I'm an old school Nintendo fan. I'm trying to make sure I'm buying real, authentic games for the NES etc and have watched multiple videos online and am dissatisfied with the quality and extent of content on the subject. They definitely help with the obvious basics, but I still find myself feeling doubtful about a lot of purchases. I can look at my own childhood games for games that I get extra copies of, but I find checking the PCB's online to be disconcerting for the games that I haven't owned yet. The only place I've found is the bootgod site for NES games, and I don't see a discord or a means of contacting almost anyone on the site at all that seems to be fitting so I'm trying to hopefully reach someone that happens to be very knowledgeable here. I don't know if the database on bootgod is considered complete or comprehensive or just has what has been submitted so far.
I have a Blaster Master game with a different SLROM (it's an SLROM2) board type than even listed on the entire bootgod site, but the game, box & manual look so legit compared to the board itself that I have a hard time convincing myself if the cart PCB is fake or not. The U2 board also has a completely different chip identifier, too. I have similar issues with a lot of games. Half+ of the chip identifiers are legit seeming, but one or two of the major ones (usually the U2) tends to vary a lot from typical listings for said chips on the sites out there.
Also, I was wondering if the PCB has a K or YB or a similar country identifier in a small circle on part of the NES/SNES PCB board, are any of those red flags to watch for? I don't know if Korea (which is what I'd expect the K in a circle to mean) was quite making PCB's for Nintendo back in the early NES and/or SNES era or not. These kinds of boards tend to look brand new a lot of the time, but a lot of people do take good care of their games.
Thanks in advance to anyone that can shed some light on all these concerns or can inform me of the most expert fake-spotting techniques out there. I really want to become as much of an expert as possible on these things so I can buy and sell comfortably. Any links to more in-depth expertise available in useful sites or resources that I'm not finding in basic online searches would also be extremely appreciated.
I have a Blaster Master game with a different SLROM (it's an SLROM2) board type than even listed on the entire bootgod site, but the game, box & manual look so legit compared to the board itself that I have a hard time convincing myself if the cart PCB is fake or not. The U2 board also has a completely different chip identifier, too. I have similar issues with a lot of games. Half+ of the chip identifiers are legit seeming, but one or two of the major ones (usually the U2) tends to vary a lot from typical listings for said chips on the sites out there.
Also, I was wondering if the PCB has a K or YB or a similar country identifier in a small circle on part of the NES/SNES PCB board, are any of those red flags to watch for? I don't know if Korea (which is what I'd expect the K in a circle to mean) was quite making PCB's for Nintendo back in the early NES and/or SNES era or not. These kinds of boards tend to look brand new a lot of the time, but a lot of people do take good care of their games.
Thanks in advance to anyone that can shed some light on all these concerns or can inform me of the most expert fake-spotting techniques out there. I really want to become as much of an expert as possible on these things so I can buy and sell comfortably. Any links to more in-depth expertise available in useful sites or resources that I'm not finding in basic online searches would also be extremely appreciated.