Sega Pico

Sega Pico is an educational video game system aimed at children. The system was also the first Sega system to carry Nintendo licensed games.

Overview

The Pico was released in Japan in 1993 and in 1994 in the USA. The Pico was a surprising success and had games being produced up to 2005. As of April 2005, 3.4 million systems had been sold.

Cartridges

The cartridges were known as "Story Ware", because they were book shaped. The player could turn the pages of the cartridge and the screen would change to that part of the story.

Technology

CPU: 16/32-bit Motorola 68000, the same as in Mega Drive RAM: 64 KB of Main RAM Video RAM: 64 KB ROM: "Storyware" cartridges of various sizes Video: 315-5313 VDP, same as in Mega Drive Sound: TI N76489 PSG and custom PCM chip.

It was the first console to use touch controls as the default control scheme, and the earliest known device to use active digitizer technology.

Successor

The Pico was succeeded by the Advanced Pico Beena, a more technologically powerful learning device, released only in Japan in August of 2005. Games were developed for this upgraded Pico until 2011.