Genesis region blocked games may still be dual region

[Michael Helgeson]

I installed a region mod switch on my Genesis 2 tonite.
Anyway, after messing with it for a bit I got the USA Streets of Rage 2 cart to bypass the region block message and boot in japanese region mode. After doing so it ran as Bare Knuckle 2. To do this you have to wait untill the Sega logo has gone away,and right after it does switch your region switch from USA mode to Japan mode. The game then continues to boot as normal,but in the Japan region mode. Doing this I was also able to boot Sonic 3 and the 6 Pak game cart also. By doing this with the Sega 6 Pak cart Streets of Rage 1,Revenge of Shinobi ect ect ran in their Japan mode. I noticed no change in Sonic 3,but at least it did bypass the region lock.

There are probably alot of other USA titles that are region locked that still have the japanese versions there too. If I had more I would try them,but alas I don't because mostly I keep only titles from 1989-1993.

Nice info for some one wanting to force region locked carts to boot. Enjoy

[akamichi]

Cool info!  I just recently bought a Model 1 MegaDrive and the three US games I have don't play.  Castlevania only displays the Konami logo, Street Fighter 2':SCE displays a lame message about not working on NTSC Genesis systems, and Streets of Rage 3 just comes up with a blank screen. 

I'll have to put in a region mod switch and see if that trick works for these games too.  I remember back in the day I bought the JPN Bare Knuckle soon after the release.  When I let my friend borrow it, it played as Streets of Rage on his Genesis.  That was the first time I heard about the multiregion carts.  Turned out a number of Gen/MD games are like this.  Pretty cool.

[Michael Helgeson]

Yea Ive only got about 30 games or so,maybe a little more,so I don't have enough to test out. Next time my friend comes by I'm going to have him bring some of his to try out.

[Black Tiger]

Don't some carts also check for pal/ntsc as well as language?

I got ripped on a modded Megadrive II and Mega-CD combo that has the language and frequency switches plus S-Video out on the Megadrive and the Mega-CD has a multi bios switch.

But even when I switch it to NTSC, it sends out a variant PAL signal(but allows play of the U.S. Sega-CD bios), so it's useless to me, since I bought it to record videos and my capture card only does NTSC.

I originally asked to buy a modded japanese combo, but he was out of them, so he sold me the U.K. set saying that it'd still work the same. When it didn't work, he said that I knew what I was buying and would only do another Genesis mod if I paid full price for it.

Since he took so long to do the work, I could get a refund through PayPal. I've been meaning to sell it to someone in the U.K., but I keep forgetting about it.

Ideally, I'd at least like to find someone who can do the region and S-Video mods on a Genesis and keep the multi-bios Mega-CD.

[Michael Helgeson]

The region mod isn't really a issue. Its super easy to do on a Genesis 1 deck. On the Genesis 2 its a bit more of  a pain as you have to lift one of the tiny pins on one of the chips. S-video on a Genesis 1 is done similar  to the NeoGeo AES s-video mod if I remember right. I was thinking Oldschoolgamer offers both for a fee. Does the Pal Mega Cd play US,Japan,and UK,or just US and UK titles? I'm not really sure why anyone would want the UK stuff other then that the cases were smaller. The pal switch he installed may have not been doen right,you could always try to correct it. Let me give you a link.

http://www.mmmonkey.co.uk/console/sega/md2switches.htm
http://www.mmmonkey.co.uk/console/index.htm

This tells you how to do both switches. The second page tells how to do the pal/ntsc switch. Maybe you can get it running the way you want with this info. Hope it helps.

BTW,I never needed the pal/ntsc switch to play pal carts on a US system. I think you only need the switch if you just want your system to display in Pal except for maybe a few titles like the Pal Alien Soldier and Castlevania New Generation carts. Im thinking on these games you can start the system in Pal mode to get them to run,then after they boot switch to NTSC to get them going in NTSC mode. I dont have either cart so I can't test this. Then again I never messed with any Pal titles past 93. The Pal carts I had were stuff like Shadow Dancer,WrestleWar,Splatterhouse 2,and Strider Returns.

[Black Tiger]

The region mod isn't really a issue. Its super easy to do on a Genesis 1 deck. On the Genesis 2 its a bit more of  a pain as you have to lift one of the tiny pins on one of the chips. S-video on a Genesis 1 is done similar  to the NeoGeo AES s-video mod if I remember right. I was thinking Oldschoolgamer offers both for a fee. Does the Pal Mega Cd play US,Japan,and UK,or just US and UK titles? I'm not really sure why anyone would want the UK stuff other then that the cases were smaller. The pal switch he installed may have not been doen right,you could always try to correct it. Let me give you a link.

http://www.mmmonkey.co.uk/console/sega/md2switches.htm
http://www.mmmonkey.co.uk/console/index.htm

This tells you how to do both switches. The second page tells how to do the pal/ntsc switch. Maybe you can get it running the way you want with this info. Hope it helps.

BTW,I never needed the pal/ntsc switch to play pal carts on a US system. I think you only need the switch if you just want your system to display in Pal except for maybe a few titles like the Pal Alien Soldier and Castlevania New Generation carts. Im thinking on these games you can start the system in Pal mode to get them to run,then after they boot switch to NTSC to get them going in NTSC mode. I dont have either cart so I can't test this. Then again I never messed with any Pal titles past 93. The Pal carts I had were stuff like Shadow Dancer,WrestleWar,Splatterhouse 2,and Strider Returns.

The multi bios just so I could have one set to play both Japanese and North American games with S-Video. I'm not ready to mod myself yet, which is why I paid someone for the first mod. I think that I'll end up just getting oldschool gamer to S-Video mod a Genesis and a Japanese Megadrive when I can afford it.

[FM-77]

You can't mod a PAL Mega Drive to output NTSC. You can mod it to output PAL-60 (which I assume yours is doing), but not NTSC. Therefore, it won't work on an NTSC TV at all.

You can still use the PAL Mega-CD with an American Genesis though, that shouldn't be a problem at all.

[Michael Helgeson]

That is true,it will run in 60 hertz,but will still display black and white,I forgot about that. You could do that and possibly tap the RGB lines,and run that into a j-rok or Micomsofts XMD-1 or XMD-2 units.With the j-rok you'd have to do some work,with the XMD-2 I think it plugs right into the av port on the Genesis/Megadrive.

You could also get one of the composite and s-video to VGA adapters. I have one and it will accept both Pal and NTSC signal. You could find one like it,possibly better then the one I use.

[Black Tiger]

You can't mod a PAL Mega Drive to output NTSC. You can mod it to output PAL-60 (which I assume yours is doing), but not NTSC. Therefore, it won't work on an NTSC TV at all.

You can still use the PAL Mega-CD with an American Genesis though, that shouldn't be a problem at all.

Oh it works fine on an NTSC TV, it's just black & white.

The Mega-CD won't work with a Genesis, each bios checks for NTSC/PAL and for language. Since my Mega-CD has the multi bios mod, I can use it with any system, but only to play that region's games.

My projector runs the PAL signal fine, but I just wanted to capture real NTSC signals through S-Video, so I'll just get a Genesis modded for now and if someday I really want to play a JP Mega-CD game in S-Video, I'll order a JP Megadrive (unless I can find my misssing one) and get it modded(unless someone can mod my Multi Mega by then).

[Hobo Xiphas]

It works with Insector X too, but there isn't much difference.