My DC Does't Love Me (one of my games, anyway) Anymore

[BulletMagnet]

I've been having a weird problem with my US DC lately...for some reason it doesn't seem to want to boot Giga Wing (US) anymore...and ONLY Giga Wing, for some reason. All my other games that I've tried lately seem to work okay with it, including Giga Wing 2 and Mars Matrix, oddly enough, as well as my imports via boot disc...when the DC starts up with Giga Wing in it, it'll get to the "Sega" logo, but then it'll go back to the "Dreamcast" boot-up screen, and repeat the two screens infinitely. Starting the DC up first and then inserting the disc doesn't help either.

I know it isn't the game disc either: at first I thought it might be my disc, since it has a couple of very small marks on it: I was a bit puzzled that such small defects would ruin the disc, but I bought myself another copy, since the game is cheap. My new copy has NO marks on it, but the exact same thing happens with it. My DC just doesn't seem to want to boot this particular game for some reason.

The DC is one of the black "Sega Sports" models, in case that sheds any light on anything...but the game USED to work, but after giving it a rest for awhile and then pulling it back out, the system doesn't take it. I'm pretty puzzled by this one...anyone have any ideas as to what might be going on?

[mannerbot]

but I bought myself another Dreamcast, since they are cheap.

Problem solved.

[BulletMagnet]

Heh, that's a last resort, I suppose, but seeing as every other game I have for the system still works, I'm hesitant to look around for another decent-condition DC just to play one game before at least inquiring about what might be wrong with the one I have...

[dementia]

The same thing happens with my PSO, and ONLY my PSO. Apparently certain DC models have problems booting certain games (PSO works fine on a Generation 2 DC, but not my Gen 1 DC). The way I remedy this is simply by turning "autostart" off and leaving the game inside the DC for a couple of minutes whilst the BIOS screen runs. Then I start it by selecting "Play" on the BIOS, and it works normally. Try it out.

[Capt. Takehiko]

That's exactly right. Its what I do with my Waku Waku 7 on my Japanese DC. Its weird that some games randomly require it but its not a great hassle.

[SheSaidDutch]

Well I had that trouble but with all my games, untill I found out it was the lid, the lid would just be out a tiny bit, so the dreamcast thought it was open, So I put something on top of it, and my problem was solved.

not sure If it'll help in your case but you might aswell see If that will help.

[BulletMagnet]

I tried the "leave it in the DC at the startup screen" method, and it didn't seem to work...I left it there for a good 20 minutes or more, too, and the same ol' "reboot ad infinitum" kept happening. Thanks for the advice anyhow...any other ideas?

[The Bullet Dodger]

The only thing I can think of is that it's probably your game. But you say that it's in good condition right? Remember, with Dreamcast games, the game data doesn't always take up the whole entire disc. It depends on the game. When it comes to shmups, like Giga Wing, the game data is small, since shmups are usually short. The actual game data is that tiny little strip toward the inner part of the disc. If that little strip is scratched up, then your DC won't read it. I've had this problem too with games that looked like they're still in good condition, but that little strip was scratched. And that usually was the problem.

I hope this helps. And I hope I explained it well.

[sjewkestheloon]

this is going to sound real dodgy but why don't you try and aquire a duplicate, none purchased, from the beautiful web? i've previously (on ps1) had a similar problem and in a stab in the dark, i got a backup and it worked fine with my boot disk. it sounds like the dc may be having problems with the boot routine of that paticular game and by bypassing this routine with a bootdisk and a backup you might just get lucky.

if i'm going to get modded for this post please note that i'm not endorsing piracy at all but the guy clearly owns the game (possibly twice) so it should do no harm

[Diabollokus]

Yeah the dreamcasts are weird very selective about what games they will play!

mine won't play ecco the dolphin but that back up route worked for me.

if your disc is severely scratched thats likely another reason the GDs are dam sensitive to scratches.

Gen 1s work best will back ups.

I've custom made my dreamcast so to speak its got the best parts (imho) from the diferent regions, some parts are 6 years old and work great!

[OmegaFlareX]

Interestingly, if I try to play Giga Wing in RGB, I encounter the exact same problem as BulletMagnet describes (endless reboot loop). That only happens if I have the RGB cable plugged in. Works flawlessly with A/V and VGA.

[neorichieb1971]

If it detects RGB cables for certain games (That stupid pengiun racing game is one of them, Street fighter zero 3 is another) the machine will reboot. You have to use Svideo or Composite outputs for these games. This is one reason the Saturn version of SFZ3 went up in price. Some of those Segaonline games suffer this too (Vampire chronicles, Super street fighter 2x).

I concluded once upon a time it was resolution based as the VGA adaptor will probably cause this too. Some games probably were not meant for VGA adaptors so the RGB clan suffered too.

Apparently this was wrong, and that some discs have certain flags and it was up to the developer to turn them on or off. Apparently its as simple as that.


However, I once scratched a disc and the same effect happened as described above. It was one tiny scratch and the game never booted again..

[BulletMagnet]

Interestingly, if I try to play Giga Wing in RGB, I encounter the exact same problem as BulletMagnet describes (endless reboot loop). That only happens if I have the RGB cable plugged in. Works flawlessly with A/V and VGA.

I thought this topic was dead, but just on a whim I checked it again, and saw this reply...I dug out my DC AV cable, hooked it up to a TV a few rooms away, and lo and behold, my new RGB cable was the culprit. Both my old copy of GW and the new one I bought worked fine when the AV cable was being used. That's a really weird glitch, I'd never heard of it up unti, now.

In any case, thanks to everyone for their help, guess from now on I'll just hafta take the extra minute or two to move my DC when I get the hankering for some Giag Wing.

[oxtsu]

Or you could get the PAL region Gigawing instead. Allows RGB and has 60hz option.

[BulletMagnet]

I have a PAL Guardian Heroes on my Saturn and it always has a section of garbled stuff on screen...not unplayable, but irritating. Not sure if the same would happen on DC, but in any event I've already bought the darn thing twice, heh. In fact, I've never paid enough attention to notice how many PAL GW's show up on eBay...