It looks like this cart has hit eBay. It doesn't have any bidders yet.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/142440060...

Edit: Oops, mobile sucks.  

TO CLARIFY: 

I'm J. Bone-Christian, the director of Mother to Earth (a documentary about Mother's history reaching America). Zeldaboy or Ferris Bueller can confirm that I've been working on this project for a while, if anyone has any doubts.
 

Old thread, but it's important to note that all the information about "Barbara" was documented by me and told to Jacob secondhand. I tracked the yard sale on foot (asking around at the has station it was near, and interviewing the seller), and in the interview I learned that Barbara was the *AUNT* of the seller.
 

Jacob has admittedly botched a bit of this information (including the name of my documentary, yikes), but I can assure that Barbara was NOT the seller. The seller had no idea what she had, as she actually is not a gamer herself.
 

Additionally, the ROM has been dumped and compared to multiple versions, and I am under the assumption that it is *final version.* It matches with the version of Roo's and one other prototype (currently in the hands of Clyde Mandelin), neither of which are available online.

 

I've outlined some of this information in a video about it here:

 

Hope that clears stuff up. Figured it was necessary, especially if it's up for sale.

Thank you. Having to find the yardsale yourself as a trusted 3rd party lends a lot of additional credibility and I hope the price reflects that.

I didn't speak up because I did not know how much of the information about the cart we were keeping for the doc versus going public. But yes, Josh is legit, one of the leading authorities on this game and it's protos, and has seen I think every one in person. Shoot, we interviewed people from NoA back in the day, including the guy who localized it, and they said Josh knows his stuff.
 

Wow, it's up to $4,600. Way higher than I would have thought, but what do I know? Congrats seller, I hope you aren't getting troll bids!

Shows what some good marketing can do.

Why do so many insist that the version online is final if the final version hasn't been released online? What version is Nintendo using on the Virtual Console? Is it less than final or modified further?

Edit: Confirmed that the ROM Nintendo is using in the Virtual Console is 1:1 identical with the public prototype dump. Unless Nintendo downloaded it online (as some baselessly assume), I believe that makes it the "final" version. This "other protos are different and have unreleased data" thing is just outta left field. I hope it isn't another case of people assuming a freshly-dumped ROM with a different header or more/less padding contains different code.

Actually, believe it or not, I talked with Phil Sandhop in an interview (once a few years ago and another time last October) and he flat out said in *both* interactions that Earthbound Zero is NOT the final version. The prototype sent out to NoCL was a build or two before the final, so that if it leaked (which it did) they'd know where the leak was.

That said, the differences between that and the Wii U version are unnoticeable- There are still changes to the base code, though, and that's why the cross-comparing has led me to believe this version was FINAL final.

$8,300!

Congrats to the seller.

It was immediately relisted with a huge BIN. Must have been a fake bid.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/RARE-NES-...

Interesting.

Just to be clear, he-and now we, aren't actually talking about the Earth Bound Zero ROM, right? That was Demiforce modifying it to make it NESticle compatible. They didn't correct the CRC, so a second hack of Earth Bound Zero also exists with the "Zero" changed to a blue color. The actual prototype ROM does not say "Zero," since Demoforce added that.

If NoA made changes that NCL didn't have for the VC release then, yes, that would be very useful for verifying the prototype. No one had ever heard that before though. The assumption was that the leaked one was also an NoA final. The news that it wasn't is news all it's own! I'm very interested in how that was verified. Was the ROM split and was overdumping/underdumping accounted for when comparing to the public ROMs CHR/PRG?

He is not. We also interviewed Demi earlier this year. But I'll let Josh do the talking, because again, he's the expert and I don't know what we're keeping public/private for the documentary (Mother to Earth).
 

Knew that would happen after it got past 5k. Oh well, hope he sells it. 

Yup, the top bidders who sniped in at the end were just boosting bids. :/ He's looking for a Best Offer now, hence his listing price.

I'm not his mom, so we'll see how it goes- I just hope he gets something out of it.

I didn't notice, did anyone address the lack of silkscreen on the pcb? Seems a bit unusual (compared to pretty much every other tkeprom board pic on the net)

Looks like yet another buyer fell through. He's trying another auction, good luck!

https://www.ebay.com/itm/11251274...;

Different seller trying to scam or is he just selling under a different ID? *confused*

I just searched earthbound prototype on ebay and found an auction thats using my pics and description, clearly a fraud. I reported him and sent them a message asking them to stop being a piece of shit and do something with their life.

Reported as well. Amazes me what people do...yeesh.

Ah ok! Using the same story too.

Prick.

Damn, was wondering about that thinking it was a friend of yours reselling it or something. Thanks for posting and letting us know!

Well looks like it is removed.

 

Wow what a fkn dirtbag

Those Earthbound fans are freaking weirdos. Anyways, I know who bought the BIN, it is a Japanese collector named Koala.

Scam Sent!!!