Mortal Kombat (Game Gear) - Authentic Sega Cartridge, Tested & Cleaned

Fatalities in your pocket

Authentic Mortal Kombat for the Sega Game Gear - the handheld cut of the fighter that started it all. Every copy gets powered on, verified to boot and play, and has its contacts cleaned before it ships.

The blood code that beat the censors

Here’s the fun bit: like the Genesis version, and unlike the famously sanitized SNES one, this port ships censored by default but hides an uncensoring code that restores the blood and Fatalities. On Game Gear it’s 2, 1, 2, Down, Up at the code screen - a different string than the Genesis’s legendary “ABACABB,” since it’s a different machine. That whole blood-versus-censorship fight is the one that dragged games in front of the US Senate in 1993 and gave us the ESRB rating system. The 8-bit version trims a couple of fighters (no Kano or Reptile), but it still won GamePro’s 1993 Handheld Game of the Year - and it’s a direct ancestor of the Mortal Kombat series NetherRealm is still making today (Mortal Kombat 1, 2023).

Region-free, and bundle-ready

Game Gear carts are region-free, so it plays on any Game Gear worldwide. Sold by condition grade: every grade plays the same, and the grade only describes looks - here’s how I grade condition. A great add-on for a restored Game Gear bundle.