Yesterday, Sega’s Hiroyuki Miyazaki and Yosuke Okunari hosted a livestream at Sega’s Mega Drive Mini launch party, where some extra details were revealed regarding the Mega Drive Mini and Mega Drive Tower Mini, including a hidden 43rd game in the Japanese edition.
The stream itself was very informal, and was essentially held in the background of what was a large reunion party between various Sega developers (and some M2 and Taito staff, thanks to Darius).
Particular mention needs to be made for nearly the entire staff of the original Sonic the Hedgehog being present, except for composer Masato Nakamura.
On the stream, a 43rd game that can only be accessed via a hidden code was revealed – Kiss Shot, a snooker game released by Sega in 1992. The game is only available on the Japanese Mega Drive Mini, by pressing A+B+C and Start while inside Game no Kanzume Otokuyou.
The Japanese Mega Drive Tower Mini was also revealed to come with some extra goodies, including an envelope with Sega Enterprise’s old logo, which contains a poster with the design sheets for the Mega Drive on one side, and a list of released games by date on the other.
It also comes with an extra booklet that has the hand-drawn designs for the Mega Drive design, as well as the various add-ons that came afterwards, such as the Lock-on Cartridge for Sonic 3 & Knuckles. At the very back is the lyrics and musical sheets for Sega’s company song, ‘Power of Youth’.
Asked about why this wasn’t marketed at the start, Miyazaki remarked, “Well, sales were doing great, so I didn’t feel the need to.”
Some other details about the Mega Drive Mini were revealed on stream:
- There were several games that they wanted to add to the Mega Drive Mini, but couldn’t out of various reasons. Star Cruiser nearly made it in, but was cut right before the mastering of the mini console, because they couldn’t find the rights holder.
- Other games which were considered included Sword of Sodan, Michael Jackson’s Moonwalker, Ferrari Grand Prix Challenge, as well as unreleased games RPG Densetsu Hepoi, and Ushiwakamaru Saburota Monogatari.
- Yuzo Koshiro was present at the event, and when asked whether there will be any revival OSTs, as well as an official soundtrack release for the songs he composed for the menu themes of the Mega Drive Mini, he said, ‘No… Well, if Sega gives the okay.’ Miyazaki gave the okay on the spot, and Okunari announced that Sega will try work something out.
You can watch the livestream below:
The Mega Drive Mini is available today in Japan, while the Genesis Mini is available today in North America. However, the Mega Drive Mini was delayed to October 4, 2019 recently.
