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130-405: Although D-pads offer less flexibility than analog sticks , they offer high accuracy and can be manipulated with minimal movement by the thumb. They require comparatively little maintenance and their minimal profile makes them ideal for portable devices. D-pads have appeared on diverse forms of electronic equipment including calculators , PDAs , mobile phones , and car stereos . A precursor to

260-475: A joystick or mouse . Less-sophisticated designs similar to those on remote controls appear on some calculators , particularly scientific and graphing calculators , which use the D-pad for cursor control on multi-line screens, as well as input/output recall, menu navigation, and occasionally direct screen access (graphing calculators in particular allow the use of the D-pad to determine values at specific points on

390-727: A library of more than 900 games on ROM-based cartridges . Several add-ons were released, including a Power Base Converter to play Master System games. It was released in several different versions, some created by third parties. Sega created two network services to support the Genesis: Sega Meganet and Sega Channel . In Japan, the Mega Drive fared poorly against its two main competitors, Nintendo's Super Famicom and NEC 's PC Engine , but it achieved considerable success in North America, Brazil, and Europe. Contributing to its success

520-515: A palette of 512. The games are in ROM cartridge format and inserted in the top. The Genesis produces sound using a Texas Instruments SN76489 programmable sound generator , integrated with the Video Display Processor (VDP) , and a Yamaha YM2612 FM synthesizer chip. The Z80 processor is primarily used to control both sound chips to produce stereo music and sound effects. Most revisions of

650-485: A "Blood Code". This technicality allowed Sega to release the game with a relatively low MA-13 rating. Meanwhile, the tamer SNES version shipped without a rating. The Genesis version of Mortal Kombat was well-received by gaming press, as well as fans, outselling the SNES version three- or four-to-one, while Nintendo was criticized for censoring the SNES version. Executive vice president of Nintendo of America Howard Lincoln

780-634: A 32-bit console. Following tensions with Sega Enterprises, Ltd. over its focus on the Saturn, Kalinske, who oversaw the rise of the Genesis in 1991, lost interest in the business and resigned in mid-1996. Sega sold 30.75 million Genesis units worldwide. However, some sources claim that the console sold 40 million units during its lengthly lifespan. Of these, 3.58 million were sold in Japan, and sales in Europe and

910-479: A D-pad of some shape on their controllers, until the Nintendo Switch in 2017, which used the older four-button design on its included Joy-Con controller, allowing each Joy-Con to be used as an individual controller for multiplayer games: the optional Switch Pro Controller, and the handheld-only Nintendo Switch Lite, retain the usual D-pad. To avoid infringing on Nintendo's patent, most controller manufacturers use

1040-408: A D-pad. For three generations, Nintendo's control stick was distinguished from analog sticks used in other major consoles by its surrounding octagonal area of freedom that only allowed it to be moved in any of eight different directions, with each one assigned to each of the octagon's eight vertices where the control stick could be pushed towards. Nintendo would eventually change this octagonal area to

1170-589: A Genesis instead. The SNES debuted against an established competitor, while NEC's TurboGrafx-16 failed to gain traction, and NEC soon pulled out of the market. In large part due to the popularity of Sonic the Hedgehog , the Genesis outsold the SNES in the United States nearly two to one during the 1991 holiday season. Sega controlled 65% of the 16-bit console market in January 1992, the first time Nintendo had not been

1300-405: A ball through a long winding tube. This concept was developed with Ohshima's character design and levels conceived by designer Hirokazu Yasuhara . Although Katz and Sega of America's marketing experts disliked Sonic , certain that it would not catch on with American children, Kalinske's strategy to place Sonic the Hedgehog as the pack-in game paid off. Sonic the Hedgehog greatly increased

1430-596: A card with two of these and an associated analog joystick, the JS-1. This is the first known example of such a device for personal use. The first consumer games console which had analog joysticks was the Prinztronic/Acetronic/Interton series , launched in 1978. This system was widely cloned throughout Europe and available under several brand names. The 2 sticks each used a pair of potentiometers, they were not self-centering in most models but some, such as those of

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1560-414: A controller, to allow for more functions. With the prevalence of analog sticks, the aforementioned limitations of the D-pad ceased to be an issue. Two analog sticks offer greater functionality than a single stick. On some modern game controllers , the analog sticks are "staggered", such that the left stick is positioned to the upper left of the D-pad while the right stick is positioned to the lower left of

1690-779: A cross in a circle shape for the D-pad. In 1984, the Japanese company Epoch created a handheld game system called the Epoch Game Pocket Computer . It featured a D-pad, but it was not popular for its time and soon faded. Following the release of the Sega Mega Drive in 1988, Sega coined the term "D button" to describe the pad, using the term when describing the controllers for the Sega Genesis in instruction manuals and other literature. Arcade games, however, have largely continued using joysticks. Modern consoles, beginning with

1820-459: A displayed graph). On programmable units, the D-pad can also be mapped directly, allowing it to be used as a gaming or pointer control. Analog stick An analog stick ( analogue stick in British English), also known as control stick , joystick or thumbstick , is an input device for a controller (often a game controller ) that is used for two-dimensional input. An analog stick

1950-417: A mascot character to compete with Nintendo's Mario series . The winning submission was a blue hedgehog with red shoes, Sonic , created by Naoto Ohshima , spawning one of the best-selling video game franchises in history. The gameplay of Sonic the Hedgehog originated with a tech demo created by Yuji Naka , who had developed a prototype platform game that involved a fast-moving character rolling in

2080-401: A month. His work was reviewed by EA's lawyers before being disseminated to Hayes and Nitchals to verify its originality, and subsequently to the rest of the developers to let them build games. After a few months, EA began developing for the Genesis in earnest. The EA founder, Trip Hawkins , confronted Nakayama the day before the 1990 Consumer Electronics Show (CES), informing him that EA had

2210-466: A new partner to market the Genesis in North America and offered the rights to Atari Corporation , which did not yet have a 16-bit system. David Rosen made the proposal to Atari CEO Jack Tramiel and the president of Atari's Entertainment Electronics Division, Michael Katz. Tramiel declined to acquire the new console, deeming it too expensive, and instead opted to focus on the Atari ST . Sega decided to launch

2340-539: A rounded shape, a directional pad , three main buttons, and a start button. In 1993, Sega released a slightly smaller pad with three additional face buttons, similar to the design of buttons on arcade fighting games such as Street Fighter II . Sega also released a wireless revision of the six-button controller, the Remote Arcade Pad. The system is backward compatible with the Master System. The first peripheral

2470-517: A second analog stick and later the 3DS' initial lack of such feature have been criticized. Nintendo has since released an add-on for the 3DS that adds, among other things, a second analog "circle pad". The follow-up to the PSP, the PlayStation Vita , features dual analog sticks. It is the first handheld game console to do so. The New Nintendo 3DS line of systems added a second analog controller, known as

2600-563: A second analog stick, namely the Wii's standard controller (whose lone analog stick is implemented in the Wii Remote 's Nunchuk attachment), Sony's PSP and Nintendo's 3DS . While the Wii's abovementioned supplemental Classic Controller accessory and its initial backwards compatibility support of the GameCube controller allow for dual-stick control schemes in certain games , the PSP's complete lack of

2730-427: A self-centering analog thumbstick. In 1985, Sega 's third-person rail shooter game Space Harrier , released for the arcades , introduced an analog flight stick for movement. It could register movement in any direction as well as measure the degree of push, which could move the player character at different speeds depending on how far the joystick is pushed in a certain direction. Sega's analog Mission Stick

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2860-415: A single piece of plastic rests on a central pivot and four directional switches that provide input and keep the plastic pad resting in a neutral position. Tiger introduced the D-pad on their 1980 handheld game Deluxe Football with Instant Replay and called it the "Playmaker" button in their handheld sports products. Media coverage described it as offering "one-button control". The same year, Mattel released

2990-425: A step which would pave the way for subsequent leading console manufacturers to follow suit. An analog stick is often used to move some game object, usually the playable character . It may also be used to rotate the camera , usually around the character. The analog stick can serve a great variety of other functions, depending on the game. Today many analog sticks can also be pushed in like conventional face buttons of

3120-477: A stronger name. After reviewing more than 300 proposals, the company settled on "Mega Drive". In North America, the name was changed to "Genesis". Rosen said he insisted on the name as he disliked "Mega Drive" and wanted to represent "a new beginning" for Sega. Sato said some design elements changed, such as the gold "16-bit" wording, in case it was mistaken for yellow. He believed the changes represented different Japanese and American cultural values. Sega released

3250-490: A successor to the Master System almost immediately after that console launched. In 1987, Sega faced another threat to its console business when Japanese computer giant NEC released the PC Engine amid great publicity. To remain competitive against the two more established consumer electronics companies, Ishikawa and his team decided they needed to incorporate a 16-bit microprocessor into their new system to make an impact in

3380-467: A symmetrical configuration with a D-pad on the left thumb position and face buttons at the right thumb position, with analog sticks below and closer to the center on both sides. Sony 's PlayStation -series analog controllers—the Dual Analog Controller , DualShock , DualShock 2 , Sixaxis , DualShock 3 , DualShock 4 and DualSense —all use this configuration, with the remainder of

3510-521: A technical protection mechanism into a new edition of the Genesis released in 1990, referred to as the Genesis III. This new variation of the Genesis included a code known as the Trademark Security System (TMSS), which, when a game cartridge was inserted, would check for the presence of the string "SEGA" at a particular point in the memory contained in the cartridge. If the string was present,

3640-400: A time. Many, though not all, such designs include a trigger button in the center of the button arrangement, usually labeled "Enter" , "OK" , or the like. Some older devices do not have D-pads as such, but simple single-axis, up/down or left/right pads. On some remotes, the D-pad can also be used to control a robot using a signal-compatible receiver. On remote control devices, the buttons on

3770-810: A two-part approach to build sales. The first part involved a marketing campaign to challenge Nintendo head-on and emphasize the more arcade-like experience available on the Genesis, with slogans including "Genesis does what Nintendon't". Since Nintendo owned the console rights to most arcade games of the time, the second part involved creating a library of recognizable games which used the names and likenesses of celebrities and athletes, such as Pat Riley Basketball , Arnold Palmer Tournament Golf , James 'Buster' Douglas Knockout Boxing , Joe Montana Football , Tommy Lasorda Baseball , Mario Lemieux Hockey , and Michael Jackson's Moonwalker . Nonetheless, Sega struggled to overcome Nintendo's presence in consumers' homes. Tasked by Nakayama to sell one million units within

3900-706: A version was operated in Brazil starting in 1995. Another phone-based system, the Mega Anser, turned the Japanese Mega Drive into an online banking terminal. In 1994, Sega started the Sega Channel , a game distribution system using cable television services Time Warner Cable and TCI . Using a special peripheral, Genesis players could download a game from a library of fifty each month and demos for upcoming releases. Games were downloaded to internal memory and deleted when

4030-515: A well-regarded soundtrack. ASCII Entertainment reported in early 1993 that Genesis had 250 games versus 75 for the SNES, but limited shelf space meant that stores typically offered 100 Genesis and 50 SNES games. The NES was still the leader, with 300 games and 100 on shelves. Sega's advertising positioned the Genesis as the cooler console, and coined the term blast processing , an obscure and unused graphics programming method, to suggest that its processing capabilities were far greater than those of

D-pad - Misplaced Pages Continue

4160-415: Is a variation of a joystick , consisting of a protrusion from the controller; input is based on the position of this protrusion in relation to the default "center" position. While digital sticks rely on single electrical connections for movement (using internal digital electrical contacts for up, down, left and right), analog sticks use continuous electrical activity running through potentiometers to measure

4290-420: Is almost essential for most modern first-person shooters such as Halo , where it controls the player's gaze and aim, as opposed to the left stick, which controls where the player moves. In Namco's Katamari Damacy and its sequels, both analog sticks are used at once to control the player's character. In spite of widespread adoption of dual analog sticks, a few modern video game systems are designed without

4420-404: Is connected to is powered on, the current position of its analog stick(s) become the established neutral position. If the analog stick is moved away from its center during a time while it is established, the neutral position would shift to some place away from the center of the stick, causing the controller to interpret the center motionless position of the stick as in-game movement, since it is not

4550-570: Is the Power Base Converter (Mega Adaptor in Japan and Master System Converter in Europe), which allows Master System games to be played. It is designed for the Model 1 revisions and will work with the Model 2 revisions, however the shell blocks the power and AC ports of the Model 2 revision, meaning that the converter must have its shell modified or by using a pass-through adaptor. A second model known as

4680-598: Is the first instance of a thumb pad-based joystick controller. The Quickshot Chimera 2 is another example of an early thumbstick controller available to the NES. In 1989, the Japanese company Dempa released an analog thumbstick controller called the XE-1 AP for the Sega Genesis console and several Japanese computers. It was intended to replicate the HOTAS controls found in Sega’s arcade games at

4810-570: The Donkey Kong arcade game. The design was popular on subsequent Game & Watch titles, although Nintendo still utilized separate directional buttons on later titles, including the Super Mario Bros. handheld game. The design was patented and later earned a Technology & Engineering Emmy Award . Initially intended to be a compact controller for the Game & Watch handheld games alongside

4940-559: The IBM Personal Computer BIOS around 1984. The process began in 1989, led by Steve Hayes and Jim Nitchals. They created a controlled room in EA headquarters nicknamed "Chernobyl", to which only one person was allowed access, Mike Schwartz. Schwartz reviewed Sega's copyrighted development manuals and tools, studied the Genesis hardware and games, and wrote original documentation that summarized his findings. The process took him about

5070-524: The Intellivision with a unique alternative to the joystick, a smooth freely rotating circular pad that registered presses in up to 16 directions. Internally, a metal spring holds the Intellivision's control disc centered above sheets of printed mylar. Nintendo 's familiar "cross" design positioned for the left thumb was developed by Ichiro Shirai under Gunpei Yokoi for the 1982 handheld adaptation of

5200-665: The Mega Drive outside North America, is a 16-bit fourth generation home video game console developed and sold by Sega . It was Sega's third console and the successor to the Master System . Sega released it in 1988 in Japan as the Mega Drive, and in 1989 in North America as the Genesis. In 1990, it was distributed as the Mega Drive by Virgin Mastertronic in Europe, Ozisoft in Australasia, and Tectoy in Brazil. In South Korea, it

5330-575: The Nintendo 64 , provide both a D-pad and a compact thumb-operated analog stick ; depending on the game, one type of control may be more appropriate than the other. In many cases with games that use a thumbstick, the D-pad is used as a set of extra buttons, all four usually centered on a kind of task, such as using items. Even without an analog stick, some software uses the D-pad's 8-directional capabilities to act as eight discrete buttons, not related to direction or on-screen movement at all. Jam Sessions for

D-pad - Misplaced Pages Continue

5460-460: The Nintendo DS , for example, uses the D-pad to select music chords during play. D-pads vary in design but generally have a: The housing of the controller or other device holds these components together. The central pivot keeps all four directions from being pressed at once and causes the D-pad to tilt into the direction pressed. Outside of gaming, D-pads are used for menu navigation and may lack

5590-443: The PC , Sega 32X , and 3DO . According to Digital Pictures founder Tom Zito, "You know, I sold 50,000 units of Night Trap a week after those hearings." Although experiencing increased sales, Sega decided to recall Night Trap and re-release it with revisions in 1994 due to the congressional hearings. After the close of these hearings, video game manufacturers came together to establish

5720-486: The Sega Saturn . In the early 1980s, Sega Enterprises, Inc. – then a subsidiary of Gulf+Western – was one of the top five arcade game manufacturers active in the United States, as company revenues surpassed $ 200 million between July 1981 and June 1982. A downturn in the arcade business starting in 1982 seriously hurt the company, leading Gulf+Western to sell its North American arcade manufacturing organization and

5850-537: The United Kingdom , with former Sega of Europe development director Mike Brogan noting that " Night Trap got Sega an awful lot of publicity ... it was also cited in UK Parliament for being classified as '15' due to its use of real actors." This came at a time when Sega was capitalizing on its image as an edgy company with attitude, and this only reinforced that image. By far the year's most controversial game

5980-621: The United States District Court for the Northern District of California , on charges of trademark infringement, unfair competition , and copyright infringement. In response, Accolade filed a counterclaim for falsifying the source of its games by displaying the Sega trademark when the game was powered up. Although the district court initially ruled for Sega and issued an injunction preventing Accolade from continuing to reverse engineer

6110-475: The Wii U Pro Controller . With genres such as action , adventure games , platforming , and shooting , the left stick normally controls the character's movement while the second stick controls the camera. The use of a second analog stick alleviated problems in many earlier platform games, in which the camera was notorious for bad positioning. The right stick not only allows for camera control in third-person games, but

6240-595: The Winter Consumer Electronics Show in January 1991, where Sega showed the new Genesis III and demonstrated it screening and rejecting an Ishido game cartridge. With more games planned for the following year, Accolade successfully identified the TMSS file. It later added this file to the games HardBall! , Star Control , Mike Ditka Power Football , and Turrican . In response to the creation of these unlicensed games, Sega filed suit against Accolade in

6370-410: The "C-Stick" to the right side of the device. To operate properly, an analog stick must establish a neutral position, a special, unique position which the stick must maintain that the controller would interpret as an intentional cessation or absence of in-game movement. Ideally, this would be the stick's very center when it is not touched or moved. Whenever the controller is activated or the system it

6500-449: The 4 Way Play and Team Player. Codemasters also developed the J-Cart system, providing two extra ports on the cartridge itself, although the technology came late in the console's life and is only featured on a few games. Sega planned to release a steering wheel peripheral in 1994, and the Genesis version of Virtua Racing was advertised as "steering wheel compatible", but the peripheral

6630-633: The D-pad function in the same manner as other buttons, and are generally used to navigate on-screen menus. Though initially not common, the quick success of the DVD format led to wide availability of remote designs with D-pads circa 2000, and most current menu-driven consumer electronics devices include some sort of D-pad on the remote (and, occasionally, on the unit itself). In addition, many small computing and communications devices, particularly PDAs , mobile phones , and GPS receivers , include D-pads not only for menu navigation but as general input devices similar to

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6760-460: The D-pad was the usage of four separate directional buttons. This input method was used in arcade video games such as Gremlin 's Blockade (1976) and SNK 's Vanguard (1981). Entex 's short-lived " Select A Game " cartridge-based handheld system featured left, right, up and down buttons next to a row of action buttons. Similar directional buttons were also used on the Atari Game Brain ,

6890-510: The Genesis 3, projecting to sell 1.5 million units of the console by the end of 1998. As of 2012, Tectoy had sold an estimated 3 million Genesis units. The main microprocessor is a 16/32-bit Motorola 68000 CPU clocked at 7.6 MHz . An 8-bit Zilog Z80 processor controls the sound hardware and provides backward compatibility with the Master System. The Genesis has 64 KB of RAM , 64 KB of video RAM and 8 KB of audio RAM. It can display up to 61 colors at once from

7020-545: The Genesis, Accolade appealed the verdict to the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit . As a result of the appeal, the Ninth Circuit overturned the district court's verdict and ruled that Accolade's decompilation of the Sega software constituted fair use. The court's written opinion followed on October 20, 1992, and noted that the use of the software was non-exploitative, although commercial. Further,

7150-556: The Hedgehog , Sonic the Hedgehog 2 and Disney's Aladdin . Sega Enterprises focused on developing action games , while Sega of America was tasked with developing sports games . A large part of the appeal of the Genesis library was the arcade -based experience of its games, as well as more difficult entries such as Ecco the Dolphin , and sports games such as Joe Montana Football . Compared to its competition, Sega advertised to an older audience by hosting more mature games, including

7280-471: The Hedgehog 3 and Sonic & Knuckles sold a combined 4 million copies worldwide. After the release of the Genesis in 1989, video game publisher Accolade began exploring options to release some of their PC games on the console. At the time, Sega had a licensing deal in place for third-party developers that increased the costs to the developer. According to Accolade co-founder Alan Miller , "One pays them between $ 10 and $ 15 per cartridge on top of

7410-540: The Interton VC4000 models did self-center. When the Apple II was released, it shipped with an analog paddle controller as a standard input, but these failed to meet FCC emissions guidelines and Apple Inc. was forced to stop selling them. This left hundreds of games unable to be used, and this problem was quickly rectified by 3rd party suppliers. Not long after, these same companies began producing analog joysticks for

7540-562: The Mark III for release in North America as the Master System. This was followed by a European release the next year. Although the Master System was a success in Europe, and later in Brazil, it failed to ignite significant interest in the Japanese or North American markets, which, by the mid-to-late 1980s, were both dominated by Nintendo. With Sega continuing to have difficulty penetrating the home market, Sega's console R&D team, led by Masami Ishikawa and supervised by Hideki Sato, began work on

7670-760: The Master System Converter II was released only in Europe for use with the Mega Drive II, which works with other region Genesis consoles and revisions but lacks the ability to use Master System cards. Both the original Power Base Converter and the Master System Converter II do not work with the Nomad or the Genesis 3. Other peripherals were released to add functionality. The Menacer is a wireless infrared light gun used with compatible games. Other third parties created light gun peripherals, such as American Laser Games and Konami . Released for art creation software,

7800-518: The Mega Drive in Japan on October 29, 1988, though the launch was overshadowed by Nintendo's release of Super Mario Bros. 3 a week earlier. Positive coverage from magazines Famitsu and Beep! helped to establish a following. Within two days of release, the console's initial production run sold out. However, Sega only managed to ship 400,000 units in the first year. In order to increase sales, Sega released various peripherals and games, including an online banking system and answering machine called

7930-556: The Mega Drive to all ages, unlike the Famicom, which was aimed primarily at children. According to Sato, the Japanese design for the Mega Drive was based on the appearance of an audio player, with "16-bit" embossed in a golden metallic veneer to create an impression of power. The console was announced in the June 1988 issue of the Japanese gaming magazine Beep! as the Mark V, but Sega management wanted

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8060-609: The Mega Drive's launch and marketing in Australia, as it had done before with the Master System. In Brazil, the Mega Drive was released by Tectoy in 1990, only a year after the Brazilian release of the Master System. Tectoy produced games exclusively for the Brazilian market and brought the Sega Meganet online service there in 1995. Samsung handled sales and distribution in Korea , where it

8190-510: The November/December timeframe". Nakayama's decision to focus on the Saturn, based on the systems' relative performance in Japan, has been cited as the major contributing factor in this miscalculation. By contrast, Nintendo concentrated on the 16-bit home console market, as well as its successful handheld , the Game Boy , and took in 42% of the video game market dollar share without launching

8320-575: The SNES port of Mortal Kombat II was released uncensored. Sega released two add-ons to increase the Genesis capabilities: a CD peripheral, the Sega CD (Mega-CD outside North America and Brazil), and a 32-bit peripheral, the Sega 32X . Worldwide, Sega sold 2.24 million Sega CD units and 800,000 32X units. Following the launch of the next-generation 32-bit Sony PlayStation and Sega Saturn , sales of 16-bit hardware and software continued to account for 64% of

8450-557: The SNES to outsell the Genesis from 1995 through 1997. According to a 2004 study of NPD sales data , the Genesis maintained its lead over the Super NES in the American 16-bit console market. However, according to a 2014 Wedbush Securities report based on revised NPD sales data, the SNES outsold the Sega Genesis in the U.S. market by 1.5 million units. To compete with Nintendo, Sega

8580-420: The SNES. A Sony focus group found that teenage boys would not admit to owning an SNES rather than a Genesis. With the Genesis often outselling the SNES at a ratio of 2:1, Nintendo and Sega focused heavily on impression management of the market, even going to the point of deception; Nintendo claimed it had sold more consoles in 1991 than it actually had, and forecasted it would sell 6 million consoles by

8710-551: The Sega Activator the third-worst video game controller ever made. Both EA and Sega released multitaps to allow more than two players to play at once. Initially, EA's version, the 4 Way Play, and Sega's adapter, the Team Player, only supported each publisher's games. In response to complaints, Sega said a new Team Player, which would work with all Genesis multitap games, would be released. Later games were created to work on both

8840-554: The Sega Mega Anser. Nevertheless, the Mega Drive was unable to overtake the venerable Famicom and remained a distant third in Japan behind Nintendo's Super Famicom and NEC's PC Engine throughout the 16-bit era. Sega announced a North American release date for the system on January 9, 1989. At the time, Sega did not possess a North American sales and marketing organization and was distributing its Master System through Tonka . Dissatisfied with Tonka's performance, Sega looked for

8970-677: The Sega Mega Mouse features three buttons and is only compatible with a few games, such as Eye of the Beholder . A foam-covered bat called the BatterUP and the TeeVGolf golf club were released for both the Genesis and SNES. In November 1993, Sega released the Sega Activator, an octagonal device that lies flat on the floor and was designed to translate the player's physical movements into game inputs. It

9100-414: The U.S. are roughly estimated at 8 million and 18–18.5 million as of June 1997 (at which time Sega was no longer manufacturing the system) respectively. In 1998, Sega licensed the Genesis to Majesco Entertainment to rerelease it in North America. Majesco began reselling millions of unsold cartridges at a budget price, together with 150,000 units of the second model of the Genesis. It released

9230-404: The ability to run its own licensing program if Sega refused to meet its demands. Sega relented, and the next day EA's upcoming Genesis games were showcased at CES. EA signed what Hawkins described as "a very unusual and much more enlightened license agreement" with Sega in June 1990: "Among other things, we had the right to make as many titles as we wanted. We could approve our own titles ...

9360-417: The affected analog stick's neutral position back to the center of the analog stick. For Nintendo controllers with analog sticks, this would involve holding down a certain combination of buttons while the affected analog sticks are untouched. Shortly after the introduction of the first microcomputers , Cromemco introduced a S-100 bus card containing an analog-to-digital converter , and shortly after,

9490-417: The central pivot. Some remotes instead have a central "select" or "OK" button. With the increased usage of touchscreens, some applications offer virtual D-pads. D-pads appear on a number of menu-driven devices as a simple navigational tool; though superficially similar to those used for gaming devices, they are not optimized for real-time control and therefore can usually accept input from only one direction at

9620-571: The circle widely used in other console controllers during the eighth generation starting with the Nintendo 3DS and Wii U , to allow for many more different movement directions beyond these eight. On July 5, 1996, Sega released Nights into Dreams for their Saturn console in Japan; bundled with it was the Saturn 3D control pad which featured an analog pad intended to give the player more fluid control over that game's flight -based gameplay. The analog pad used magnet-based Hall effect sensors , which

9750-544: The company increased the order by 10,000 units when advanced orders had exceeded expectations, and another 10,000 units was later added following the console's success at the ECES event. The projected number of units to be sold between September and December 1990 had eventually increased to 40,000 units in the United Kingdom alone. Other companies assisted in distributing the console to various countries worldwide. Ozisoft handled

9880-432: The console leader since 1985. The Genesis outsold the SNES for four consecutive Christmas seasons due to its two-year lead, lower price point, and larger game library compared to the SNES at its release. Sega had ten games for every game on SNES, and while the SNES had an exclusive version of Final Fight , one of Sega's internal development teams created Streets of Rage , which had bigger levels, tougher enemies, and

10010-529: The console through its own Sega of America subsidiary, which executed a limited launch on August 14, 1989, in New York City and Los Angeles . The Genesis was released in the rest of North America later that year. The European version of the Mega Drive was released in September 1990, at a price of £ 189.99 , i.e. $ 337 (equivalent to $ 732 in 2023). The release was handled by Virgin Mastertronic , which

10140-621: The console was powered off. The Sega Channel reached 250,000 subscribers at its peak and ran until July 31, 1998, well past the release of the Sega Saturn. In an effort to compete with Sega, third-party developer Catapult Entertainment created the XBAND , a peripheral which allowed Genesis players to engage in online competitive gaming. Using telephone services to share data, XBAND was initially offered in five U.S. cities in November 1994. The following year,

10270-454: The console would run the game, and would briefly display the message: " Produced by or under license from Sega Enterprises, Ltd. " This system had a twofold effect: it added extra protection against unlicensed developers and software piracy and forced the Sega trademark to display when the game was powered up, making a lawsuit for trademark infringement possible if unlicensed software were to be developed. Accolade learned of this development at

10400-452: The controller layout closely resembling the original digital PlayStation controller . The Classic Controller for the Wii also uses this configuration. The original configuration of the Wii U GamePad controller had twin analog "Circle Pads" positioned symmetrically above the D-pad and face buttons, but was reconfigured to have twin clickable analog sticks several months ahead of the system's planned launch. This setup also carried over to

10530-467: The court found that the trademark infringement, being required by the TMSS for a Genesis game to run on the system, had been inadvertently triggered by a fair use act and was the fault of Sega for having caused false labeling. Ultimately, Sega and Accolade settled the case on April 30, 1993. As a part of this settlement, Accolade became an official licensee of Sega, and later developed and released Barkley Shut Up and Jam! while under license. The terms of

10660-450: The end of 1992, while its actual U.S. install base at the end of 1992 was only just more than 4 million units. Due to these tactics, it was difficult to ascertain a clear leader in market share for several years at a time, with Nintendo's dollar share of the U.S. 16-bit market dipping down from 60% at the end of 1992 to 37% at the end of 1993, Sega claiming 55% of all 16-bit hardware sales during 1994, and Donkey Kong Country helping

10790-524: The exact position of the stick within its full range of motion. The analog stick has greatly overtaken the D-pad in both prominence and usage in console video games . The initial prevalence of analog sticks was as peripherals for flight simulator games, to better reflect the subtleties of control required for such titles. It was during the fifth console generation that Nintendo announced it would integrate an analog stick into its iconic Nintendo 64 controller ,

10920-598: The exception of the Sega Dreamcast controller and Nintendo 's Wii Remote controller. Other exceptions to this dual-stick rule are Sony's PlayStation Portable and Nintendo 's 3DS handheld game consoles aside from the New 3DS (although the former may be upgraded to dual-stick functionality through the use of an accessory), which both feature only a single small, flat sliding analog "nub". How Stuff Works articles on: Sega Genesis The Sega Genesis , known as

11050-483: The face buttons. The controllers of all of Microsoft 's Xbox consoles ( Xbox controller , Xbox 360 controller and Xbox Wireless Controller ), as well as controllers for Nintendo 's GameCube and Switch ( GameCube controller , the dual Joy-Con Comfort Grip and the Nintendo Switch Pro Controller ), utilize a staggered analog stick layout. Other controllers instead have the two analog sticks in

11180-404: The family-friendly GA rating to the more mature rating of MA-13, and the adults-only rating of MA-17. With the rating system in place, Sega released its version of Mortal Kombat , appearing to have removed all the blood and sweat effects and toning down the finishing moves even more than in the SNES version. However, all the arcade's blood and uncensored finishing moves could be enabled by entering

11310-453: The faster drawing speed of the Genesis made it more suitable for sport games than the SNES, and credits EA's success on the Genesis for helping catapult the EA Sports brand. Another third-party blockbuster for the system was the port of Mortal Kombat . Although the arcade game was released on the SNES and Genesis simultaneously, the two ports were not identical. The SNES version looked closer to

11440-555: The first year, Katz and Sega of America sold only 500,000. At the Winter Consumer Electronics Show (Winter CES) in January 1990, the Sega Genesis demonstrated a strong line-up of games which received a positive reception for approaching arcade-quality graphics and gameplay as well as for providing non-arcade experiences such as Phantasy Star II . In mid-1990, Nakayama hired Tom Kalinske to replace Katz as CEO of Sega of America. Although Kalinske knew little about

11570-469: The front of the console produces stereo sound. On the Model 2, the DIN port, RF output port, and headphone jack are replaced by a 9-pin mini-DIN port on the back for composite video , RGB and stereo sound, and the standard RF switch. Earlier Model 1 consoles have a 9-pin extension port. An edge connector on the bottom right of the console can be connected to a peripheral. The standard controller features

11700-411: The licensing rights for its arcade games to Bally Manufacturing . The company retained Sega's North American R&D operation, as well as its Japanese subsidiary, Sega Enterprises, Ltd. With its arcade business in decline, Sega Enterprises, Ltd. president Hayao Nakayama advocated that the company leverage its hardware expertise to move into the home console market in Japan, which was in its infancy at

11830-489: The licensing, including whether or not any special arrangements or discounts were made to Accolade, were not released to the public. The financial terms of the settlement were also not disclosed, although both companies agreed to pay their own legal costs. In 1993, the American media began to focus on the mature content of certain video games. Games such as Night Trap for the Sega CD , an add-on , received unprecedented scrutiny. Issues about Night Trap were brought up in

11960-598: The market: the DualShock . The controller featured similar twin analog sticks to the Dual Analog, although they featured convex rubber tips rather than concave plastic ones. It also removed the third analog (Flightstick) mode and added two rumble motors. In 1999, Sony's Ape Escape became the first video game in history to require the use of two analog sticks. In the console generations that followed , many video game console controllers have included two analog sticks, with

12090-463: The marketplace and once again turned to Sega's strengths in the arcade industry to adapt the successful Sega System 16 arcade board into architecture for a home console. The decision to use a Motorola 68000 as the system's main CPU was made late in development, while a Zilog Z80 was used as a secondary CPU to handle the sound due to fears that the load to the main CPU would be too great if it handled both

12220-403: The month. The first Genesis version of EA's John Madden Football arrived before the end of 1990, and became what Gordon called a " killer app ". Taking advantage of the licensing agreement, Gordon and EA's vice president of marketing services, Nancy Fong, created a visual identifier for EA's Genesis cartridges: a yellow tab molded into the casing. Sega held a company-wide contest to create

12350-408: The neutral position as it should be. This phenomenon, commonly called drifting , causes undesired gameplay effects, depending on the current game's controls, such as constant movement of the player character in a single direction or the game camera being skewed towards one particular angle while the affected stick is unmoved, and can only be corrected by performing particular actions that would restore

12480-459: The original Genesis contain a discrete YM2612 and a separate YM7101 VDP; in a later revision, the chips were integrated into a single custom ASIC (FC1004). The back of the Model 1 console provides an RF output port (designed for use with antenna and cable systems) and a specialized 8-pin DIN port, which both provide video and audio output. Both outputs produce monophonic sound; a headphone jack on

12610-562: The plan, but all four points were approved by Nakayama, who told Kalinske, "I hired you to make the decisions for Europe and the Americas, so go ahead and do it." Critics praised Sonic as one of the greatest games yet made, and Genesis sales increased as customers who had been waiting for the release of the international version of Nintendo's Super Famicom, the Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES), decided to purchase

12740-482: The popularity of the Genesis in North America, and the bundle is credited with helping Sega gain 65% of the market share against Nintendo. Similarly, in Europe, Sega captured a 65% share of the European console market, where the Mega Drive maintained its lead over the SNES through 1994. Sonic the Hedgehog 2 set records for the fastest-selling game, selling 3.2 million copies worldwide within two weeks, and Sonic

12870-496: The prior non-connected style pad, Nintendo realized that Yokoi's updated design would also be appropriate for regular consoles, and Nintendo made the D-pad the standard directional control for the hugely successful Famicom / Nintendo Entertainment System (first released 1983) under the name "+Control Pad". Part of Nintendo's rationale came from the durability of the D-pad and the expectation that controllers would be left on floors and crushed. All major video game consoles since have had

13000-517: The rating system and put ratings on it. In response, Sega of America vice president Bill White showed a videotape of violent video games on the SNES and stressed the importance of rating video games. At the end of the hearing, Lieberman called for another hearing in February 1994 to check on progress toward a rating system for video game violence. As a result of the congressional hearings, Night Trap started to generate more sales and released ports to

13130-527: The rating system that Lieberman had called for. Initially, Sega proposed the universal adoption of its system, but after objections by Nintendo and others, Sega took a role in forming a new one. This became the Entertainment Software Rating Board , an independent organization that received praise from Lieberman. With this new rating system in place for the 1994 holiday season, Nintendo decided its censorship policies were no longer needed, and

13260-418: The real hardware manufacturing costs, so it about doubles the cost of goods to the independent publisher." To get around licensing, Accolade chose to seek an alternative way to bring their games to the Genesis. It did so by purchasing one in order to decompile the executable code of three Genesis games. Such information was used to program their new Genesis cartridges in a way that would allow them to disable

13390-423: The royalty rates were a lot more reasonable. We also had more direct control over manufacturing." After the deal was in place, EA chief creative officer Bing Gordon learned that "we hadn't figured out all the workarounds" and "Sega still had the ability to lock us out ... It just would have been a public relations fiasco." EA released its first Genesis games, Populous and Budokan: The Martial Spirit , within

13520-436: The security lockouts on the Genesis that prevented unlicensed games from being played. This strategy was used successfully to bring Ishido: The Way of Stones to the Genesis in 1990. To do so, Accolade had copied Sega's copyrighted game code multiple times in order to reverse engineer the software of Sega's licensed Genesis games. As a result of piracy in some countries and unlicensed development issues, Sega incorporated

13650-479: The service was extended to the SNES, and Catapult teamed up with Blockbuster Video to market the service, but as interest in the service waned, it was discontinued in April 1997. The Genesis library was initially modest, but eventually grew to contain games to appeal to all types of players. The initial pack-in game was Altered Beast , which was replaced with Sonic the Hedgehog in 1991. Top sellers included Sonic

13780-534: The system in the United States and smaller numbers were sold by Samsung in South Korea. By the mid-2010s, licensed third-party Genesis rereleases were still being sold by AtGames in North America and Europe. Many games have been re-released in compilations or on online services such as the Nintendo Virtual Console , Xbox Live Arcade , PlayStation Network , and Steam . The Genesis was succeeded in 1994 by

13910-488: The system, but these took some time to become popular. In 1982, Atari released a controller with a potentiometer-based analog joystick for their Atari 5200 home console. However, its non-centering joystick design proved to be ungainly and unreliable due to the filing, alienating many consumers at the time. During that same year, General Consumer Electronics introduced the Vectrex , a vector graphics based system which used

14040-456: The system. Initially announced in late 1995, Nintendo released their Nintendo 64 controller on June 23, 1996, in Japan. The new controller included a thumb-operated control stick which, while a digital stick (the analog stick operated on the same principles as a mechanical ball-type computer mouse ), still allowed for varying levels of movement and near-360-degree control, translating into far more precise movements than were possible with

14170-486: The time, such as After Burner II . This controller included a thumb-operated control stick which allowed for varying levels of movement and near-360-degree control, translating into far more precise movements than what is possible with a D-pad. It was released twice, with a price drop upon its re-release in 1994. A few games on the Genesis (as well as the Sega CD and 32X add-ons) supported the controller’s analog stick functions, including some of Sega’s first-party games for

14300-570: The time. Nakayama received permission to proceed with this project, leading to the release of Sega's first home video game system, the SG-1000 , in July 1983. While it had sold 160,000 units in Japan, far exceeding Sega's expectations, sales at stores were dominated by Nintendo 's Famicom which had been released the same day. Sega estimated that the Famicom outsold the SG-1000 by a 10-to-1 margin. The SG-1000

14430-450: The uncensored version of Mortal Kombat . The arcade hit Street Fighter II by Capcom was initially released on the SNES. As the Genesis continued to grow in popularity, Capcom released a Genesis version, Street Fighter II: Champion Edition , which sold more than a million copies. One of the biggest third-party companies to support the Genesis early on was Electronic Arts. Trip Hawkins , founder and then president of EA, believed

14560-515: The unreleased precursor to the Atari 2600, and on some early dedicated game consoles such as the VideoMaster Star Chess game. The 1981 game Cosmic Hunter on Milton Bradley 's handheld Microvision featured four directional buttons around a fifth button in the center, all under a single rubber membrane. William F. Palisek patented the D-pad for Tiger Electronics in 1979. In Palisek's design,

14690-640: The video game console market generated between $ 200,000,000 (equivalent to $ 400,000,000 in 2023) and $ 250,000,000 (equivalent to $ 500,000,000 in 2023) in Russia, with Sega accounting for half of all console sales in the country. However, only about 15% of the sales were official Sega units distributed by Bitman, while the rest were unofficial counterfeit clones. For the North American market, former Atari Corporation Entertainment Electronics Division president and new Sega of America CEO Michael Katz instituted

14820-637: The video game industry, and the Genesis and several of its games attracted legal scrutiny on matters involving reverse engineering and video game violence . Controversy surrounding violent games such as Night Trap and Mortal Kombat led Sega to create the Videogame Rating Council , a predecessor to the Entertainment Software Rating Board . 30.75 million first-party Genesis units were sold worldwide. In addition, Tectoy sold an estimated 3 million licensed variants in Brazil, Majesco projected it would sell 1.5 million licensed variants of

14950-427: The video game market in 1995. Sega underestimated the continued popularity of the Genesis and did not have the inventory to meet demand. Sega captured 43% of the dollar share of the U.S. video game market and claimed to have sold more than two million Genesis units in 1995, while Genesis software such as Vectorman remained successful, but Kalinske estimated that "we could have sold another 300,000 Genesis systems in

15080-443: The video game market, he surrounded himself with industry-savvy advisors. A believer in the razor and blades model , he developed a four-point plan: cut the price of the console, create an American team to develop games targeted at the American market, expand the aggressive advertising campaigns, and replace the bundled game Altered Beast with a new game, Sonic the Hedgehog . The Japanese board of directors initially disapproved of

15210-501: The visuals and the audio. The 68000 chip was expensive and would have driven the retail price of the console up greatly, but Sega was able to negotiate with a distributor for a tenth of its price on an up-front volume order with the promise of more orders pending the console's future success. The appearance of the Mega Drive was designed by a team led by Mitsushige Shiraiwa that drew inspiration from audiophile equipment and automobiles. Shiraiwa said this more mature look helped to target

15340-467: Was Midway 's Mortal Kombat , ported to the Genesis and SNES by Acclaim Entertainment . In response to public outcry over the game's graphic violence, Nintendo decided to replace the blood in the game with "sweat" and the arcade's gruesome "fatalities" with less violent finishing moves. Sega took a different approach, instituting America's first video game ratings system, the Videogame Rating Council (VRC), for all its current systems. Ratings ranged from

15470-463: Was a unique implementation of the technology that was carried forward into the design of the Dreamcast controller as well. The Saturn's analog controller was previously mentioned in the June 1996 issue of Computer and Video Games magazine. On April 25, 1997, Sony introduced the world's first dual stick controller for its game console, PlayStation . Based on the same potentiometer technology that

15600-443: Was cancelled. In its first foray into online gaming , Sega created Sega Meganet , which debuted in Japan on November 3, 1990. Operating through a cartridge and a peripheral called the "Mega Modem ", this allowed Mega Drive players to play a total of seventeen games online. A North American version, dubbed "Tele-Genesis", was announced at the Winter Consumer Electronics Show (Winter CES) in January 1990 but never released, though

15730-574: Was distributed by Samsung Electronics as the Super Gam*Boy and later the Super Aladdin Boy . Designed by an R&D team supervised by Hideki Sato and Masami Ishikawa, the Genesis was adapted from Sega's System 16 arcade board, centered on a Motorola 68000 processor as the CPU , a Zilog Z80 as a sound controller, and a video system supporting hardware sprites , tiles , and scrolling. It plays

15860-401: Was first shown at the January 1993 Consumer Electronics Show (CES), where it was demonstrated with Streets of Rage 2 . Several high-profile games, including Mortal Kombat and Street Fighter II: Special Champion Edition , were adapted to support the peripheral. The device was a commercial failure, due mainly to its inaccuracy and its high price point. IGN editor Craig Harris ranked

15990-428: Was its library of arcade game ports , the popularity of Sega's Sonic the Hedgehog series, several popular sports franchises, and aggressive youth marketing that positioned it as the cool console for adolescents. The 1991 North American release of the Super Nintendo Entertainment System triggered a fierce battle for market share in the United States and Europe known as the " console war ". This drew attention to

16120-562: Was later purchased by Sega in 1991 and became Sega of Europe. Games like Space Harrier II , Ghouls 'n Ghosts , Golden Axe , Super Thunder Blade , and The Revenge of Shinobi were available in stores at launch. The console was also bundled with Altered Beast . The Mega Drive and its first batch of games were shown at the 1990 European Computer Entertainment Show (ECES) in Earl's Court . Between July and August 1990, Virgin initially placed their order for 20,000 Mega Drive units. However,

16250-411: Was more open to new types of games, but still tightly controlled the approval process for third-party games and charged high prices for cartridge manufacturing. The American publisher Electronic Arts (EA) sought a better deal, but met resistance from Sega. They decided to reverse-engineer the Genesis, using a clean-room method similar to the method Phoenix Technologies had used to reverse-engineer

16380-515: Was named Super Gam*Boy and retained the Mega Drive logo alongside the Samsung name. It was later renamed Super Aladdin Boy. In India, Sega entered a distribution deal with Shaw Wallace in April 1994 in order to circumvent an 80% import tariff, with each unit selling for INR₹ 18,000. In Russia, Sega officially licensed the console to local distributor Forrus in 1994, replaced in 1996 by Bitman. That year,

16510-516: Was quick to point out at the hearings that Night Trap had no such rating, saying to Senator Joe Lieberman : Furthermore, I can't let you sit here and buy this nonsense that this Sega Night Trap game was somehow only meant for adults. The fact of the matter is this is a copy of the packaging. There was no rating on this game at all when the game was introduced. Small children bought this at Toys "R" Us , and he knows that as well as I do. When they started getting heat about this game, then they adopted

16640-508: Was released for the Saturn console on September 29, 1995. On April 26, 1996, Sony released a potentiometer-based analog joystick for use in Flight-Simulation games. The Sony Dual Analog FlightStick featured twin analog sticks and was used in games such as Descent to provide a much greater degree of freedom than the typical digital joysticks of the day. The NES Max , released in 1988,

16770-532: Was replaced by the Sega Mark III within two years. In the meantime, Gulf+Western began to divest itself of its non-core businesses after the death of company founder Charles Bluhdorn , so Nakayama and former Sega CEO David Rosen arranged a management buyout of the Japanese subsidiary in 1984 with financial backing from CSK Corporation , a prominent Japanese software company. Nakayama was then installed as CEO of Sega Enterprises, Ltd. In 1986, Sega redesigned

16900-493: Was used in the larger Dual Analog Flightstick, the Sony Dual Analog Controller featured rumble (removed in overseas versions), three modes of analog (Flightstick, Full Analog and Analog-Off), and dual plastic concave thumbsticks. It also added two new buttons, L3 and R3, under the thumbsticks, which could be used by pressing down on the sticks. On November 20, 1997, Sony released their third analog controller to

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