Mega Drive Mini, and now... Mega Drive Mini 2!

[Down by Law]

Lovely bit of kit, the 3 buttons pads are a very high quality and the model is spot on. It does annoy me however that Eternal Champions is the wrong box art, it should be this one

 

 

Oh well !

 

Honestly well worth getting a retrobit pad! It's a 3M thick cord vs a thin 2M cord and the mode button on the front for instant menu access is much more user friendly than holding start. (Think of how handy that will be when you're save scumming Contra) That said I'm going to get the wireless version at the end of the month because I can never have enough six button Sega pads in my life.

 

 

Lovely little thing!

 

 

For scale (last couple of days of Sega goodness that arrived)

 

 

 

2 hours ago, Sketch said:

Lots of questions

 

I can answer some of them for you:

 

Castlevania Bloodlines is in the box art menu and boots as Bloodlines if set to Korean:

 

 

Streets of Rage is '2' in Korean and 'II' in English

Landstalker has the full subtitle in English on the mini menu and the game menu

Sonic Spinball music IS sped up on the English one.

Sonic Spinball is the Japanese box art when set to Korean but is the US version (i used this to test the music speed for you)

Probotector is listed as such and boots as such in English. Boots as Contra in Korean with no hits points vs 3 Hit Points if booted in Japanese

[Sketch]

6 minutes ago, HKT3030 said:

All three versions of both Contra and Castlevania are available (and yes, that means Probotector and robots for Europe). Streets Of Rage II/2 displays differently depending on if you choose the European or US version. I'd confirm more but I really need to get back to Essex...

 

Thank you Nik!

 

14 minutes ago, MW_Jimmy said:

I'm not quite sure what you are asking. Are you trying to make sure that there are 3 versions of each game included (where possible) as is the case with the Genesis Mini?

 

I wanted to be sure that for titles which are distinct between UK and US, that both the UK and US versions are included.

 

The mixed up box art in the Korean menu is partly what confused me when watching videos online / seeing photos.

 

Basically, as long as I can play only the US versions I will be happy.

 

Bit disappointed I can't get a nice uniform wall of Genesis box art, but oh well.

 

Also, I still think it's dumb I need to set everything to Korean just to access American games.

[Sketch]

5 minutes ago, Down by Law said:

Streets of Rage is '2' in Korean and 'II' in English

Landstakers has the full subtitle in English on the mini menu and the game menu

Sonic Spinball music IS sped up on the English one.

Sonic Spinball is the Japanese box art when set to Korean but is the US version (i used this to test the music speed for you)

 

Aha! So the Spinball music is sped up, but I can still access the US version. Thank you so much!

 

See? It's the little details like this that were bugging me.

 

And I bloody suspected it too! You need to access the Korean menu and click on Japanese boxart of Spinball to access the American version because the UK original has been artificially boosted to 60Hz, despite the original being optimised at 50Hz.

 

I am truly vindicated by these answers!

[Down by Law]

Oh yeah regarding Comix Zone, it's just track 10 in the sound test that seems to be fucked up. The rest of them seem to be as I remember it.

[Down by Law]

And lastly, here's the spines of the Korean language. Super Shinobi does boot as Super Shinobi and not Shinobi III, though you can always boot the english version for that.

 

 

The hard to read one 7th from the right bottom row is Light Crusader. (Facebook is compressing the shit out of my image)

[Down by Law]

19 minutes ago, Sketch said:

 

Aha! So the Spinball music is sped up, but I can still access the US version. Thank you so much!

 

See? It's the little details like this that were bugging me.

 

And I bloody suspected it too! You need to access the Korean menu and click on Japanese boxart of Spinball to access the American version because the UK original has been artificially boosted to 60Hz, despite the original being optimised at 50Hz.

 

I am truly vindicated by these answers!

 

Hang on a sec. I've made a fuckup. I assumed Sonic Spinball was the US rom because all the text, including the options and the pinball headers in game, is in english. I've googled the differences between the two and the Japanese version has a different death sound. I've only just gone and killed Sonic, and this is the Japanese version. So whoops on my part. 

The UK boxart version is definitely sped up in regards to sound, so it doesn't look like you can access the US rom on this machine as is.

 

I thought I'd better double check after Super Shinobi booted like that and not as Shinobi III.

[Sketch]

15 minutes ago, Down by Law said:

And lastly, here's the spines of the Korean language. Super Shinobi does boot as Super Shinobi and not Shinobi III, though you can always boot the english version for that.

 

 

Thanks for these pics - this is great. You should be making YouTube videos or something. This is precisely all I wanted to know several weeks back when the Aussies were getting theirs.

 

Hmm... The ROMs list only has 2 entries for Shinobi. I wonder if the English is PAL running at 60Hz, or the American version? More importantly, are there possibly any differences between them the regions for Shinobi III?

 

Several people suggested that Sega do what Nintendo did with the SNES Mini, and just junk the PAL games in favour of NTSC-U. I agree.

 

Interesting regarding Spinball. The ROM list has 3 versions:

eu_en_Sonic_Spinball.bin

eu_eu_Sonic_Spinball.bin

eu_jp_Sonic_Spinball.bin

 

I wonder how you access them all?

 

It might be, the only way to play the NTSC-U version, is to import a Genesis Mini. I ask though, is it worth the import charges?

[Down by Law]

Ha no problem, enjoyable life being a Sega nerd. With my thick Dudley accent, I'd have to subtitle all my Youtube vids. 

 

Today I learned:

PAL Sonic Spinball music is pretty awesome when forced into a 60HZ mode. 

The Japanese version doesn't have the SKREE SKREE SKREE SKREE death sound.

 

[Keyboard Koala]

25 minutes ago, Down by Law said:

For scale (last couple of days of Sega goodness that arrived)

 

 

The hell is there a Genesis seal of approval on that box?! 

[Sketch]

 

30 minutes ago, Down by Law said:

And lastly, here's the spines of the Korean language. Super Shinobi does boot as Super Shinobi and not Shinobi III, though you can always boot the english version for that.

 

 

The hard to read one 7th from the right bottom row is Light Crusader. (Facebook is compressing the shit out of my image)

 

This is such a good photo. Very valuable. I wish photos like this were being shown weeks back. Looking at this, and seeing Story of Thor the Japanese version shown, I take it that there is literally zero way of accessing or booting the US version, Beyond Oasis?

 

The Americans get Beyond Oasis, plus Story of Thor in Japanese, plus all the Euro versions of Story of Thor, whereas in Europe we are denied Beyond Oasis?

 

I don't even like the game, I'm just kinda irritated that Sega is telling me I can't have something that the Americans can have.

 

Story of Thor / Beyond Oasis regional differences:

 

https://tcrf.net/Beyond_Oasis#Regional_Differences

 

Basically the PAL version has a crappier earlier localisation that was not properly edited.

 

Why aren't YouTube channels and websites covering this shit? We have received an inferior product.

 

EDIT:

Spinball:

https://tcrf.net/Sonic_Spinball_(Genesis)#Regional_Differences

 

TCRF doesn't have regional differences for Shinobi III sadly.

[stefcha]

You'll be able to put precisely what you want on it at some point, making the whole issue moot.

[Down by Law]

6 minutes ago, Sketch said:

 

 

This is such a good photo. Very valuable. I wish photos like this were being shown weeks back. Looking at this, and seeing Story of Thor the Japanese version shown, I take it that there is literally zero way of accessing or booting the US version, Beyond Oasis?

 

The Americans get Beyond Oasis, plus Story of Thor in Japanese, plus all the Euro versions of Story of Thor, whereas in Europe we are denied Beyond Oasis?

 

I don't even like the game, I'm just kinda irritated that Sega is telling me I can't have something that the Americans can have.

 

Well, I found Genesis Beyond Oasis and Landstalker - they are in the Traditional Chinese language menu!

 

Can't find US Sonic Spinball in any of them though

Quote

 

eu_en_Sonic_Spinball.bin

eu_eu_Sonic_Spinball.bin

eu_jp_Sonic_Spinball.bin

 

 

I'd assume eu_eu would be a French or German version?

 

 

[Down by Law]

1 minute ago, stefcha said:

You'll be able to put precisely what you want on it at some point, making the whole issue moot.

 

I saw the hacking group had 32X games running already

[Sketch]

2 minutes ago, Down by Law said:

 

Well, I found Genesis Beyond Oasis and Landstalker - they are in the Traditional Chinese language menu!

 

 

Fantastic! Also, how very counter intuitive!

 

But thank you. OK, this has settled it. I'll save the money and get the PAL release.

 

But again, I am unsettled by the number of YouTubers who had early access to this, and all of them utterly failed to do what Down by Law achieved in a single evening. Every one of those YouTube channels has failed, trounced utterly by a lone forum poster. The mind boggles.

[Ketchup]

Youtubers won’t be covering this because 1) such a tiny tiny tiny percentage of people will care and 2) most youtubers are not very knowledgeable about what they’re talking about and only knock out videos for the views rather than spending time researching and verifying everything like some channels do.

[Sketch]

1 minute ago, Ketchup said:

Youtubers won’t be covering this because 1) such a tiny tiny tiny percentage of people will care and 2) most youtubers are not very knowledgeable about what they’re talking about and only knock out videos for the views rather than spending time researching and verifying everything like some channels do.

 

And The Guardian, Ketchup? And Metro? So many websites ran a story and never went into this level of asinine detail. Is there no outlet for those who crave this level of arcane knowledge?

 

I should nickname myself Professor Arcane!

 

I'm probably enjoying this hunt for the truth more than I'll enjoy seeing the machine collect dust on my shelf.

[Fry Crayola]

Well it's sure as fuck not going to be The Guardian or Metro covering the specifics of which region ROMs are available when you set the device to different languages.

 

You just gotta face it - it is esoteric knowledge. Embrace it!

[Rev]

2 minutes ago, Sketch said:

 

And The Guardian, Ketchup? And Metro? So many websites ran a story and never went into this level of asinine detail. Is there no outlet for those who crave this level of arcane knowledge?

 

I should nickname myself Professor Arcane!

 

I'm probably enjoying this hunt for the truth more than I'll enjoy seeing the machine collect dust on my shelf.

 

Why on earth would you think the Metro would give a shit about the background music of Sonic Spinball?

[MW_Jimmy]

36 minutes ago, Sketch said:

 

It might be, the only way to play the NTSC-U version, is to import a Genesis Mini. I ask though, is it worth the import charges?

 

In my view - no. What I quickly thought was which shell am I most likely to want and which pads.

 

It it highly likely that changing the inner workings will end up being pretty trivial and given the different language menus it will likely be able to deal with having different lists of games depending on which you choose - allowing you to leave the stock list alone.

 

BTW changing to Chinese gives you Beyond Oasis.

 

 

[Down by Law]

1 hour ago, Super Craig said:

Here's the ROM list: https://pastebin.com/fyhRNJfj

 

Doesn't look like that they've included separate UK/US versions for every game. I did a quick check on my UK model and changing it to Korean does show US Genesis art (with ERSB ratings) for a few games, but I'd assume that the rest are the Japanese versions.

 

eu_en_Disney_s_Aladdin.bin

 

Disney you Bastards

 

eu_en_Mortal_Kombat_II.bin

 

PEGI 16 wins. Fatality!

[Ketchup]

18 minutes ago, Sketch said:

 

And The Guardian, Ketchup? And Metro? So many websites ran a story and never went into this level of asinine detail. Is there no outlet for those who crave this level of arcane knowledge?

 

I should nickname myself Professor Arcane!

 

I'm probably enjoying this hunt for the truth more than I'll enjoy seeing the machine collect dust on my shelf.

Of course not, if the metro could have gotten away with copy pasting the press release they would have. This information is super niche, is there an audience for it? Yeah of course. Is it a big audience? No. Your best bet is someone like DF retro but even then time is more often than not the limiting factor let alone if they even care about talking about this stuff. It certainly won’t increase their ad revenue enough to spend lots of time on it.

 

But hey maybe you’ve found a niche here, go start a YouTube channel covering stuff like this and you may earn yourself a good fan base!

[DarhkFox]

Huh Aladdin's on this but not accessible?

[Down by Law]

29 minutes ago, Keyboard Koala said:

 

The hell is there a Genesis seal of approval on that box?! 

 

Heh, after the years of crap Atgames has shat out with the Sega branding on it, I guess they felt it was needed.

[Super Craig]

Just now, Darhkwing said:

Huh Aladdin's on this but not accessible?

 

Looks like they were working on a few games that didn't make the cut for whatever reason.

[Down by Law]

Honestly. Between the Mega Drive Mini, the retrobit Mega Drive/Saturn USB controllers, Shenmue III and Streets of Rage 4, I haven't been this happy to be a Sega fan since the early 2000's.

[MW_Jimmy]

Tetris is really interesting. Doesn't follow a lot of the standard rules:

 

- Doesn't follow the 7 bag. You can get the same shape 3 times in a row.

- Cannot slide pieces at the fast speeds

- Cannot hold pieces

- Only see the next piece

- Hard drop present but switched off by default

[NEG]

1 hour ago, Fry Crayola said:

Well it's sure as fuck not going to be The Guardian or Metro covering the specifics of which region ROMs are available when you set the device to different languages.

 

They would be if I was the editor of all these newspapers. 

[Fry Crayola]

I thought you were already the editor of the Daily Sport?

[NEG]

6 minutes ago, Fry Crayola said:

I thought you were already the editor of the Daily Sport?

 

Why? Do they have a SEGA section?

[JohnC]

Oh, the JP tower cart doesn't fit in the EU console. Bloody region locking. But it's fine as long as you have either or both other pieces in between.