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Analogue Co. Mega SG
Post Posted: Sat Nov 10, 2018 10:14 am
https://www.analogue.co/mega-sg/

So, how do we all feel about this?

This thing is emulating the Megadrive/Genesis in hardware via an FPGA. It works with the MegaCD hardware (but not 32X), and apparently every single released for the hardware.
It'll have cartridge adapters available so you can play all Sega's 8bit console games (including GameGear, which I'm pretty darn excited about), and - making it relevant to this community - it ships with an SMS cartridge adapter.

Personally, I think this is amazing. My ex threw out all my old Sega games and consoles a few years back, so this is a great place to start again with minimal fuss about playing the old machines on new TVs and whatnot.
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Analogue Co. Mega SG
Post Posted: Sat Nov 10, 2018 3:27 pm
A hardware implementation instead of a software emulation that plays carts with high compatibility and plugs straight into current TV - that's pretty damn good.

I thought the price tag of $190USD was reasonable as well all things considered.

I checked out a couple of reviews of the Super NT which is the SNES version that came out a year ago and that version performs very well.

Personally, it's not the real thing but this looks so much better than running an emulator on a Pi or something.

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My ex threw out all my old Sega games and consoles a few years back, so this is a great place to start again with minimal fuss about playing the old machines on new TVs and whatnot.


That's cold. Very cold. Unfunkenbelievable even.
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Post Posted: Sat Nov 10, 2018 4:16 pm
Awesome sounding system. But already having a genesis, and an SMS adapter for it, for that price might as well get myself a real sega cd.
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Post Posted: Sat Nov 10, 2018 5:21 pm
I have tried but so far failed to get decent video output from SG-1000 games with their original (pre-SMS/MkIII) color palettes. The Yeno SC-3000 comes closest but its video quality still leaves much to be desired. Maybe this will finally do the trick?

Also their Super NT has unofficial firmware which turns it into a very capable cartridge dumper — quite a bit more compatible than the Retrode2, for instance. Should the Mega SG grow similar capabilities at some point it could become the best way (both most affordable and easiest) to back up & preserve cartridge collections for Sega's 8- and 16-bit systems.
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Post Posted: Sat Nov 10, 2018 6:13 pm
What I would most like to see is if there was a way to make a flashcart for CD games, to bypass the CD reader entirely (as I imagine that is the thing most likely to break down as it ages?).
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Post Posted: Sat Nov 10, 2018 7:01 pm
The biggest deal for me is that it produces digital video, so you get clear graphics on modern TVs. It may be a bit late now (as the attempted fad has passed) but it would be awesome to support 3D games via HDMI to TVs with 3D capability. (Maybe the picture size would ruin the effect though?)
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Post Posted: Sat Nov 10, 2018 10:48 pm
Pre-ordered on the day it was announced :O :P
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Post Posted: Sun Nov 11, 2018 8:29 am
Maxim wrote
It may be a bit late now (as the attempted fad has passed) but it would be awesome to support 3D games via HDMI to TVs with 3D capability. (Maybe the picture size would ruin the effect though?)


This is a brilliant idea.
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Post Posted: Sun Nov 11, 2018 5:48 pm
I love the Analogue.co line of products. Quality built hardware. 100% faith that they will deliver yet another solid product.

I own a silver NT Mini and a clear Super NT. I preordered the Mega SG on day one of their announcements.

It's nice to be able to hook up a console to your TV and not have to worry about cable quality/lag/jailbars/video quality. Yes I know about LCD panels having lag. But scalers will have lag too. If I want to get serious I'll bust out original hardware and use my PVM.

I barely touch my original hardware now that I have these units. Only reason I take them out are for light guns or someone wants to see the original consoles.
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Post Posted: Mon Nov 12, 2018 9:55 am
unfnknblvbl wrote
So, how do we all feel about this?


I want one!
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Post Posted: Mon Nov 12, 2018 11:02 am
If it's anything like versions of the nes and snes, it should be sublime. A friend owns the analogue nes console, and it's quite simple excellent. Beautiful, well-built and works perfectly.

So, yeah, i want one.
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Post Posted: Mon Nov 12, 2018 11:05 am
KingMike wrote
What I would most like to see is if there was a way to make a flashcart for CD games, to bypass the CD reader entirely (as I imagine that is the thing most likely to break down as it ages?).


There is for the Saturn (there's a board/mod you can buy that lets the console read ISOs on a SD card), so i think it may be possible to built something similar for the Sega CD? I never looked into it, but i've never heard of the cd drive failing on the sega cd, however it is a problem with the saturn.
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Post Posted: Mon Nov 12, 2018 2:03 pm
tibone wrote
KingMike wrote
What I would most like to see is if there was a way to make a flashcart for CD games, to bypass the CD reader entirely (as I imagine that is the thing most likely to break down as it ages?).


There is for the Saturn (there's a board/mod you can buy that lets the console read ISOs on a SD card), so i think it may be possible to built something similar for the Sega CD? I never looked into it, but i've never heard of the cd drive failing on the sega cd, however it is a problem with the saturn.


Yeah there's replacement lasers on the market, they use the same exact ones as the neo geo cd model 2.
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Post Posted: Wed Nov 14, 2018 6:29 pm
tibone wrote
KingMike wrote
What I would most like to see is if there was a way to make a flashcart for CD games, to bypass the CD reader entirely (as I imagine that is the thing most likely to break down as it ages?).


There is for the Saturn (there's a board/mod you can buy that lets the console read ISOs on a SD card), so i think it may be possible to built something similar for the Sega CD? I never looked into it, but i've never heard of the cd drive failing on the sega cd, however it is a problem with the saturn.


The ODEs available for the Saturn and Dreamcast basically do just that - they emulate the optical drive units and feed the machine game data from an SD card / USB drive rather than a CD. This can't be done so easily with a Mega CD as it contains other hardware chips which need emulating; it's a extra console unit in its own right.
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Post Posted: Tue Nov 20, 2018 9:33 am
What I'd like to see is an addon unit that you could just stick a slimline optical drive into for MegaCD stuff. With the FPGA, it would (theoretically) just be a case of reprogramming the base unit.

...but we're getting offtopic now.

I really want one, but I'm not so keen as to preorder one just yet (seeing as I have more important things to buy).
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Post Posted: Thu Mar 28, 2019 10:23 am
I only recently became aware of this device, and after seeing youtube reviews it's everything I've ever dreamed of in a Sega console and I definitely want one when I can afford it.
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Post Posted: Fri Mar 29, 2019 1:02 pm
I got a message that my preordered Mega Sg has shipped, so I should be able to post some impressions soon.

My main reason for ordering it was the announced Game Gear support. I‘m just curious why that even works. Is a regular Mega Drive compatible to GG software? I always thought only the SMS VDP was supported?
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Post Posted: Fri Mar 29, 2019 1:11 pm
Kagesan wrote
I got a message that my preordered Mega Sg has shipped, so I should be able to post some impressions soon.

My main reason for ordering it was the announced Game Gear support. I‘m just curious why that even works. Is a regular Mega Drive compatible to GG software? I always thought only the SMS VDP was supported?


It's not supported, GG has bigger palette than Mega Drive. However, I suppose they have "created" a VDP with Mode 0-3 support, Mode 4, Mode 5 and GG mode.
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Post Posted: Sat Mar 30, 2019 12:16 pm
My Mega SG arrived and I had some time to play around with it, so here are some impressions.

Coming from the Super NT I had high expectations, yet the Mega SG actually manages to surpass them. You get a ton of options for tweaking the console's output to your liking, including scaling, scanlines, and the likes. So far the system has worked perfectly with any cartridge I've thrown at it regardless of region. There's a neat auto detect feature for the region, so you don't have to switch them manually if a cartridge has a built-in lockout. My Mega CD II unit slots neatly into the side of the Meg SG, although the tiny console looks a bit lost on top of the bulky CD drive. CDs work as flawlessly as cartridges, although you have to enable CD audio in the system settings. Whay that isn't the default is beyond me. The built-in bonus game is a bit ho-hum, but it's free, so I won't complain.

What's most interesting for us is of course how it handles Sega 8-bit content, and I'm happy to report that again, it played every game I've fed it without any problems. The Mega SG comes with a cartridge adapter for SMS games. More of those are announced for later this year (covering Mark III, Game Gear, Sega MyCard, SG-1000 & SC-3000). Strangely enough, you can access the system options for SMS games only if an SMS game is inserted, but on the plus side that means you can save settings for each mode individually and independently.

The Master System's pause button is mapped to the Mega Drive controller's start button, which is pretty neat, so you don't have to rely on hacks that add this functionality. Games that normally don't work with MD controllers (e.g. Wonderboy in Monsterland) now do.

FM sound is present and automatically activated if the game supports it. So far I haven't found a way to switch back to PSG (unless the FM sound is tied to the region). In SMS mode there's no automatic region detection, you have to switch manually if you need to.

My Master Everdrive works perfectly fine with the Mega SG. I've run SMS Test Suite from it, and interestingly, it identifies the Mega SG as a Game Gear. I've also tried some SG-1000 games to run from the Everdrive (Girl's Garden, Ninja Princess, Super Uwol) and they all worked fine, too. I'm no expert on all things SG-1000, but to me it looks like the Mega SG runs these games with the correct palette instead of the one you get on a Master System.

The handling is great in all modes. Basically, the Mega SG looks, sounds and plays just like the real thing in either mode.


tl;dr: The Mega SG is a great piece of kit. When the announced cartridge adapters are released, it's going to be pretty much the perfect all-in-one solution for playing all pre-Saturn Sega content on a modern TV set.
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Post Posted: Mon Apr 01, 2019 12:30 pm
Kagesan wrote
My Master Everdrive works perfectly fine with the Mega SG. I've run SMS Test Suite from it, and interestingly, it identifies the Mega SG as a Game Gear.


Probably it doesn't support disabling cartridge port (just like the GameGear) via the bit on port $3F.
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Post Posted: Mon Apr 01, 2019 3:54 pm
Kagesan wrote
CDs work as flawlessly as cartridges, although you have to enable CD audio in the system settings. Whay that isn't the default is beyond me.


Per the Ars review, which is well worth a read:

Quote
By default, the Mega Sg mutes any CD audio, because leaving this on can lead to a slight buzzing in standard games.
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Post Posted: Sat Apr 06, 2019 9:04 pm
Does anyone know whether it's possible to switch to the game gear core for a cartridge? I have the RetroFreak Gear Converter but its Game Gear port seems not to work correctly with the Mega SG even after switching to the unofficial firmware — it acts like maybe it's running in SMS mode instead, misinterpreting palette data.

Also, the Game Gear core doesn't seem to accurately emulate the Game Gear's SG-1000 video mode support, so SG2GG conversions won't run. I guess it's not a big deal, though, since no commercial GG games used that mode afaik

Edit: forgot to add that the "square pixels" scaling option is not labelled correctly for the Game Gear core; just choose matching horizontal and vertical factors by hand (e.g. 7x for 1080p) and the aspect ratio will be correct; note that each core stores its settings separately
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Post Posted: Sun Apr 07, 2019 6:49 am
The „square pixel“ option is wrong for SMS mode, too. You need to set both horizontal and vertical scaling to the same factor manually, e.g. to 1024 x 960 for x4 in 1080 p.

It‘s really confusing that the Mega Drive modes add horizontal overscan and SMS and GG modes don‘t.

However, for GG I actually like to set the Mega SG to 6:5 pixels, so you get the Game Gear‘s 4:3 display. In 1080p I chose 960 x 720, whiche gives huge borders, but a nice integer scale of the GG display.
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Post Posted: Sun Apr 07, 2019 4:25 pm
Nice! I'm using the same 6:5 scaling now and it looks pretty authentic, although some of the games (e.g. Puyo Puyo 2) look like they were designed for 1:1 PAR rather than the actual Game Gear screen :P
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Post Posted: Sat Nov 02, 2019 5:51 pm
Just seen this is their next project - https://www.analogue.co/pocket/

Looks interesting for Game Gear fans...
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Post Posted: Tue Nov 05, 2019 2:25 am
Brynaldo wrote
Looks interesting for Game Gear fans...
Drooling...

Still, my enthusiasm is tempered by the fact the extra adapters for the Mega Sg where announced for 2019 but there's still no word on them. Game Gear, Mark III, MyCard...
Edit: I have been reading their Twitter and they haven't answered even once all the questions about release date for the GG or MkIII adapers. I don't mind delays, but stonewalling is not nice...

Btw, do you know if they're based in the US? Their international shipping is a hefty 50$.
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Post Posted: Tue Dec 21, 2021 11:36 pm
BTW after 1.0 fw update which fixes SMS and TMS mode scaling the Pocket is now a pretty decent Game Gear clone

No FM chip in this core of course but still sound seems decent to me

Haven't tried tuner yet but hopes are not very high given how it only sorta works on Mega SG

Pretty cool to finally have a portable GG hardware clone compatible with original cartridges! AFAIK this is the first one
IMG_20211221_151101_753.jpg (3.07 MB)
PS retranslation
IMG_20211221_151101_753.jpg
IMG_20211221_142918_324.jpg (1.43 MB)
Zemina MSX port + SG2GG for palette
IMG_20211221_142918_324.jpg
IMG_20211220_222502_701.jpg (2.69 MB)
GG Aleste II
IMG_20211220_222502_701.jpg

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Post Posted: Wed Dec 22, 2021 12:25 am
Actually TV tuner is not working at all in Pocket and I suspect video signal is misinterpreted as code or bus traffic because sometimes random sounds come out. Usually screen stays black but sometimes entirely white instead. Works fine original GG though so I know the adapter is fine
IMG_20211221_162032_789.jpg (2.95 MB)
Working: GG White model with tuner fed by portable Famiclone
IMG_20211221_162032_789.jpg
IMG_20211221_162201_240.jpg (2.74 MB)
Not working: same but in Pocket
IMG_20211221_162201_240.jpg
IMG_20211221_162220_399.jpg (2.88 MB)
Famiclone shows what it should too
IMG_20211221_162220_399.jpg

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Post Posted: Wed Dec 22, 2021 12:39 am
Also adapters for the cartridge slot seem functional
IMG_20211221_163812_571.jpg (2.72 MB)
A bit ungainly
IMG_20211221_163812_571.jpg

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Analogue Pocket for Game Gear
Post Posted: Wed Dec 22, 2021 3:17 am
Thank you for the tests Bsittler, especially the Master Gear Converter. I was quite interested in this.

May I ask, can it support its own weight? The photo makes me think if you tried to play this on the subway or bus, the Master System cart and converter's weight would end up damaging the Pocket's pins, or the Pocket's Game Gear adapter.

They're still selling the Pocket but delivery is sometime 2023...
https://store.analogue.co/#pocket

I must confess I ordered one because its only real competition is a recapped-refreshed-McWill screen modded Game Gear with an Everdrive, to allow save states. Must-have feature for playing on public transportation. The Pocket allows hibernation (and limited save states too), but *also* using the carts. Huge plus for me.

I was on the fence and then I finally got to see the scanline simulation for Game Gear and was blown away. (Click to see original size.
Source: https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-2021-analogue-pocket-review-th... )

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Post Posted: Wed Dec 22, 2021 4:05 am
I may be in the minority but I found it to be top-heavy (even without any adaptors) and the buttons to be squishy. At that point I said “I’m not sure I’d be getting value out of this device.”
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Post Posted: Wed Dec 22, 2021 5:06 am
For a first attempt at handheld gaming device from a very small team that never made one before, and running the first (or second) software update, it is really quite good. I want the third generation Pocket already ;^)

I sincerely hope this first Pocket iteration is just the first of several good Sega cartridge-compatible handhelds built with modern technology, but I do realize that is more a wish than based in realism. In the meantime I do plan to continue enjoying this one

Jair wrote
Thank you for the tests Bsittler, especially the Master Gear Converter. I was quite interested in this.

May I ask, can it support its own weight? The photo makes me think if you tried to play this on the subway or bus, the Master System cart and converter's weight would end up damaging the Pocket's pins, or the Pocket's Game Gear adapter.

They're still selling the Pocket but delivery is sometime 2023...
https://store.analogue.co/#pocket

I must confess I ordered one because its only real competition is a recapped-refreshed-McWill screen modded Game Gear with an Everdrive, to allow save states. Must-have feature for playing on public transportation. The Pocket allows hibernation (and limited save states too), but *also* using the carts. Huge plus for me.

I was on the fence and then I finally got to see the scanline simulation for Game Gear and was blown away. (Click to see original size.
Source: https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-2021-analogue-pocket-review-th... )


I suspect you will find it worthwhile, and there will be many ready buyers should you decide otherwise. All around I think it is a very nice little machine

It is both top-heavy and loose regardless of what is in the cartridge slot, and the Game Gear adapter is a separate movable piece further increasing the "play" and chance of a mishap. It does not support its own weight reliably in any configuration, and less so with the Game Gear adapter interposed. If you use it in a vehicle, while walking, or even while standing I would recommend temporarily taping it together to avoid converting the expensive FPGA's and screen into tears and ewaste prematurely

Even without a converter for SMS cartridges, just the Game Gear cartridge adapter itself seems very prone to disconnection. Again, tape or some other secure fastener system would be good here. A fastener system with an elastic strap and a button or something could be a solution too. These are all ideas I have not tried yet though

For that matter, even the Game Boy, Game Boy Color, and Game Boy Advance cartridges are prone to accidental disconnection. They chose a much shorter "pocket" for the game cartridge than any of the original consoles used, and the result is far less robust physical support

I suspect a custom Game Gear adapter could be designed that more fully "embraces" the back of the Pocket and locks on to avoid slipping.

For SMS a better design might slot the SMS cartridge in sideways and from behind with multiple case clips to withstand the typical SMS insertion and removal forces, and connect directly to the GBA cartridge slot with no intermediate Game Game adapter stage. Maybe a fan will come forth with a design or commercial offering?

SavagePencil wrote
I may be in the minority but I found it to be top-heavy (even without any adaptors) and the buttons to be squishy. At that point I said “I’m not sure I’d be getting value out of this device.”


I agree with your top-heavy assessment and with your button assessment, though I plan eventually to void my warranty and attempt to replace the rubberized pads for direction cross and action buttons.

Interestingly I found the Start/Select buttons to be extremely accurate and not mushy at all. I think they probably used a decent microswitch design for those instead

I ran an interactive pad tester my children and I homebrewed some years back for Game Boy Color, and it looks like the direction pad is very prone to "slipping" errors where it will either register a spurious diagonol input, or fail to register any input at all.

I suspect a pad replacement could help somewhat, as it often does with these errors on SNES controllers and clones. Also in my past experience with such controllers otherwise identical controllers purchased at the same time from the same source would sometimes vary wildly in accuracy. The rubberized dome switches are just not very good if dependable accuracy is the goal

I will likely cause offense with this, but probably worth sharing an any case: from my perspective Analogue's dpad and buttons are a sad compromise between modern design and nostalgia and end up being slightly worse than original DMG model Game Boy inputs and slightly better than the best Game Gear I've had the pleasure of using. Low bars... :-/

A better solution for me, but less likely to tickle the nostalgic fancy of Ni****do or Sega collectors, would use the same microswitch sensing they already seem to use for start/select for everything else too. Even more ideal would be swappable modular controls a la Switch or GPD XP so you could make it actually have the right inputs for whichever old handheld you fancy, or a decent modern set if you prefer accuracy to nostalgia. Also I have no idea how to cram such an arrangement into the limited space without adding side controller rails of some sort

Likewise the display is good but I suspect in a few years some kind of LED panel will be a far better replacement.

Even other LCD panels are more vibrant and have less backlight bleed. As an aside, I have a Unihertz Titan phone with a thumboard which happens to be about the same width and height as the Pocket and on which I use SMS, Game Gear, Game Boy, Game Boy Advance, and SMS emulators using WASD+KL button mappings, and honestly the Titan has a much larger, crisper, brighter display than the pocket despite slightly lower screen resolution (9x scale factor for Game Boy original generation instead of 10x like Pocket) and shockingly even has more reliable control using WASD mappings than the Pocket with its rubberized buttons and dpad. Of course it's emulation and not FPGA core and cannot read a physical cartridge without an external USB devide (Retrode 2 etc.) and even then likely not fast enough to feed an emulator, but I was still a bit saddened to realize my phone is accidentally a better Game Boy than the Pocket as far as screen visibility and input accuracy goes

Please don't take this wrong, I do love the Pocket and plan tokeep using it and following first-party and hoped-for third-party developments for it with interest. Overall I do find Pocket a pleasing console, and it is good in places where the aging originals are decidedly less so, and clearly there is still room for further improvement
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Post Posted: Wed Dec 22, 2021 5:18 am
Jair wrote
Brynaldo wrote
Looks interesting for Game Gear fans...
Drooling...

Still, my enthusiasm is tempered by the fact the extra adapters for the Mega Sg where announced for 2019 but there's still no word on them. Game Gear, Mark III, MyCard...
Edit: I have been reading their Twitter and they haven't answered even once all the questions about release date for the GG or MkIII adapers. I don't mind delays, but stonewalling is not nice...

Btw, do you know if they're based in the US? Their international shipping is a hefty 50$.


The adapters were available, at least briefly. I bought (and received) a set. They work great on my Mega SG, including the replacement fixed Game Gear adapter. They seem like a decent manufacturer who stands by their work and replaces it when there is a problem discovered after sale.

However if you mean another round of ordering, your guess is as good as mine...

I do not know where they are based for hardware shipping purposes, though I think their software development teamis based in the US. Their shipping to destinations in the US is not really cheap either. I recently ordered a second Pocket Game Gear adapter and the shipping nearly doubled the price
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Post Posted: Wed Dec 22, 2021 6:32 am
Thanks for your reports, really interesting.

While I'm not hugely interested in the Pocket apart from Lynx emulation, I do love my Super NT and Mega SG.

The new PCE thingy looks promising, but I refuse to buy another product from them until they fix the FM sound for the SG's Master System mode, so probably …never.
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Post Posted: Wed Dec 22, 2021 6:52 am
Kagesan wrote
Thanks for your reports, really interesting.

While I'm not hugely interested in the Pocket apart from Lynx emulation, I do love my Super NT and Mega SG.

The new PCE thingy looks promising, but I refuse to buy another product from them until they fix the FM sound for the SG's Master System mode, so probably …never.


It does run Pigarus very well, what's not to like? ;^)

I suspect good FM will come if and when the hardware is more open-sourced or reverse-engineered and the FM cores from other projects are ported, assuming that is even somehow possible

I am also looking forward to the promised PCE, Lynx and Neo Geo Pocket adapters! I have modded GT, Neo Geo Pocket Color, and Lynx with fairly usable screens, but that hardware is all quite old and finicky at this point and having a modern screen could be a huge improvement. Also unlike Lynx the Analogue Pocket can actually fit in the pocket of clothing I own. Even for GT pocketability was a stretch, that was a very thick "handheld" indeed. The NGPC is actually close in size to Analogue Pocket but mine likes to power itself off whenever I start Sonic

Also looking forward to the Duo. I use SSDS3 in a PC Engine but those particular original consoles self-destruct far too readily for my taste. I have a small stack of them that destroyed themselves during normal operation

(I also use Mega SG, Super NT, and NT Mini Noir and like them very much. So my judgment may be questionable here.)
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Post Posted: Thu Dec 23, 2021 6:06 am
Thank you very much for your detailed review, Bsittler.
It also helps temper my expectations.


Kagesan wrote
until they fix the FM sound for the SG's Master System mode
It's broken? I though the only problem was you can't manually select PSG sound instead of FM.
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Post Posted: Thu Dec 23, 2021 7:01 am
Jair wrote
Kagesan wrote
until they fix the FM sound for the SG's Master System mode
It's broken? I though the only problem was you can't manually select PSG sound instead of FM.


It's very broken. Sound-wise it's fine, but it drops notes seemingly at random, so any piece of music it plays becomes a mess.
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Post Posted: Thu Dec 23, 2021 7:14 am
Wow, pity. Even more since I understand there's no elegant way to select PSG sound, you need to set the console as European or American.

I really hope they would patch it in the future. Possibly an FPGA's biggest selling point is that patches by definition update the hardware, not simply the firmware.
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Post Posted: Thu Dec 23, 2021 9:35 am
A bit late to the party but are these Mega SGs any cop? I want to run master system games and possibly Mark III.
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Post Posted: Thu Dec 23, 2021 4:18 pm
8BitBoy wrote
A bit late to the party but are these Mega SGs any cop? I want to run master system games and possibly Mark III.


They are good but not perfect. If you can get one with the adapter set it will indeed play SMS and Mark III games. Whether the accuracy is good enough for your purposes I cannot answer

Also should mention the Game Gear core in the Pocket doesn't support TMS video modes at all when in GG mode, only when in SMS mode. And when in SMS mode it uses a fixed color palette similar to the SG-1000 rather than an editable one like a real GG or an ugly one more like the SMS and Mark III. In my opinion the end result looks better than any of Sega's later 8 bits and it is certainly more compatible than a real GG since no "*2GG" patching is needed.

If you have a GG EverDrive and some SG-1000 game cartridge dumps on there it is quite playable.

If you have actual SG-1000 or Mark III cartridges you need to build an adapter because right now it is not commercially available. The resulting adapter or adapter tower will definitely be less portable than a Pocket normally would be. Also no FM

I suspect Mega SG with adapters is the simplest all around but not in any way portable and as mentioned cores are not perfect
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Post Posted: Thu Dec 23, 2021 4:21 pm
One more note: Pocket didn't (as of current firmware update) have any way to choose region that I could find. You may need to force the region by patching ROM's
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Post Posted: Fri Jul 28, 2023 12:12 pm
To some of you this might be old news, but Analogue released a bunch of firmware updates not long ago, including one for the Mega SG (after close to two years). According to the release notes, this includes some SMS-specific fixes.

Unfortunately, SMS FM-sound is still broken.
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Post Posted: Sun Jul 30, 2023 9:13 am
Thanks for the heads-up Kagesan.
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Post Posted: Sat Aug 05, 2023 6:27 am
Kagesan wrote
To some of you this might be old news, but Analogue released a bunch of firmware updates not long ago, including one for the Mega SG (after close to two years). According to the release notes, this includes some SMS-specific fixes.

Unfortunately, SMS FM-sound is still broken.




Never updated mine but should probably get round to doing so. Looks easy enough with an SD card.

I've never had any issues with FM sound, is that one specific games?
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Post Posted: Sat Aug 05, 2023 6:55 am
No, all games with FM sound are affected. It sounds fine, but it just randomly misses notes that are simply not played for whatever reason.
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