Have You Spotted What's Wrong With The Genesis / Mega Drive Mini 2 Yet?

Sega is getting ready to release the second of its Genesis / Mega Drive Mini consoles, with the new micro-system arriving on October 27th worldwide.

The console will come pre-loaded with 60 Sega titles spanning both the Mega Drive and its Mega CD / Sega CD attachment, and the hook this time around is that the machine's design is based on the Genesis / Mega Drive 2, a revised version that arrived in 1993, five years after the launch of the original Mega Drive in Japan.

At first glance, the Mega Drive Mini 2 appears to be an accurate facsimile of the original machine, but eagle-eyed Sega fans will spot one notable difference in the western versions: they both come with a power switch rather than a power button.

The original Japanese model had a power switch, but, for some reason, when Sega released it in North America and Europe, it swapped out the switch for push-button power control. That difference doesn't seem to have been reflected in the Genesis Mini 2 and Mega Drive Mini 2, both of which retain the power switch of the Japanese model (albeit in a different colour). Also missing from the western versions is a small vent which was found in between the power / reset buttons on the OG Genesis / Mega Drive 2; this housed the red power LED.

As you can see from the images below, all of the new Mini models have the same switch power button:

Here's a photo of the original '90s Mega Drive 2 from Japan, which shows the same switch design:

The images below are the original western '90s hardware (Europe and North America), and both have a power button and a small vent in between the power and reset buttons:

It's likely that Sega has decided to do this in order to cut down on production costs, as it would have required the company to produce a different case design for the west. Even so, it's a shame that the Genesis / Mega Drive Mini 2 isn't quite 100% accurate.