How to tell if a game is fake
 
This thread is being created to prevent members from getting scammed. Refer to this thread, when the legitimacy of a game is questionable. If you are able to share any information about how to spot a fake game/box/manual/seal/etc, then please post what you have to share.  Please help, if you know of a fake then post it here http://www.nintendoage.com/forum/messageview.cfm?catid=3&...  
 
Signs  it’s FAKE:
 
Cartridge

• The easiest way to tell if a game is fake. Is to open it up and have a look at the board. If you see any of these things then the game is not original.

1. Re-wiring.
2. De-soldering.
3. Surface mount components might be a sign, depending on the component
4. Missing components
5. Carts that have a different colour, and have cheap light weight plastic
6. Eprom chips

• Check the label for any discoloration or if the image has more pixilation then you would normally see. This will normally be easier to see in black print.
• The nintendo official seal of quality should have a shine to it.
• If the cartridges front and back do not line up, this means the back was swapped (Which is easiest to tell with snes carts). This could be a sign that the game is a reproduction, so your going to want to open the game up.

Sealed games

• Look for wear under the packaging this is a sign of use.
• NES/SNES/N64 games have an H Seam seal across the back. If there are specific games that don’t, please post in this thread.

Games with no H Seam

• Majesco varients.

 I’m not a sealed collector but if we can make a list, it would be most excellent.
 

• Vent holes in the shrink wrap, would indicate that the game has its origanal seal.

Manuals and Boxes

• The nintendo official seal of quality should have a shine to it.
• Discoloration or if the image has more pixilation then you would normally see. This will normally be easier to see in black print.
• For boxes, compare cardboard thickness and feel. If the boxes is super mint condition and seem to be firmer than other games you own, this could be a sign.

 
Prototypes

• The board will be larger than the version sold to the general public.
• Will have EPROM chips

 
Seal collectors and Proto collectors please share any other information you may have these are not games that I would normally go after so I’m sure many more helpful tips can be added.

This threard will be a work in progress, suggestion and tips will be added and removed from the list.

I almost bought a loose Final Fantasy VI GBA Cartridge, it was a FAKE, you can tell cuz it has cheap plastic, slightly brighter and its lighter than original ones.

its hard to tell when you see them in bulk with others.

For prototypes you should put: "Signs it's a real prototype:". Because now, according to the structure of your post, you indicate that a prototype is a fake in case is has a larger board...

Signs it's a real prototype:

- Bigger boards (regular sized boards can still be prototypes)
- Eprom's / Re-wiring
- Handwritten labels
- Handwritten name on carts
- Standard labels used by company's for prototypes
- Age of the label  ===> old labels mostly have a faded look
- Printing on the label ==> old school printing  
- Windows cut out for the EPROM's so they can stick out (because they use a chip holder to easily remove and insert the reprogammable EPROM's, the board won't fit in the cart anymore. So they cut windows in the cart)

A good way to learn people how to spot if it's a prototype (or to spot fake seals) is to make a picture catalogue with pictures of multiple prototypes having one or more of the things I mentioned above.


For example, here you can see that my Captain skyhawk prototype and the "A boy and his blob" prototype from nesplayer.com have the same kind of label style. 
If you look at the boards however: my prototype has a regular sized board. But it does has rewiring and uses a Eprom. 

Vent-holes on sealed NES games?

90% of sealed SNES games should have the vertical seal. You may want to list the majesco varients which don't have it.

You might want to add glob tops on the boards!

Glob tops doesn't necessarily mean a fake. SMB1/DH is mainly glob tops, for example, and I'm sure there are other legit released games that had them as well.

ETA: I believe Star Fox or F-Zero had a version that was released with glob tops as well.

Also, are we talking about just fake carts, or fake boxes/reseals, or all of the above? There's quite a few things to look at, and I believe a lot of the experts won't reveal a lot of the harder to spot things to avoid someone from catching on (from what I've gathered in previous topics about this).

Good topic. I can't speak as an expert in games, but I can speak as someone who makes repro/homebrew carts, and who does repairs.

The fact that the cartridge halves don't line up really doesn't mean much. Either the cartridge was opened, or it just loosened up over time - I see it a lot. SNES carts especially seem to get somewhat loose over time.

For spotting fakes, another thing to look at is the label. Making good labels is hard - very hard. For example - the labels I make look superb, but they're clearly not original. They are not quite as shiny, and not quite as thick, because I'm using a different material. Some people use clear packing tape to make the labels as shiny as real ones - but then that makes them thicker than original. Compare to several real cartridges, and you'll see which one looks different.

The corners and edges are another spot to check. When cutting by hand, it's difficult to get a perfectly straight edge, and even harder to get that perfect rounded corner as on a real cart. Compare to a real cartridge and a fake label stands right out.

Inside the cartridge will be the real telltale. If you see any ceramic chips with windows - it's an EPROM, and thus not original (at least on licensed games, I think Color Dreams put EPROMs in some games, etc). Look at the part numbers on the ROMs - if any of them are standard part numbers for flash chips, it's also not original. Look at the solder joints - a solder joint that's been hand soldered will look different than a wave soldered joint. On top of that, typically you'll see flux residue around the joint as well, since normally you don't wash the board after hand soldering. Any stray wires inside the cartridge also point squarely at fake.

Now, these things all won't apply to protos - those are all going to be handmade, and obviously so. Hand soldering, EPROMs, handwritten or simply made computer printed labels. Prototypes are a whole separate thing to authenticate, and I know nothing about them.

-Ian

Star Fox competition edition has glop tops as well. 

And yeah threads like this are fine for newbies but we are also giving scammers nice information as well. 

Some real games do use glop tops (smb /duck hunt) smd',s (doom) and have 'missing' components (mmc5 games often have places for resistors and Metroid has a spot for a battery.

You might want to consider adding DS games to this. There's lots of bootlegs floating around Ebay, and now I occasionally find them locally. Someone on here told me that most of the fakes have holes on the back, have a slightly different plastic surface. I know the first game I ever tried to sell on here was New Super Mario Bros, and it had both issues, plus the title text on the label was slightly to the side.

The more people know,the harder it will be for scammers.

This are the glob tops I mean

only 1 glob top

Star fox has 4

Beware of buying Miss Peach World these days. There's a couple overseas people making pirates of that game and selling them for lots of money. They look pretty much like Miss Peach World to the untrained eye, but if you look closer, you will notice the box is actually a bit wider than standard Hacker releases. The pirate versions typically use Sega Genesis clamshells... not even Famicom clamshells, and the game cart will be in a Famicom shell, but it won't have the signature Hacker International shell design. In pictures they can look pretty authentic, but just remember some of the tall tale signs in spotting the fakes as mentioned : The cart shell will be standard Famicom rectangular shaped, not the more triangular shape of the authentic Hacker carts and the clamshell case will be slightly wider than official Hacker clamshells. Also, the PCB would be different of course.

I know this because one of my buddies actually bought one of these not knowing it was a pirate, though he did manage to get partial refund.

Shiny seals of quality aren't necessarily true. I have many games that have yellowish bright seals that aren't shiny, and I know for a fact they aren't fakes.

OP, vent holes in the shrink wrap would indicate an authentic seal, not a reseal.

Well hopefully I can help a little bit about the reseals.

NES/SNES/N64 games have an H Seam seal across the back. If there are specific games that don’t, please post in this thread.

Ehhh....well the for the N64 there are several seams. Of course the V seam and you might want to add the 3 seam, which I personally call the tri-seam. Also the overlap seam [which is vertical]. The 3 seam [tri-seam] has factory air holes and contains the seal on three sides of the box, but one side of the box doesn't contain a seal. Tri-seams [3 seam] contain no V-seam and all 3-seams connect. I'm sure some people will try to re-seal games like this, but usually the 3 seam seal is tight as hell. Usually some re-seals are loose and contains "fat seams". However this doesn't necessarily mean the N64 seam is a re-seal. Even some first party Nintendo games lack the V seam on the back, which are usually the 3-seam. There's another N64 seam that some users here said was legit, but I can't remember it. If I see it I'll post it here.

I know this is a very old thread, but I figured I should bump this as opposed to making a new one.

I'm hoping to get my hands on megaman x3, pocky and rocky 2, and pocky and rocky. All very valuable and hard to come by boxed SNES games... I'm deathly scared that this guy might be a scumbag, and be selling me bad stuff (I've heard from other people in my local trading community that he's traded a fake clay fighter sculptor cut around, unknowingly, or so it was claimed... dunno tho the whole story tho...), anyways maybe I'm being paranoid... but since I'm meeting in person and doing a cash trade, and the fact for these particular games the packaging is worth double of the cart, I feel like I need to be extra vigilant.

Anyways... basically what I wanted to know: the shine on the nintendo seal in the manual, is that a guaranteed way to find out if the manual is indeed legit? I checked the carts I own and I do notice a bit of a shine.
I also wanted maybe some more pointers on how to check for the boxes, as far as I can see the best way to tell if the cardboard is white, but, I've seen some posts in threads that say the darker cardboard can be faked too..
I also want to mention that someone told me that a surefire way to check if the box is legit, is to see what kind of cardboard the box is made of.

Essentially what he told me is that snes game boxes used to be made with a special type of particle cardboard, where they had 'layers' and you could actually shave off layers of the cardboard with a thin razer to see. this was just how the boxes were manufactured. he also went on to say that the machines that make this kind of cardboard arent available anymore... is that true? so essentially what he told me was, that if the cardboard of the box has the layered type, its legit for sure? he seemd to know what he was talking about, would love clarification on this.

anyways I'm going to meet him regardless, and I'll bring along one or two of my SNES boxes to compare, but since I don't have a lot of experience I would love some pointers.

^^ honestly the fakes are not that great yet (hopefully stays thay way) especially the boxes, if you compare your boxes you will be fine, look at the colors, photo quality, cardboard type, the mega man x3 box is a lower quality box so it may not be as shiny as the boxes your comparing it too but the seal of quality should still match. Not sure about manuals.

The game, well give a good lookover of the label, if you can open up the carts.

Big purchase for someone whos unsure so just go with your gut, walk away from the deal if its not right.

I don't want to be a total noob here, Any one have pictures of fake vs real boards? I'm more of a visual learner.

The only fake I was ever unknowingly duped into buying was an import copy of Super Mario Advance 2 Super Mario World in December 2001 or January 2002. This was before most people were aware of fake GBA games on eBay and people still thought that cartridges were too expensive to pirate. The GameCube had just launched and the N64 was still fresh in our memories. If you recall, that was one of Nintendo's main justifications for the N64 using cartridges: less incentive to pirate due to expense. This seemed to be confirmed because almost all N64 piracy was done with special hardware and sold on discs/disks instead of pirate carts intended to fool buyers. Almost no one at that time would have expected a brand new boxed and shrink-wrapped import GBA game less than a month from the release date to be a pirate. As I recall I paid as much for it as I would have if I waited for the US release (about $30).

The first thing I noticed was that the shrink-wrap plastic was VERY hard where it was melted together. In fact, it was sharp enough to cut yourself on! It didn't even occur to me at the time that Japanese releases were not usually shrink-wrapped at all.

The next thing I noticed was that there was no tri-wing screw like my import F-Zero Maximum Velocity ("F-Zero for Gameboy Advance") had. I imported that with my GBA so it was almost certain to be genuine. I compared boxes and found the "AGB-[whatever]" impression stamped onto the insert to be a lot more sharp and crisp compared to the same thing in my other import game. Yeah: the pirate actually looked better than the original in some ways. I also noticed what looked like dirt in the box image (didn't flake off so it had to be scanned and printed). The logo with the halting hand signal intended to discourage export and second-hand sales was noticeably worse on the pirate, like the red lines were out of focus.

The manual had some pages upside-down and some pages from an entirely different game! The game label itself was plastic-coated like Japanese releases were supposed to be... but so were the US games the seller was selling. At the time US releases had normal paper labels since at least the launch of Killer Instinct on SNES. The first title I recall getting which went back to plastic-coated labels was Fire Emblem for GBA. The label was slightly smaller and a bit crooked. The ridge on the top of the cart looked smooth until you compared it to a real game and saw a distinct point where it begins rising from the flat face of the cart on each side.

The game did not save a high score and it was the first GBA title to use a certain kind of EEPROM save (either a larger chip or two chips, I can't recall), so I took it apart to look inside. Sure enough, I found an SRAM battery instead on a glop-top chip and a PCB with no silk-screening or Nintendo markings. The game's ROM had been patched to save progress to SRAM for flash card compatibility and the patch simply didn't address the high score. On top of that, the save quit working entirely a week or two later, prompting me to by the US release as soon as it came out.

I gave the pirate one to an excited kid who didn't care about it being genuine/able to save but I should still have the box and manual around. I'm pretty sure the box and manual were made by someone other than the ones pirating the cart or else they would have tried a little harder and used a tri-wing screw like other pirates on eBay at the time.

Yeah: I noticed a lot more on eBay around that time and almost all had thousands of perfect feedback. No one seemed to be aware. Even the few negs/neutrals I found were clueless people complaining about a sealed game not including some freebie trading card or something mentioned on the box and they still had no clue! No, lady, I'm not surprised you Spy Kids 3D didn't have the 3D glasses. No, dude, your SMA4:SMB3 cards were not taken out when the seller flattened the box to ship from Hong Kong: they never existed.

The sad part is that these eBay pirates were flooding the market with so many that they entered circulation and could be found at any game trade place. For years after I'd walk into GameStop or a fleamarket vendor and point out several pirates in their inventory right away, even without being able to handle them (behind glass). I think Pat and Ian have been more than a little clueless about this when they talk about GameStop getting duped by pirate Pokemon DS and GBA games as if this is a new thing. If they didn't know just how long this has been a problem then I bet countless pirate GBA games have passed through their hands at Luna Games without them ever noticing! That said, I love Luna Games and stop there every time I am in San Diego.

Around 2007 I found a pirated Rockman 7 at Goodwill. The label was a scan of the real one but there was inexplicable junk that should not have been there if they were hoping to fool anyone (looked terrible). The SFC-style cart shell had slots to fit in a US console with the tabs intact. It used NEC External Line Head screws (AKA "GameBit") like a real Super Famicom cart. This was before Alibaba was selling pirate SNES/SFC games to order and SFC/SNES pirates were rare, so I bought it as a curiosity and still have it. The care instructions were molded in the back instead of printed on the label but I know some legit carts are made that way and can't say that it means much. Inside was a glop-top chip and some chip serving as a CIC.

Through the GBA's entire life it was simply too risky to buy most titles on eBay. They got more and more sneaky and started making it almost impossible to tell. I couldn't spend hours reading feedback for clues when I could just go to Wal-Mart and buy it. The situation was almost as bad for import DVDs when I tried to import Katsuhiro Otomo's Memories and the soundtrack. I ended up with four different counterfeits with four different sets of English subs by the time a US release was announced and sold. Why do I want to spend money on pirates when I already had a pirate download from the start which prompted me to find the originals?!

Would my FF: Mystic Quest be legit? There are two chips I don't recognize Mosel MS6264CLL and KM23C4001B. I did a google search and found data sheets, even found an alibaba express page for the Mosel.

There are no wires, no de-soldering, and it's not a valuable cart. Legit?


Edit: http://nintendoage.com/forum/mess...

Figured out its legit SNS-MQ-O on the mask ROM.