Page Location: Home > Support > Get Your Dreamcast Online > Topic
netrogames
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Posted:
Sat Jan 14, 2017 4:41 pm
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Is it more important to select an ISP onramp close to home, or use a higher quality Dialup ISP for playing Dreamcast games if you have some sort of digital phone? I have Vonage and Vonage says it's a 100% substitute for a regular phone, including dial up (it can do faxes so I assume it can do dial up) and has free unlimited long distance to the US and Canada. I found a couple Free Dial UP ISPs, but none in Ohio, and I heard complaints about certain ISPs, and I was wondering if I don't have to pay Earthlink to update my email account to add 10 hours of dial up.

Most things I do on the internet I use the broadband, but if I can sneak in a Dreamcast game, maybe I'll add a dialup, so if a limit saves me money, than a limit it is.

I assume you can't direct dial a Dreamcast like you could (and MUST) a Sega Saturn NetLink for Saturn Bomberman. If you can, is there a number I can reach these gaming computers at directly and bypass the dial up onramp?
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gary_b
rank 37
Posted:
Sun Jan 15, 2017 3:20 pm
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If you have free long distance then try using Michigan free dial up service and see for yourself. pick a border town that is closest to you maybe a town such as Maybee MI or even Detroit if Maybee does not have an access number. I have used this service to get my Dreamcast online in the past. I have not tried using Vonage though. here is a link to Michigan Dial in free. http://www.dialinfree.net/
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netrogames
rank 2
Posted:
Mon Jan 16, 2017 1:56 pm
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Well, I can confirm that I can get a Website that wasn't available back in the Dreamcast days, albeit it wasn't formatted like it would on a modern Macintosh, and the apostrophes in the words like "don't" and "Sam's" were misformatted, but then again if you want to hook up online with a Dreamcast at 56k speeds, there's only one thing you really want to do: play Dreamcast games online. If you've got broadband, for 99.9% of the things it's eaiser to work with broadband, but to play retro Dreamcast games online, dial yup is the onlyone that's 100% compatible.

I have Vonage, and I subscribed to the free Dial up augment ISP in Michigan whereas i Live in Ohio that was mentioned earlier in the post, but remember with Vonage and similar digital phones, long distance is no object. I can't tell the quality unless I test it with a game. So if anyone can give me a list of games that Currently work with Dreamcast online in 2016, let me know.

I own these online games: Alien Front Online, Bomberman Online, Chu Chu Rocket, Daytona USA, Maximum Pool, NBA 2k1, Next Tetris, NFL 2K1, NFL 2k2, Ooga Booga, Outtrigger, Phantasy Online Ver. 2, Unreal Tournament, World Series Baseball 2k2, Worms World Party. Which of these games are online? Are people negotiating with Sega and other companies to restart the servers that are stopped? Are the servers truly stopped or just hidden and dormant? I guess I can search the site and see which games are online.

I read someone from Rhode Island prefers the cost ($0) and low pinginess of a California ISP than a more local Rhode Island ISP. He has some sort of digital phone, so long distance is no object, just like me.
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gary_b
rank 37
Posted:
Mon Jan 16, 2017 10:28 pm
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I wish it was as simple as telling you what games are online. Some games require other steps to getting online. But I will tell you which ones work and you will have to dig deeper into how they get online. Some games need a save file others need a boot disc etc. A few should work with only a few adjustments to your Dreamcast settings. Alien front online, PSO v2, Chu Chu Rocket, Maximum Pool, Worms World Party, and The Next Tetris (Japan only) If I am not mistaken though.

Also Quake 3, Star Lancer, 4x4 Evolution, and a few others.

Lord Nikon has a list of games by region in the online games tab at the top of the page of this forum. It is not complete due to a few that just came back on but it will help you. Also all of the games on the main page are online and you will find more information on how to get them to work in their sub forums.
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netrogames
rank 2
Posted:
Tue Jan 17, 2017 10:06 am
quote : #5
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Well I got VMUs which can store the save files. And all my games are legitimate GD ROMs, (no CD-R Copies for me) Does that help me more than if I didn't have genuine Sega VMUs and GD ROMs?
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gary_b
rank 37
Posted:
Tue Jan 17, 2017 11:02 am
quote : #6
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Not really.. Max pool needs a save file to connect and many methods of connecting PSO use a codebreaker code that needs to be saved to a separate VMU. If you keep the codebreaker save on the same card as your PSO save you will not get any rare drops. There is a disc that you can use to connect the north American version of PSO v2 to Sylverant servers, You will need a real GD rom for that to work. Online Consoles uses other methods that do not work with the North American ver 2. I have not played some of the game that have had the online functions restored yet. You will need to figure out what game you want to play and then look into how to connect. Many users use a Dreampi these days so it is possible that you may encounter issues that I would not. I have a Dreamcast Broadband adapter and a Dreampi, I quit using real dial up a long time ago. My best advice for you is to look in the online game area here to see if you can connect to what ever game that you choose to play. If you have a specific question about a specific game I can try to help but I cannot tell you how to connect to each game in a thread like this as it might take way to long. best to take things one game at a time.
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netrogames
rank 2
Posted:
Tue Jan 17, 2017 11:36 am
quote : #7
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Want to meet up and try to connect at 3PM eastern today? If so, leave message on this forum, or xbox friend me if you have Xbox: TripleTopper321 You can discusss meeting people to play games on Xbox. My group, the Jack Of All Games Game Dabbler Opponent Finder club, though small, has one purpose, being messaged when someone wants to play a particular game on Xbox One, 360, or competing system. I guess retro-hoking Dreamcast will be defined as competing systems.

Also would using a real dial up ISP and hooking the Dreamcast modem to my Vonage device be easier or harder to hook up my Dreamcast than a DreamPi. Vonage says it's a 100% compatible phone line, usable for voice, fax, and credit card modem ports. And I tested it, and it worked on loading a website on a Dreamcast. Don't know how well it will game.
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gary_b
rank 37
Posted:
Tue Jan 17, 2017 2:38 pm
quote : #8
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I am about to leave for work so I cannot play atm. The Dreampi is probably your best option. I know it works and it is going to be just as easy as setting up dial up and it is future proof. It will cost more though. You need to buy the Dreampi, a compatible USB modem and a LVI. Some users are building the Line voltage inducer into the modems tough. It is easier going with the Dell Modem with LVI built in. You won't need a battery that way. I pad somewhere around $50 or 60 buying everything and I made my own LVI.
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netrogames
rank 2
Posted:
Tue Jan 17, 2017 3:18 pm
quote : #9
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I'm using Vonage and a free dial in ISP. (Oh by the way, I called Vonage and told them that their service does Dial Up perfectly fine, and told them to have a DialUp ISP specifically for people where long distance is no object, like Vonage customers. I told them they have 2 advantages over AOL and Earthlink. 1. It's not a broadband user's primary internet and the only time it would be used is for Dreamcast and older computers like Atari and Commodore, if they had such things. So their servers will be less taxed. 2. They don't have to have dial in access points in every little podunk community. They could literally have one long distance number for the whole nation to dial into. The guy from Rholde Island said he got a better perfromance from the California free ISP than the Rhode Island ISP. So travelling most of your distance on the phone line rather than the internet lines makes for quicker ping. They can even have a vanity number for their dialup access number like 1-xxx-DialVonage where xxx is a regular area code. It would be free for Vonage customers, and if non-Vonage customers are not satisfied with their current dial up augment, they could subscribe for $1-3 a month, depending on number of dial up hours, and use their DSL/Cable/Fios/UVerse based phone to dial in.)

On Alien Front Online, I could see my previous Dreamcast identity i forgot. ("latari", a combination of Latare, Latin for "rejoice", and Atari, Japanese for "I got you surrounded" in a game of Go. Wink Actually I took Atari from the game company's name. I used the name Latare4atari for my ebay name, but I found my buying bid prices going up thinking, a guy with Atari in his ebay name is likely to pay big bucks for old video games, so someone coordiantes and boosts the price. So I changed my ebay name.) as well as my online games and wins, and when I pressed one button it said disconected. In Chu Chu Rocket, it said I was connected but it would take several minutes to hook up to a server. I waited 5-10 Minutes then pressed power off. On Maximum Pool I was able to log in and see a meeting room which was bare. Does that mean my Vonage works in getting online Dreamcast, and all those games work with the network today and the only reason I couldn't play an online game was a lack of opponents, or does that mean I got some errors with my Dreamcast and/or Vonage and/or DialInFree.net account? By the way, the one game that had a data rate said I was at 48,000 baud. So that's 48 kilobits per second (if you define a k as exactly 1000 and not exactly 1024) Not bad for a Vonage phone line hooked up to a 1.5 Meg in / 400k out DSL. and that free Michigan dial up ISP calling from Ohio.
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gary_b
rank 37
Posted:
Tue Jan 17, 2017 10:26 pm
quote : #10
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Posts: 817
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Max pool did not work because you do not have the save file that redirects you to the lobby. Also no one is likely to be online. When playing Dreamcast games online you need to set up matches ahead of time as it is hard to find people already in a match. Max pool is not a game that has a large user base. Most people play PSO and Quake. If I have to guess I would say that you are online, but you need to be redirected to the right place. I have not played worms or Alien front online yet, but it is possible that you need to set up the DNS settings to what ever is required for those games.
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VGA is the way to play
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