It would have taken an enormous effort to revive the Second Division following the Tenth Mega Drive Championship. Members who were deemed "tournament material" were not exactly in a plentiful supply and, with a sorrowful air of defeat hanging over the tournaments, the Division Two experiment was put to a premature end. There was no talk about further Championships, the variation it was hoped a Second Division would bring never had the chance to materialise, the collapse of the lower league was a bitter pill to swallow. The pace in which each tournament had been churned out, following the procceeding Championship, had slown from the giddy days of mid-2001's monthly competitions, but now they ground to a complete halt. Continuing would have been an admission of defeat and to return to the same warisome system that had dragged on for far too long all ready.

Eight months passed before talk of further tournaments sparked up again. It had taken a long time for the abject failure of the Tenth Tournament to ebb away, but some of the unearthed gems that had appeared in these dark days now shone brightly. The Tournament Knockout was still relatively fresh and with Sir Jackaman and Professor Mizutani still very much involved things started to pick up again. This time there was no grand talk of Division Two rising like the Pheonix, just the idea of a lower-key, one-leagued, friendlier Eleventh Mega Drive Championship. A big problem came that, with the "Baron Von Hooton" system, a league containing six members would require sixty games to complete just one tournament. The members were all ready tired of many of the games used and to have four games played fifteen times per Mega Drive Championship was a nauseating prospect.

The "Home and Away" system was inspired by the Tournament Knockout. The idea of a game pool remianed, however, this time every fixture would have its game drawn individually as opposed to in bulk. No member could play another twice on the same game and members appeared on the fixture sheet once as player-1 (home) and once as player-2 (away). The game pool also recieved adjustments, NHLPA Hockey '93 was removed and Micro Machines '96 and Road Rash 2, which had both proven very popular in Division Two, were added to the roster. This meant the six man league of Baron Von Hooton, Doc Shakib, Lord Dilks, Mr Smith, Professor Mizutani and Sir Jackaman could continue. Yet to have six members in the Knockout seemed a little futile so Tenth Tournament temporary member, Lieutenant Gareth, continued as a Knockout Only member while Princess Charlene joined the tournaments with the same status.

The Eleventh Tournament started off on a very bad note. The blight of non-attendances, that had dogged the tournaments since Baron Von Hooton had walked out of the Sixth Championship, continued. With the event taking place at 3pm on Monday 7th July 2003, Sir Jackaman had just arrived back in the country from a holiday and he reassured any fears, as he inisited he would be at the Eleventh Mega Drive Championship, ushering the now infamous quote "when the tournament calls me, I'll be there". At 3:15pm Sir Jackaman was nowhere to been found and a search party was dispatched to bring the renegade to heel. He was discovered in his car and after a frosty confrontation Sir Jackaman and the Mega Drive Championships parted company. The league continued with just five members and to begin with the atmosphere was filled with resentment for the betrayal of Sir Jackaman. Despite this the gameplay started off brightly with the new games and draw system throwing up some interesting clashes. Baron Von Hooton and Professor Mizutani went head-to-head in an exciting game on Road Rash 2 before Mr Smith annihalated Doc Shakib on Super Street Fighter 2. The following game on Micro Machines '96 was the highlight of the tournament as Baron Von Hooton battled Lord Dilks to a 5-3 victory. Things declined afterwards as the old and predicatble Golden Axe 2, Pete Sampras Tennis, Sonic the Hedgehog and World Cup Italia '90 started appearing on the fixture list and following twenty games the league table had an all too familiar final standing. Mr Smith won the Eleventh Tournament with eight wins from eight games, the first 100% record in a single tournament. Lord Dilks, Doc Shakib and Baron Von Hooton were bunched closely together with just six-points seperating second from fourth. Professor Mizutani held up the table having failed to secure a single point and scoring just one goal, ironically against Mr Smith.

Era can be a vague description when talking about history. The period between the Eighth and Fifteenth Mega Drive Championships have certainly seen many changes and it can be difficult to pinpoint where and when specific alterations affected the tournament enitiy. Certainly those who participated in the Eleventh Championships were witnessing the beginning of the modern era of tournaments. Yet even at that juncture the old order still remained prevalent over the longer-serving members. The blow of Sir Jackaman's betrayal merely compounded the misery of the collapse of Division Two and the lackluster tournaments that precceeded it. The Tournament Knockout dragged out to such an extent that the final game was compelted over six months after the league had been settled. By this point the tournament website had a new design and was shifted from its previous home on Geocities to its current location. Lord Dilks won his second Knockout title after beating Princess Charlene in the final, in a one sided encounter, on Pete Sampras Tenis. Princess Charlene had defied the odds to reach the final, beating both Lieuteuant Gareth and Doc Shakib in the early rounds. It was this uncertainty that made the Tournament Knockout special and at this point in time there were never any plans to wind up what had, thus far, been a very successful competition, however, circumstance would change the very essence of the Mega Drive Championships and in a matter of months the tournaments seemed, once again, to be falling in on themselves.

Division Two had gone, Private Mary had left, Sir Jackaman was not welcome and in April 2004 everything that was new at the Ninth Tournament was over. Professor Mizutani was unable to make the Twelfth Mega Drive Championship and in an instant, the impractical Tournament Knockout became completely untenable. Both Lieutenant Gareth and Princess Charlene were unceremoniously dropped from the competitions which now became souly a four-man league. Everything that had been strived for since the outset of the Ninth Championship was gone, a fact painfully hammered home by the predictable nature of the Twelfth Tournament final standings. Mr Smith won the competition with Lord Dilks and runner up. Doc Shakib was third and Baron Von Hooton was once again last. Despite this the road to the finished league table had been quite interesting and Baron Von Hooton's performaces perhaps warrented a little bit more than last place losing 1-0 to both Doc Shakib and Mr Smith on Golden Axe 2, drawing 2-2 with Lord Dilks on Sonic the Hegdehog 2 and pulling back Mr Smith to 6-6, on World Cup Italia '90, on to conceed in the 88th minute. A marginal change in any of those scores would have altered the league table, however, it was not to be. The Twelfth Tournament table mirrored that of the Eighth Championship (which had taken place two and half years earlier) all the work since then now seemed obsolte, nothing had changed, the sun was truly setting on the Mega Drive Championships.

Four years after the First Mega Drive Championship it was decided to bring the tournaments to a close, yet the Twelfth Tournament, with it's lamentable atmosphere, seemed a bad way to end the saga. Despite a general tedious feeling towards the tournaments from its members none of them wanted the championships to end with a fizzle into obscurity. The Thirteenth Tournament was billed as the final Mega Drive Championship and each member was determined to have it go out with a bang and not a whimper. Seeing as this was going to be the final Mega Drive Championship, Captain Maltby agreed to return for one last tournament. The fixture list was the shortest since the First Tournament, each member would play the other once, nobody wanted the event to drag on too long and it was with this short set of fixtures that the Home and Away draw system achieved what it was always intended to do - a quicker tournament with no one game overused to the point of overkill. One of the pivotal parts of the Thirteenth Tournament was the addition of "spectator seating". In previous tournaments all the members sat in a semi-circle in front of the television, but now there were two designated seats for the two competitors and suddenly the focus was on the two men playing, with the three non-participating members able to cheer and discuss the current fixture. The atmoshpere was very much in the spirit of the early tournaments, before repetivie game play and scorelines quashed passion and enjoyment. Owing to such a small amount of games being played, any error was going to prove costly, however, in truth the final league standings were largly irrelivant. Lord Dilks won the Thirteenth Tournament following a controversial game on Road Rash 2 against Mr Smith. Baron Von Hooton finished above Doc Shakib for the first time since the Tenth Championship while Captain Maltby ended up last with no points. Not that much of this mattered. The Tournaments had ended with a bang, on a high which was nigh impossible to visualise a few months ago. Now the intense passion was over and in truth the Thirteenth Championship felt too short and that the axe had been bought down too quickly, for the enjoyment of the event could have easily expanded to another ten fixtures. The four-year adventure was over, the front page of the website simply declared "The Mega Drive Championships, 2001 - 2005".

PART FOUR OF THE HISTORY OF THE MEGA DRIVE CHAMPIONSHIPS