Release Date: May 19, 2001 Download Now |
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Cryptic Allusion had barely been heard of before we entered into homebrew/hobbyist Dreamcast(tm) development. But with DC Tonic we announced to the scene and to the world in general that we were here to play.
DC Tonic is a compilation CD of various games, demos, and game demos produced using the KallistiOS toolkit. It was a collaboration between Cryptic Allusion, Moving Target Software Design, GankSoft Entertainment, and AndrewK of Napalm to produce an attractive Dreamcast(tm) CD to hand out to the attendees of the 2001 Electronic Entertainment Expo(tm).
Each disc was burned on a red, orange, or violet CD and was covered with a custom-printed label. The disc was bootable on any Dreamcast(tm) capable of booting non-GD media, and contained not only the games and demos mentioned above, but all of their source code under free software licenses! To take this a step even further, Cryptic Allusion included the source code for the current version of the compiler tools used to build the whole thing. A homebrew development kit in a box.

All original DC Tonic CDs were given away at the show or kept by individual developers who helped to build it, but you can build your own using the images linked to in the header on SourceForge, the free collaborative Open Source development site.
There are raw files (for mkisofs/cdrecord junkies), DiscJuggler, and Nero images. All archives include the bonus audio tracks included on the original CD and a high-resolution copy of the CD cover so that you can re-create the original authentically for your own collection.
Note, however, that even though those tools were state of the art at that time, they are now quite crusty! So if you are interested in doing your own development work, please visit our friends over at B00B Dreamcast Research to find more up-to-date compiler tools and information. And once you're done setting that up, head on over to SourceForge and grab the latest and greatest KallistiOS!