Minigen Video Entertainment System - Compatible with Sega Genesis & Mega Drive Games

I purchased Three! Great price and works excellent.

So, I've recently been feeling nostalgic for the days of video gaming past. When games were, by today's technical standards anyway, simple but no less enjoyable. The Sega Genesis, in the late 80s/early-mid 90s, was a shining example of that and I wanted to get back into it. At first I thought of going with a Retron unit, but I've had bad luck with those in the past and decided against it. I then went ahead and ordered some original Genesis hardware from a site called DKOldies.com. Great prices and all but the system I ordered (Genesis 3) arrived heavily scratched, missing one of the covers on the cartridge slot, and the piece of crap controller they included stopped working after less than an hour of gameplay. No joke. Fortunately, the company made the return process very simple. Perusing Amazon for something comparable, I stumbled upon the Minigen. I was hesitant to give it a try because I'd never heard of Gamerz Tek before, and I figured it'd be a piece of crap like the Retrons I've had. But for $30 including two six-button controllers, it was worth a shot. Well, color me surprised, because this is easily the best clone system I've ever used. I wasn't expecting much at all, but my expectations were surpassed. The controllers are very well-made and responsive. Better than anything a Retron or AtGames system includes, for sure. I'd price the controllers alone at about $20 for the pair. They aren't quite as heavy as the original Genesis units, but they're more than sufficient. The name "Minigen?" Fits perfectly. This thing is actually smaller than the Genesis 3. It fits comfortably atop my Sony Blu-ray player with room to spare. See the included photo for reference. Above all else, the gameplay is smooth and flawless. Sure, it's not HDMI output, but for $30 that shouldn't be expected. The standard AV cable does the job just fine for games that are 20+ years old. It's my understanding that the system won't play Genesis games with certain "special" chips, i.e. Virtua Racing and Gargoyles, but I don't recall there even being too many titles like that anyway. You can always get an original Genesis 1 or 2 on the cheap if you really want to play those. I've tried the Minigen with each of the following games and they have all worked perfectly: Sonic the Hedgehog 1 and 2, Mortal Kombat, Mortal Kombat 3, Streets of Rage, Maximum Carnage, Street Fighter II Special Champion Edition, Columns, Golden Axe, Revenge of Shinobi, Super Hang-On, Road Rash II, Mighty Morphin Power Rangers, X-Men, and Disney's World of Illusion. Flawless, all of them. My only criticism: the grip on the cartridges in the slot is *very* tight. Like, visegrips-tight. The trick to getting a game out is to pull up from the left or right side of the cartridge, as opposed to straight up from the middle. But aside from that lone flaw, this was $30 well spent and I can't recommend it enough. Well-done, Gamerz Tek.

This is pretty much the same as the MD Compact which is available from import sites. There are some slight differences in the shell design, but the internals are identical. The plastic is thick and good quality. It has a TCT-6801 console-on-a-chip which means it is compatible with Everdrive flash carts, high-capacity multicarts (112-in-1, 126-in-1, etc) and has accurate sound (unlike old AtGames clones). There is a O/J (Overseas/Japan) region switch, so it's compatible with US and Japanese games. This is an NTSC console, so PAL region-locked games are not compatible. The controllers are high quality. The price is good (under $28 shipped; just add a cheap add-on item to get free shipping from Amazon). I've noticed that the text and diagrams on the back of the box are identical to the ones on the Fei Hao HDMI Mega Drive clone consoles, so Fei Hao is probably the OEM of this console. There are a few negatives. The included ac adapter is 9v 300mA center-negative and produces a humming noise in the audio. I have tested it with a 9v 1A ac adapter from a different clone console and it eliminates the humming. I have also tested it with an official Japanese Mega Drive 1 ac adapter (9v 1.2A) and it also eliminates the humming. So it seems the console needs at least 1A, which the included ac adapter doesn't provide. Also despite having separate left/right audio output jacks, the sound is in dual-mono only, so there is no stereo separation. The cartridge slot has a tight grip so it can be difficult to pull cartridges out. Overall for under $30, it's a good quality budget clone if you don't mind the mono sound and humming (or buy a 9v 1A center-negative ac adapter).

Good for the money. Graphics are a close match to the original Sega Genesis and game compatability is good, at least on the two games I've tried. The controllers feel cheap, but they function correctly.

After 4 months and only using it 20ish times, both controllers stopped working correctly. They won't move to the right which is very odd. It started slowly but then eventually stopped. So I'm not sure if it's a consol issue or the controllers themselves. Very disappointed because it worked great up until we couldn't use it anymore!

Great product! Was able to play Star Control (awesome game!) which is not the standard size cart so really happy (just had to power off, insert and remove a few times and power back on for the console to load the title screen). The controllers feel really good. I had a little bit of video interference (you may not - it could have been my cables). I was able to fix it by removing the red audio output and leaving it unconnected. In addition to the yellow video cable, I put on a "y" splitter for the white audio out, and running that to my tv that way. Others have commented that the system is dual mono anyway so you aren't missing anything. Lastly, make sure you are using deep socket rca cables some of the thicker expensive cables may not fit in the back as the outputs are flush to the back of the console. Picture great and audio is great now. I would recommend this Minigen console!

Great console with two controllers and the old school RCA cables to plug into the orignial old school TVs.