What happened to Windows CE on the SEGA Dreamcast?

[@mawnkey]

Fun fact: the version of Windows used for the XBox had basically nothing to do with Windows CE. Microsoft definitely learned lessons from their CE experience to build it, but CE itself is different from any other OS in their lineup. The XBox ran off a stripped down version of the Windows NT/2000 kernel which is directly related to every version of Windows used by consumers today. CE, meanwhile, was a kernel completely separate from the NT or 9X series that was retired in 2013.

[@christiangomez2496]

And the 360 still used the Win2K-derived software. The meat thing was that it still used DirectX, but ported to the system's PPC chip.

[@TheeGlocktopus]

@@christiangomez2496 Literally the only "windows" component in that OS is the D3D API. It wasn't ported. It has a translation layer which converts instructions. Saying it's "win2000" is like saying a NASCAR is the production version.

[@christiangomez2496]

@@TheeGlocktopus Oh, thanks for the correction. It's because the 360 still uses a modified Win2K kernel underneath which made me think D3D was also a port.

[@TheeGlocktopus]

@@christiangomez2496 Neither system uses a ported version. They are totally different builds that are forked from windows 2000. Both the Xbox and 360 use this. The major difference is multitasking. Win 2000 is focused on multitasking applications where as the XBSS (Xbox System Software is what the OS is called) can only run one application at a time. D3D APIs are translated to match the instruction set of the hardware. This keeps D3D consistent across Console or PC and is pretty much the sole reason Microsoft has been able to integrate crossplay and cross-platform development across windows/xbox. This is an area that Sony is way behind on. They have a "man in the middle" which is the PSSL, or Playstation Shader Language, but this is more akin to a port than the native integration in xbox. It's also a nightmare to develop in and why there are more "exclusives" on PS these days. It's not exclusive for a positive reason, but rather it's too much work to make it crossplatform.

[@iamfreeareyou681]

That's not a "fun fact" as the OS on Xbox, is not Windows, and it never was. The original Xbox used a custom operating system built on an NT kernel. It was only based on a heavily modified Windows 2000. What that means is that none of the Xbox consoles ever actually used Windows. Even if the rumours were true that it's a stripped down copy of Windows 2000, if you strip the majority of it out, it is no longer the same thing, it's something different. If I take everything off of an apple except for the core and give it to you, I did not give you an apple.

[@LonSeidman]

I had a whole fleet of Windows CE based IBM Thinkpads that I bought cheap back in my IT days. We installed DOS emulators on them for an inventory project at my old job. Those were the days!

[@LuccianoNova]

Think pads had the best cursor control in the early 2000s

[@tiagopereirasantossilva556]

I also heard that Windows CE overhead meant that Ports for Dreamcast (Sega Rally, Virtua Fighter 3, etc.) that use Windows CE had much worse performance and lower FPS when compared to ports and games (which are not ports) that do not

[@rsmith02]

@@tiagopereirasantossilva556 This video directly disagreed with that assertion and noted DirectX was highly optimized for its day- did you watch it?

[@MIDNITE69]

@@LuccianoNova Absolutely. People often forget how small and terrible trackpads were in those early days. The Thinkpad nipples were a life saver back then!

[@MisterPikol]

aaay Lon, nice seeing you here !

[@manojsahu-hr9qe]

Sad to see that sega Dreamcast was the last console from sega it was waay ahead of its time

[@therealpoolboy420]

I still miss the memory card

[@SoyAntonioGaming]

it's the latest Sega console, not the last

[@game-tea]

​@@SoyAntonioGamingno, latest means last to have been released and the Dreamcast is not their latest console.

[@nicholsliwilson]

Being old I remember being impressed by it’s capabilities, having upgraded from a Play Station 1 & Sega Saturn. It really was ahead of it’s time but I can’t help wondering what it would have been like with the originally planned Voodoo3 based graphics chip if 3Dfx hadn’t screwed up the deal? That would have allowed the DC to run games using the arcade implementation of Glide.

[@MarquisDeSang]

no it was not, it had only 1 analog thumbstick while PS1 had 2. It could not play videocd nor DVD. PS2 was way more advanced that Dreamcast, dreamcast was only a cheap off the shelf PC.

[@yvesrn]

I was so excited to get my Dreamcast on 9.9.99. NFL2K blew me away. I even brought my DC with me on a ski trip so I could play Crazy Taxi. Gone too soon.

[@ciscornBIG]

9.9.99 was the only time I skipped class in high school to go buy my dream cast. Just got up and left. No one said a word and I spent the rest of the day playing soul calibur.

[@tehshingen]

I didn’t have the cash for a Dreamcast on launch day, so I picked up Final Fantasy 8 instead, which released the same day, and marveled at the Dreamcast demo station with the “better graphics than the arcade hardware” port of Soulcalibur, sequel to Soul Edge, an arcade fighter I adored. It made me want a Dreamcast that much more!

[@innerlude]

same. I don't have my OG DC, but I have one of the good ones and I did the battery mod. I want to do the mod that replaces the cd-rom with a sd card.

[@Pyke_]

best console I ever had. When it was launched it was even better than most pcs

[@valkiris]

I remember calling one of the phone numbers I found on the Dreamcast manual to inquire about the Windows CE logo and how exactly could I take advantage of it. The Sega rep kept telling me "all it means is it's compatible with Windows CE", which left me confused. How is it compatible, what can I do with it?! He didn't know. Finally, decades later, MVG solves the mystery for me. So thank you!!!

[@TheWarmestFuzzy]

The dreamcast was such an amazing machine. So easy to work with backups and media. I remember burning copies of movies (back in the vcd days) to run specifically on the DC. No special hardware or software required, just had to add a file as the opening track and it would play flawlessly. Great for early digital media.

[@hanzobi1926]

lol, i used burn DC VCD's too and sell them at my lunch break in work back in 2001

[@subtledemisefox]

Unfortunately, by the time I got into the Dreamcast, it was one of the patched models. I wasted so many discs trying to get it to work.

[@MartinPiper6502]

During my time at Argonaut UK and programming various SEGA consoles, I don't remember seeing any of the Windows CE support or SDK.

[@henke37]

It was probably treated like middleware. So, an extra charge if you wanted to use it.

[@98167]

did SEGA revolt & turned a cheek to use their “Katana” after all? I recall seeing that on the console itself. I immediately thought it had a pc interface format available to the user !?

[@blunderingfool]

Sorry to bug you but I've gotta know, did you enjoy working on any particular games? =D

[@djkanyetwitty]

No

[@TheKayliedGamerChannel-YouTube]

@@henke37 PS2 needed that Middleware much more - PS2 third party stuff was riddled with RenderWare titles :-)

[@joe_schmoe_420]

Early morning video game history is the best way to wake up Thanks MVG

[@Weyk47]

Nothing quite like it.

[@awarepenguin3376]

best breakfast

[@djkanyetwitty]

No

[@CocoHutzpah]

That explains quite a lot. Years ago, I burned a few CDs with emulated Neo Geo games for my Dreamcast. I thought it was novel that the emulator came in the iso with the game, as at that point, I had installed emulators on the Wii and game roms were separate. Keeping the OS on the disc really is a brilliant move and I understand why the scene around the Dreamcast is still so vibrant.

[@djkanyetwitty]

No

[@CocoHutzpah]

@@djkanyetwitty Yes you silly bot

[@MaddTheSane]

The Pippin did something similar, but the Pippin was a disaster. Granted, most of the Pippin's problem was due to other issues, not the OS being on the disc.

[@greggv8]

​@MaddTheSane Pippin was sort of their version of the Atari XE-GS. Take one of their computers then chop it down to make a game console. But Apple also wanted to have Pippin be an internet appliance - and do it all with a too slow CPU and not enough RAM. One the most successful computer cut down to game console designs was the Atari 5200. It was essentially an Atari 400.

[@BastetFurry]

@CocoHutzpah I would assume nothing you couldn't do on more modern consoles, have a bootloader in the boot medium that overtakes the system and then boot your OS of choice. It is just that more convenience to just use the already existing OSes API calls and not bother with writing your own or, for example, modify Linux to do your bidings.

[@chuckd.68]

Experiencing the Dreamcast when is first came out was just a joy. It always felt ahead of the PS2 and Xbox. So many hours on NFL2k1

[@magicknight8412]

This was interesting, I never really knew what Windows CE was doing on the Dreamcast as I also mistakenly thought it was the operating system and thus the Dreamcast was a Windows machine.

[@ner0p]

I think most people thought this, I also did.

[@djkanyetwitty]

NO

[@ner0p]

lolnope.pvr

[@Waccoon]

If anyone is curious about the overhead involved with an OS on a game console, consider that the Amiga game console (originally codenamed Pixel), was designed to ship with its multitasking OS back in the 80's, including timer, graphics, and audio library support. After the video game crash of '83, the Amiga was retargeted as a personal computer, and TRIPOS was later licensed as the command line and user space portion of the OS. Using an embedded OS on a console from the 90's wasn't far fetched. I'm not a 3DO person, but I believe that console uses an OS as well.

[@CorporalDanLives]

Oh yeah, I remember talking to some people at Crystal Dynamics back in the day and they absolutely hated the OS!

[@kilodeltaeight]

See also the Apple Pippin platform, which was basically Mac OS 7 on a game console.

[@russellgolden7546]

Do you have links to anything about that?? Interested in Amiga changing tack after VG crash…

[@Waccoon]

​@@russellgolden7546 There are several books you can buy, but a lot of personal homepages have gone offline and that info is slowly disappearing from the Internet. Also, KZbin deletes all my comments that include links to external sites... because of course they do. There's a few videos here on KZbin from the Vintage Computer Federation where they've interviewed Commodore and Amiga engineers. Those are worth watching.

[@martinantelo7086]

My understanding is that Windows CE allowed for quick porting of PC games from that period, since the APIs were more or less the same, requiring less code rewriting. So for that alone it was worthwhile, maybe games like Soul Reaver wouldn't have been ported otherwise.

[@MeadowStargazer]

You are absolutely correct. WinCE had nearly a carbon copy of Win32 and DirectX APIs, just like Windows NT had parity with Win9x in that aspect, while the kernels and drivers were developed for entirely different architectures underneath.

[@feamatar]

Soul Reaver was not a WinCE game though, most WinCE games were showelware (Caesar Palace 2000, Bust-A-Move), or bad ports like the 2 Tomb Raider games. Most WinCE games are barely remembered, like the port of Railroad Tycoon II or Hidden and Dangerous. There was a quality gap between WinCE titles and proper first party games.

[@koolaid33]

@@feamatar I wouldn't say most, and Bust-A-Move isn't shovelware? That's been a long running franchise since the 1980s, it's a spinoff of the Bubble Bobble series. Also, how are most barely remembered? He literally just showcased three big titles on the Dreamcast that used it, Sega Rally 2, Resident Evil 2, and Rainbow Six.

[@feamatar]

​@@koolaid33 Please let me explain, there are about 3 bigger Windows CE titles: Sega Rally 2, Resi2 and the 2 Tomb Raider games. The others are fairly unknown (yeah, I doubt there were more than 10.000 Rainbow Six games sold on the DC, though I have seen that in the wild). This is out of about 80 Windows CE titles. Regarding showelware, I specifically mean those certain games which use zero percent of the capabilities of the Dreamcast, and they solely exist because it was trivial to port. Bust-A-Move is a classic, but there is hardly any reason to own the Dreamcast version. I wonder how many people could guess that it was ever ported to the dreamcast. Reident Evil 2 is a good game, but it was released at the same time as Code Veronica. It is based on a PC port of a PS1 game that doesnt use capabilities of the Dreamcast. I actually have RE2, RE3 and Code Veronica on the actual hardware, all play fun, but there is a generation of a difference between RE2/RE3 and Code Veronica. Rainbow Six is the same thing, it is a cheap port of a Voodoo 1 generation PC game (which runs fine with software rendering mind you), and the Dreamcast can do miles better. Sega Rally 2 is a mess. I have the original on the Dreamcast (PAL) and it is a mess.

[@alexandernorman5337]

Yeah, and DirectX 6 was like that too. The Dreamcast's hardware would readily accept what was produced form it once compiled. It wouldn't be well optimized though. In many cases, it might still make sense (think Tomb Raider) because the game wouldn't push the hardware anyhow. But I think everyone who advanced what Dreamcast was shown to do dug into SEGA's natively developed tools.

[@Chaoskeeper56]

Crazy you uploaded this the same time I'm on a Dreamcast kick. Just got a new disk drive for mine and have been playing it nonstop!

[@retractingblinds]

Ian Michael at Dreamcast Talk made an optimized version of HL1 for Dreamcast which uses a newer WinCE SDK and improves the framerate and load times significantly by being built for the GDEMU. That too is worth mentioning alongside WinCE for DC.

[@retroboy-fh1ji]

Link please 🙌🏻 i want to play the more optimized version

[@bedwablackburn]

That actually does clarify quite a bit, including why the Dreamcast was so good at emulation for the time. Build for CE, have it load CE and run with it

[@djkanyetwitty]

No

[@AltCutTV]

Well, did the Bleem thing use it? They sure would have been in even more troubles if so though probably. ;)

[@bedwablackburn]

@@AltCutTV I'd be interested to find an old bleem for Dreamcast or emulator for Dreamcast from that era to dig into it and see.

[@joshpearson4256]

Bleem was written in assembly using the hardware directly with no operating system

[@bedwablackburn]

@@joshpearson4256 appreciated. And NGL, that's kinda hawt.

[@MedalionDS9]

Great vid MVG. I always did find this fascinating about the Dreamcast how it was talked about its Windows based OS... kinda like a proto-Xbox in a way.

[@thomasandrews9355]

This answers a lot of questions for me. I remember as a child wondering about that. This was a very informative video!

[@JGKingCrusher]

One of the crimes of the century was the discontinuing of the Dreamcast. The DC is in my top 5 favorite systems EVER. Absolutely loved my Dreamcast (still do).

[@NiGHTSaturn]

I fully agree with you, but unfortunately the world was on a format exchange right when when we entered the new millennium. DVD players were also mostly more expensive than a PS2. It was a no brainer for so many consumers. 😢

[@greatwolf85]

As good as it was, don't forget it was competing with the PS2. It's always been survival of the fittest and in that regard I have to add, to this day I play PS2 games every now and then, but Dreamcast? never.

[@JGKingCrusher]

@@greatwolf85 The PS2 was an awesome system... At the time the Dreamcast came out (a year before ps2) it was the best on the market. Personally I liked the games for the Dreamcast better than the ps2. But that's the joy of having choices, which is why we want all the systems to succeed.

[@SRC267]

Someone ported 3D Pinball - Space Cadets to Dreamcast, which is cool, they also done it for NDS. KallistiOS is a powerful tool.

[@djkanyetwitty]

No

[@SRC267]

@@djkanyetwitty ?

[@djkanyetwitty]

@@SRC267 No

[@SRC267]

@@djkanyetwitty yes

[@djkanyetwitty]

@@SRC267 No

[@justeroo88]

This was really interesting to watch. Would love to see more things like this.

[@alancartridge]

Great Episode I Always Wondered About Windows CE Running On The Dreamcast. You Have Concicely & Easily Explained Everything Thanks! Will

[@11vag]

Very interesting video. Thanks MVG. I'd love to see more content like this.

[@straubulous9511]

I always appreciate and look forward to your Monday videos.

[@Soniti1324]

MVG, we are of a similar age, and the Dreamcast is my favorite console from my childhood. I ate this content up, please do more in a similar vein.

[@ralvarezrank]

MVG, I do love your content, it really makes you see the industry from another set of eyes. It teaches a lot of things that though I might've had a vague idea, seeing your videos it's full circle. Thank you

[@LunaTheFoxgirl]

Main thing to note is that DirectX did not map all that cleanly to the PVR architecture, just like how corners need to be cut with OpenGL on the Dreamcast, so must corners be cut for DirectX as well as workarounds be made to expose DirectX API that the hardware doesn't natively support in the same capacity. Katana exposed more of the PVR's power to the developer. This is from my experience programming the Dreamcast in a homebrew capacity and instructing the PVR directly, as well as being the person handling the DLang toolchain dreamcast port.

[@LunaTheFoxgirl]

There's also the part that to get the full performance out of the SH4 CPU when it comes to T&L you often end up having to write inline assembly to properly utilize the extra linear algebra helper instructions included on the SH4 variant (SH4A) the Dreamcast uses.

[@italodirenzo5876]

Like any abstraction, it's a trade-off. More portable code at the cost of additional overhead. I do find it interesting that WinCE games ran as well as they did on DC considering it's hardware was nothing like conventional PC hardware of the day.

[@thenicflynn]

I absolutely love watching your videos as it is time to wind down my day man. Fantastic stuff always!

[@bleachedcow4723]

You’re killing on the videos lately. Love this channel

[@burtlancaster1]

It's about time someone did this deep dive. Great job MVG.

[@simonorange4191]

Thanks for clarifying the Windows CE myth. I always thought the bad frame rate on Sega Rally 2 was affected by that.

[@chrispybee]

I must admit, I never really knew what Windows CE was on there for. I had it in mind it was used for external peripherals such as modems.. Great insight and learned something today.

[@rkrim2008]

I too :)

[@JazawaToad]

I always wondered what was up with the CE compatibility, but never bothered looking into it. Thanks for the video!

[@TheKayliedGamerChannel-YouTube]

Was purely a marketing 'sticker' tbh that MS paid for.

[@fabio78]

I know MVG cleared up the fact that Windows CE wasn't to blame for poor performance, but goddamn if it isn't then a coincidence that nearly every Windows CE title runs like crap compared to "native" DC games.

[@machinefannatic99]

he's wrong im not an expert but till today developers complain of direct x api being heavier than other low level api;s like on playstation and the cut down windows os on xbox still uses more memory than playstation os, and this has been the norm since as far as i can remember, windows is simply not good for consoles when your trying to extract as much needed power and performance

[@feamatar]

Exactly, and Windows CE had nothing to do with the later XBOX OS and DirectX versions. Even on the PC there was a huge difference between DirectX 6 and 8. Plus the Dreamcast GPU used tile based rendering, which was not common on the PC back then.

[@DaVince21]

I think it's a similar kind of thing to the Nintendo Switch supporting the Vulkan graphics API: sure, you _can_ use it, but an API that's targeted specifically for the hardware it's made for will always perform better. That said, I really don't think it would have been impossible to make well performing games with it.

[@fabio78]

@@DaVince21 oh I didn't know the Switch supported Vulkan. Do you know of any high profile game that uses it?

[@watchm4ker]

​@@feamatarTile based? Are you sure you're not thinking of the Saturn? The DC used a PowerVR2 GPU, which was a powerful, but pricey, competitor to the Voodoo series.

[@peterpereira3653]

I bought a Sega Dreamcast not long after it was released in UK. It is still may favourite video game console to this day. I also owned a MID mobile device ( If anyone still remembers them), that also ran Windows CE as the OS. I used the MID mainly for reading books on, and it was pretty good for that purpose. And you could actually put it in a pocket and it was actually smaller than a regular paperback book. But you could carry multiple books on you without adding extra bulk.

[@Blanco8x8]

I suspect that Microsoft did Sega dirty by fulfilling the bare minimum of their contract, and went full-steam on Xbox development afterward.

[@poeskey]

Same thing Sony did to Nintendo, I think they took a page from their book. Learned how to make a console and fucked off and did it themselves.

[@FuzedBox]

@poeskey Other way around. Nintendo had a reputation for screwing over its partners and Sony was no exception. Nintendo was paid back in karma twofold: Sony rolled with the punch and continued work on the PS1, and the Pihillips CD-i was a shitshow.

[@bucknasty69]

@@FuzedBoxWhy Nintendo didn’t think switching to CDs from cartridges is beyond me. The PlayStation might not exist had Nintendo went with a CD drive instead of cartridges for the N64.

[@OhKayEl]

No, Hotel Mario and the Zelda CD-i games are culturally significant masterpieces.

[@mostverticalproductions4808]

Your comment about Xbox being a Dreamcast successor reminds me of how Sega wanted to work with Microsoft to make the Xbox have DC backwards compatibility, and Illbleed was rumored to get both an enhanced version and sequel on Xbox.

[@jhfoleiss]

Thanks for including the name of the games in the video! Keep it up!

[@supersat]

Fun fact! The Windows CE logo is stored in the boot sectors/IP.BIN and as the screenshot at 9:20 implies, can be virtually anything

[@italodirenzo5876]

Excellent video! I've always been fascinated by the dual developer environment on the Dreamcast. It's interesting that WinCE games had this level of performance in an era where games were still mostly coded "to the metal".

[@notenoughmonkeys]

The thought of Windows CE being baked into the Dreamcast and stifling development makes me wince.

[@jamesbeggs4324]

Thanks MVG! I'd love to see an episode on the uniquely Australian Microbee and how it opened the gaming door to so many of us in the 80s!

[@jarrodjob]

I’ll never forget endless Virtua Tennis at home. NFL 2k. House of the Dead. True arcade level games at home. Unreal.

[@TheKayliedGamerChannel-YouTube]

Never beaten.

[@jarrodjob]

@@TheKayliedGamerChannel-KZbin it really ended my lust for a NeoGeo AES. It was that good. 😌

[@mykr0324]

I miss the special feeling of basically having a true arcade system in your house. It was crazy. Like playing Soul calibur, Power stone and 4 player power stone 2. House of the dead 2, 3rd strike. Then on top of that all the hours of pso2 I played on dial up lol. None of this shit was available on anything else. Well apart from some of them were released years later on other platforms and were pretty much inferior anyway.

[@RocketRenton]

You learn something new everyday.... Nice Video, always wondered about Windows CE on the Dreamcast, my brother had one and he loved it then went onto the Xbox.

[@CorporalDanLives]

Old geezer developer here. I remember being told that Sega Rally 2 was forced to use Windows CE because the Sega SDK did not support the modem yet, and they wanted to have peer to peer network play. I can't find any information about the Japanese or US versions having modem play, however, does anyone know if this turned out to be a thing?

[@LouisTheSEGANerd]

The Japanese version did indeed have online multiplayer! kzbin.info/www/bejne/iHivhKqblr6Lncksi=ZWX3S8bQHTfThMgp

[@greggv8]

Several early Dreamcast games were either canceled or had online multi-player support taken out because SEGA just couldn't help screwing up their own stuff. After ensuring they didn't repeat the many errors they had done launching Saturn, SEGA launched Dreamcast before its online service was ready. So games that would have been must have for online play, like Armada, became bargain bin filler because SEGA had their developers remove online multi-player.

[@HybridDivide]

Interesting stuff. Great video, MVG!

[@MysticMike]

That is very interesting. What's also interesting is that the dreamcast controller face buttons are similar to Microsoft's controller layout. B is on the right and A is on the down

[@NeafPlays]

Loved the video, you always manage to grab my attention 100%! Keep it up : )

[@mightylink65]

I remember when the PS3 came out the opposite happened, the OtherOS feature was in high demand and when Sony removed it in an update they even had lawsuits over it. Strange how this is a double standard to other consoles.

[@NikosSmyrnis]

I like those videos ! As well as your other videos too ! You have the right voice for documentaries !!

[@gpturismo]

Love deepdives like this. Being in my late 40s and growing up with consoles I still learn little things here and there and these deep dives are one of them.

[@r34lp0w3r]

That pronunciation of 'Microsoft' is spectacular. Sorry for the silly commentary but it's really awesome. That said, very insightful post as always, :)

[@AwesomeGames56]

My next obsession is more than likely going to be Dreamcast, I’ve finally finished collecting all the other consoles I’ve wanted since I was a kid so there’s nowhere to go but up.

[@pirrracy]

So many cool mods for them now. Just wish the DCHDMI was cheaper, but the price is understandable.

[@koolaid33]

I started collecting for the Dreamcast in 2021, it's one of my favourite consoles of all time now. I had no nostalgia for it or anything, so I didn't have any bias either. Look out for the Sonic Adventure games, Resident Evil games, Street Fighter games, Jet Grind Radio, Shenmue, and a few others, there are lots of great games for the platform beyond just these though. Any FPS games like Quake 3 Arena, Unreal Tournament, Soldier of Fortune, Rainbow Six: Rogue Spear or Half-Life (didn't actually release but you can burn the near final completed version) you'll want the DC keyboard and mouse. Also, side note but if you get one, only use 1st party memory cards, so like the VMUs or 4X cards, 3rd party seem to be very prone to corrupting your saves and so you'll consistently lose all your progress in any game with them.

[@dylanherron3963]

An unexpected upload from the man who explores platforms I've never heard of/forgotten about? On a Monday in the office, full of filling excel sheets? Click.

[@koolaid33]

I had no idea Windows CE was an actual operating system/coding system, I don't know why but I always thought it was like a nickname for Microsoft servers that were used in some tandem with the Dreamcast's online component. Interesting to learn this!

[@batemanjo9]

CE was on a lot of things. More than what we know. There was a time when CE was on set top boxes for TV. Specifically ATT Uverse in the beginning. They changed it to something else later. It was also used for retail point of sale systems. And touch screen kiosk systems. Even though Microsoft ended support for CE in 2023 they are still selling licenses for it till 2028. Some self checkouts use it too.

[@D.u.d.e.r]

Excellent ep as always, thx MVG! BTW, Starlancer looks excellent even now on the Dreamcast👍

[@johnmccain1460]

Being impressed by bump mapping on Sonic Adventure. Good times. That aside, I've been wondering very thing since 1998.

[@awarepenguin3376]

when I saw that Windows CE on the console my child brain thought "Man this is serious business."

[@S-420]

That's the only reason they printed it on the console

[@nicholsliwilson]

That answers some questions. Thanks, Dimitris.

[@extradipboneless]

The simplistic minimalistic nature of Windows CE running on the Dreamcast gives it's own kind of nice charm. Makes me wonder what would've been if Sony had more PC gaming trends in vision when making the PS2.

[@TheKayliedGamerChannel-YouTube]

PS2 everyone used RenderWare or CRi Middleware

[@T00muchF00Dchannel]

It’s always a good morning when it starts with MVG.

[@besutogaido]

Cool deep dive into Dreamcast. Cheers :D

[@sundhaug92]

I mean it's figuratively a cut-down version of Windows, during the life of CE Microsoft had 3-6 different Windows' that were largely or entirely different: - DOS-based Windows - Windows NT - Windows CE - Xbox (original) Windows (cut-down from Windows 2000) - Xbox 360 Windows (cut-down from Windows 2000 but different than the original Xbox OS)

[@shawnm8232]

It doesn't run any regular windows programs. It just looks the same and is similar to program. I still work with CE and 6.5 on the mobile computers. A cut down version would imply it's the same OS but just a lite version but CE is completely different ecosystem from 95, 2000, XP, etc.

[@machinefannatic99]

and for some reason even console cut down versions of windows require more memory than other os like on playstation i really think they are the issue why some games underperform

[@gr1mkeks]

@@machinefannatic99 personally for the 6th gen era I think it's because of the ps2 selling far more than the xbox it made itself the main target for console development. When prioritising development on a different archtecture and sdk, publishers might push out a port for a different console that runs less efficiently. The same could also be explained for the 7th generation, where third party games would often run worse on the ps3, with developers like gabe newell bashing it in its early lifespan with its complexity

[@machinefannatic99]

@@gr1mkeks Nope not true at all, this notion has been disproved time and time again, most games performed better on og xbox than on ps2 but ps2 came early on the market so devs had time to learn its low level architecture and was simply faster in other things than xbox and made some games perform or look better, xbox was powerful but it ran windows and was a pc in a box not as proprietary as ps2 same way with ps3 and 360, ps3 was simply complex and hard to develop for than the easier 360 and therefore devs could push more performance and sometimes visuals better on 360 up until the end of that gen, its now 2024 and the devs are still saying direct x is not as efficient as playstations api, even microsoft own studios have recently ported games to ps5 that perfomed better than their own consoles so that tells you something, Consoles require low level architectures and at the same time be easy to develop for, i dont buy the market leader excuse,

[@betaswithWack0]

i mean, the last two are just forks of NT in the first place...

[@SomeDudeInBaltimore]

Oof, those nested switch statements made my eye twitch. 2:33

[@MostlyPennyCat]

When i was graduating with a computer science degree in Uxbridge, one of the careers open nights was by Imagination Technologies, the designers of the PowerVR tile based renderers and some of the design in the Dreamcast They told me the story of how they _begged_ Sega to use the new DVD format for both the capacity and the new video format. But Sega was having none of it, terrified of pirates they went with their 1gb proprietary GD-ROM format. And thus is was _sony_ that took the world by storm with its PS2 that was also an incredibly cheap DVD player, less than half the price of a standalone at the time. We were so close to a world where the Dreamcast _exploded_ because it was a cheap DVD player AND web browser that played the best games in the world _So Close_ 😫

[@TheKayliedGamerChannel-YouTube]

Putting a DVD in the PS2 meant the PS2 was sold at a heavy loss for quite a while, much like the OG Xbox - they were playing the long game banking on software sales - money always wins.

[@mohamedouamane2951]

This is very informative i didn't know there was such a partnership on the Dreamcast, vert intresting video indeed i would like more of them please 😁

[@aisback1990]

I’ve always wondered this. Thank you MVG. Also any idea when Tomba! Will be available for digital order ?

[@ModernVintageGamer]

@@aisback1990 August 1st !

[@aisback1990]

@@ModernVintageGamer I can’t wait

[@GalactasRivals]

I remember there being a GDROM file of a proposed Windows CE build for the dreamcast floating around online a long time ago. Never knew if it was real or not.

[@Swordslinger-hb1ns]

If I can put two and two together. Microsoft used Windows CE into the Sega Dreamcast as ploy to learn everything they needed to know about console gaming considering they only were familiar with PC gaming. After that they buried both Sega and the Dreamcast within 3 years and then launched the original Xbox. Quite devilishly devious of them.

[@MMadous]

Point of Sale technician here. I still install NEW SYSTEMS, TODAY, in the year 2024 that run on CE! When I tell people the Dreamcast used the same OS, they're always stunned.

[@Azlehria]

I can't remember the last time I saw a CE terminal. By 2014 or so it was all POSReady or some other customized Embedded variant.

[@MMadous]

@@Azlehria POSReady and general Win32 clients are the bread and butter for sure, but at least once a week I have to help out an ancient location that still uses these Workstation 5a models, running CE. It's a massive pain to navigate that OS even as someone who grew up with Win95.

[@Azlehria]

@@MMadous I guess either you're not in SWUS, or my boss knew how to avoid those jobs - and did. I'm still sad that I'll never get to deploy another TRU. They had a wonderfully simple combination of modern and "ancient" technology - iPXE to self-image each system at installation. Always up to date. On the other hand, I'll never have to deal with J.Crew's multiply-virtualized and emulated, remote _monstrosity_ again, either. So I guess it balances out.

[@Azuris190]

That raises the Question for me, is it easy to backport those Titles :D ?

[@gfdgdfgdfgdfggfdgdfgdfgdfg9709]

Fantastic Video. Lots of stuff I didn't know

[@colinstu]

I'm surprised any games ran off CE on there. I thought that CE logo on the front was purely for the dial-up modem & web browser for browsing it

[@TheKayliedGamerChannel-YouTube]

Just a paid for advertisement licencing deal.

[@TimChuma]

I had a Dreamcast where the disc part no longer worked but it still booted up to the OS after 18 years.

[@itis3000]

Back in 2009, I remember there was an Dreamcast emulator called NullDC. That emulator has refused to run WinCE games

[@koolaid33]

Those early DC emulators were all pretty bad anyway. NullDC and Flycast specifically, Flycast was actually put on some consoles but all versions are very unstable and run games horribly, many it can't play at all it'll just crash.

[@jktwiceft]

@@koolaid33Wdym? Flycast is a good emulator that’s still getting a ton of support. It runs Win CE games.

[@louism771]

Instead of Flycast probably mean Chankast? It was pretty bad, way worse than nullDC even

[@jktwiceft]

@@louism771 oh yea. That’s some old shit lolol.

[@retroboy-fh1ji]

@@jktwiceft even Sega NAOMI 1, NAOMI 2, Atomiswave and even Sega System SP (this one on an experimental phase)

[@fensoxx]

I know you’ve got the chops to do it so what I’d like to see next is a simple hello world, or as advanced as you care to make it, live coding and running of a Windows CE Dreamcast app.

[@johnsimon8457]

I guess you’d be using some Metrowerks compiler when using Katana and VC++6 when using Win CE? I wonder if quake 3 on Dreamcast with its famous still-working network mode was winCE - all that networking stack had to come from somewhere

[@feamatar]

No, Q3 was not WinCE, Q3 was also an OpenGL title on PC, Carmack was very anti-DirectX in the pre-DirectX 9 days.

[@JB2X-Z]

​@@feamatarfor good reason lol DirectX still felt like it was in its infancy even at the time of Quake 3.

[@TheCoolDave]

This is one, for sure, I was always wondering about but, never looked into it. I did/do have/had a bunch of CE based devices (PDA's etc), and never saw anything like it on the years I had a Dreamcast. Thanks for looking into it.

[@Fantanchero]

So basically, poor performance is due to poor optimization or lack of experience with the APIs, like today's games.

[@raxadian]

Sega had the advantage of having been developing for the Dreamcast from the start. Sega was unwilling to delay the Dreamcast launch just to include Windows CE on it once they figured Windows CE would need many months more to be faster. Considering the PS2 was looming had Sega delayed the Dreamcast it would have hurt their sales.

[@retroarcadefan]

Would love to hear you describe how WinCE games on the platform were so much more difficult to emulate. Thanks for this video!

[@faenethlorhalien]

This was such a great idea and it's almost a crime that it went nowhere after the DC. The XBox should have inherited the system

[@nickm5419]

the Xbox absolutely carries the torch though; love Shenmue 1 and 2 on Xbox one

[@teknixstuff]

The XBox got a modded version of Windows 2000, which was pretty good

[@GeorgeWashingtonLaserMusket]

I don't know about pretty good, but yeah, I did get that. Also, a copy of Windows 95 or Windows 98 Iran, which ran way better as it was spec'd for na older system. 64 megs of RAM just ain't enough.

[@Tempora158]

This idea eventually came to the Xbox One/Series in that each game boots into its own virtual machine and run on its own Game OS, and this this applies to native and backwards compatible games.

[@drapos]

Well, you are not considering the huge footprint of Windows CE on system RAM. That on top of suboptimal DX5 support for the console. Sega Rally 2 would have been a better port if using Katana SDK, no doubt.

[@raztaz826]

I was thinking Windows: Combat Evolved

[@jcosmecprt]

Sega to me was that thing from the 90s that really gave me a real sense that the new millennium had arrived. The technology leap was amazing when we compare it to n64 and ps1.

[@gvfc]

"very good port" and "framerate issues" is a bit of a contradiction.

[@Storm_.]

It'd be a bad port if the ported engine was inefficient or slow, causing framerate issues. But (I assume you know what vsync is?) since the CE OS had a double buffered Vsync, meaning if the FPS dipped under 60 (by even 1 frame, 59!) it would instantly limit the framerate to 30. Then as soon as the system can output a constant FPS above 60, it'd lock back to 60. So you get 60, 30, 60, 30 (which is quite jarring) So as you can see, this isn't a fault of the port, the engine, or anything in that regard. If Vsync could have been turned off in the underlaying OS, then you'd have experienced FPS like 50, 55, 58, 60. Rather than 60, 30, 60, 30.

[@lookitskazzy]

​@Storm_the arcade runs at locked 60FPS. It's not a good port, MVG is really contorting himself to try and justify it being "good"

[@Storm_.]

@@lookitskazzy I guess if you're definition of 'good port' doesn't take anything into account other than purely the playing experience, then perhaps you'd be right. I'm just saying that anyone with an understanding of what's going on underneath can see it's not the ports fault.

[@jahjoeka]

Everytime i watch a dreamcast video i cry. We all cry.

[@FabledGentleman]

God only knows how many people i have argued with in my life that I've owned and used smart phones with windows CE as far back as the late 90's, yet so many people claim, and are totally convinced that the first Smartphone was the iPhone from 2007. There is just no arguing with fanatics i guess. Anyways. How y'all doing?

[@winterwatson6437]

do you only talk to 15 year olds? no one who was alive and conscious before 2007 thinks the iphone was first

[@GeorgeWashingtonLaserMusket]

If anyone wouldn't it be Palm Pilot or Windows CE? The iPhone was commercially successful, but it was hardly first lol. Kids these days. I remember in the 90s, I desperately wanted a palm pilot as a kid.

[@samholdsworth420]

I had a windows ce flip phone lol. It sucked

[@FabledGentleman]

@@winterwatson6437 Oh you have no idea! 😂

[@FabledGentleman]

@@samholdsworth420 The best one i had was the iMate Jasjar.

[@josephdouglas6482]

This is incredibly interesting, very cool!

[@moxheeuk2671]

I was at my cousins as a child and I tried plugging his dream cast in to the phone line to try phantasy star online 2. I knew nothing of the net back then haha

[@jajabinx35]

Crazy, I also went to a cousin house to see them try this.....

[@koolaid33]

What does this have to do with the video? Just because your talking about a Dreamcast and he's talking about a Dreamcast?

[@moxheeuk2671]

I'm just learning about all this stuff having fun and here comes captain shit on it all. Just don't bother. Thanks for trying to ruin someone's day tho you absolute whammer

[@SWISS-1337]

I miss this period of gaming. It was so exciting. Now it's basically either PC gaming or consoles which are basically PCs just slightly less power but punch above their weight due to optimisation. The only console that comes close to is the switch, but that's only because it's hardware is so old and so underpowered that they have to be creative to get games looking like they're not from the game cube generation (slightly hyperbolic of course).

[@Rift2123]

cant get past windows combat evolved lol

[@paulrahme]

Fascinating stuff! Would love to see a video about KallistOS :)

[@GyattGPT]

Sounds like just another case of Microsoft not putting enough resources to Dreamcast Windows CE developers. They were making way more money on other businesses.

[@metaleggman18]

Doesn't sound like that at all based on the video.

[@davidmay268]

Thanks, I always wondered. I'd love a deep dive into the dreamcast, and the xbox and the glaring similarities. Like the controllers, and the fact they would both forget the time and date

[@crunchinjelly]

When you booted a game and it had the Windows CE logo you knew it was gonna run like crap.

[@JB2X-Z]

It's almost as if you made the comment before watching the video or something.

[@714SNF]

MVG always spreading good knowledge

[@santoyo85]

This an answer I was waiting for about 24 years LOL. Nice video.

[@theopiumden1551]

Would love to see a video on the Dreamcast’s GDI discs.

[@Bowen_Landry]

Interesting as always. Thanks for the Info.

[@thestoicwhinger]

I can still close my eyes and almost feel the satisfying "click" when plugging in a DC controller. Special