Washington, 1966-67, 1969). However, the first run of discs had a high rate of defects; and eventually pirates managed to copy the games anyway (in some cases distributing them before the release of the legitimate versions).

New England). Dreamcast used a proprietary format called GD-ROM (Gigabyte Disc Read Only Memory) or "GigaDisc" for storing games in order to discourage software pirates, although it had similar overall technology to the CD-ROM. 300 TD passes in Fewest Amount of Games to Start Career: 157 (9/4/94 vs. Several Dreamcast emulation projects have emerged after the Dreamcast's end of production, with Chankast being the most notable. 200 TD passes in Fewest Amount of Games to Start Career: 89 (9/17/89 at New England). It is even starting to become a cult classic, as the system is getting harder to find (in fact, although the Dreamcast was officially discontinued in January 2001, Sega continued to produce the console for a short time afterwards due to rising demand, not least among collectors and hard-core fans). 100 TD Passes in Fewest Amount of Games to Start Career: 44 (9/7/86 at San Diego). Despite its short lifespan, the Dreamcast is still a very popular and highly-regarded console among many fans due to its impressive library of both mainstream and quirky titles.

Most Consecutive Seasons, 20 or more Touchdown Passes: 10 (1983-92). On February 24, 2004, Sega released their final Dreamcast game, Puyo Pop Fever, although a small number of third-party games are still being released, such as the recent release of Trizeal, released in April 2005, or the upcoming releases for 2006, Rajirugi and Under Defeat. Most Seasons, 20 or more Touchdown Passes: 13 (1983-92, 1994-95, 1998). Hacked unreleased games like Propeller Arena and Half-Life continued to become available to the public by program decoders like Echelon. Most Seasons, 40 or more Touchdown Passes: 2 (1984, 1986). It was released in September 2002 in Japan only after a large amount of speculation on the game's fate; its US release was on the Nintendo GameCube in April 2003. Most Seasons Leading League, Completions: 6 (1984-86, 1988, 1992, 1997). Many consider the critically acclaimed arcade shooter Ikaruga developed by Treasure to be the Dreamcast's swan song.

Most Seasons Leading League, Attempts: 5 (1984, 1986, 1988, 1992, 1997). Though the Dreamcast was officially discontinued in early 2001, commercial games were still developed and released afterwards, particularly in Japan. Lowest Percentage, Passes Intercepted, Rookie Season: 2.03 in 1983 (296-6). By the time Sega decided to cease development of the Dreamcast, about 10 million consoles had been sold. Most Consecutive Games, Four or more Touchdown Passes: 4 in 1984. With the company announcing no plans to develop a next-generation successor to the Dreamcast, this was Sega's last foray into the home console business. Most Games, Four or more Touchdown Passes, Season: 6 in 1984. The last North American release was NHL 2K2.

Most Games, Four or more Touchdown Passes, Career: 21. In January 2001, Sega announced that production of Dreamcast hardware was to be discontinued by March of that year, although the 50 to 60 titles still in production would be published. Most Consecutive Seasons, 3,000 or more Yards Passing: 9 (1984-92). In 2000, the announcement of the Microsoft Xbox and Nintendo GameCube was widely regarded as the last straw for the Dreamcast, since both competitors had deep pockets (like Sony) which fueled speculation that Sega did not have the resources for a prolonged marketing campaign. Most Seasons, 3,000 or more Yards Passing: 13 (1984-92, 1994-95, 1997-98). As a result of these three developments, the Dreamcast began to lose momentum as gamers waited to see which console would come out on top. Most Games, 300 or more Yards Passing, Career: 60. Electronic Arts also threw its support to the PS2 and their titles helped to negate an otherwise unimpressive PS2 launch.

Most Games, 400 or more Yards Passing, Season: 4 in 1984. Even though Sega touted the Dreamcast's online capabilities (the PS2 would not go online until late 2002), much public attention was focused upon the PlayStation 2's ability to play DVDs. Most Games, 400 or more Yards Passing, Career: 13. Sony's press release, despite being a year ahead of the launch of the PS2, was enough to divert a lot of attention from Sega. Most Passing Yards, Season: 5,084 in 1984. In April 1999, Sony announced its PlayStation 2, designed to be backwards-compatible with the older PlayStation, and released the unit in Japan in March 2000. Most Touchdown Passes, Career: 420. Although Electronic Arts declined to support the Dreamcast which included the omission of its popular sports games (due in part to EA's losses from the past Sega Saturn), Sega Sports titles helped to fill that void.

Most Yards Passing, Career: 61,361. Much like the PlayStation's launch in North America, the displays of titles such as Soul Calibur, Sonic Adventure, Power Stone and Hydro Thunder helped the Dreamcast succeed in the first year. Most Completions, Career: 4,967. Before the launch in the United States, Sega had already taken the extra step in displaying Dreamcast's capabilities in stores nationwide. Most Attempts, Career: 8,358. Sega even compared the record figure to the opening day gross of Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace, which made $28.5 million during the first 24 hours in theaters. Sega confirmed that it made $98.4 million on combined hardware and software sales with the Dreamcast with its September 9, 1999 launch.

In fact, due to brisk sales and hardware shortages, Sega was unable to fulfill all of the advance orders. In the United States alone, a record 200,000 units had been pre-ordered before launch and Sega sold 500,000 consoles in just two weeks (including 225,000 sold on the first 24 hours which became a video game record until the PlayStation 2 launched a year later). It enjoyed brisk sales in its first season and was one of Sega's most successful hardware units. Many Americans knew that the Dreamcast was coming, but didn't know what one was.) The Dreamcast was the first console to include a built-in modem and Internet support for online gaming.

(The vagueness of these campaigns and almost total lack of any in game footage has been touted as one of the reasons for the Dreamcast's eventual downfall. The tagline used to promote the console in the US was "It's thinking", and in Europe "Up to 6 Billion Players". The Dreamcast was released on November 27, 1998 in Japan, on September 9, 1999 in the United States (the date 9/9/99 featured heavily in US promotion) and on October 14, 1999 in Europe. [1] A timeline of the development of the console's GPU may be found here.

In September 1997, 3Dfx filed a lawsuit against Sega and NEC (later including VideoLogic), claiming "breach of contract", although they later settled. In July 1997, it was decided that the Japanese "Katana" would be the chosen format, renamed Dreamcast. This codename was only used by the US group, and in fact, the US hardware team called themselves the "Dural team". Contrary to popular misinformation, the Japanese hardware was never codenamed "Dural".

The first US prototype boards were silkscreened "Shark" (in response to the Japanese "Guppy") and the later ones "Dural". The US skunkworks group (in a secret suite at the 303 Twin Dolphin Drive building) led by Tatsuo Yamamoto settled on an SH4 processor with a 3Dfx Voodoo 2 graphics processor, which was originally codenamed "Black Belt". The first Japanese prototype boards were silkscreened "Guppy" and the later ones "Katana". This was originally codenamed "White Belt".

The Japanese group led by Hideki Sato settled on an SH4 processor with a PowerVR graphics processor developed by VideoLogic which was later bought by NEC. However, it soon became apparent that the existing Japanese hardware group led by Hideki Sato did not want to relinquish control of hardware, and so there were two competing designs led by two different groups. He hired Tatsuo Yamamoto from IBM Austin to head a skunkworks group to develop the next-generation console. When the time came to design the successor to the Sega Saturn, the new President of Sega, Shoichiro Irimajiri, took the unusual step of hiring an outsider.

. After the Dreamcast was discontinued, Sega withdrew from the console hardware business. An attempt to recapture the console market with a next-generation system, it was designed to supersede Sony's PlayStation and Nintendo's N64, and although generally considered to be "ahead of its time", it failed to gather enough momentum before the release of the PlayStation 2 a year later. The Sega Dreamcast (Japanese: ドリームキャスト; code-named "Blackbelt", "Dural" and "Katana" during development) was Sega's last video game console.

Storage: Visual Memory Unit ("VMU") 1 Mbit (128 KByte) removable storage device and 4x memory cards that hold four times as much data. 16.78 million simultaneous colors (24 bit). Color Output: Approx. Broadband: these adapters are available separately and replace the removable modem.

Modem: Removable; Original Asia/Japan model had a 33.6 kbit/s; models released after September 9, 1999 had a 56 kbit/s modem. Color: White. Weight: 1.9 kg (4.4 lb). Dimensions: 189 mm x 195 mm x 76 mm (7 7/16" x 7 11/16" x 3").

Four ports support devices such as digital and analog controllers, steering wheels, joysticks, keyboards and mice, and more. Inputs: USB-like "Maple Bus". A normal CD-ROM holds 700 megabytes. GD-ROM: Holds up to 1.2 GB of data.

GD-ROM Drive: 12x maximum speed (when running in Constant Angular Velocity mode). Sound Engine: Super Intelligent (Yamaha) Sound Processor with 47MHz 32-Bit ARM7 RISC CPU core built-in (64 channel PCM/ADPCM). Memory: Main RAM: 16 MB (Hyundai), Video RAM: 8 MB, Sound RAM: 2 MB. Graphics Engine: PowerVR2 CLX2, capable of drawing around 4-6 million polygons per second (though rarely pushed this far; the models for the polygons would become a limiting factor, chipping away video memory for the textures).

CPU: SH-4 RISC CPU with 128 bit graphic computational engine built-in (operating frequency: 206 MHz 360 MIPS/1.4 GFLOPS). Mature: 32. Teen: 93. Everyone: 151.