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Mega
Duck - The system
Let me tell you a bit about what we're dealing with. The Mega Duck is slightly bigger than the Gameboy, and has a smooth, rounded casing. The screen looks remarkably similar to the Gameboy, and I've got serious reasons to believe it *is* the exact same one. The controls are nothing we haven't seen before as well: you've got your up/down/left/right buttons, A, B, "select" and "start". I think a fitting description for the Mega Duck would be a kiddy version of the Gameboy, like "Sony's My First Cartridge Takin' Handheld Game System". The reason *why* it's called the Mega Duck is a mystery. First of all, it sounds incredibly toy-ish. Nobody in their right mind will take a game system by the name of Mega Duck seriously - at least not when they're looking for a hip and hot new handheld! Also, the logo looks like it has been drawn by a 8 year old drunk kid. In Brazil this exact same system is called the Cougar Boy - which is ofcourse a slightly better name. Basically it's just the Mega Duck in another suit, and everyhting is completely compatible. Tech spex: Nobody really know's what exactly is inside the Mega Duck. There's no tech spex available on the net, I can't tell by looking at the Duck's organs, and the companies involved in the production of the Mega Duck aren't any help. But! Fear not, obscure Taiwanese videogame pulp lover, fear not! I've come up with some theories to keep us occupied. First of all some facts. I think, by the looks and the functioning of the thing, the Mega Duck is a very close copy of the Gameboy. I'm pretty sure it has the same processor, an 8-bit Z80 (clone), and it has the same display: a 160x144 LCD display with four shades of gray. Since the Mega Duck has "CHEAP RIPOFF!" written all over it, I wouldn't be surpised if the memory is sliglty less than a Gameboy (which has 8kB). But other than that - I think they're very similair under the hood. Okay, here's the theory for these facts. Let me begin at the Mega Duck's producing company. The Mega Duck has been released under several names, Creatronic being the one most mentioned, and unfortunately there's little known about this company. All the games for the Mega Duck have been made by a company called Commin, and were all released by Creatronic. My guess is that Creatronic contracted this game company Commin to produce games for their Mega Duck system. Whichever way - Commin and Creatronic were in close cooperation, and might even have been the same company. Anyway, years went by, the Mega Duck flopped, and nobody heard of it anymore. A few years later, Commin released a lot of the Mega Duck titles for the Gameboy and Gameboy Color on 4-in-1 cartridges. These were *exact* copies, including al the graphics and characterising details of the Mega Duck versions. This, and some details about Commin explained in the "GAMES" chapter, lead me to form this theory. First of all, the chance of a Taiwanese company completely doing a remake of some unimportant, obscure, lousy game for the huge, high-quality Gameboy market is pretty small. Second of all, Commin had proven to be quite talented hackers and had serious reverse- engineering skills (especially if they get the credit for developing the Mega Duck). My guess is the Mega Duck's internals were the same as the Gameboy's, and the games were reprogrammed on tiny details to work on the Gameboy. If the processor and the screen is the same, it's not a difficult task. They crammed four games on each cart, and voilla: two weeks of work and about eight cartridges to present on the blooming Gameboy market. Easy money! (For a summary of the known Duck's tech spex, check out the FAQ)
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