When did Sega switch from Black Genesis cases to the Red ones?

[The Adventurer]

I'm curious when Sega switched from the black style game case design they launched with, over to the red spine cases.

Also, I notice some of my Black box Genesis games have barcodes on the spine, and some don't. Is there a reason for that?

[Satoshi_Matrix]

I'm pretty sure it was when they switched to the Genesis II. Around 1993 or so.

[SparTonberry]

I'd agree. Around the latter part of 1993, with the launch of the Genesis/Sega CD 2 is when Sega switched to the candy stripe boxes for all their consoles.

[BlastProcessing402]

Keep in mind, it wasn't a total switch all at once. You could still find a few games being released in the black cases even on the 32x.