Dreamcast-Talk.com

This game, Evolution: The World of Sacred Device, has really been giving me a lot of trouble. It just doesn't seem to want to be played. I'm not sure if it's my dreamcast, or if its the game it self, but from what I see, it seems like it's neither and just doesn't like my house.
When I put the game in, it loads normally. The Sega logo comes up with the "this product is licensed by Sega for use on Sega products" etc, like it does when every DC game first boots up, but after the Sega license screen goes away, it's just a black screen. I can hear the disc still spinning but the laser stops moving so I know it's not loading. When I open the lid, I can see that the disc had been spinning, and the laser moves back to its original position.

I've tried cleaning the disc to the point where its cleaner than it was when it was brand new. No scratches or anything on either side of the disc. Lets just say I have many other games that are in a lot worse shape that work fine. Which brings me to the next part, every other DC game I have works fine, no problem what so ever, so I know it's not my DC. I actually have two Dreamcasts, and it does the same thing on both of them. I took it back to the Play N Trade where I bought it, and they cleaned it in their heavy duty cleaner and popped it in their DC, and it booted up just fine. I took it home, wouldn't work on either of my DC's. So I decided to take one of my DC's with the game to the PNT to show them what I'm talking about. They hook it up and it freakin works. They told me that sometimes the laser can get misaligned so he pushed the laser to the back so it could realign itself.

When I got home, I hooked up the DC and it worked. Now about a month later, I boot it up to play the game, and its back to it's old ways. I tried resetting the laser like he said, but it didn't work this time. Again, every other game I have works fine, and this game works on their DC's, but not on either of mine. Maybe it doesn't like the electricity in my house or something. I can't find anything remotely similar to my problem. Didn't know if anyone here would have the slightest idea what I was talking about. Any bit of help would be greatly appreciated.

I am here only for announcement of a solution that worked for me. I had this exact same issue.

- Power the system off
- Unplug any devices other than the controller you will use
- Unplug controller accessories (VMU, Rumble pak)
- Turn the system on, try again, and it should work!

I don't know if this is related, but my memory card had no space left when this happened. If you want to eliminate the problem altogether, I would start there, and either make more space on the VMU or buy a 2nd one. I'll figure it out later but you can easily diagnose the issue yourself. Maybe the game doesn't have a screen to tell you that your memory card is full and then softlocks because it doesn't know what to do? Who knows.

I know this is an old thread but this I think is good for a special allowance. This may prove useful to others in the future because as of 2019 jan 22, this is the first thing that google gave me when I searched "evolution dreamcast black screen" and well this is it. I didn't see anyone else online with this particular problem except this guy above me and myself.

I just registered here so I could thank you for the post. You are absolutely correct in that if you have a full VMU in the controller you get the black screen without the no save message. This had been bothering me so I tested two different discs and both just had the black screen. Never realized that it was due to a full VMU. I took the VMU out and both discs now show the no save warning language on the bottom of the black screen. I am shocked that I could not find out any information on this until now. Games work fine now. Thank you again for the post!!

IG_Bugz wrote:I am here only for announcement of a solution that worked for me. I had this exact same issue.

- Power the system off
- Unplug any devices other than the controller you will use
- Unplug controller accessories (VMU, Rumble pak)
- Turn the system on, try again, and it should work!

I don't know if this is related, but my memory card had no space left when this happened. If you want to eliminate the problem altogether, I would start there, and either make more space on the VMU or buy a 2nd one. I'll figure it out later but you can easily diagnose the issue yourself. Maybe the game doesn't have a screen to tell you that your memory card is full and then softlocks because it doesn't know what to do? Who knows.

I know this is an old thread but this I think is good for a special allowance. This may prove useful to others in the future because as of 2019 jan 22, this is the first thing that google gave me when I searched "evolution dreamcast black screen" and well this is it. I didn't see anyone else online with this particular problem except this guy above me and myself.

Wow! I have never went through this problem, when I had my dreamcast years ago. But the info in your post was interesting. Thanks for posting this. It will come in handy, in case something like this, happens to me one day.

Man, I had this exact same problem and searched online thinking there was no way I'd find a solution. When I found this thread, I was so excited but, unfortunately, it did not work for me. I have the exact same scenario described in the post. I tried booting with and without a VMU (my VMU has 132 blocks free) in all four controller ports. I tried booting with a DC-X. No luck there. When I play the disc like it's a music CD, it recognizes that it's Evolution, so I feel like the disc is fine. I tried four other games and they all worked fine, though.