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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 27 มิ.ย. 2024
- Sega didn’t have a lot of luck in the home console market in their early years. They released the SG-1000 in Japan but it failed to compete with the Famicom. They brought the Master System over to the US, but once again, they couldn’t beat Nintendo. So what about the Game Gear? A lot of people put that in the same category as the Master System or SG-1000, but does it deserve to be? Or did this console actually do alright?
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Part 1 (Master System):
• Better Hardware Does N...
Chapters:
0:00 Introduction
1:15 Master System and Genesis
2:32 Development of Game Gear
3:43 Game Gear vs Game Boy
4:50 Games
8:34 Third Party Support
9:56 Issues
11:38 Conclusion
12:20 Outtro
Special thanks to the following users from pexels.com for the stock footage:
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Special thanks to streambeats.com for the music used in this video.
#sega #gamegear #sonic - เกม
As a kid I remember my cousin had both the Gameboy and the Game Gear. I had neither until Majesco rereleased the GG later on. Mine was always plugged in when playing. That battery life was brutal.
I remember having Shinobi, and Mortal Kombat for it. For me it was mostly a dust collector until I got the Master System adapter. Seeing R-Type on the small screen was impressive even with the flicker.
it cannot be understated that the battery life of the Game Gear at the time was an absolute no-win situation. Most people I knew who had one, including myself, just opted to plug it into a wall than actually waste batteries on it, which kinda killed the entire point of the Game Gear being a truly portable system; and why the seemingly "inferior" GameBoy was the more popular option.
Yeah, 3-5 hours vs 30 hours is a huge difference.
@@pojr I was a Game Gear kid in the 90's, and 5 hours on AA never happened, I think the most I ever got on AA turning down the brightness was close to 4 hours, but on the official SEGA external battery pack, and the DOCS branded battery pack when they were new I remember getting around 5 hours with the brightness turned down, but my parents also made sure I had a wall adapter, and the car adapter as they got tired of buying batteries. So yeah SEGA using a CFL lit screen really was it's best, and worst feature. Still it's a very underrated awesome little handheld that's great to emulate on an Android tablet, or Android Phone with Sonic 1 on the Game Gear being some of my favorite gaming music to this very day.
I bought a Game Gear while I was in the Army and since I worked Class 9 supply, batteries were never a problem. I had the Master System adapter and bought a lot of master systems games on discount. Great times.
I remember my buddy in school having a Game Gear then and thought it was cooler than Gameboy with being in color. What really blew my mind is when he plugged in the TV tuner. I really liked the TV tuner on my Turbo Express but ergonomically the Game Gear was more comfortable. Everyone had a Gameboy in those days, but a Game Gear and Turbo Express made you much cooler on the block.
Thank you for showing what the games ACTUALLY looked like on the system itself as this is lost when the games are emulated and in a lot of cases broke the game.
Very true! And it wasn't easy to record that footage either.
I'm glad you noticed cause unlike the Sega Master System to which the Game Gear hardware was based on, even though the SMS is region lock between PAL and NTSC, the Game Gear was never region lock so all GG games run at 60hz no matter what. This is why when Sega decided to bring their 8-Bit games to the modern era, they mostly choose the Game Gear version despite some had SMS versions such as Sonic 2, Streets of Rage 1 & 2, and Sonic Chaos. The reason for not using the SMS versions was due to that 50hz/60hz regional differences. While some SMS games are in 60hz since they got Japanese and US versions, games like Sonic 2, Sonic Blast, and Sonic Chaos were only ever released in Europe and Brazil, both of which are PAL territories and only support 50hz. Porting those to modern platforms could had some performance issues despite the better aspect presentation of those games.
Had one when they came out. External battery pack, magnifying screen, TV adapter, and a master system game adapter. Loved it. The master system adapter was by far the best peripheral.
Same here, I had both the official SEGA battery pack, and a Docs branded 3rd party battery pack along with the car adapter, screen magnifier, and the official carry bag, as back in the 90's my family loved to vacation, and go camping, so lots of time in the car/truck to kill. Good times ☺
Sega wasn't necessarily "lenient" on EA. EA reverse engineered the Genesis and started releasing unlicensed Genesis games. EA did this until Sega gave them a big discount with their licensing.
Not 100 percent true.
EA reversed engineered the Genesis and was going to go ahead without Sega license. They even told Sega this. Sega had no choice ro relent on their license fee and allowed EA to manufacture their own carts. There are zero unlicensed EA games for the Genesis/Mega Drive.
Hey congrats on 10k subs. Next up 100k and you will get there because this is a stellar channel. Keep up the good work.
I went all in on the Game Gear back then and you were right the screen, even though backlit and color was not that good. It beat using one of those game magnifying lights on the GameBoy though.
The funny thing is that people keep complaining about the game gear’s battery life but it’s still better than the switch
Yeah NO, I was an actual Game Gear kid in the 90's getting it at near launch as my Christmas gift with the pack in of Sonic the Hedgehog 1.0 also getting the pack in thank you for being an early adopter of a free game from a set list you could check off(I randomly got sent Columns), along with a free SEGA Visions Magazine subscription, but the most I can ever remember getting out of 6 fresh AA batteries back then was close to 4 hours, and on the official SEGA external battery pack was maybe 5 with the brightness turned down, same for the DOCS branded battery pack, which is why my parents bought me multiple AC adapters, and the official 12v adapter for car trips.
It's not better than switch cause you can't play games when the battery runs out. With the Switch at least you could dock it and play on the TV while it's charging. Also Switch is a home console too so it's unfair to compare Game Gear to it. A home console multiplayer support is different from a dedicated handheld.
6:53 that’s a stretch to say jam looks 16bit. It’s good but the snes and genesis versions are a huge step up
These videos on the Game Gear from different TH-camrs almost aggravate me, because I had a Game Gear growing up, and it was one of my biggest regrets. Most of my friends had GameBoys. I did the research, and spent the entire summer mowing lawns to save up money and buy the superior product. The problem was, there was only one store that stocked Game Gear titles, and that was Toys R Us, and my local store only ever had like a dozen titles before they stopped carrying them. Truthfully, until a few years ago, I thought the entire library for the Game Gear was like 25 titles. Being 12 and this being the 90s, its not like I could go anywhere else to get the titles. Its like all they ever carried was Sonic 2 (which I had, and still as an adult cannot get past the first stage - the hit detection was awful), Columns, Echo, Mickey Mouse and like a Baseball game. This was part of the problem - Nintendo didn't just have contracts with game makers, they had contracts with stores as well. Then the thing was awful on batteries, and rechargables at the time had horrible battery life, so if you DID have rechargable batteries, you got like 1.5, maybe 2 hours out of it. I felt cheated, and that's not the last time that happened to me. The Game Gear was my first Sega console I bought. My parents did give us a Genesis for Christmas in like 93 (we already had a Super Nintendo, I think my parents were wanting all the Disney games for my younger siblings), but the next console I bought was the Saturn. Same issue - couldn't find software anywhere, one of the games had a bug where it was impossible to get past the second or third stage, and shortly after I bought it, it was discontinued.
I know how you feel, I bought a TG16 in 1991 at Toy R Us for $99 bucks with two free games. It was my first console I bought with saving money from my first job, I did not know that Toys R Us were giving them away with lack of sales and a few years later they also quit carrying the games. No one had TG16 in the Southeast especially in boondock Ga. and would of had a better chance on the west coast but TG16 overall did poorly in sales in the US. I mean TG16 in my area was only carried at Toys R Us. No were else but Baggage's which became GameStop years later but was a broom closet in the mall and only had 1 used TG16 game if lucky. I racked up on the CD Rom and a few games when another used game store opened in the mall in 96 but closed within a year and was without any games. Man I loved the console but if I only had a few more bucks I would had bought a Genesis or patience would had waited for SNES but probably could not afford those with being a new system.
There's a reason why you couldn't find Saturn games in retail and that's Sega's own fault. They stealth launch the Sega Saturn at selected retailers earlier than their plan September launch without telling any retailers about it so those retailers that was not inform such as KB Toys and Wal-Mart refused to carry Saturn games and products.
Congrats on finally hitting 10.000 subscribers! :D
As a Sega gamer, I personally prefer the Game Gear to the Game Boy for the GG's bright, beautiful color, brighter backlit screen, and line of Sega games, including the Sonic the Hedgehog games. Last year, I bought a modded Game Gear off eBay that had modern capacitors for enhanced picture and sound and ran on rechargeable batteries (to charge it, you needed a USB-C cable).
Congratulations on 10k subs!
Thank you so much!
gamegear was always a weird one in my book, some great games but it hindered a lot by batteries and hardware issues. Great video!
Congrats on reaching 10k subs!!
Thank you so much!
Thank you so much!
10k subs! Rad as hell my man
Thank you so much!
Awesome content! Thank you!
CONGRATS ON 10K SUBS!
Thank you so much!
Yeah! 10.1K subscribers ;) because your content is awesome!
Suggestion: reserve the word “clone” for nearly identical copies. Fantasy Zone is at most a Defender-style game. Not a clone.
What's the music playing in background at "Conclusion" section? Good video, btw!
Game Gear's biggest issue was battery life, and price. Because of this, it just wasn't in demand, and finding a selection of games for it back then was kinda difficult.
I also hated how big it was, and as a kid, with small hands, it just wasn't for me.
GameBoy was just cheaper, more efficient on batteries, and had a much larger library. The screen was not the best, but this was kinda rectified with GB Pocket and GB Color.
Nonetheless, Game Gear was still an ok product. It just had too many technical issues.l, and parents weren't buying it for their kids like they were for Game Boy.
Oh congrats on getting 10,000 subs!
You made it man! 10k and counting!
I remember having a Game Gear. I even had the tv antenna.
My introduction to the Game Gear was at an allergist’s office as a child. I need a full back panel done, and they handed me a GG with Sonic. I wasn’t any good at the game, never have been with Sonic, but it was a nice way to keep me distracted.
Nowdays is clear that strong hardware doesn't mean better console. Wii and Switch sold much more than Playstation and Xbox. But at that time wasn't that clear.
Very true.
A great console is just an interesting fact if players can't actually afford purchasing one. Which is why the Game Boy, Wii, and Switch were so popular in comparison with the competition - they're intentionally less capable than the competition specifically to hit low retail prices in return.
@@csolisr Price is not the only factor, but the hardware needs to have games on it people actually want to play, plus if you ask the average person who is not technically minded they don't really care about the specs, they just want it to have the games they want to play, and that they run well enough that they are not a chug fest, or filled with bugs, and glitches.
But Nintendo is great at doing more with less
@@ShytPump For the most part that is true, unless we look at the late NES, and the SNES eras where they had to keep adding various helper chips to their games to keep current till they released the N64.
Now you can buy a modded game gear that fixes the screen and battery issue, actually considering buying one of those in the future.
I agree with your points about games making a console but I’m still glad I got an Atari Lynx. It really was something to behold back then. The PC Engine GT was even more incredible.
The game boy, with its lack of background lighting, was abysmal.
I liked my Atari Lynx a lot more.
First Nintendo mobile console that I really liked was the DSi.
Never had a Game Gear though, as a Sega Fan.
I had a Game Gear as a kid. Most Game Gear users had battery packs that gave us 10 hours of play, or rechargeable batteries (two sets to swap out). I also had the TV tuner which you didn't mention, or the screen magnifyer. I think price was more of an issue. Game Gear. Games and accessories were more expensive. Game Boy cost almost half as much, so more people got them. Game Gear was in all ways superior. Most just couldn't get their parents to buy it when Game Boy costs a lot less.
The best GameGear games are Space Harrier, and Galaga 91. I want to get Super Space Invaders eventually.
We had a game gear with the sms adapter and I think I only ever used the game gear unplugged one time in a car. Taking that thing to school would have meant it getting stolen for sure. I never saw anyone at my school bring a gameboy(or game gear).
Majesco Sega GameGear is supposedly better than the original in some ways, and worse in others. Better Capacitors, maybe better battery life and LCD screen, no Master-Gear adapter compatibility. Personally I recommend the Coleco Sonic/Playpal GameGear/Master System handheld, and the GameGear Micro, these devices are more power efficient, and have better LCD screens. Whether you use an actual GameGear or Coleco Sonic/Playpal or GameGear Micro, using rechargeable Ni-Mh batteries is an option.
Had one when they were fairly new and it was super cool having a color portable at the time, but mainly stuck by a wall socket. Never used a DC adapter on car trips but really should have in retrospect, I couldn't even make it a few levels into Sonic Triple Trouble before my batteries died. Still a novelty to play a game at night in the car. I'd never played Master System games at the time so rather than that comparison it always just seemed like a suckier version of Genesis titles which was mostly fine but not fooling anyone. I ended up with a Nomad later though and promptly forgot my Game Gear existed. Same issues for the most part and even worse battery as I recall, but playing actual Sonic and Knuckles + Sonic 3 in the car? Couldn't top that at the time!
I own a game gear with an handful of games...lcd screens and bad caps are an issue but otherwise a very cool machine...almost as ahead of the time as the atari linx. ..
It was the battery life. I love my GG but I mostly played it plugged in. It wouldn’t even last a 3 hr drive. For all its flaws the game boys battery was the difference maker. I love what it had but I can’t deny this was this and the Nomads main flaw
it's because they both used CFL lit screens which take a lot of power considering it's a mobile device(best tech we had at that point in time for even lighting), a modded Game Gear with an LED backlit screen, and internal lithium packs, or rechargeable Lithium AA batteries can get about 9 - 12 hours of playtime depending on how bright the screen is. Even with the official external SEGA battery pack, and DOCS battery pack the most I ever got when they were new was maybe 5 with the brightness turned down, so my parents made sure I had a couple wall adapters for charging both batteries, and playing at home, and a 12v adapter for long car trips.
@@CommodoreFan64 interesting. Always wondered if they held out on the Nomad if they could have gotten to that point.
I wish sega had more focus on solving the battery instead of pushing the genesis two add-ons.
Sure the Game Gear had color, and a backlit screen, but it suffered heavily in software. One of it's games, Bubble Bobble, one of my most favorite games, was just the SMS port shrunk down, and since I own the SMS version boxed, I'd have no need for a GG. I had a brick GB, gave it to my brother, had a GBC, stupidly gave it to my sister, and I have a first model GBA (with a desire for a GBA SP for my GB Color games that won't play on a DS, nor a Super Game Boy, so that I can actually see the games as the first GBA's really didn't have great screens, but the GBA SP has a nice backlit screen).
i loved my gamegear and impressing my friends who only had gameboy.. but then the games on the gameboy seemed to be getting better while the gamegear went stagnate. gameboy pocket came out with Donkey Kong Land, Killer Instinct, and games i had missed out on since i didnt have snes.. It was still a black and white system but was enough for me to sell my Gamegear in favor of Gameboy.. was cool when it lasted though.
I didnt know about Sonic Blast back when I had GG. That would have impressed me.
I remember that this was the coveted handheld of the dentist's office.
I just wanted to mention that the GBA does a fantastic job emulating the Game Gear. With the screen and battery life of a GBA-SP or NDS, Game Gear Games look amazing compared to the original screen.
Pojr, I am not criticizing you needlessly, but the quality of an original Game Gear screen _today_ is nothing like an original Game Gear screen within five years of being manufactured: they are simply worn out -and, yes, you could add the complaint that they're not built to last 30+ years, but even (rugged) arcade hardware isn't built to last 30+ years (I was at an arcade museum recently and a lot of those screens, too, now look terrible, if you're not willing to replace them).
I just wanna say something on third party support. The Game Gear may have had third party support towards the end of it's lifespan but the quality of games took a massive hit as Sega were not making them in-house themselves. The Master System had almost no third party support but the quality of the games was really good. Example there is a game called ''Taz-Mania'' on the Game Gear it is developed and published by a third party and the game play and music is horrible! Where as the Master System version has great game play and great music as it was developed by Sega themselves. This kind of example happened a lot during that era. Having third party support a lot of the time means crappy third party games as that level of quality was often overtaken by quantity. Same thing happened with the Mega Drive/Genesis too towards the end. Nearly every western game was a mediocre experience compared to what was coming right out of the horses mouth in Japan.
Great video Pojr. Like your content subbed.
There were a lot horrible games being made for the genesis once the gem sound driver was made in 1991.
In the end, it's not about better hardware, but better gameplay. 😉
100% true!!
Had Sega made a Pokémon competitor for the Game Gear then I could see the GG lasting a few more years perhaps even til the launch of the Game Boy Advance. Oh the miss opportunity that could had been, Sega killed the Game Gear way too soon.
I've been a Nintendo person since the release of the NES. But yet I wonder what would have been if Nintendo hadn't managed to manipulate the market into serving only them. The SMS and SGG were both technically superior to their Nintendo counterparts. And there was so much talent out there that maybe if third parties weren't contracted to Nintendo Sega may have come out ahead. But on the other note it was Nintendo's in-house library that made the pedestal they were perched upon. So who knows?
The Sega Game Gear was launch after the Nintendo third party contract debacle so when it launch the bound to contract from third party doesn't exist anymore. The only reason the Game Gear doesn't had that many third party support was cause third parties were too focus on Sega's other hardware such as the Sega CD, Sega 32X, and Sega Genesis. The sheer amount of platforms out there means not many 3rd party devs had the time to release waterdown versions of their games for the Game Gear, to some they simply port a colorize Game Boy version to the GG instead. The only few that did make exclusives to the Game Gear manage to do so quite interestingly such as the incredible Mighty Morphin Power Rangers games.
The Sega Game Gear released from 1990-1992. It was the definition of painfully average and I don't know if it was successful in Japan, North America, Europe, and Australia.
thanks to modding, the game gear is even better.
Yeah some of the mods that allow you to play the Game Gear on a TV screen are really cool. Would have been cool if there were an official way to do this.
But it's already too late. Nowadays you could play Game Gear games on everything already.
The smile only a mother could love.
Game Gear may have had 4-5 hour life on some of those fancy premium Energizer/Duracell batteries but think my parents were buying those when they realized I ate through them? Nah, dollar store bulk packs and I was lucky to get 3hrs on those. Hope you like never beating a game, most didn't have save or password features
We had those toxic NiCd batteries at that time. You can recharge them.
Problem with an advanced and powerfu,l stystem being portable especially back then is the battery life is short. There was a reason the Gameboy was as simple as it was.
I'm thinking back and I *never* saw anyone take their gameboy or game gear to school or even outside. They were always at home. Nintendo had the upper hand with titles in general but as a kid we didn't really care about those things. It was just amazing playing games on the nes/sms etc. The only exception I remember was someone had an atari 2600 I think it was and we played it for 10 minutes or so and went outside. It's just weird thinking about how little we actually spent inside playing games compared to being outside.
Game Boy batteries last longer cause Nintendo used a non-backlit dot matrix screen for their original handheld. Dot matrix screen originally only runs on CMOS battery which was used in calculator and only last around 20 hours. Through four AA batteries, that double the Game Boy's battery life by 20 more hours making the handheld last a whopping 40 hours. When Nintendo upgrade the Game Boy to Game Boy Pocket and Game Boy Light, they no longer used a dot matrix screen and instead used LCD monochrome which support two AAA batteries which reduce the battery to only last 15 hours. Had they stick with dot matrix even longer the battery lifespan would had remain close to the same.
the screen really let the game gear down.
It so does
Nomad video when?
If only Nomad was much more than just a portable Sega Genesis.
Sad story SEGA consoles were all ahead had far better hardware up to DreamCast.
The DreamCast was miles ahead the PS2 only missing a DVD drive. Saturn was ahead of the PS1. Etc...
As a europe active programmer with 40 years of experience contracts and exclusives can kill good hardware.
Saturn could have had a chance to kill competition if the Tomb Raider deal ran 100%, it didn't. DreamCast missed EA. Etc...
The Saturn wasn't ahead of the PS1, it was behind it. PS1 had full 3D capability whereas Saturn doesn't and only used software trickery to make games look like 3D when it's really not. Dreamcast was the only one that's ahead of its time but even so it threw away a lot of what the Saturn got right.
@@VOAN You are wrong. The Saturn was far superior to the PSX, especially in terms of compute power. The PSX was the weakest console of this generation, lagging behind Sega and Nintendo's N64.
I had Sega consoles from the Mega Drive to the Dreamcast.
While the Mega Drive was initially inferior to the SNES, it had CD support which allowed for much bigger games.
The console era ended when the PC became ubiquitous (those things were really expensive in the 80ies and beginning of 90ies) and CD drive, sound card and 3D accelerator became standard.
Now most consoles are PC clones with a custom OS.
Now I still keep a Switch around for mobile gaming and a Wii U when I invite people over to play Mario Kart/Party/3D World and 8 Player Smash.
@@VOANplus, better Luminosity (brightness/lighting) and transpericies/Alpha blending.
I dunno dude, Im a bigger fan of the gamegear.
It's amazing how much Sega tried over and over without being successful
SEGA was huge in the South American, and European markets where Nintendo did not have as much success, and is very fondly remember in countries like Brazil that had strict import restrictions where Nintendo was mostly black market affair only, and it's still that way for a lot of gaming to this very day.
The Sega Game Gear was kinda popular in Europe and Brazil. Heck later games like Mortal Kombat 3 was only released for it in those countries.
Master System and Mega Drive (Genesis) were hugely successful consoles. Together with Nintendo, they outcompeted most of the market (3DO, PC Engine, Atari etc.) in the late 80ies/early 90ies.
Now the console times are over, Microsoft and Sony are doing PC clones and Nintendo is using nVidia Tegra with custom controllers and OS.
@@svr5423 All I remember was there was the genesis, saturn, and dreamcast. No kid on my block knew what a master system was at all and nobody owned a saturn or dreamcast besides me. Yeah not doing to well in the US
@@Riz2336 Master System was more of a South America thing.
Saturn seems to have flopped in the US, but here in Europe, it was quite popular.
And yeah, by the time the Dreamcast came out, everybody and their dog had switched to PC gaming. VGA was superior to PAL and consoles didn't have digital outputs for the new LCD panels. Market also wasn't big enough anymore. "Home computers" died out as well (Atari, Commodore, Amiga etc.)
Now Microsoft and Sony are doing PC clones, and Nintendo is doing an nVidia Tegra integration.
pojr
The console was fine. it's far more better than the game boy. what really ruin consoles were the prices.
I was a Game Gear kid, and once you bought the hardware the games for the Game Gear cost about the same as the Game Boy, on average $25 - $30 a pop, but the battery life off of 6 AA's really did not help it any, nor did having to use bulky external battery packs to get around 5 hours help either, plus I fully admit the GameBoy had more games kids wanted to play.
The Game Gear is just a bulk of a brick that only lasts some hours with a weird screen that is all I gotta say about it.
FIRST
Sup lol.
The title of this video shouldn't be "Better Hardware does NOT Mean Better Console", but rather "the best video game isn't always the most successful". Not only did the Game Gear beat the Game Boy, there was also Atari's Lynx and NEC's TurboExpress, which was far superior to all of them and sold the least. Everyone knows that Nintendo formed a cartel of companies in the mid-80s until the end of the first half of the 90s. It held on to its lead by playing dirty until the day it ended the cartel through no fault of its own by calling Sony into play. That's why these analyses of the console wars aren't very credible, because if we weigh up the facts, after Nintendo, Sega sold the most handhelds, while all the competition had a product far superior to the Game Boy.