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Astro City Mini


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It seems that the system's official arcade stick is now sold out on Amazon and won't be restocked until February. Third party sellers have the stick, though. I am still not sure if I want it, as I think it's overkill for a mini system like this and costs just as much as the system itself. After looking at the reviews on Amazon, it seems I'm not the only one who left the screen protecting thingy on there.

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  • 2 weeks later...
On 12/26/2020 at 5:37 AM, Steven Pendleton said:

It seems that the system's official arcade stick is now sold out on Amazon and won't be restocked until February. Third party sellers have the stick, though. I am still not sure if I want it, as I think it's overkill for a mini system like this and costs just as much as the system itself. After looking at the reviews on Amazon, it seems I'm not the only one who left the screen protecting thingy on there.

I picked up the arcade stick with the cabinet.  The stick is solidly made, hard to say 'well worth the money' as it is expensive, but I am still glad I bought it.  When the system was first announced I pre-ordered with the pad, as soon as the stick was announced about a month later it was a no brainer really, I cancelled the pad an stumped for the stick.  I left it a while before doing the exchange rate from yen to £, didn't need the fright.

Edited by Bod2019
typo
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On 12/24/2020 at 9:07 PM, BitMerge6502 said:

Anyone have any luck finding a USB controller that works with the SEGA Astro City Mini cabinet?

So far, I've tested: Several wired official Nintendo Switch controllers, Wii-U pro (using USB cable), Sega Genesis Mini (3 button USA), Turbo Grafx 16 Mini, Playstation Classic, various 8BitDo controllers (via USB dongle), RetroFlag (SNES & Megadrive both using D-input & X-input modes), RetroBit SEGA Genesis 6 button (two wired [blue/pink], & one wireless [black] via dongle), Mocute, and a few other generic Chinese USB SNES/NES controllers ("Next" branding). None of them appear to be compatible. I also tried a couple Powerpoint style wireless USB pointers, & a Logitech keyboard (just for the shell of it). 

As you can see from the extensive list above, I have quite a collection of USB controllers, and don't want to have to buy another if I can find an alternative. I also would prefer a SEGA Megadrive style over the Astro City controller for confort. I saw a YouTube video of someone using the Japanese Megadrive Mini 6 button USB controller, but seems suspicious to me as to why the North American 3 button or officially licensed 6 button controllers from RetroBit would not also be compatible.

I've also thought about disassembling my Astro cab to test the USB power/data lines to see if they receive proper voltage & such. I know this was the case with the Playstation Classic, (A resistor had to be swapped). Curious to me why no other controller is being recognized at all. 

Sadly, from what I've read, the only controllers that work are:

  • The Official Astrocity Mini Pads
  • The Official Astrocity Mini Pads Sticks
  • The JP Megadrive Mini 6 button pads
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11 minutes ago, Bod2019 said:

I picked up the arcade stick with the cabinet.  The stick is solidly made, hard to say 'well worth the money' as it is expensive, but I am still glad I bought it.  When the system was first announced I pre-ordered with the pad, as soon as the stick was announced about a month later it was a no brainer really, I cancelled the pad an stumped for the stick.  I left it a while before doing the exchange rate from yen to £, didn't need the fright.

When connected to a TV, can one player use the controls on the unit itself, and the 2nd player use the arcade stick?

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6 hours ago, legeek said:

When connected to a TV, can one player use the controls on the unit itself, and the 2nd player use the arcade stick?

In all honesty I haven’t tried this.  I’d seen a couple of videos and written reviews that suggested it could.  If I get a chance I’ll try it out and confirm, unless someone else beats me to it.

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It's starting to be very frustrating. I made the mistake of ordering from the wrong site and now it has been almost three weeks and I don't even know if the thing has shipped or not. The seller didn't reply to my message sent almost a week ago, and I'm not sure I can ask PayPal to help yet.

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6 hours ago, roots.genoa said:

It's starting to be very frustrating. I made the mistake of ordering from the wrong site and now it has been almost three weeks and I don't even know if the thing has shipped or not. The seller didn't reply to my message sent almost a week ago, and I'm not sure I can ask PayPal to help yet.

Not sure where you ordered it from, but I ordered my Astro City Mini directly from Amazon.jp . I also just ordered the control pad from there on the afternoon of the 28th, and I kid you not it arrived on Dec 31st! So at least for me, importing directly from Amazon.jp has been the best option for me.

 

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19 minutes ago, -^CrossBow^- said:

Not sure where you ordered it from, but I ordered my Astro City Mini directly from Amazon.jp . I also just ordered the control pad from there on the afternoon of the 28th, and I kid you not it arrived on Dec 31st! So at least for me, importing directly from Amazon.jp has been the best option for me.

 

I had a similar shipping time with Amazon.jp... it's pretty amazing, really. Same results earlier in the year with the PC Engine Mini.

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5 hours ago, -^CrossBow^- said:

Not sure where you ordered it from, but I ordered my Astro City Mini directly from Amazon.jp . I also just ordered the control pad from there on the afternoon of the 28th, and I kid you not it arrived on Dec 31st! So at least for me, importing directly from Amazon.jp has been the best option for me.

 

That's what I should have done, and I tried to cancel my order but this site (Nin-Nin-Game) won't cancel orders. ? And even when they do, they refund you with coupons. ?‍♂️

Oh, and I had to pay PayPal fees for the first time in, like, fifteen years.

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On 1/6/2021 at 12:09 PM, legeek said:

Sadly, from what I've read, the only controllers that work are:

  • The Official Astrocity Mini Pads
  • The Official Astrocity Mini Pads Sticks
  • The JP Megadrive Mini 6 button pads

I went ahead and bought the Official Astrocity pad. It's surprisingly more comfortable than it looks, the D-pad has classic SEGA feel. Although, I still haven't given up trying to study how the lockout works.

Edited by BitMerge6502
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On 1/12/2021 at 2:54 AM, BitMerge6502 said:

I went ahead and bought the Official Astrocity pad. It's surprisingly more comfortable than it looks, the D-pad has classic SEGA feel. Although, I still haven't given up trying to study how the lockout works.

Cool.  Do you need two pads for multiplayer on a tv?  Or can player one use the stick on the unit itself?

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On 1/7/2021 at 4:36 PM, roots.genoa said:

That's what I should have done, and I tried to cancel my order but this site (Nin-Nin-Game) won't cancel orders. ? And even when they do, they refund you with coupons. ?‍♂️

Oh, and I had to pay PayPal fees for the first time in, like, fifteen years.

I had a very good experience with them on the Aleste Collection. I'm sorry to hear you're having an issue.

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1 hour ago, jgkspsx said:

I had a very good experience with them on the Aleste Collection. I'm sorry to hear you're having an issue.

Well, after I asked them what was the status of my order (for the second time, but this time through a new ticket), they finally shipped my order THREE WEEKS after I placed it. They claim they've cheated on the price of the package to lower the custom fees, but I guess I'll find out soon enough... If I don't pay custom fees, maybe I won't warn about them in my review, and just recommend using Amazon Japan (because you'll never pay custom fees with them). In any case, I'm pretty sure I won't order anything from them anymore; I refuse to pay PayPal fees for such an expensive order, and being unable to cancel it may be legal in their countries, but not in mine. ?

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On 1/8/2021 at 12:47 AM, -^CrossBow^- said:

Not sure where you ordered it from, but I ordered my Astro City Mini directly from Amazon.jp . I also just ordered the control pad from there on the afternoon of the 28th, and I kid you not it arrived on Dec 31st! So at least for me, importing directly from Amazon.jp has been the best option for me.

 

Amazon Japan doesn't mess around when it comes to getting people their stuff. I ordered something a few years ago with 1 week shipping, but it showed up about 12 hours later. There's a reason that I tell people to use Amazon Japan.

 

16 hours ago, legeek said:

Cool.  Do you need two pads for multiplayer on a tv?  Or can player one use the stick on the unit itself?

I am extremely confident that you can have 1 person use a controller and 1 person use the system. Not home right now. Will check when I get home.

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I finally got it today and didn't pay any custom taxes; Nin-Nin-Game was not kidding when they said they lied about the price of the package: the system is supposed to be 3101 yens and the controller 743 yens. ?

 

For now I find it mostly great; I don't mind that there are only two save slots since there are infinite credits, but 2 things are disappointing:

- like Steven said, the system can't be powered through a Switch dock, but not a TV USB port either; you really need the socket and it's not included

- Credits+Start to pause games is kinda awkward, not as much as holding Pause for 5 seconds like on the Genesis Mini, but still

 

But my real problem is I tried to play Crack Down (which I love) twice, and the system rebooted after a few seconds of playing. ?

Did it happen to some of you?

 

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1 hour ago, roots.genoa said:

I finally got it today and didn't pay any custom taxes; Nin-Nin-Game was not kidding when they said they lied about the price of the package: the system is supposed to be 3101 yens and the controller 743 yens. ?

 

For now I find it mostly great; I don't mind that there are only two save slots since there are infinite credits, but 2 things are disappointing:

- like Steven said, the system can't be powered through a Switch dock, but not a TV USB port either; you really need the socket and it's not included

- Credits+Start to pause games is kinda awkward, not as much as holding Pause for 5 seconds like on the Genesis Mini, but still

 

But my real problem is I tried to play Crack Down (which I love) twice, and the system rebooted after a few seconds of playing. ?

Did it happen to some of you?

 

I have mine powered through a spare USB on my iMac, no issues.  My TV has a couple of USB connections, some supply a higher amperage than others, check to see if you have a higher output option on the back of your TV.

 

I haven’t tried Crack Down yet, but will try later if I get the chance.

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1 hour ago, Bod2019 said:

I have mine powered through a spare USB on my iMac, no issues.  My TV has a couple of USB connections, some supply a higher amperage than others, check to see if you have a higher output option on the back of your TV.

 

I haven’t tried Crack Down yet, but will try later if I get the chance.

Yeah, apparently it depends on TVs - and mine has only one USB port. ? Actually the problem probably came from the power plug I used (from a crappy budget tablet). I changed it and I could beat the first level. :) Clearly this thing consumes a lot more power than any mini console, which is not surprising given it features more evolved games like Virtua Fighter, and the screen also has a better resolution than the NeoGeo Mini, since Gain Ground and Crack Down use high resolution for instance.

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If you lived in the USA or Japan, I'd say to use the Mega Sg or Super Nt plug and cable if you have them, as those work perfectly for mini consoles. Unfortunately, France does electricity a bit differently than the USA and Japan do. Why is there not one international standard with a single plug type shared by the entire world?

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I was having issues with reboots and complete shutdown while using an older Samsung phone charger on mine. I eventually found two issues that cause it. One was apparently the USB cable I was using it didn't like and two, I switched to an iPad charger and didn't have any more issues after that.

 

So I'm not sure exactly what is needed but I believe my ipad charger is a 10w model that came with iPad gen3 or something a few years back.

 

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  • 1 month later...

So this thing is getting a Limited Run Games release:

 

https://www.limitedrungames.com/collections/neo-frontpage/products/astro-city-mini

 

It looks like it's identical to the Japanese version aside from the box art. It's also cheaper on Amazon Japan, as well, so if I lived outside Japan and didn't have one, I'd just get it from Amazon and save money.

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2 hours ago, Steven Pendleton said:

So this thing is getting a Limited Run Games release:

 

https://www.limitedrungames.com/collections/neo-frontpage/products/astro-city-mini

 

It looks like it's identical to the Japanese version aside from the box art. It's also cheaper on Amazon Japan, as well, so if I lived outside Japan and didn't have one, I'd just get it from Amazon and save money.

Nothing really wrong with it, but I found this kind of funny on the LRG listing above:

"This features localized English packaging for the US market.

Only 3,500 units have been manufactured in English packaging for the US market."

 

So like...a box that has English on it that says...Astro City Mini?  I just kind of feel like if they're going to make a thing out of it being localized in any actual significant capacity, they would have had to actually translate the menus and game text.  This just seems kind of cheap.

 

That said I am actually a LRG fan and like their stuff.  And the Astro City is a fantastic little piece for any big Sega fan.

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12 minutes ago, Curious Sofa said:

Nothing really wrong with it, but I found this kind of funny on the LRG listing above:

"This features localized English packaging for the US market.

Only 3,500 units have been manufactured in English packaging for the US market."

 

So like...a box that has English on it that says...Astro City Mini?  I just kind of feel like if they're going to make a thing out of it being localized in any actual significant capacity, they would have had to actually translate the menus and game text.  This just seems kind of cheap.

 

That said I am actually a LRG fan and like their stuff.  And the Astro City is a fantastic little piece for any big Sega fan.

The Japanese release's menu is entirely in English anyway if you choose the English option, so aside from maybe including the English ROMs of the games, there isn't really much they would need to do to localize it. I think there are a few games on there that are basically entirely in English anyway, even though they are all the Japanese versions. Actually, I think the majority of them should be 100% fine if you can't read Japanese at all. Still, paying over $30 more just for English box art is questionable, I think.

Edited by Steven Pendleton
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