I have had maybe twenty copies of this game, and maybe three that actually worked. I have tried it on various systems, thinking maybe that would help, and it did not. Upon opening them, they architecture seems no different from any other games. Is there something unusual about the function of this game? Another game that seems to do this for me is Cybernoid. Any ideas?

hey pedro! ... not sure about that ... I have a Contra and F117A that did not work though they looked cosmetically sound and internally they looked sound...the NES lockout chip on both of these even still worked properly.  If I had to guess it has something to do with the one of the two main chips on the board and possibly being manufactured cheaply...either that or they sat in an attic for years on end and the heat killed the electrical components ---- btw are you the pedro! on ebay?  How's that working for you?  I've seen your score go from 50 to thousands...so good job on that.

Interesting, could you take a pic of this unusual PCB? Later on in the NES's life Acclaim made some of their own carts, and some companies also had their games produced by them (Hi-Tech, Virgin) but The Immortal has no relation to any of them, I'd love to see what you have there.

The Cybernoid cart has bus conflicts which I suppose could make it not work on some models. A lot of games have bus conflicts, but Cybernoid happens to rely on them, due to shitty programming I suppose. AFAIK emulators have to do a special case for this game to get it to work right.

There are couple games that pop into my head that also have issues: Astynax and Snake, Rattle & Roll. There must be something odd about the video signal output by these games, they do not work on my LCD monitor at all, as if the monitor doesn't think it's getting a valid signal. I've not looked into it much so I couldn't tell you much more than that.

I've had the same problem with Immortal.

I am the pedro! from ebay, thanks for noticing. Things are going very well over there. Pretty sure we're the third largest volume NES dealer on ebay at the moment, looking to be number two by Christmas. pedrogames.com will get you to our store on ebay if you're interested. We'll have a full blown website soon, mostly informational though.

The pedro! name by the way has nothing to do with my real name, more to do with my favorite pitcher, and a reference to a great movie.

I've bought games from you. Nice to see you around.

I have also had 2 Immortal carts that didn't work.....
~~NGD

you gotta chillax guys

I've had several not work as well. I know it has nothing to do with dirty contacts as they were spotless.

anyone have any of these "non-working" ones right now? If I could see a pic of the insides and it is something odd, I'd like to pick one up.

I still have my PCB boards for mine I think Bootgod. I can send it to you if you want to poke around with it.
~~NGD

I have 2 noin-working immortals in my hand right now.  They are both mint - no damage.  Also, they are both stamped "28" on the back.

I'll send them to you if you'll cover the $3.00 shipping.

I also have a flawless immortal cart that works on average 20% of the time. I have to practically push the catride down 50 times before it works. I'm guessing the electronics are made cheap. 

Doh I just realized I mis-read pedro's original post, I thought he said it was different from other PCB's, but he said *no* different, selective reading I guess

Anyways, I'm still curious as to what is going on here. I didn't remember having trouble with this cart but I decided to dig mine out and check it and I am having issues. The program seems to be running fine, i.e. music is playing and demo runs and whatnot. The graphics are messed up, but not in the typical dirty connector garble / lines. Instead the picture seems very unstable, shaking all over the place. Is this the same problem everyone else is having? This seems like a timing issue to me, but if that were the case, it should consistently not work.

My cart also has mfg ID '28', I wonder if they had a bad run? To anyone who has a cart that doesn't give them trouble: Does it have a different mfg ID on the back (a 2-digit number impressed into the top-left corner of the back label, can be hard to see)?

I have had 2 that wouldn't work at all, and believe me I cleaned them. Then I have had 1-2 more than has issuses like you mentioned.
~~NGD

The shaky graphics and perfect music is exactly the problem I've had with every non-working Immortal I've seen - at least 5 different carts.

My Immortal is ID 28, and it *always* has garbled graphics but perfect music on power up; however, I've never had a problem making it work properly after a couple of minor adjustments to how the cart is seated in the control deck.

I'm just glad I'm not the only one. I've seen them for sale by the hundreds on ebay, but I went through at least twenty before I got one I would sell, that worked every time. I also got one that had Cybernoid in it, the other game I have regular problems with. I thought that was pretty weird.

I just tried both of my "28" Immortals over and over - repositioning them like you said.  I never got them to work properly.

I've never had a problem with a cybernoid.

I tested my Immortal cart (with number 28 on back) on 3 different systems:
NES toaster: works perfectly
NES top loader: works perfectly
Super 8 adapter (play NES on SNES): shaky graphics, very dark color compared to NES systems making the text hard to read but the music is perfect

The Super 8 has AV plugs, so maybe this why the cart is not working great.

From a post on nesdev talking about color palette 0x0D (which was the color that was causing my Sudoku game to appear hosed on some people's TVs)

<quote>Besides the Game Genie, has anyone here ever see TVs glitching because of other games that use color $0D? Maniac Mansion (the American version, not the Japanese version), Skate or Die 2, and The Immortal use this color, so maybe those owning a PowerPak could test these games on their TVs, especially if those TVs glitch for Game Genie. </quote>

So I guess you guys that are seeing a bad "Immortal" can maybe try out Skate or Die 2,  or Maniac Mansion and see if you see something similar (assuming the original poster on nesdev was correct)

Al

All those other games work fine.  It's only Immortal I've had this problem with.  And it's all of them...I'm running the regular RF adapter out of my top loading NES.

I've never had a problem with those other 2 either. Actually I tried Skate or Die 2 yesterday at the same time because it was right next to the immortal and the only other game EA published.

Well it looks like our Immortal carts are not broken I brought this up over at nesdev, and it is indeed due partly to using the palette index that Al mentioned, but the problem is amplified because the game also uses the color emphasis bits to further darken the color. The reason this is a problem because the resulting voltage level of signal is close to the level used for the sync signal. So some TV's are mistaking it as such. From what others have said, this seems to affect mainly newer TV types like LCD. I couldn't get a stable picture at all with my LCD, but then I hooked it up to a CRT and then it worked just fine.

i just picked up an Immortal cart with manual for $5. it is stamped with "28" and works fine.