A lot of people say that the Dreamcast is gone forever, but I disagree. Think of all the people out there who are going to read this thinking about the Dreamcast in their attic, their basement, or their room. Its out there, and i bet you the Sega people know this. They were right in saying that the market was becoming competitive, but failed to predict that the focus would be turned away from graphics and torward gameplay with the Wii.

Now, i'm not suggesting that Sega start remaking tons of consoles for sale on store shelves, but what could be the harm in starting another Sega craze right from the console that's already in consumers' houses?

Heres the plan Sega, start supporting the original Dreamcast again, only this time just create exclusive games for a while like you've been doing for other consoles. Once people figure out what's going on the Dreamcast will be one of the most valuable consoles on the market and anyone that still has one will be in luck. The catch is, if you don't have one of these consoles still around you will most likely have to search for one once Sega starts advertising. The value of having one will go up, kids will start to want one for their birthday; and thats when Sega should start making consoles, except in limited quantity. 

They should focus on the amount that are flying off shelves, and make just enough to underwelm the market with the consoles to where they are hard to find. Plus, they could sell the consoles for a ridiculously low price, about 50 dollars (technology has gotten much better now to where i'm sure they could do this). Then the updates start, release a brand new version of the memory card with advanced display and the ability for keychain use so that kids can take it to school with them. All games will from then on have additional mini platforming games that are downloaded to the cards along with memory for their games so that you can enjoy mini-versions on the go and at school. That would be the main hook, make the games on the cards simple and addictive and have progress in them unlock special items in the console version. Add to that some wireless controllers, better online support, and exclusive updates to some of the most noteworthy Sega titles from other consoles (Wii, PS3, 360), and the Dreamcast could make that comeback...

I recently went over to the DanceDanceRevolution forums and I noticed that quite a few posts seem to be under the category of "nostalgic". Many of the gamers seem to be focusing on gamer days long passed rather than what they can do to make their game more interesting. For those people, i'd like to offer you a rant.

I know the reason why the popularity of DDR is fading, it's because nobody wants to play the same game for the 15th time. Sure, it was interesting the first couple of times i played one of the games, but after that i just didn't find myself really connecting with the game.

Let me put it this way, i know there's a little niche market out there that enjoys looking at japanese anime and may be interested in fast paced japanese music that nobody recognizes, but for me eventually i find myself seeking solace in simply hearing fall out boy where in any other situation other than playing DDR I would have rather shoved a rusty spoon in my ear.

Note to DDR devs: For the love of whatever floaty spiritual thing you believe in, make a game from music that people actually know. Look, Japanese dance music can be fun for about 2 games but at this point I wouldn't care if you put 90's college rock in your game. Please, just put popular songs in your game, is it too much to ask for some rock or noteworthy rap? Dare i say it, put some country in your game, because if my options came between playing another rehash of the same DDR game i've played for 10 years or to dance to "save a horse, ride a cowboy"; bring on the half chaps.

Ok so at this point you probably are thinking what happened to my other blogs? Well, i got rid of them, not only because they are old, but i figured ranting about how messed up mmo designers are right now doesn't actually fix anything. So, i want to give you all out there a sense of some of the ideas that i have for online mmos with hopes that maybe they will be used. (and for god sakes if you like these ideas hire me! : ))

Welcome to my design blog: Episode 1: Life Experience

So you guys probably all know what it's like to play the mmos out there right now. Basically, you select a class, do quest after quest after quest to level, all with the hopes of defeating some guy in ireland when you hit the level cap. This is all fine and dandy right now, but we need to start thinking of ways to mix it up. I'm not talking about different styles of gameplay, i'm talking about changing the way you level up in general. My idea i like to call the "life experience bar"

Imagine playing world of warcraft, but on top of that purple experience bar for combat there was a green bar, your life experience, and that it was the bar that controlled what level you are. That's kind of what my idea for life experience would be like. Except, instead of only being able to level your character from combat, you could level from fishing, playing cards, or even participating in the auction house.

Let me put it a different way. In real life, everyone has life experiences that make someone who they are. They build on top of eachother until you reach new levels of understanding of your life and you become a stronger person. This is the sort of thing that the life experience bar would represent. Say instead of going on a quest or grinding you just want to spend a pleasant evening catching fish, however you still need to get to the next level to keep up with your friends. With life experience, you could get just as decent of experience for catching a fish as your friend would get for killing a monster. Obviously, the rewards for both items would be different, but you would still be leveling either way.

This sort of idea to me fills the main void that mmos have failed to accomidate in the past and therefore have lost subscribers. That void is that some people don't really always feel like going on quests or grinding, so they don't really feel like playing the game. If a game were to use my "life experience" idea it would most likely be very successful. I really hope a game is created like this.