DC Game Questions

[V.E.S.]

Good evening, all. I purchased a used Dreamcast just recently (I couldn't refuse at such an astonishing price), but have encountered some difficulty using it in any meaningful way. I have done quite a bit of reading on various q/a related difficulties I have encountered, but to very unfocused end.

So here's what I do know: I have a HKT-3020 Dreamcast, Manufactured in August of 1999, which seems to be well before the cut-off for DCs that can run burnt material. This is all well and good. I've seen a friend use the Utopia Boot Disc, so I quickly obtained a copy of v1.1, and obtained a few copies of games and ran them (or attempted to, rather).

The Utopia v1.1 boots fine; I get that retarded reindeer and everything. The first game I burned (using Alcohol 120 usually, with Nero ocassionally) was Aerowings (just happened to be part of a collection of games, and was the first to finish) worked fine from Utopia 1.1. However, all the games I procured thereafter haven't worked at all (the reindeer endlessly dances on the screen after having placed the disc in). Such games include:

Dead or Alive 2
Soul Calibur
Pro Action Replay
4x4 Evolution
Power Stone 2

I had heard that using something like a Gameshark or Pro Action Replay I would be able to boot a game as well, since it utilizes soft-boot, but even though I was able to run Gameshark, it didn't run games I could run with Utopia.

I thought the problem might be with Utopia being only v1.1, so I tried to obtain the v1.2, but every copy I've burnt so far has not booted either.

I pursued the option of self-booting discs (namely, converting most of the ones that weren't self booting to self booting ones) but the process seemed to be rather vague given the explaination. I even got an error message using one program that read, and I quote, "Shit wheres the ip.bin", which admitable made me laugh at having wasted countless hours trying to figure this out.

So for the most part, the only games I can get working are Aerowings, Utopia 1.1, and Grandia 2 (a game that I obtained with the self-boot already configured for it).

Sorry for the excess of information, but I wanted to make it easier to understand the problem. Can anyone think of what might be wrong with why I cannot boot these other discs, or a method I might care to try? The games I have running run great, but I just am extremely limited to what I can play. Clues? Hints even?

Thanks a lot.

[Cookie Monster]

What software are you using to burn the games?
If the image file is .cdi use Disjuggler, it's free and higly reliable. When using it to burn dc games be sure to say no when it asks you to correct errors before burning.
If the image file is .nrg use Nero 5.x, but not Nero 6.x.
Always burn at the lowest speed possible.
Chances are that some of yours are bad images, but let's try this before.

[AKUMA™]

Soul Calibur and Power Stone 2 are good images, and they are also self-booting, so there's no need to do anything to them. Just do what Cookie said.

[Zorlon]

I had heard that using something like a Gameshark or Pro Action Replay I would be able to boot a game as well, since it utilizes soft-boot, but even though I was able to run Gameshark, it didn't run games I could run with Utopia.

There has never been a version of Gameshark that can run any copy it may help you play imported games though

There is a version of CodeBreaker that can be used with selfbooting game, maybe even boot Utopia then a none selfbooting game (I havn't tested with Utopia as all my games selfboot)

For burning yeah go for DJ or if you have it anyway use Nero 5.X as Cookie recomended

If the Image is not in a format that either Nero or DJ does not recognise you can always mount the image with Daemon tools 3x and re create the image with either DJ or Nero then burn it

Note:- for nero avoid using cdi2nrg as it's not 100% perfect and can produce coaster making cd images the above method is more reliable although cdi2nrg will work for alot if not most cdi images