I yearned for one of these TV tuners for years and never got one cause they were too expensive.
this post was submitted on 12 Nov 2025
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I still have the box for mine that advertises the TV tuner. I always wondered if there were other attachments too.
The game gear had two major issues:
-It was too far ahead of its time (something SEGA unfortunately did multiple times, cfr Dreamcast's online gaming capabilities)
-Battery life sucked major donkey cock
It was also somewhat pricey, but the former point was paramount.
The battery life was hilariously bad, it was almost the defining trait. It was made especially prominent since it was being compared to the OG Game Boy which could go 20 hours on four AA batteries. The GG could only go about five, if you were lucky, on six AA. Mine basically lived plugged into the wall with a long extension code so I could use it from anywhere in my bedroom.
The GG could only go about five, if you were lucky, on six AA
Which, while of course requiring exponentially more power, the Switch 2 only goes for about 6 hours on less demanding games, funny how battery life hasn't really changed much for advanced handhelds.
Sure but the switch 2 has a rechargeable battery unlike the game gear which had to be supplied with new batteries every time which cost money.
I’m not sure if rechargeable AA were common in those days.
Rechargeable batteries were common, but in my experience they tended to not hold up as long as normal batteries and took 6-8 hours to recharge. At that time they also degraded quickly, were expensive, and overall just a massive hassle to try and manage.
rechargable AA's before Eneloops were all absolute dogshit
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It was more like 30 minutes with the Super Heavy Duty AA's my dad could afford.
But that's okay, he hand soldered me a DC adapter that only threw sparks sometimes.
Game Gear "services" are quite common now - you can get them recapped to solve the infamously troublesome sound dropouts, and most will change the screen to a far more power efficient LCD display as well to let you play at night.
It still eats batteries, but at a much slower rate.
I'm just gutted I left mine in the garage in storage where the damp air fucked it for good
How bad is it? You would be amazed how salvageable they are with the right chemical soak and solder reflow.
Honestly I never opened it. I have a Master System II and in fairness, the difference in game ports are negligible for the most part, so I never really looked at repairing it.
Speaking more broadly, I wouldn't mind learning how to solder - my skills have mostly been in software rather than hardware. Things like fucking about with a Raspberry Pi and their expansion boards sounds like a right laugh.
if the board is completely fucked, people have made reproduction boards to move the components to, too.
soldering isnt hard, it just takes common sense, a modicum of thought, and a little bit of patience and carefulness.
If you are on a extreme budget, try to find a used Weller soldering station at a pawn store/garage sale/thrift store/etc and just take some dead electronic device you have and practic desoldering and resoldering the components on it.
if you have a bit of money to spend, pick up a Hakko FX-888d station and beginners soldering project (You can get radios, various LED projects, and some lead solder etc etc, all for pretty cheap, and by the time you've done one you'll be well on your way to basic soldering skills on most non-micro components.
That's very kind of you, thank you for the crash course - some great pointers!
np, good luck with it, if you try to pick it up.
Its a great skillset to have, even at a basic beginner level.. Once you get comfortable with a soldering iron, so many dead electronics suddenly can be repaired for cheap instead of replaced... You have no idea how many TVs I've saved just from the dump just with capacitor replacements alone.
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The best mod would be changing it from batteries to a cell phone style rechargeable battery. At least then I wouldn't care as much of how quick it dies since im not replacing a ton of batteries every day. Even rechargeable ones, you still gotta take them out and put them back, which is annoying as well.
I miss mine as well. I remember as a kid our grandmother got me and a few cousins it for Xmas one year. I also remember breaking it the following year during a parent kid picnic at school where it got crushed. I still remember it, which says a lot because I have very few memories from way back then!
Edit: of course they made this mod! If I ever find one for cheap I would love to do this just as a hobby.
https://handheldlegend.com/products/cleanjuice-game-gear-rechargeable-battery-module
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That was one of the reasons I wanted to have one.
One kid on my bus had it, we were all SUPER jealous and kicked his seat
The whole union of kobolds kicked his seat!? That must have been miserable for him!
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I never saw a game gear last 5 hours. The one guy I knew who owned one seemed to have it run out of battery everyday on the school bus which was only like a 45 minute ride.
I got one for xmas one year, probably it's last year when Sega was clearing inventory, because I didn't ask for it. All I ever had was the pack-in Sonic title. I wish I kept it so that I could modernize it, but who would have seen that coming? I remember playing it and then seeing the battery light flash and I was like, "I wonder what that means, that can't mean a low battery since I've not been playing it all that long!" Yep, it was a low battery :(
It probably wouldn't have been a big deal IF Sega bundled a damn AC adapter with it instead of charging separately for it. It was hard to convince my parents to get me video game stuff as a kid.
He should've bought the official Game Gear AA battery bandolier
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I had that thing! It was really cool to watch a football match while camping!
And I gave it to my father when he was in the hospital... Eurocup was at the time.
I think it was pretty rare, at least after the first year or so. I had a Game Gear maybe a year after it launched, and I desperately wanted this as a kid so I could watch TV in my bedroom or on car trips. I searched everywhere, called stores, etc. but never did find one.
I got a GameGear from a garage sale that had a bunch of accessories including this... It was definitely rad for car trips, but it would chew through 6 AAs in about 2.5-3 hours, and my parents shut that down pretty fast.
It wasn’t that good. The system already drained AA batteries like virgin sacrifices but imagine fm radio dials to sync for tv channels… That being said.. chefs kiss…
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Yep!
An every time I was in Toy r Us, Babbage's, Children's Palace or looking througu the JC Penny's Christmas catalog, I thought it was the coolest thing in the world and oh so desperately wanted it....despite not owning a Game Gear...😅
I have this. It's been on my wishlist ever since I was little and now that i have some disposable income I bought it. Unfortunately the analog signal has been disabled for years, but there's a jack on the tuner that allows you to connect composite video (with a special cable to go from the yellow, red and white to a single 3.5mm jack).
I played some Xbox on it, for the novelty. The screen is small, the resolution is low, the lcd isn't very clear in some cases, ... I love it.
There are special kits to replace the screen with a modern crisp led screen, but they are not compatible with the tuner, something to keep in mind.
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That would have been so baller back in the day.
Yes! I remember wanting one and envying the kid on the bus with his!
I gotta get my gamegear fixed. It’s too bad we switched over to digital OTA signal because I would love to mess around with this tuner.
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