[jordanmorgan10]

The same idea extended to the SNES too if I recall, a quick dig up on Wikipedia:

"The system was designed to accommodate the ongoing development of a variety of enhancement chips integrated in game cartridges to be competitive into the next generation."

[whermans]

Going as far as co-processors for 3D rendering[0] - image buying a game today that comes with its own GPU!

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Super_FX

[duxup]

I wonder if we'll ever get back to that sort of thing... I guess with digital downloads not so much, but i really like the idea.

[toast0]

We have some sorts of similar things. EyeToy and Kinect were additional hardware added to the system for games; not on the same media as the games though. The difference is expansion hardware today is always going to be subordinate to the main system --- the economics and data transfer realities don't work out to put a polygon processing enhancement in a USB add-on; but the cartridge slot has immense potential and it could also be cheaper to use the base system with enhancements than to release a whole new enhanced system (although, it's not clear to me how much the base genesis/megadrive benefits the 32x)

[jordanmorgan10]

Well with xCloud coming up from Microsoft, and Sony partnering with them on cloud gaming - we appear to be going in the opposite direction, for better or worse.