Do some Mega Drive games change language because of system?

[molotovwars]

The above may not be the best title, but I couldn't think of how to really word it. I'll explain below.

Are there any Mega Drive games that will play in different languages based on which region system you use?

I am living in Korea and any Korean Mega Drive games I find that I don't add to my collection, I usually sell. The games are Korean version games and I am playing them on a Korean Samsung Mega Drive. Very games were ever actually translated into Korean, so the vast majority of Korean version games are just English version roms with Korean packaging. There were some games that were only released in Japan (and Korea) and as a result those games instead appear in Japanese.

Today I was testing a few games I was sure would be in English only to find a good deal of Japanese in them. The menus and even story would appear in English, but then game mechanics and other things would appear in Japanese.

I'm wondering if some of those games have 2 languages on them, which is decided when the game detects what system its in. The Korean Mega Drive is afterall just a Japanese Mega Drive with a Samsung Korean shell.

The four games I tested today:

Desert Strike: Return to the Gulf (EA Games)
LHX Attack Chopper (EA Games)
Steel Talons (Atari/Tengen)
Rampart (Tengen)

If anyone has any of those games and both a US and Japanese Mega Drive to do a test I'd appreciate it.

[ZeroAX]

Perhaps they were halfassed attempts at translating the game?

[Breetai]

Did you know you can do that test in an emulator? Usually the region on an emulator like KEGA is set to "auto-region". Just change it to USA, test the game, change it to JPN, and test it again. I have heard of a few MD/Genesis games having multi-languages (like Neo Geo games), so this wouldn't be unheard of.

I've also used that same check to test whether a game is region-locked or not.

[flamepanther]

I don't know about those specific games, but there are definitely some Genesis/Megadrive games that have multiple localizations on them, and will select based on the region of the console. Streets of Rage and Bare Knuckle are both on the same cart.

[Hobie-wan]

I have a Japanese Daisenpuu and when I play it on my US Genesis the title screen comes up as Twin Hawk. That's the only one I'm aware of offhand. I traded a Japanese EA basketball game to Sevin. I tested to make sure it worked, but I don't remember what the languages were doing.

[molotovwars]

If I have some time I may run them through an emulator, but anyways interesting to hear that some games did have that feature.

[hashiriya1]

This happens when I put Ghouls N Ghosts into a Mega Drive. It becomes Daimakaimura.

[DaddyMulk]

As others have said, there are quite a few Mega Drive/Genesis games that will change in some fashion depending on which region your console is from. I had a switch installed on my Genesis in the early 90's that allows me to switch between U.S. mode and Japanese mode, and used to really enjoy firing up my Genesis carts in Mega Drive mode just to find the differences.

FWIW, I tested all four of the games you mentioned in Japanese mode. I only have copies of the U.S. releases of these specific games, so that's all that I could test (I *think* this might be what you're looking for, though I'm not entirely certain). Anyway, all four of them play 100% in English when loaded in Japanese mode. The only difference I noticed was that "Licensed to play on the Sega Genesis" is replaced with "Licensed to play on the Sega Mega Drive" on the title screens of both Rampart and Steel Talons (a pretty common change when swapping regions).

As a side note, reading this thread last week inspired me to go through my entire Japanese Mega Drive collection just to see which games changed, and how, when running in U.S. mode. Would anyone be interested in reading this/sharing info on titles from their own collection? Also, since I'm new here, I'm not sure if it's okay to post it here, or whether I should start a new thread for it (I don't want to hijack this one if what I'm posting is too off-topic).