There is no doubt that the Dreamcast possesses technology that has never been witnessed before in a home console, as the machine is highly capable of producing graphics and technical effects that had been previously seen in arcade games. The games that have been released for it thus far validate this statement - Sega Rally 2, Virtua Fighter 3, and Sonic Adventure, for instance - and brings up a critical question that deserves to be commented on. That question is none other than the subject of arcades and the effects of increasing sophistication in console technology on the arcade market.

It is quite a valid concern for arcade manufacturers and developers, as videogames developed for the home continue to get closer to the arcade experience and threaten the survivability of arcades worldwide. Gameplayers are losing sight of them in the face of the debut of Dreamcast and the upcoming next-gen systems from Sony and Nintendo, and if this continues, arcades might be no more.

The reasoning behind arcades having thrived all this time in the history of videogames is easy to discern. Arcades have operated on the knowledge that they offered games that were far beyond what gameplayers were playing at home, and that, in order to play those games, a steady flow of money was necessary. Those games depended on the “shock” factor - the graphics and overall experience would always be so advanced and unlike anything that they would get at home that gamers would be enticed into coming back again and again to whet their appetite, along with a supply of tokens. Moreover, the social experience enjoyed at arcades could not really be duplicated at home, with what the limited connectivity that previous home systems have had to offer.

But all of this is rapidly changing, as indicated by the wording and foreshadowing used earlier in this editorial. Graphics technology has become so advanced that gameplayers are being shocked right at home with their Dreamcasts, thereby putting the need to go to arcades near to extinction. Take into consideration the Internet and hardware-based multiplayer capabilities Dreamcast has incorporated within its immense yet amazingly small architecture and you have a near-successful duplication of the social experience that previously only arcades could offer.

There is something to be said about the social factor that plays a hand in all of this pertaining to the implementation of the Internet to play with other gamers, though. It is understood that the critical nuances of social behavior and interaction seen and experienced by gameplayers in arcades are, in fact, eradicated through Internet gaming. However, it is speculated and theorized by this editor that as Internet popularity grows, it will, in fact, develop its own mainstream culture with its own psychology and social culture. This has already been done to some extent, and looks to continue in its development as the years pass. Therefore, the social experience had by gameplayers in arcades will probably be substituted for a different kind of social experience that is just as substantial as the kind seen and had in arcades.