I know I promised more stuff like my last post, but I’m going to have to interrupt that plan for a bit because today I got something utterly amazing in the mail.
Woot! My man in Australia came through in  spades and I am now the proud owner of a Dreamcast Collection vinyl record!
I talked about this ealier, but in case you aren’t familar; Sega recently released a new collection of Dreamcast games for the Xbox 360. The game was pretty much a worldwide release. But Australian customers who preordered the game got this exclusive free record as a bonus! It is totally the best preorder bonus in the history of preorder bonuses. Since I live in America and not Australia, I ended up begging my readers for help. One truly awesome dude from Down Under came through and now we all get to bask in its pearl white glory.
Mass Effect 2 can take its stupid armor and shove it.
The Dreamcast Collection game contains four complete Dreamcast games; Sonic Adventure, Space Channel 5 Part 2, Crazy Taxi, and…um…Sega Bass Fishing. Each of the games, except Sega Bass Fishing is represented somehow on the vinyl. Sorry fishing fans, better luck next time.
So what is exactly on this record? Let’s take a look.
Sonic Adventure
Crush 40 – Open Your Heart
This is the theme song to the original Sonic Adventure video game, which launched with the Dreamcast in 1999. Sonic Adventure is a…weird game that has not particularly aged well. Sure it was fun at the time, and that shit with the whale was totally awesome! But play it now. The controls are more than a little lacking, the graphics have not aged well, and the “adventure” aspects of the game are like pulling teeth. The game is best when Sonic is blazing through crazy 3D environments at light speed, which is sadly when you have almost no control over the character.
Anyways, the song. Yeah…it’s something else. I haven’t heard this tune since 1999 and I recall thinking it was pretty stupid then. Like the game it is from, time has not been kind to it. Still, it’s definitely fun in its own way, and would probably work great on a workout mix. Besides, have you heard any other arena rock songs have mention Choas Rings? Didn’t think so.
Space Channel Five Part 2
Naofumi Hataya, Kenichi Tokoi, Mariko Nanba and Tomoya Ohtani – Option Remix 2002 (Space Channel 5 Part 2)
The first Space Channel 5 was a game I always really wanted to like. It has an amazing look to it and some great music. However, I always found the goddamn thing hard as all hell. I’m used to rhythm games, but it was just too much for me. If you were off by one-tenth of a millisecond with the timing you were you totally boned! But hey, some people swear by the series, so who am I to judge? Like I said, it certainly looks amazing.
Like the name suggests, this is the music for the Options menu in Space Channel 5 Part 2. It is the best Options screen music you were hear all day. It’s great song, totally upbeat techno/lounge music that makes you wanna groove all night. Unfortunately it’s only 1:20 long, so get that repeat button ready.
I don’t know if I’m attributing it to the right people, but those are the names of all the composers who worked on the game. So one of them probably did it.
Crazy Taxi
The Days The Nights – Radical Sabbatical
The Juliet Dagger – Flinch
The Hooks – Get Out
Now this game was my jam when it came out. My friend Matt and I spent many a night in his dorm room trying to ace this game, fighting over bragging rights for the highest score in arcade mode while trying to desperately finish the insanely hard mini-game challenges. For a game that consisted of little more than driving recklessly to Pizza Hut while listening to The Offsrping ad nauseum, it offered surprisingly good times.
So if you’re like me, when you first saw the tracklisting for this record you thought , “Hey, I played Crazy Taxi hundreds of times and I never heard of these songs, what gives? Where’s my Offspring and Bad Relgion”
Well, “what gives” is music licensing issues. Sega most likely bought the rights to use said Offspring and Bad Religion songs for the original Dreamcast release only. Any derivatives or remakes do not feature those classic tracks. Instead they feature these newer songs.
How are they? Well, it’s a mixed bag. Despite its great name “Radical Sabbatical” is kind of generic, forgettable alt-rock. “Flinch” by The Juliet Dagger is alright, and it has a good tempo. However it kind of sounds like a song by The Hives, the name of which escapes me  at the moment. “Get Out” by The Hooks is the same, not bad, but not very memorable either. I see this band having some potential however. Still, all three probably fit well in the actual game, even if they don’t make well for casual listening.
So as a whole, the tracks on this compilation are great more for the novelty factor than anything else. But what a novelty! Dreamcast songs on vinyl! How cool is that shit? I hope they do this again when they undoubtedly release more Dreamcast games on the 360.
Hey Sega, Jet Grind Radio, do it. If they made a 2LP soundtrack to that game and charged me 100 bucks for it I would buy it. The music in that game is amazing. I don’t recall the music from other Dreamcast greats like the Power Stone series and Virtua Tennis as much, but those games need to get re-released in HD, and why not put out the music as well?
Video game music on vinyl. It has to start happening more often!
oh man, i love space channel 5 (both 1 and 2). i always found the first to be a bit harder than the second even though the second definitely was difficult in it’s own right. thankfully i was able to get both of them when they released the space channel 5 collection a few years ago.