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12/29/2009 1:37:35 AM
By RetroRalph
Tommy has been going over the SMS games for the new database update and recently got to the Phantasy Star. An interesting thing about this game is the many variants, including a "megadrive version" of it.The MegaDrive version is actually very similar to the SMS variants of the game, and uses the "SMS compatibility" mode of the Megadrive to play it. Now a lot of people know the Megadrive/genesis had the powerbase converter which let you play Sega Master System Games on it :-Now how did it do this? Well the MD/GEN hardware has a Z80 in it that also happens to be the main CPU in the SMS. It also added SMS graphics and sound into the MD/GEN VDP, basically the MegaDrive was designed from the start to be backwards compatible with the SMS (like the Mark III was to the SG-1000). The PowerBase converter merely allows the different shaped SMS cartridges to fit into the Megadrive slot whilst pushing a special pin that tells the Genesis to revert to "SMS mode". It also has the pause button on it, but it is basically an expensive wiring kit because there is nothing really technical inside it.This is how the Phantasy Star cartridge works too, it pushes the same pin the powerbase converter does and allows you to play this SMS derived game on the Megadrive by forcing it into compatibility mode.As can be seen in the image it's an actual Megadrive cart, not SMS cart.What I see as a good thing for the official GAME database is that we don't include these Megadrive games in the Sega Master System set. The Phantasy Star MD cart was only released for the Megadrive system not the SMS, the fact it can be played on the SMS when you dump it isn't really relevant. If it was relevant you would have to include every game that a system was compatible with in its set, which is near impossible.That being said it will still "unofficially" work in SMS mode in RetroCopy.
micky wrote:
12/29/2009 7:14:32 PM
Very interesting !!!
ANewHuman wrote:
12/29/2009 11:51:12 PM
The power base converter looks like it is mating with the Megadrive. I didnt know the Mark III was compatible with the SG-1000, did you also need a converter for it?
RetroRalph wrote:
12/30/2009 12:46:52 AM
The SG-1000 / MarkIII / Japanese SMS were pin compatible in regards to their cartridges, so you could plug a SG-1000 game straight into the MarkIII. A SC-3000 game called F16 Fighter was actually marketed as a separate SMS release even though it's the same ROM (in Japan). It's the only SMS game I'm aware of that uses the SK-1100 (a keyboard addon which was available for the SG-1000 or SC-3000), mostly because it was originally designed for a different system. I guess by the time the MegaDrive came about they realized they could monetize the backwards compatibility aspect (PowerBase converter) so decided to change the layout to make it impossible without their device. Good for business but bad for users.