Asian Megadrive questions

[Cruedude75]

Hi there, I have recently bought an Asian Megadrive II (PAL version), after owning a Japanese Megadrive for many years I decided to relive some of my youth by getting hold of what I was led to believe was another Jap model, only to find out that my new machine is actually essentially a UK Megadrive in Japanese clothing!

Now that I have the machine I have been trying to run some games on it and after having success with most things I have hit a brick wall with four of my purchases and was wondering if anybody on this forum has tried the same games successfully with either an Asian model or a UK one with a Japanese converter attached.

The games are a Brazilian (Tec Toy) version of Mortal Kombat III, which just comes up as NTSC only on the screen, a Japanese Sailor Moon which says is only authorized for use in Japan, and Japanese versions of Alex Kidd and Wonderboy V, which both do absolutely nothing after the boot-up screen.

I would be especially interested to know if anybody has had the last two working with the use of a Japanese Converter because I can't work out whether they are incompatible or just faulty carts, although the Wonderboy one was brand new and sealed so that is fairly unlikely.

Thanks for any advice you can give me.

[Pilotwings]

I have a couple of asian megadrive 1s which are modded now. But before they were modded my usa Contra Hardcorps would not go past the konami screen what so ever but my usa Castle vania would only go past the konami screen if i held in the b or c button when booting the game up.

Some games definetly have a region lock so you can try holding the b/c button trick or you will need it modded or converter.

Im quite sure the Alex kidd game should work but not 100% sure.

[chaoticjelly]

You can tell Japanese hardware by the serial number. If its Japanese it will always begin with "HAA-"

The reason those games will not run is because they are checking to see if the console is running in 60Hz (NTSC) but since its an Asian model its running in 50Hz (PAL) and so the message is displayed and the game will not boot.

I would of thought Alex Kidd would work too.. is it Alex Kidd in the Enchanted Castle? Its not unknown for cartridges to look perfect, but be faulty. In fact I have my suspicions as to what the problem of perfect-looking and clean "dead" cartridges could be caused by, and am working on a fix.

The best way around your problem is probably getting the mods done. Then you can play all of your games in 60Hz full screen full speed as well.

There are some converters out there that should play the games your having trouble with if you want to go down that route. Look for a converter with dip switches on the rear.

[anagrama]

Alex Kidd should certainly work - it was released a long time before region locks were introduced in late '92.