Sega Mega Drive Mini review – a legacy truly honoured

Perfectly modelled and smoothly animated, the 42 built-in games are lovingly reproduced, with modern gaming benefits. It's a delightful surprise

It's been almost three years since Nintendo launched its diminutive NES Mini console and discovered a vast audience for stylish retro hardware. Since then, it has re-released the NES Classic Mini and launched an SNES sequel, while Sony has clambered artlessly on to the bandwagon with an uncharacteristically mediocre offering, the PlayStation Classic. Now Sega has joined the fray, its official Mega Drive Mini set to banish memories of the fairly awful Mega Drive retro consoles produced by third-party manufacturer At Games.

The result is a wonderfully cute and detailed reproduction of the original Mega Drive model, sensibly priced at 70. Although it's small enough to fit in the palm of your hand, it packs in accurate cosmetic features such as a volume switch, side grille and extension port, closely mimicking the ghetto blaster form of the 1988 machine. It is kind of a shame that the volume control is non-functional - a headphone port would have been a lovely extra, but doubtless prohibitively expensive to include.