I've recently got a Famicom cart of Strider from a friend, and when I took the PCB out I was puzzled because it looks nothing like the NES board. Can someone identify the "unnamed" chip for me on the right?
That's obviously a pirate board, and that unmarked chip is an MMC1 clone.
... How is one to protect oneself from being sold a knockoff or "pirate" version of a classic cartridge game. I doubt many vendors will let you open it up and look inside before buying. And even if you did, is there any universal way to immediately say "Oh yeah that's not original at all"? Like yeah if there's a post-1900s date on something, but given something like the picture above...?
Considering my personal collection and how recently I acquired most of it, I'd say there's a good chance I own a couple fakes and didn't notice...
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And even if you did, is there any universal way to immediately say "Oh yeah that's not original at all"?
Look at the Nintendo made famicom PCBs on Bootgod's database, the difference is obvious. All PCBs have a (c) 19xx Nintendo written somewhere on them, and always have either two round holes or a rectangular hole in the middle of the PCB, in addition to a complex PCB shape.
For non Nintendo made, but legit, carts, the name of the manufacturer (such as Namco) is almost always nolded in the plastic case. This does not stop people from creating bootlegs intended to look like originals, but it makes you able to detect original games from blatantly pirated ones easily.
You have to know the library and have a handle on how legitimate and fake carts compare. afaik Strider didn't see an official famicom release, so that's a dead giveaway you're buying a pirate cart. Outside that after you see enough of both kinds of carts you'll get a feel for what's official and what's fake. It just takes longer to get a handle on it since there's a wide variety of styles for real famicom carts.
Also, sorry to say, but former Soviet bloc countries, S. Africa, Middle East, Asia (outside Japan) are saturated with pirate carts. So if the seller is from there...
Khaz wrote:
... How is one to protect oneself from being sold a knockoff or "pirate" version of a classic cartridge game. I doubt many vendors will let you open it up and look inside before buying. And even if you did, is there any universal way to immediately say "Oh yeah that's not original at all"? Like yeah if there's a post-1900s date on something, but given something like the picture above...?
Considering my personal collection and how recently I acquired most of it, I'd say there's a good chance I own a couple fakes and didn't notice...
In this case it's easy to know just because there is no official Famicom version of strider (except prototypes). I guess this cart has the NES ROM.
Thank you all for the answers, for the record I did not buy this, I received it as a gift because the previous holder didn't want it anymore... (maybe because it's a pirate copy) I just wanted to say this because I don't want to look like a complete jackass again.
Sadly I can't check what's on this for a while because my last RF adapter appears to have died. Now I did take a photo of the plastic cover as well, and I have to say... these are either pirates who wanted to spend a lot of effort, or it's a prototype. On the back of the PCB it says CC-110 (could stand for CapCom?)
But if they're pirates... kudos to them for not using the stupid epoxy blobs this time.
It appears legitimate, or if it is a pirate they took time to make it appear legitimate. You can see the famicom logo on the back label, along with some dummy warning message which is almost the same on most produced carts. On the front, the Capcom logo and the game's code CAP-SH seem to confirm it's a real cart.
It could be one of those "well-made fakes" though, I believe they are rare for the famicom format.
It's a Pirate, there is no legitimate 60-pin version of Strider besides the prototype as I said, plus I think that artwork is from a newer game.
I've seen a Strider Hiryuu pirate cart like that before (with fake box and manual). It's probably containing the Japanese ROM from the prototype that was dumped recently.
Recently, the big thing in the Japanese repro scene is making fake prototypes and "weathering" them so they can be passed off as authentic protos from the 1980s and such. And of course selling them on Yahoo Auctions for big $$$$ / Yen.
It's really "buyer beware" at this point.
Strider was never released in Japan. Only prototype exist. There was some information about it a few years ago.
Just to make it clear, when I mentioned it looked like a real cart I was talking about his "gift", not about strider.