If you want to support homebrew, buy the carts. Higher sales and profits will only bring in more developers. If you want to give to charity, do it. Pick your favorite cause instead of something someone else chooses for you. There is no connection between the two anymore than buying a movie ticket requires a donation. Forcing buyers to pay for games they don't want or forcing sellers to give away their money won't help either side.

A guarantee list wouldn't help for CIB releases anyways, there would never be enough people on the list to cover the minimum box order. It also just creates yet another version of the same game for those with more money, part of nesworld's main complaints.

Depending on the doner, it can be anywhere from $2-$10 a doner, moreso though, the costs come from eproms, mappers(if needed), Boxes(minimum $3 a piece and I know that for quality printed, scored boxes, the minimum order is 250, usually higher., Cart stickers, and manuals.

I know NGD is going for an all out CIB, so I can totally see 4k. Plus, I think he's usuing new parts which will cost a liitle more. It's probably $10 or so just for the cart, before any of the paper products. I'll put a sample break down here. Let's say you want to make something in a 250 print run CIB with new parts.

Cart shell, Board, Eproms, mapper---$10 each
Cart Sticker-----------------------------------$1 each
Manual-----------------------------------------$1 each
Box----------------------------------------------$3 each

total---------------------------------------------$15 each times 250 equals $3750

As a business owner, I pay double social security.  That extra $3-4K/year for old people is enough!  What happens when my charity isn't the one you want?  How much money will you give to the KKK Reunion Fund?  

I agree with what you are saying but I dont understand if someone spent 4 thousand dollars to get the ball rolling to make a homebrew  why limit the number of releases. Myself Im kind of out of the loop when it comes to the homebrew stuff. I would gladly front some money for any homebrew project in exchange for getting a cart when there finished.   Why cant when someone has a plan ready to start a home brew they say hey im making a homebrew  to get in on the project send 40.00 and when there finished you get a copy.  

I dont want to tick anyone off and get a big debate started But my biggest question is whats really the purpose of homebrew games.  at this point in time it seems like a big way to divide the community and cause hard feelings. hey heres this really neat homebrew game the coolest and best get the first 30 copies and the rest of the phesants get the next group which will be different because your not special like the first group. or 40 will be made certian people will get a copy and to bad for the rest of you. then 6 months later ones on ebay  look this rare homebrew i got for 30 dollars but now if you want it pay 4 times what I did.    Myself I have a few but ive also passed on ones that really didnt interest me.

seems like to me since this is a kind of brotherhood of nes collectors here there would be enough carts for everyone. and all the same. In my opinion homebrews and repo games are in a whole different realm then released games. stadium events there arent very many and your going to have to get one when you can but homebrew and released arent out of production unless the producer decides to stop making them.

I dont know if anything I said makes any sense I just dont understand why there would be a limited amount of released homebrews if people are willing to buy them. but as far as charity I think the people that put in all the work should decide what to do with any profit

This thread is shit, you have countless posts talking about how strong the Euro is and how weak the USD is and then accuse people of only thinking/caring about money. People get paid for doing work, this is no different than any other job. As was stated before, living in the US (as I believe everyone on your list to be) and paying taxes already contributes to non-profit organization funding. These guys are charitable every time they pay their taxes.

I'm a school teacher, and just like you, I'm fairly certain I could be making more money in another field. I enjoy teaching and working with children, but I also like getting paid for it. Does that make me greedy? I have a mortgage and other expenses to pay, I'd like to keep a roof over my head even if it means giving away less in the form of charitable acts/gifts.

I am very grateful that we have these home brewers in our little community and its something that helps keep a 20 year old hobby alive. What they've done is give something to the community that very few have done in the past, and I think that kicks some serious ass. I'll continue to support them for as long as they continue to support us, regardless of whether they "give back" more than they've already given back.

Ditka will have a production run of 250 carts total, 10 of which are gold special editions ones. After that there will never be anymore produced. 4k is really on the low side as a guess anyways, cause that isn't counting for a lot of other stuff that has been involved, little alone the time and effort.

Dutch just cause you donate to charity doesn't mean the rest of us want or have to. That is a personal decision and has NOTHING to do with gaming what so ever.
~~NGD

so if 300 members want one you wouldnt make 50 more even if they paid.

Nope. I am making 250 CIB games...once they are gone they are gone period. 250 is the number cause that is the minimum number of boxes/manuals/and stickers to get printed.
~~NGD

If I was greedy, I wouldn't sell games on a website. They would trickle out on ebay 2-3 at a time. Start the first ones bidding at $100. List until they don't sell anymore, then drop the price to $90. Repeat! Once that runs out, make a small variant change and start again at the top. That way you always get the maximum everyone is willing to pay. I could try the "Disney Vault" idea but I doubt that would work on such a tiny market... Of course if I was greedy then NES games is a bad choice to begin with!

EXACTLY!! but don't do it.......

Yeah, I'd have to say my main motivation for making a game was not for the money, but to do something cool on an old hardware platform.

If I had wanted to make money I would've targetted one of the bigger, easier game making markets such as XBox Live Arcade, WiiWare or mobile phones, but I chose the NES because I was a collector, as well as someone bought up with the 8 bit architectures of the 80s. It was fun to reminisce.

Sure, I've made *some* money off Chunkout 2 sales, but really only enough to continue this hobby. Sales will be buying me a CopyNES and PowerPak Lite to further increase my ability to develop games, and potentially some other dev tools such as an EEPROM programmer. As bunnyboy says, there's no Ferraris here, and I can make a crapload more money doing my real job.

This topic has become more political than the Presidential race it would seem, and it really has become difficult for me to guage interest in limited editions. I'm starting to go insane trying to determine what the public sentiment would be like if I was to announce one.

My original agreement with Dutch's idea earlier in the thread was for the fact that if you created 1 more copy of a limited edition, would it eat much into the value of the sales of the others? Lets go with a hypathetical scenario of a limited edition release.

Game is released as a limited edition of 10 copies for sale on ebay. As part of this, it is also announced that following these auctions, 1 more will be placed on ebay for a charity. During the course of the auction for those 10, will people hold back bidding in a hope of winning the 1 extra? I don't think so, the likelihood of winning the single cart for a lower price than one of the 10 is fairly low. And once the first 10 sell, they really set a line in the sand for the price of the single cart. Then you get the philanthropic people who will bid extra on the charity one because it's for charity, so I'm sure the single cart will sell for a higher price. Sure the money isn't going to the developer, but has it eaten into any of their potential profits?

I'm jealous!!!!

can you blame him though?    Why pay to get 300 made?    He's just out another 50 x unit cost until they sell.  I'm sure he doesn't have unlimited funds for this purpose.

Here's the thing man.  If you think its such a great idea and such a easy way to make money then get off your ass and do it yourself.   What's that?  It would be work???

You had a nice idea going here but trying to ram it down people's throats is only going to serve to turn people off of your idea.

this thread has gotten crazy... all i gotta say is that i work like 60 hours a week and make great money, but i would NEVER give my money to a charity. screw that, even though i make a lot, i have tons of bills and live paycheck to paycheck most of the time. and if you have a problem with me saying that, i dont really care, because it is MY decision to not give to charities. if you want to give to charities, more power to ya. if you dont want to give to charities, more power to ya.

and on a more happy note, jason, i will kiss ya once you release that cib ditka... it better come with a poster of chris farley and the superfans!!!

So much negativity on NA these days.

by the way, I whole-heartedly agree that this is an individuals choice, and perhaps should have been read as more of a suggestion from Dutch

when you get more than 1 person together you will have disagreements. but we can all get together in tenn for a big group hug.

A group hug, and a beer for those of us who drink (and for those of us that don't, such as myself, a good old-fashioned bottle of pop will do).  I'm there.  That reminds me...I found an old hat I bought at a church yard sale 12 years ago...  It's made of corduroy, a baseball cap with the Super Mario Bros. logo on it, copyright 1988...I'll be wearing that to Knoxville in September (even though I don't look normal with a hat on...but then again, what's normal, eh ?).

One last point here.. I venture to bet if NGD knew for sure 300 would sell, he would have 300 made, but 300 is a huge risk, I don't think any NES homebrew has sold 300 carts yet. If you add up all 3 versions of Sudoku maybe, but even the NWC Repro hasn't passed 300 yet.

If I had to guess, I would bet NGD didn't even want to do 250, and only chose that number because that the minimum order for boxes.

You can't just make another 50 after the fact, there'd be another 250 minimum box order, so he'd have to do 500 and I'll say will 95% certainy that he wouldn't sell 500 copies.Up front you could order 300 boxes, but re-orders are subject to the minimum again.

Here's another hypothetical...What if it only sells 100 copies? what about the other 150 then? He takes a $2000 hit in the ass.  This is where general releass come in handy. If and when the CIB run sells out, I'm sure NGD won't have a problem with say gamereproductions making single cart onlys. It's be available in some form. I'm sure the rom will get dumped at some point and you can go and make your own personal copy if you want.

This is what happened with Sudoku, there was a 100 limited run, they sold out, and Al signed on to do a general run through retrozone. I'd venture to bet maybe 100 more carts have sold since that cart released nearly a year ago.

No one misses out with these special editions or anything. The games will eventually, in one form or another, be available for all to play and enjoy.

its a free country, you can do what you want with your time and money. stop drinkin the haterade

You hit the nail on the head udisi! I didn't really want to even do 250 but that is the lowest number you can do for a CIB game. I doubt I will sell all 250, but there is no way to really know to be be honest. I know my break even point and just hope that I can sell that many of them. There just aren't that many people who are into NES and doing something like this is a HUGE risk.

AMEN on the negativity comment K-Han. I don't know what has been going on lately but everyone seems on edge for some reason.
~~NGD

Will they be available outside of the Age expo as well?  I'd love to get one, but I won't be able to go to the expo. 

One of the reason people might be 'on edge' has to do with Aerosmith "Living on the Edge"

Sad, but true.

MLN'er

I was wondering the same thing.  I dont really get into sports games but I would buy this one.