"I think it may be enough just to create an online space for players, and the rest will sort itself out. That may only be a slight exaggeration. Right now, what people value in games is diversifying. It’s extremely hard, therefore, to design a single game that will please everyone."
- Sega console R&D head Hideki Sato
To celebrate the release of the Dreamcast -- at that time just about to launch, but ultimately Sega's final console -- the company's hardware R&D head Hideki Sato published a retrospective of the company's work in the space, which could be described as both "confused" and "innovative."
That 1998 article is now live for the first time in English on Shmuplations, and it's worth reading both as a chronicle of the history of one company's console development and as a nearly 20-year old reflection on the ever-changing nature of the video game space, particularly interesting through the lens of Sega's perpetual underdog status and its penchant for discursive hardware design.
Check it out -- not just for the text, which is almost utopian in its flavor; but also the great images -- over at Shmuplations.