System Overview
The Sega Game Gear was launched in North America in June 1991 as Sega's answer to Nintendo's wildly successful Game Boy. It was a full color, backlit portable console with a larger screen (3.2 squared inches versus the Game Boy's 2) that packed a lot of punch for about, oh, 5 or 6 hours until your 6 AA batteries died. In 2009 prices, that's $1+ an hour in just battery costs alone if you buy name brands! Luckily, you could use the wall adapter or any number of rechargable battery packs.
Once you decided how you're going to power this device, things were actually pretty good overall. The Game Gear was essentially a portable Sega Master System (you could even buy the Master System Converter and play SMS games on it), so it allowed for fairly impressive looking portable games for the time. Many popular SMS games were ported to the tiny screen, and many popular Genesis games saw portable shenanigans unleashed on the Game Gear.
You'll most often hear that the Game Gear was a failure, but it actually sold over 11 Million units. In comparison, Nokia's N-Gage sold 3 million, SNK's Neo Geo Pocket just 2 million, and Atari's Lynx didn't even manage 500,000 units.
The Best Sega Game Gear Games
Below are some of my favorite games for the Sega Game Gear.
Aleste - Compile's classic vertical shooter makes a respectable stop.
Ax Battle - You might know this from other articles on SegaFans, but I love Action/RPGs. Ax Battler is about as close to one as I've found on the Game Gear aside from the next-to-the-last game on this list.
Crystal Warriors - A solid Strategy/RPG game that is often forgotten. It's got to be one of the few (and definitely the first) SRPGs with a two-player battle mode!
Defenders of Oasis - A simple, enjoyable RPG on a console that severely lacked them. Nuff said? DoO offered a Middle East setting, something pretty unique for the time.
Fantasy Zone Gear - Opa Opa can help you kill some time on those long car trips!
Shining Force: The Sword of Hajya - The only Shining Force GG game released in English. You could import the other two if you feel like dealing with the Japanese, since there is no regional lockout on the Game Gear.
Shinobi - Joe Musashi is now a ninja on the go, and Yuzo Koshiro (Streets of Rage, The Revenge of Shinobi) brings along the music. This is an interesting entry in the Shinobi series because Sega mixed a little bit of Mega Man into the usual formula. You've got a stage select screen and you unlock powers that you select via the pause menu.
the Sonic series - No brainer, indeed. Nothing to see here, move along! Triple Trouble is probably the best of the bunch and was also a GG exclusive Sonic game. The others are available on the Master System.
Streets of Rage 2 - One of the best Genesis brawlers finds it's way onto the Game Gear without sacrificing too much. You can't go wrong here.
Super Columns - The best version of the best falling blocks game on the system.
Vampire: Master of Darkness - A bit of a Castlevania ripoff but you don't see me complaining!
Wonder Boy III: The Dragon's Trap - Available on other consoles, but who cares?
X-Men 2: Game Master's Legacy - All three of the GG X-Men games are decent, but this one's the best. You start off with Cyclops and Storm, then rescue the rest of the X-Men. After the reunion, you face three more stages. This game is based on the X-Cutioner's Song storyline from the comic.
