Sega introduced the Mega Drive in Japan in 1988, in North America in 1989, and in Europe, Asia and Australia in 1990. It was called Genesis in North America due to a trademark dispute. Genesis/Mega Drive was the first 16-bit home video game console. It originally competed with the NES/Famicom and NEC's PC Engine/TurboGrafx-16, but Super Famicom/SNES would soon follow. To compete with Nintendo's entrenched market share and huge library of titles, Sega focused on a slightly older audience, producing games with more intense action and a large number of role-playing games, their initial stars being Altered Beast and the Phantasy Star series. A converter was available to let users play Master System games on the Genesis, which instantly expanded the game library. The Genesis/Mega Drive also introduced Sega's new mascot, Sonic the Hedgehog, in a very popular platforming game, directly competing with Nintendo's Mario.
