Sega Mark III

[Nightstar699]

From the NTSC-U copy I used to have, I'd have to say it does not have any notable flicker that I remember, so I'd guess the JP version is the same.

[DahrenDreamcast]

Spent a good 6 hours of today reading and watching videos to do with Mark III and Japanese Master System.
I'm quite content that it would make a lovely compliment along side my famicom  

I do think i'll get the FM add on though...
Post Merge: October 25, 2015, 07:05:32 pm
Couple of quick ones...on the Card Game, Sega Seishun Scandal My Hero, I've seen some boxed copies the colour pink and some red...is that two different versions, or is Pink Sun Faded..(edit...I managed to find this earlier http://www.smspower.org/Lists/SMSAllJ and that game falls under red card.....)

May I ask, what is a fair enough price for the original super wonder boy (not finding much out about this title) out of the games I've looked at today...

[zmaster18]

I also want to get a Mark III, as well as an SG-1000 II and a SC-3000. Lately I've been obsessed with 8 bit SEGA stuff!

And by the way, the BASIC on the SC-3000/SG-1000 is more complex than Family BASIC on Famicom. BASIC on Sega has like 10x the amount of free memory, there is upper/lower case type,  you can use decimal numbers, there's more math functions like sin cos tan, and you can actually draw lines, curves, and shapes with a command. There is no built-in graphics like Famicom BASIC though. But I think with Sega BASIC you can actually create your own sprites and BG tiles by coding them in.

I think owning both the western Master System and the Japanese one is ideal. Both systems have different-sized cart slots and both have pretty different libraries of games for each region! I hear that there are cartridge adapters for cross-region play, but these adapters are friggin hard to find.

I also like your Family BASIC setup in your pic. Looks very similar to my setup. I'm so glad you're enjoying it, we need more programmers on this forum!   

[DahrenDreamcast]

I definitely wont move into sega basic until I grasp family basic more....I should be able to spend more time with it now I've cut out consoles, which was part of the plan too :-)

Thank you for nice words Zman :-)

[zmaster18]

I also won't touch it until I have more experience with Family BASIC.

Fun Fact: Did you know that the creator of Pokemon used to use Family BASIC in his youth before creating a game for the Famicom called Quinty?

[DahrenDreamcast]

I did not & I love things like that 

[L___E___T]

Quick note - unless you care about the SG1000 stuff, I would definitely suggest going for a Megadrive converter, or a Mega Everdrive which will play all Master System / MKIII titles.

MegaDrive can natively output RGB, and there is an FM Sound solution in the works as well.  Rama has one for sale if you're already decided!  http://www.famicomworld.com/forum/index.php?topic=11880.0

[Cheetahmen]

I have an MD Everdrive, but I own a model 2 Master System and a bunch of the best games for it so I dunno whether to keep those. I mostly use the MS controller for playing my Atari 2600 cause I'm odd like that.

[zmaster18]

I used to have a North American Master System back in high school and it was actually kind popular among my group of friends at the time. One time at my friend's house, I was looking around in his basement and noticed a clear-blue N64 on a box. I said "Woah! Do you have any other old game stuff?" He said yes and showed me the inside of a cabinet and at the back was a Master System. He didn't really know what it was, but said it was his dad's. It had the Light Phaser along with After Burner, Great Golf, and Great Baseball.

I told him how cool it was to have all that and asked if I could set it up on the TV where his xbox 360 was. We started playing and found out it had Hang On/Safari Hunt built-in! We played the shit out of these 2 games. Hang On only had the one course, but it actually took a few weeks of hanging out after school to finally master the game on all 3 difficulty settings. Playing Safari Hunt was also a blast. It is a much better game than Duck Hunt in every way. The game has 3 different screens, lots of variety of animals to shoot, a catchy song that plays between levels that my friend would dance to, and a balanced score system that has a perfectly smooth difficulty curve.

Great Golf wasn't as good as NES Golf. We only played it once or twice. Great Baseball is better than NES Baseball, but we played NES baseball just as much (when we were at my house). Great Baseball has great graphics, more music, smoother animation, and better control over the players. And our favorite part of the game is when you get a foul ball, it sounds like "FAAHH!!". We used to find that hilarious!

I eventually got one at a thrift store chain in Canada called Value Village. I also bought a NES there with Mario/Duck Hunt and Mario 3 for $5 and then sold it to my friend for $30 (and then I learned about selling video games...    ) He eventually started playing NES and N64, but was mostly a Call of Duty 360 player like everybody else in high school.

My best friend/sidekick in high school also had a Master System from Value Village. It didn't work when a game was inserted in the cart slot, but worked fine with the card slot and built-in Snail Maze game. He gave it to me for free with Quartet, which is a fun game for the Sega. I was only 16 when he gave it to me, so I didn't really know what I was doing. I tried reflowing the solder on some dull points on the board, but instead somehow broke it. If I had it now, I would have just used a metal file inside the cartridge slot to shine up the metal contacts.

[2A03]

I hear that there are cartridge adapters for cross-region play, but these adapters are friggin hard to find.

There's several available on eBay and Aliexpress right now that will allow you to play American/European games on a Japanese system, they're not exactly hard to find any more. Adapters for the opposite (playing Japanese games on an American or European system) are non-existent because the BIOS will block out SG-1000 games and some Mark III games.

[DahrenDreamcast]

Perhaps not wise starting this when I have to be up for work in 5 hours!
(early starts)

[P]

I know how you feel. Congrats on getting the Mark III!

[L___E___T]

Looks great!  Always wanted one myself - that JoyPad...

[chowder]

That's really very nice, congratulations

I never got in to anything pre-Megadrive Sega wise, looks like there were some good titles though.  The Master System was more popular than the NES in the UK if I remember correctly, a few of my friends had them.  The re-designed model 2 was fugly, but the Mark III is definitely the best looking of the lot.

[L___E___T]

 

Master System got a good grip here thanks to smart advertising and marketing.  We had one in the house and it was incredible.  
I got my little brother The Ninja and Operation Wolf for Christmas, plus we had Asterix at one point as well and Castle of Illusion and of course it came with Alex Kidd in Miracle World.

In contrast, my little sister had a MK1 given to her by a friend some years later - though I liked the diagram on the console, I do remember thinking the MK2 looked way cooler and was much better.  
Funny how you see things differently as a child, there's no comparison now.  

We still had those consoles until about 8 years ago I think, as sadly there was a huge (and I mean huge) flood and everything in the basement got wrecked.  Dreamcast, MS, C64, all sorts.