Sega Nomad



The Sega Nomad (Also called Sega Genesis Nomad or just Nomad) was a handheld game console sold for the North American consumer market which played Mega Drive/Genesis game cartridges. The system was similar to the Japanese Sega Mega Jet, but featured a built-in color screen; the Mega Jet needing a separate monitor. The Nomad was never officially released in PAL territories such as Europe and Australia, though the unit retained its PAL/NTSC switch on the internal board[2]. It was released in Japan [3]after a delay as the Mega Jet was already being sold in Japanese retail stores[2]. The Nomad is one of the few Sega systems that can play most games regardless of region without an adapter[2]. Its codename during development was Project Venus, as per Sega's policy at the time of codenaming their systems after planets.

Release and features

Sega released the Nomad in October 1995 for US$180. Marketed as a portable Genesis, the Nomad was primarily an evolution of the Japanese market Mega Jet. Whereas the Mega Jet was screenless and required an AC adapter, the Nomad featured a 3.25 inch color LCD screen and an external detachable battery pack was available that had room for six AA batteries, making it completely portable as opposed to simply being a small (travel-size) Genesis system. In addition to its other improvements over the Mega Jet, an A/V Out plug was added at the top of the unit, letting owners play games on a television screen with a separate A/V cable. One particularly interesting feature of the Nomad was its ability to allow one player to play using a connected TV, while another watched on the Nomad. The directional pad on the unit controlled all one-player games, and a port on the bottom allowed a second controller pad to be plugged in for two-player games. This meant that the Nomad could be a fully functional home system as well as a completely portable hand-held solution with a pre-existing library of games available for it.

Issues

While the Nomad won praise for its screen resolution and features, there were compatibility problems with the sister system's add-ons: the Sega 32X, the Sega CD, and the Power Base Converter. While they did work technologically, forcing compatibility involved modifying the add-on units' shapes or using 3rd party expanders. The Nomad had impressive technical specifications for the time including a full color backlit display, and supported an estimated 600 titles already on the shelves in addition to being a functional home system. However, the Nomad was bulky and offered limited battery life in comparison to contemporary handhelds – specifically, the Game Boy. The Nomad was not power efficient and a rechargeable battery pack was offered separately for $79. Rechargeable AA batteries were not recommended due to voltage problems. (Ni-Cds provide 1.2V instead of the 1.5V that alkaline batteries output, and also requires full discharging before recharging; Ni-MH AA batteries were not easily nor economically available at the time[4]). Like the Game Gear the unit was too bulky to be easily portable, it consumed batteries at a rapid rate and was designed for playing what were in effect home video games. Despite a $100 price drop, the handheld did not garner enough support to continue. By the time it was released, the Genesis was almost at the end of its lifespan – already being replaced by the Sega Saturn, PlayStation and upcoming Nintendo 64, and general indifference towards 16-bit era titles hastened its demise.