Sonic Adventure, Station Square, by jvvi.

I played the Sega Dreamcast version. I think the GameCube’s “Sonic Adventure DX” is the same, but I thought I’d make the note.

I hadn’t played the game for years, but earlier this month I went back and played through it again after Sonic Generations peaked my nostalgia. Just as fun now as it was back then.

Phantasy Star Online, Pioneer 2, by Mark Hambly.

Ahh, the lobby of Phantasy Star Online on Dreamcast.  So many hours wasted in Pioneer 2 instead of playing. Waiting for a group, selling all your crap, making trades (with no trading system it was a drop swap out of trust).  When you died you came here, after a boss you came here, if you ran out of monofluid you came here (via teleport or RYUKER!)

Virtua Tennis, Sega Grand Match Court, by Mark Hambly.

Virtua Tennis on Dreamcast is the reason I play real tennis today.  The more I played Virtua Tennis (as a teenager) I started to develop my own strategies.  One day while flicking through the channels I saw a tennis match on TV (which i would typically skip right past) and decided to watch. My mind was blown. They were using the exact same strategies that I had independently developed in Virtua Tennis!  Nowadays when I play tennis IRL I still visualize my motion and my shots as if I was playing Dreamcast.

Crazy Taxi, Arcade map, by Churl.

This is how I remember the default (“Arcade”) map from Crazy Taxi. Lots of lost hours (and missed work) from the Dreamcast version of this game. Deliberate quirks of the burst and drift “moves” seeded some surprisingly deep gameplay, once you got really into the nuances of the physics, though real, competitive high-level play didn’t seem to catch on in a big way in the US. 

And, christ, that soundtrack. Scorched into my brain. “Yah yah yah yah yah…”

[Josh says: love your linework here.  So clean!]

Sonic Adventure 2, City Escape, by cubeybooby.

I know this level by heart because in Sonic Adventure 2, the way to get a lot of rings (to buy things for your Chao, of course) was to play through City Escape, over and over and over. My brothers and I could get about 300 rings each time. I don’t even remember where most of the rings are, I just sort of fly through and enjoy the constant flow of rings.

Phantasy Star Online, Forest 2, by personasama.

I was surprised to discover I remembered Forest 2 of PSO a lot better. I suppose it’s because the variations of the map didn’t change the topography too much. Though I was confused as to where to place the teleporters that lead to the top area because they either show up in the bottom left, bottom center, bottom right, or top right of the map depending on the variation. My crate positions/numbers are probably wrong too.

Phantasy Star Online, Forest 1, by personasama.

It makes me a bit sad to think I don’t remember so many details considering the hundreds of hours I’ve put into the game over the years. I’m especially stumped at the left part because I know I’m mixing up the area with the Mothant nests with another area because a cutscene with Elenor happens there overlooking the area. And there should probably be an S-curve somewhere with some switches and crates. Siiiiiiiigh.