SEGA 32X

The SEGA 32X is an add-on for the SEGA Genesis, released in November 1994 in North America and shortly afterwards in Japan and Europe, where it was called the Super 32X and the Mega Drive 32X. It plugs into the Genesis cartridge slot and plays its own cartridges.

The 32X was designed to extend the life of the Genesis with 32-bit graphics at a low price. It adds two Hitachi SH-2 processors, the same family used in the SEGA Saturn, and its own frame buffers, which it overlays on the Genesis picture. This allowed 3D polygon graphics and up to 32,768 colours on screen. It could also be combined with the SEGA CD to play the handful of games made for both.

The add-on arrived at the same time as the Saturn launched in Japan, and players and developers were unsure which SEGA system to support. Only 40 games were released, six of them on CD, among them Virtua Racing Deluxe, Star Wars Arcade, Doom, Knuckles’ Chaotix and Virtua Fighter. SEGA dropped the 32X in 1996 after selling about 665,000 units.

The 32X is hard to emulate well, because the two SH-2 processors and the Genesis have to be kept in close step. PicoDrive has long been the most reliable choice and runs on almost any hardware. ares and Kega Fusion also play most 32X games.