There are many ways to play 8 and 16-bit games out there; as well as the simple option of emulation there are the dearth of clone systems and retro machines. There are many ways to play the games of yore but I was recently handed a Megadrive Portable by my cousin who was having a bit of a clear-out. The machine itself costs around 30 pounds and I think this is an excellent value. Its certainly a cost effective alternative to getting an import Sega Nomad and an Everdrive cartridge. The machine comes with an SD card slot and the fact that by downloading roms from sites like emuparadise you can add pretty much have every single Megadrive game ever made is brilliant.

A real perk of the system is that the AV out is great to connect up to your TV or in my case, the projector in my mancave- I have spent many an hour laying down in my futon look up at the projected game on my ceiling plugged into my headphones playing my way through my childhood games.

There are only a few negative points, the main one being that the speaker isn't great quality. The machine doesn't have the Yamaha YM2612, the six-channel sound chip developed by Yamaha, and so the soundtracks don't sound like they used to (not a bad thing in some cases sure, but for games like Streets of Rage 2 or Thunderforce 3 a real loss). The controls are good without being spongy but don't feel as solid as the Megadrive controllers.

Overall the system is well worth the asking price and the litmus test is that my two nephews (aged 5 and 3 1/2) love playing the system. Even though there is no way to play two player in the games there are plenty of great games on the system to sink your teeth into.