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Well, another birthday for Sega's commercially shunned Dreamcast is upon us, and this one marks the 8th year anniversary of its release here in the United States. Although Sega made many mistakes with the Dreamcast and its predecessors--the Sega CD, 32X, and Saturn--the DC has achieved a cult status with a loyal following of hardcore fans. The system continues to see official new releases in Japan, as well as homebrewed games, and hacks to allow games from other systems to be played on the console.

For a system with such a short lifespan here in the US, the DC made an impact on gamers that is rarely achieved by other consoles with greater longevity, and much deeper libraries.

It's hard to convey in words what has made the Dreamcast such a huge cult success in the days following its demise, but it seems that the adoration for Sega's last console system is not going away anytime soon, and the library will continue to grow for years to come.

Although Sega officially shutdown their Phantasy Star Online servers for the DC earlier this year, and this past week they discontinued their dricas page (the DC internet page) for the system in its native Japan, support for the console will most assuredly continue within the online community.

There are still numerous sites devoted to the Dreamcast and its games, here are a few to check out if you are still one of the millions of gamers out there that still loves your DC as much as I do!

Dreamcast Scene - Great site with a great community. Updated frequently by users.

SegaKatana.com - A site centering around Sega rarities and development. Katana was the official codename for the Dreamcast before it was commercially released.

Dreamcast History - A site on, you guessed it, a history of the Dreamcast

Dreamcast Wiki - Wikipedia's page on the DC

PlanetDreamcast - Articles, reviews, cheats, and more can be found here.