A buddy of mine found this at the swap meet this morning for $20. I walked right by it! He hasn't tried firing it up yet, but the date code puts it a few months before the retail release. My assumption is that it is a final build, but we'll find out shortly. The cart is significantly heavier than a standard Genesis cart. Anyone have experience with these pre-production carts? The seller supposedly sourced it directly from Neverland.

Final Boss sequence:





Music Test, Stage 3 (aka Thriller)





Stage 3-2 footage (Thriller stage music)






Pic of the internals:



Here is a list of differences:


A screen with copyright info plays when the game is started. I found a reference to this in https://tcrf.net/Michael_Jackson%27s_Moonwalker_(Genesis) described as 'Unused Text'

When you start a game, there's a level select screen allowing you to choose the round and scene.

On the options screen the list of music samples is different, with generic names like 'Round 1', 'Enemy' etc. instead of song title.

There is no score & time screen after you beat a level.

The transition animation between 1-3 and 2-1 is different.

Bombs are always stationary and always explode after 3 seconds.

In 2-2 the two elevators at each end of the level are not synced. If you use one you have to go all the way back to it to change floors.

The 2-3 boss battle is different, there's no magic white dog, just a bunch of the regular dog enemies.

The Round 3 music is Thriller, the full song.

In the 3-2 and 3-3 boss battles you just fight regular zombies, they don't fly or detach their torsos or anything.

Nice, guaranteed to be a Thriller version  

I'll be watching this one. If it's FS, and not to ridiculously priced, I might be interested in it. I'd like to see it opened, though, so we can verify that it's legit.

He should be able to open it up. It's definitely legit, though.

awesome!!!
I love this game.congrats to this nice find:-)

Thank you! So one of the big difference so far is that Thriller is the stage music, and not simply an unlockable clip. Apparently there are other differences like a copyright screen at the start of the game, and no score/time summary at the end of stages.

That is awesome!

$20 at a swap meet! Thata cray. What else did the seller have?

Nice find! The final (Rev 01) ROM of Moonwalker was compiled on 1990-07-23 10:29:44 (from the official archive CDs that I got: http://hiddenpalace.org/Sega_ROM_...) so this is 3 months early, really cool.

Whoa, that's awesome! Sounds like there is more that differs from the final game, most significantly the final boss. A placeholder turret is set as the final boss, but it can not be defeated. Ultimately, my buddy plans to sell it. He will likely be listing soon.

Cool find dude!

Great find.

That's really neat, amazing to see stuff like this pop up.

I didnt know there was a NINTENDO prototype of this... ohh... its Sega... whats that doing here?

Nice! Great find. I like that Thriller is stage music. Does it work as that? Does it get too repetitive if, say, you're terrible at it and have to keep repeating the stage? Are you going to play through the whole thing to see if it's finished?

As a speedrunner and world record holder of this game, I might very well be interested in this one.

We will have to talk!

 

My buddy has played through quite a bit of it. He mentioned there were a number of differences. I'll talk to him more soon to see what he has to say. He should be prepping a list of differences. 
 

Well done.

I would also be interested in this.

Wow. Amazing find. I'm interested in the list that states all the differences in versions.

Cool, it's definitely up for grabs. Shoot me an offer and I will forward it to him. 
 

Here is the list of differences through Stage 3:


A screen with copyright info plays when the game is started. I found a reference to this in https://tcrf.net/Michael_Jackson%...) described as 'Unused Text'

When you start a game, there's a level select screen allowing you to choose the round and scene.

On the options screen the list of music samples is different, with generic names like 'Round 1', 'Enemy' etc. instead of song title.

There is no score & time screen after you beat a level.

The transition animation between 1-3 and 2-1 is different.

Bombs are always stationary and always explode after 3 seconds.

In 2-2 the two elevators at each end of the level are not synced. If you use one you have to go all the way back to it to change floors.

The 2-3 boss battle is different, there's no magic white dog, just a bunch of the regular dog enemies.

The Round 3 music is Thriller, the full song.

In the 3-2 and 3-3 boss battles you just fight regular zombies, they don't fly or detach their torsos or anything.

Ironically that makes the 2-3 fight a lot longer. The White Dog is killed in just 2 seconds.

Technically, the game can't be completed because the final boss can't be defeated. Added footage of the Thriller stage music!