30 Great Games That Defined The Dreamcast

25. Power Stone (Capcom)

Capcom - a company who's loyal support of the Dreamcast is the stuff of legend - know a thing or two about fighting games and Power Stone, re-released along with its sequel on PSP a few years back, is one of the most refreshing and madcap takes on the genre ever produced. A bit like Nintendo's Super Smash Brothers (which it pre-dates by a few months), the emphasis is on charging around 3D arenas collecting weapons with which to batter foes, rather than using the standard complicated combos associated with these sorts of games. It's also one of the few games to live up to the promise of SEGA's unusual VM memory card device, with each character providing their own simple mini games for use on the peripheral's small LCD display (a scrolling shooter in which you controlled Falcon's bi-plane was the best one). Power Stone 2, released a year later, would add a four-player mode, but the original is still remembered as the stronger title by fans of the series.

24. SEGA GT (SEGA/Wow Entertainment)

Terrorists have kidnapped the President's daughter and you have 32 hours to... no, it's really just a sim racing game. SEGA GT sees you buying, tweaking and driving a selection of consumer cars - from commonplace motors to footballer-baiting dream machines - with a view to winning enough cups to unlock more cars, etc etc etc. There's not a lot to say about it really, other than the fact that it was a really polished game from a company that used to be the market leader in the racing genre - certainly in the arcade. Though it never came close to reaching the popularity of Sony's evergreen Gran Turismo series, SEGA GT was a credible, extremely well reviewed alternative and a great addition to the simulation racing pack. It's even been suggested that the prowess of the title caused Sony's notoriously release-date-aphobic developer Polyphony Digital to delay the launch of Gran Turismo 3: A-Spec by an entire year so as not to have to compete directly.
Contributor
Contributor

A regular film and video games contributor for What Culture, Robert also writes reviews and features for The Daily Telegraph, GamesIndustry.biz and The Big Picture Magazine as well as his own Beames on Film blog. He also has essays and reviews in a number of upcoming books by Intellect.