Sega Megadrive

Sega Megadrive, more appropriately Sega Mega Drive, is a video game console launched in Europe by Sega on November 30, 1990. The Sega Megadrive is seen as a successor to the Sega Master System, though the Master System continued to be sold alongside the Megadrive till 1996, when both these consoles were succeeded by the fifth-generation 32-bit Sega Saturn. The Sega Mega Drive was Sega’s first 16-bit fourth-generation video game console as well as the first 16-bit console to garner significant market share in Europe.

In the U.K., at the time of its launch, the Sega Mega Drive was priced at £189.99, through retailers like Dixons, Comet, Toys "R" Us and Rumbelows. In Europe, also helping in the success of the Sega Megadrive was the console’s extensive game library that featured titles like Altered Beast, 688 Attack Sub, Ghouls 'n Ghosts, Golden Axe, Sonic the Hedgehog, Batman, Batman Forever and Brian Lara Cricket 96. Other games included Back to the Future 3, Combat Cars, Desert Strike, Dragon Ball Z, Duke Nukem, FIFA '98: Road to World Cup (the last "official’ game for the Mega Drive), etc.

The Sega Megadrive featured two processors, a primary 7.16 MHz Motorola 68000and a secondary 3.55 MHz Zilog Z80. The console also featured a dedicated VDP (Video Display Processor) for playfield and sprite control, and came with two sound chips. Throughout the console’s history, Sega continued launching several add-ons for the Megadrive like Sega Multi Tap, Sega Mega-CD, Sega 32X, etc.