Is there an easy way to determine the format of an NES prototype? For example is it PAL or NTSC?
 

there is a code on the lockout chip, find the code you find the region

Thank you for the information. Is there a master list somewhere? I started surfing around bootgod and found several different codes for NTSC. 
In fact, I am not sure that I am looking at the correct information. Is it by chip type? For example: http://bootgod.dyndns.org:7777/im... . Would all 6113a chips be intended for the NTSC market? Or are you working off of the code on the bottom: 6834 3aa? If so, how do you interprete it?

How would one check to see if a prototype is "timed for PAL"? I am not 100% sure I know what that means. I am guessing that is has to do with the 50 hz used in many European countries and the 60 hz used in the US, but I have no idea what effect this has on a prototype. Thanks again for the help.

The only scientific, reliable way is to dump the ROM and compare it to the retail versions. Failing that, find out if the released game has different timing (very obvious with music) by playing the ROMs or original cartridge, and see which one your proto sounds like.

Could you explain more about comparing the ROM? You dump the ROM. It is not bit for bit identical to the PAL nor NTSC. What in specific do you compare?

 

Thank you. This is exactly what I was looking for.
 

First I download the retail ROMs and see what they're meant to look like, and then compare it to the prototype. The most obvious giveaway is a Nintendo of America copyright (the majority of licensed NES games have one), the next most obvious is PAL-specific timing (usually faster music). In the kind-of-unlikely scenario that neither of those apply (in which case, are the NTSC and PAL games actually different at all?) I'd do a diff between it and the retail ROMs in a hex editor to see if one of them is obviously closer than the other.

Thank you for the information.