This October 20th marks the 20th anniversary since the Sega Mark III was released in Japan, a console that would eventually be known as the Sega Master System in the Western world. For a console that was so thoroughly trounced by the NES, it still managed to garner a dedicated following, and get its foot in the door ensuring Sega stayed in the videogame hardware business for at least another decade. With this article, we will be looking at the life and times of the Master System, right from the day it launched in North America, to when it faded into obscurity everywhere except Brazil. We'll also be looking at the consoles Sega released leading up to the Mark III, as well as all of the wacky peripherals that came with it. For a console ignored by many, the thing managed to carve out quite a niche for itself in gaming history. To find out everything you could possibly want to know about the Sega Master System, please read on.

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The Life and Times of the Sega Master System

By Mr. Nash

October 20, 2005

The Attempted Rise and Fall of the Master System:

While the 1980s were dominated first by Atari, and later by Nintendo, another of gaming’s goliaths was getting off the ground with their first console to be released in North America…or at least they were trying to. When Sega stepped onto the North American videogame scene in June of 1986, they had quite the daunting task ahead of them. The market was recovering from a major crash, and it was Nintendo who was leading the charge, already dominating consumer mind share in the West with the Nintendo Entertainment System. If Sega wanted to engrain their newly enhanced Mark III system (now being called the Sega Master System), they would have a very difficult road ahead of them.

The original Sega Master System (Right) ; The compact, redesigned Master System II (Left)

Unfortunately, this just wasn’t going to happen with the console, as it quickly became the console of the damned, with one thing after the next going wrong for it. It’s a story where it’s almost impossible to fathom just how unlucky Sega was with their first videogame system to be released in North America. The strange thing, though, is that it to this day it’s still a fairly memorable console that never faded completely into obscurity.

Right from the start, things weren’t looking so good for the Master System when it launched in North America. The NES had already been out for a while, and its software was gaining in popularity extremely fast. With games like Super Mario Bros., Duck Hunt and Gyromite already out, and the promise of even more games such as The Legend of Zelda, and Metroid on the way, Nintendo had already managed to secure around 90% of the North American videogame market, with no signs of things changing anytime soon.

It wasn’t only first party titles that were helping Nintendo lock down the market, as there were plenty of high-profile third party games coming to the NES as well. There was a catch, though, if a company wanted to release games for Nintendo’s console. As part of the licensing agreement, they would have to agree not to make games for any other console. As such, the Sega Master System was already up a creek. Since the vast majority of the top publishers, like Capcom, Konami, Namco,

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and so forth had already signed on to make NES games, they couldn't make a Master System game even if they wanted to. As such, the only places developing games for the Sega console were Activision, Parker Brothers, and Sega themselves.

This in and of itself doomed the Master System in not just North America, but globally. While Sega fought the good fight, releasing a number of reasonably popular games that

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would eventually become classics, like Phantasy Star, Golden Axe, the Alex Kidd series, and Shinobi, the vast majority of the Sega Master System’s library was ho-hum at best. Thanks to Nintendo’s iron grip on developers at the time, Sega could never hope for a proper variety of games on their 8-bit system. Eventually, Nintendo loosened its controls on third parties due to various lawsuits, and government inquiries examining whether the Kyoto-based company was participating in monopolistic practices, but this came too little, too late to save the beleaguered Master System.

Compounding the problem was a deal that Sega had made with Tonka, where the North American distribution rights were sold to the popular US toy manufacturer. Unfortunately, Tonka had no experience in trying to sell a videogame system, and it showed. The company regularly passed on releasing popular European and Japanese games in North America, instead giving the green light to various sub par titles that would do nothing to grow the Master System’s market share. When Sega released the Genesis in the US, they bought back the distribution rights for their 8-bit console, and started to release a greater variety of games for it, but by this time it was too late. The console made it a couple more years, but for that entire time the Master System was on life support, until Sega finally pulled the plug in 1992.

Strangely, the console continued to flourish in Brazil for quite some time, as a company called Tec Toy Games continued to release the Master System in that country. All the while, Brazil-only games were still released for the aging system right up until the late 1990s. In recent years, a modified version of the Sega Master System (called the Master System 3 Collection) could be found in Brazil, with about 70 built-in games. Tec Toy even released a pair of wireless Master Systems that transmitted the AV signal from the tiny unit to a corresponding antenna attached to a TV. The two systems were known as the Master System Super Compact, and the Master System Girl.

Brazil-Only versions of the Master System: The Master System III Compact (Left), the Master System Girl (Center), and the Master System Super Compact (Right)

Looking back on at the Master System, it also marks an early example that just because a console has technically superior hardware than its competitors, there is no guarantee that it will dominate a market. While their tactics may have been harsh, Nintendo proved very early on that a console’s success is closely tied to its game library. Since companies like Konami and Capcom could only make games for the NES, the Master System was quickly marginalized because of the lack of software support. Just imagine what it would have been like if things were different, and games like Castlevania, and Dragon Quest could have also been released on Sega’s 8-bit console.

As many ups and downs as the Master System had, this is only part of the story. There were three different versions of the system to come out in Japan before it ever came to these shores. Let's take a look.