Retro-Bit opens pre-orders for Twinkle Tale Collector’s Cartridge for Genesis/Mega-Drive; pre-orders open now until December 20th, 2026

Once again, Retro-Bit found a classic cult Mega-Drive shooter only released in Japan, made by an obscure, long defunct studio, and decided they had to rectify that for us westerners.

Twinkle Tale is now the latest game they’ve set their sights on. Pre-orders for a fully decked out cartridge of this newly translated Genesis/Mega-Drive shmup classic from Japan have already begun at the usual online retailers. The pre-order period runs from today until December 20th, 2026. Retro-Bit has given you a little more time than usual to get your pre-orders in, but don’t put it off for too long if you want one. Like many of Retro-Bit’s re-released games, original copies of this game are ultra expensive, so this is your best bet to obtain an official, professionally constructed physical copy if you don’t already own an original copy.

Wanna find out more? Go ahead and check out what this game’s all about right below the break.

Twinkle Tale released in 1992 only in Japan and only for the Mega-Drive. It was originally developed by ZAP Corporation and Studio Ducks and published by Wonder Amusement Studio. The latter was a company created by Toyo Recording, a company that mostly dealt with music and video related businesses, such as pressing CDs and vinyl records and managing video rental stores. Like many Japanese media companies in the 80’s, they got bit by the video game bug and set up Wonder Amusement Studio to publish console games from other developers. ZAP Corporation made games like Dead Moon (1992), Barunba (1989), and Pineapplin (1984). They’re believed to have passed on the programming duties for Twinkle Tale to Studio Ducks. Twinkle Tale went on to be the last game from ZAP Corporation and the only game from Wonder Amusement Studio.

Toyo Recording left the video game industry behind them after that, but they still own the rights to Twinkle Tale now. They are now credited as the publisher for Tinkle Tale in Retro-Bit’s new release. The game also features a new English localization by Nathan Deren with translations by Jeff Nussbaum. New artwork was made for this release’s packaging by Danmakuman, who had previously worked on Retro-Bit’s re-release of Shubibinman Zero: Shockman Zero for SNES.

As you can imagine from the story of how Twinkle Tale came to be, the game saw a low production run and only became increasingly expensive throughout the decades. It’s up there with Eliminate Down as a Mega-Drive shooter that will run you over $1k USD for a complete copy, and hundreds for a loose cartridge, if it ever shows up for sale at all. Retro-Bit’s new Collector’s Cartridge will only run you $59.99, which is a steal by comparison. It comes with the same high quality standards we’ve come to expect from Retro-Bit’s Collector’s Cartridges over the years too, including properly beveled cartridge connectors, gold plated contacts, and proper voltage chips guaranteed to never damage your precious Genesis/Mega-Drive console.

Twinkle Tale takes place in the magical land of Alphyrion and stars the young mage apprenttice Saria. She learns from the great fortune teller Raza about how Alphyrion was created after four special jewels: the Ruby of Power, the Sapphire of Life, the Emerald of Prosperity, and the Onyx of Destruction, fought with each other for dominance until the Diamond of Harmony steped in and settled their dispute. The chaos of their fight created Alphyrion and peace persisted ever since until the black mage Gado began investigating the magic jewels. The king had Gado impresioned for fear that his newfound knowledge would drive him mad, but that just accelerated his dissent into craven authoritarianism. Gado escaped and overthrew the king, installing himself as the new emperor Kaiser and taking over the world with extreme force. Raza then gifts Saria the Shooting Star bracelet, the Diamond Arrow necklace, and the Silver Comet brooch and sends her off to free the great mages so that she can take on Gado at the Diamond Palace and save the land.

The three items given to Saria are her main weapons throughout this adventure. Each one gives off a different rapidfire shot that can be fired with B and switched with C, under default controls. Pressing A will activate one of two different screen clearing magic bombs if you’re in a tight spot. The game is more of a run-and-gun type of experience instead of a shmup that sees you perpetually flying forward down a linear path. You can move and fire in any direction as you face all sorts of enemies and enviornmental traps, however you will be stuck on a linaear path and firing in one direction during boss battles. You have three hit points and your three main weapons will grow weaker the fewer hit points you have and strengthen if you regain any hit points. However, collecting Star Jewels can also power-up your currently selected main shot independantly of your health level.

Here’s what you can expect from Retro-Bit’s new cartridge release:

• First official release outside of Japan
• Localized by Nathan Deren with translations by Jeff Nussbaum
• Lucent Cartridge for Genesis®/MD consoles
• Full-color instruction manual
• Individually numbered commemorative slipcover
• Featuring exclusive artwork from DANMAKUMAN

This time, there’s also an exclusive edition only available through Limited Run Games. It’s the same as the other version, but includes a Dragon Fire red cartridge instead of a Lucent grey cartridge. If you prefer a red cartridge over a grey one, then you may want to preorder from Limited Run Games if possible. Their pre-order will last the same amount of time and cost the same amount of money as ordering from anywhere else.

Preorders for the main version of Twinkle Tale are available at Castlemania Games, Rondo Products, Video Games Plus, and PnP Games for North America and Concept Entertainment, Dragon Box Shop, NedGame, Retro Cables, Sarugami, Spel & Sånt, Xtra Life, and Zed Labz for Europe. You can check out Retro-Bit’s official Twinkle Tale website for the most up-to-date preorder information. And hey, if you need new Genesis controllers to play Twinkle Tale with, Retro-Bit’s got you covered there too with officially licensed Sega Genesis and Mega-Drive controllers, as well as their Big6 controller, at various online retailers. Any local retro game stores near you might also be selling these controllers too.

So have you played Twinkle Tale before? Are you fortunate enough to have owned an original copy of the game? Whether you’ve played it or not, do you think it looks like another banger from Retro-Bit that you just gotta preorder? What else do you hope they reprint one day? Let us know in the comments below. (Also, tell Retro-Bit yourself what else you wanna see from them.)