Sega Mega Drive Mini II

 

Now it looks almost right!

It arrived, the second mini console from Sega made by M2, the first one I wrote about back in 2020 just before the global pandemic hit all supply chains stopping productions on most things. Now it's 2022 (as of writing) and it looks that the world economy is about to tank after post-pandemic cuts in the welfare states, housing crashing, inflation rising and the Ukraine-Russian war still continues. So why wouldn't I get the console that looks like the one I owned as a kid and let nostalgia surround me and just hide from the world outside? I also spent some time waiting for confirmation of any European pre-order and when it was released I put in the pre-order for it on the British Amazon and got it without problem during my autumn holiday week. Thought I would have some problems with the Brexit deal, but I think I lucked out since then the British government imploded sending the £ falling meaning I might have got it a bit cheaper since the order was in £. Thanks Liz Truss! (Topical Political Humour, the brand of a political scientist)

More serious, what was in the box? The console, some cables and only one controller, but it was a 6-button one, so If I ever want to play Street Fighter I have a perfect controller. The best button is the mode-button which that takes you to the system menu so that you can save your game, restart or get back to the main menu and choose another game. The games then? It has 60 games total, 12 being Sega CD games and 7 being unreleased games (I think, it says presenting on the back but Space Harrier II is on both mini consoles and I don't know why). Not that many games that haven't shown up before in compilations or virtual consoles, especially the CD-games. The only games I got before are Phantasy Star II, Shining Force II, Shining in the Darkness, Sonic CD, Golden Axe II, Alien Soldier and I think I got Ristar on a Sega compilation. They even got ToeJam and Earl 2, famous from the Clan of the Grey Wolf-review!

In actuality, the game selection isn't that grand and I was a bit happier with the first console. There are some omissions that I would have liked, for example the Lunar games, but I understand that it didn't get added for the western release since the owner of the english localisation wanted a bit more payment for the english translation and you got them on the japanese version. As stated in my post on the PC Engine mini console, I would have liked the Sega CD version of Snatcher so that I actually could play it in english. Neat with some of the CD games that I only seen on youtube reviews, like Night Trap and Sewershark... but they look awful. Night Trap I get is re-released not that long ago that makes it look good and probably a better purchase than the original Sega version.

Still, I gotta say I like this song.

Is there anything else that the console does? There is some games that have gotten updates. For example Phantasy Star II that got an easy mode where EXP and gold is given out in higher amounts, diminishing the grind, which makes that probably the best version to play since I've heard that is one of the problems with the original version (that I now own 4 versions of, Wii Virtual Console, PS3 compilation, Switch compilation and now this mini console).

Is there something else? I don't like that the manuals are locked on the web, should have been accessed from the menu so I could read it directly on the console (especially when certain games need it to understand what the hell I'm doing), but didn't happen on the first console either. As mentioned above, I already got the Space Harrier II (and on the Switch compilation as well) and it's a bit of a cop-out with with Ecco CD since they gave me Ecco on the last mini console as well, but that is 2 out of 60 games so I can overlook that. And I assume the CD version have better music. I would say to me I will probably play most games on here before any other version (at least Wii and PS3 due to simpler save functionality and ease off start and quit the console, which goes for all mini consoles, only my Switch would be easier).