http://nintendoage.com/forum/ -Sqooner http://nintendoage.com/forum/messageview.cfm?catid=8&threadid=91286 2016-02-22T16:59:14 -05.00 ne$_pimp 22
There are no wires, no de-soldering, and it's not a valuable cart. Legit?


Edit: http://nintendoage.com/forum/messageview.cfm?catid=8&threadid=122991&StartRow=1#bottom

Figured out its legit SNS-MQ-O on the mask ROM. ]]> http://nintendoage.com/forum/messageview.cfm?catid=8&threadid=91286 2016-02-06T11:22:32 -05.00 ne$_pimp 22
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?! ]]> http://nintendoage.com/forum/messageview.cfm?catid=8&threadid=91286 2016-02-06T09:31:17 -05.00 ne$_pimp 22 http://nintendoage.com/forum/messageview.cfm?catid=8&threadid=91286 2016-02-06T07:35:58 -05.00 ne$_pimp 22
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. ]]> http://nintendoage.com/forum/messageview.cfm?catid=8&threadid=91286 2016-02-06T03:51:56 -05.00 ne$_pimp 22
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. ]]> http://nintendoage.com/forum/messageview.cfm?catid=8&threadid=91286 2012-12-13T15:32:06 -05.00 ne$_pimp 22
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.
]]> http://nintendoage.com/forum/messageview.cfm?catid=8&threadid=91286 2012-12-11T22:23:49 -05.00 ne$_pimp 22 http://nintendoage.com/forum/messageview.cfm?catid=8&threadid=91286 2012-12-11T21:49:16 -05.00 ne$_pimp 22 http://nintendoage.com/forum/messageview.cfm?catid=8&threadid=91286 2012-12-11T21:34:50 -05.00 ne$_pimp 22
I know this because one of my buddies actually bought one of these not knowing it was a pirate, though he did manage to get partial refund. ]]> http://nintendoage.com/forum/messageview.cfm?catid=8&threadid=91286 2012-12-11T17:46:47 -05.00 ne$_pimp 22
only 1 glob top

Star fox has 4



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