I first consciously saw the Master System when I applied for a job at Sega of America in 1989. It turned out that I had seen it years before, I just didn't know I had seen it. When I was working in the toy store (Thinker Toys, btw, the greatest toy store ever!), I had a friend who worked at Macys in the electronics department. One day, he came over to tell me about this killer new game that he and his co-workers had been playing and invite me over to check it out. Well, I went over and played the new game (Black Belt, it turned out to be, though, I didn't know that until I was employed by Sega two or three years later) and quite frankly, wasn't impressed. They say first impressions are key, and I'm writing this to prove them wrong. At the time, I was a devoted Nintendo head, and honestly, I don't think I would have been impressed by anything that I saw. I didn't give the mystery system (I didn't even know the name!) that I played one game for a second thought.
Skip forward a couple years to 1989. I had about 20 games for my NES and quite frankly, I loved it! I got fired from a computer job where I subbed as a truck driver and was badly in need of another job. I went to a local employment service, and they got me an interview for a customer service position at Sega of America, a company that I hadn't heard of before. I went into the interview knowing 2 things: 1, this company made video games and 2, I wanted to work there badly! I ended up getting the job (to this day, I don't know how I got the job, not knowing anything about the company or it's system) and started a week after the earthquake of 1989.
It was then that I learned about the company and it's history. It had released the Master System, an 8-bit system, several years ago. The system didn't go over too well and they were preparing for the upcoming titles for the new Genesis system that was released the month before I started. I quickly found out that even though the Master System wasn't widely accepted, it had it's share of fans (as the 200+ calls a day I took from the could testify). I think it was the second day I worked there, when I was allowed to go through the department's library of games. I took stack after stack of games back to my desk and played each for a short amount of time to get a feel for the system and it's games. I can attribute that day as the day I fell in love with the Master System. The games that I remember playing most on that day are Phantasy Star, Wonderboy 2 and 3, Alex Kidd, Spellcaster and Golvellius. All I could think after that day was "How the heck could I have missed out on this much fun!"
Why wasn't the system successful? I think the following sum it up quite nicely:
- Marketing. Sega had no marketing at the time. I was as devoted a gamer as I would ever become, yet I had never once heard the system advertised on TV or the radio. Aside from the one game experience, I had never had the opportunity to play any of the games either.
- Nintendo. Aside from the fact that Sega wasn't helping itself, Nintendo made sure that the Master System failed by all but disallowing any third party company that made games for the NES to make games for any other competing system.
- Games. Not quality, but rather quantity killed the system. The Master System didn't have near the number of games that the NES had, although, I could argue today that in terms of percentages, the Master System has a higher percentage of GOOD games vs. bad ones than the NES. Of course, I don't think that was important back then, and arguably isn't as important as it should be today.
- Peripherals. Although the SMS had one of the best peripherals ever made for a home console (the 3-D glasses), overall, the peripherals for the system are poorly made and designed and few and far between.
Anyway, as time went on, I eventually played a majority of the games and got to know the system intimately. I was taking 3 or 4 games home at night and changing them in the next day for others. On weekends, I would bring as many games home as I could stuff into my backpack and pretty much do nothing but play games (which, I'm sure my new wife loved). Above and beyond that, I had started to pick up games at the flea markets, from friends at work and anywhere else I could get them from. I can't honestly say that all the games for the system were awesome. Some games made me think "These are from the same group of people that did those other cool games?" However, by that point, I wanted to play and have every game for the system!
The hardest things for me to come by were the card games (primarily because I haven't ever liked a single one of them, so I had no desire to pick them up) and the 3D games and glasses. The 3D glasses are arguably the best peripheral ever released for a video game system. They are a pair of glasses that sit over your eyes and transform the image on the TV screen into a 3D image, and it works incredibly well! I never got to spend much time with the 3D games at work (at the time, we didn't have a pair of 3D glasses in their library), so they were the games that I went after with the most gusto. During my time at Sega, only a handful of games were released for the SMS (as I said, Sega wasn't concentrating on the system at all anymore), but every game that came in got as much if not more play time than any games for any other system since. It took me quite a while, but I eventually completed my collection of US released games.
In 1990, Sega redesigned the SMS. We got prototypes of the system and went over it with a fine toothed comb, thrashing it accordingly. It came in a different color and the insides were quite different from the original. The A/V cable had been removed, the card slot had been removed (read: No 3D or card games!), and the system, overall, was cheap and generic. By the time this system reached the market, though, there was no market for the SMS and the SMS 2 could quickly be found for about $10, along with the handful of games that were released around the same time, such as Strider, Psycho Fox and Ghouls & Ghosts.
One bright and sunny day (I actually don't remember if it was bright and
sunny, but I'll pretend it was, since it was a cool day and I want to remember
it that way), I got a call from someone from Sega of Europe. He was looking for
information and such about some of the SMS games, and since I was the guy, he
eventually got passed to me. We chatted, and I began to
see that my complete collection of SMS games wasn't near as complete as I had
thought! He started rattling off names of games that although I had heard of
before (I tested Ultima 4 and Battle Out Run), I had never thought made it out
anywhere! He faxed me lists, sent me magazines and even sent me some games! I
was in heaven yet again! Then, he put me in touch with someone at Sega Ozisoft,
Sega's Australian branch and I found out that there were even more games there
that weren't released elsewhere! All tolled, about 350 games made it out for the
SMS in several countries, such as Brazil (commercial games are still being
released there and a Master System 3 has been released!), Europe, Australia,
Denmark, Germany and of course, Japan. In the US, we got less than half that
total. Games like Star Wars, Ultima 4, Gauntlet, Micro Machines, Bubble Bobble
and Forgotten Worlds never made it over here and it's a darned shame, as the
games I mentioned (just to name a few) are incredible, both in play value and
graphically.
I shudder to think what could have become of the Master System. I don't see any reason why the Master System couldn't have had the success in the USA that it did everywhere else, even with the problems it faced! Oh, and for those interested, to this day, I still don't like and haven't played Black Belt since that first time!