Dreamcast Import Advice

Written by Nick Schmidt on January 24, 2001

Dreamcast Import Advice: Remember kids, imports aren't just for dorks anymore

I didn't start getting into imports until a few months ago and the reason obviously being I didn't know much about the whole scene. I wasn't hip with the Japanese lowdown: I guess you can say I wasn't "jiggy" with it. But was that really my fault? Not entirely. You see, I honestly didn't know where to begin, where to buy the games, what to get, and everything and anything else you could think of. I was as lost as Boris Yeltsin at an AA meeting.

But like the willful adolescent I am, giving up on the beauty of foreign gaming was something I didn't want to do. It all began a few months ago, right after the launch of SegaNet to be exact, and I received an offer from a friend for my recently purchased football behemoth. He wanted to give me the newly released Japanese fighter Capcom vs. SNK for my copy of NFL 2k1. I was dumbfounded. Could I really trade the all-mighty pigskin package for just another Capcom "Vs." game? Hell yeah.

Since I couldn't get online with NFL and I had last year's version, I figured there was nothing to lose. And I was right. The next day I made the trade; and as happy as a schoolgirl selling her first box of Girl Scout cookies, I played that damn game with complete satisfaction for the rest of the day. I was so fascinated, so enthralled that I had my very own import game. For the next few days I proceeded to strut around school with a smirk of contentment glued to my face; that is until I realized how lame I really was.

With this new-found absorption of exotic gaming, I became addicted. Much like ones addiction to crack, heroin, or any other narcotic that comes to mind, I just couldn't stop scouring the net for anything and everything related to Japanese imports. Along the way I found some very cool sites to buy stuff from, met some interesting people in the process, and eventually became much smarter with everything in general.

So this brought me to the conclusion that I should help you guys out who donСt know what the hell they are doing, yet at the same time are interested in imports. After all, I wish someone had shown me everything right off the bat. However, I'm not claiming to be an expert on this subject, I'll just pass along some information to those who need it.

- Step One - Getting Started With Basics:
Obviously you can't play Japanese or European games on a North American Dreamcast, so what's a poor fellow to do? Well, you have several options. The easiest, but most expensive, method is to simply just buy a foreign system. With it, you can play any game pertaining to that region just as easily as playing Metropolis Street Racer on your current DC. This, however, isn't for everyone for apparent reasons; not everyone can just throw around that kind of money at will. Don't worry my fellow cheapos, there are other methods.

The most popular method is to buy what is called a mod chip. It's basically a chip that has to be installed internally into your Dreamcast. You must remember that not all of these said pieces of hardware are the exact same and can have different forms of instillation, but are, for the most part, fairly similar. Mod chips can be bought at several online retailers (which will be touched upon shortly) and range anywhere from $20-40. Not too bad considering you're basically getting a Japanese system in return. But like I said before, installing these can be risky since you do have to mess around with the innards of the system itself to install it. So if you don't want to take a chance, void your system warranty, and screw up your Dreamcast, then you may want to look for another method.

The third, and cheapest, solution to the regional lockout dilemma is a boot disk. If you can obtain one of these, you definitely will have a care free gaming experience. It's simply a disk that you put into your system just like a regular game GD. After pressing the power button, it will prompt you to open the lid, remove the disc, and place the game inside followed by closing the lid. It's very easy to use and doesn't involve internal tampering. However, the legality issue of this is at hand. I'm not quite sure if these are entirely legal to use, so utilize these at your own risk.

- Step Two - Buying and Finding Games:
After you have come to a conclusion on your method of playing the games, it's now time to actually find some titles to enjoy. This is where I was lost when first starting with imports; I had no clue as to where you actually bought these God forsaken games. But after scouring the net, I've found a bunch that I thought I would share:

National Console Support is one of, if not the most, popular places to order your games. They have every single title imaginable at competitive prices, plus full accessories and anything else you can think of. Highly recommended.

Tronix Web is my favorite import site. Great prices, awesome selection, clean design, and very functional. They even have domestic games too, but the lack of many accessories is a bit of a disappointment.

Buy Rite has a big selection and some sort of price guarantee on all games, but I'm not really sure how it works. For some reason I don't like this site, it's very cluttered feeling and they kill you on the shipping. But a lot of people I know use it and love it, so it must be pretty good.

Express.com sells a lot of things, and import games happen to be there too. Lots of titles can be found at very good prices, the only problem is the availability of certain titles.

Game Choice has anything you could ever want that is foreign and gaming related. Saturn games, Neo Geo stuff, exotic DVD players, and collectibles. Great site for whatever you need. Only problem is that shipping is a bitch since they are located in Hong Kong.

- Step Three - Having fun:
After you get whatever it is you ordered, play the damn game and have fun. That's what it's all about, and that's what I'm telling you to do. But be sure that the game you are buying is good, you don't want to be stuck with a horrid strip Mahjong game and end up using it as a coaster. Importing can be tricky, but once you get the hang of it things are like buttah'.