It Appears I Got Scammed Buying Prototypes

[Code Monkey | 2,008]

I decided a new thread is in order, even though this originated from the end of another thread. Here's the whole story.

I made a post here asking if I should put custom labels on some of my prototypes that were bare. Someone posted there that one of the prototypes resembled some fakes that recently got discovered and then someone else posted on my YouTube video of game play with even more information. Here is the initial post from that thread:

  

On 2/5/2023 at 4:46 PM, ndiddy said:

Just so you know, that Mario Bros. prototype is fake. From the footage you posted on youtube, it's just the PAL ROM with the title screen edited to say "1991" instead of 1993. I was able to replicate the change in about 5 minutes (I can provide the ROM file if anyone's interested):

In the last year or so, I have noticed a pattern of someone selling fake prototypes of NROM games with the title screens modified to look like unreleased region variants (see here for more examples). They all have no changes compared to the actual retail versions they're based on besides the licensing text and dates being modified (i.e. a PAL "prototype" will have the licensing text and dates changed but will still run at NTSC speed and vice versa). They're always NROM games because the retail NROM boards take standard EPROMs without needing rewiring, so it's easier to fake a prototype compared to mapper-based games that used special EPROM specific boards just for prototypes.

I would appreciate it if you could say where you got the Mario Bros. prototype from. Hopefully bringing more attention onto this will spook the seller and make him stop ripping people off. I hope that you can get your money back.

 

And then much more information was posted here:

 

On 2/7/2023 at 1:37 PM, ndiddy said:

I'm glad he's cooperating, it's a shame he knew all about it before you contacted him and didn't take the initiative to reach out.

It wasn't me, I left a comment on the video a while ago but it didn't show up, maybe it got flagged as spam or something.

 

I had some people message me asking for more information, so here's a summary of everything I've seen. I can't figure out how to get this site to let me use bbcode instead of the visual editor, so it'll show up as a giant wall since I'm unable to put images inside spoiler tags. Sorry about that.

In June 2022, someone posted on Discord about a listing on ebay for a PAL localization prototype of Lode Runner, from a seller called "eternax" based out of Germany. Here's the images from the listing:

I thought the game was suspicious because as far as I'm aware no PAL NES games say "Licensed by Nintendo of Europe", they all just say "Licensed by Nintendo". Additionally, Nintendo of Europe wasn't even founded until 1990. One of the users in the server speaks German, so he messaged the seller to get more information. He said that he got the game from an American collector that sells him PAL prototypes every once in a while, and that the collector told him that he works with the Video Game History Foundation (who I later found out have no idea who this guy is).

 

In November 2022, I stumbled upon Code Monkey's social media posts about his Mario Bros prototype, and realized that it was a PAL game with the title screen changed, running at NTSC speed.

 

In December 2022, a German collector called Commander Dennis donated a few PAL NES localization prototypes to the site hiddenpalace.org. This would normally be a very nice thing to do, but unfortunately some users quickly noticed that the games were suspicious:

- I found that there were no code changes, only the text strings were changed, along with some minor CHR ROM edits. When a string was made shorter or longer, the data around it was overwritten or padded out, which pointed to the ROMs being binary patched rather than assembled from source code.

- Some other users (mainly togemet2) were more familiar with how NES prototypes are physically. He noted that the ST 32KB EPROMs that most of the prototypes used were very common on eBay, but rarely seen in NES prototypes. He also pointed out that most developers wouldn't be using ROMs with 1981 date codes in 1995, and that the Othello prototype cartridge was yellowed except for where the warning label would have been.

- I noticed that despite the games originating from different developers, there were some big similarities between them. For example, the handwriting on the Ms. Pacman prototype's label matched the chips on the Othello prototype.

 

The Hidden Palace admins emailed the collector with the news and flagged the game pages on the site. I'm not sure if he's gotten his money back from whoever sold him the games.

 

At this point, I remembered the Lode Runner and Mario Bros. prototypes. Sure enough, the Lode Runner EPROM labels have the same handwriting as Ms. Pacman and Othello, and Code Monkey's Mario Bros. prototype uses the same EPROM types as the Ms. Pacman and Dig Dug prototypes.

 

Some takeaways:

1. Use the stuff I found suspicious as guidelines, rather than strict "bootleg/not bootleg" rules. It's the combination of all of this that led me to calling them out as fake.

2. Nintendo never made a prototype board for NES NROM games, so developers would modify retail games to make prototypes. Because of this, when you see a prototype for an NROM game you have to be more suspicious (definitely ask about provenance). If I've come across 5 of these things by chance, all made by the same person, there's got to be more out there.

3. It always helps to familiarize yourself with how NES games work on a technical level, what prototype cartridges look like, etc. You definitely want to dump your games and inspect the ROM data (and compare it to any available retail builds) as well. With how fast prototype prices have grown in the past few years, I bet we'll see more bootlegs as people continue to realize that they can buy a $5 copy of Golf, solder in new ROMs, and sell it for at least a few hundred bucks.

 

And here is the complete writeup of how I got the prototypes and what I've done since I found all this out last night.

November 6 2021 - I was scrolling through Instagram and saw the prototypes posted on Instagram by user nes_tunes_music. I messaged him to ask if he would sell them and he said yes. His first request was that he didn't want to see them getting graded nor resold. I had no intention of either so that was fine with me.

November 9 - He tells me he has prototypes for Othello PAL-B, Banana NTSC, MS. Pac-Man PAL-B, Ironsword PAL-B and Crackout NTSC. I want the 2 NTSC copies only, he suggests 500 Euros per game, I suggest $900 USD for both and he agrees to $900. He tells me another German collector of NES Commando has made an offer on those 3 since he's looking for PAL-B prototypes. I ask where he is located and he tells me Neuss, Germany. He also tells me I can contact Retro Game Enthusiast or Joseph Leo for a reference check and I can save the fees with Friends And Family but I decline and send Goods And Services for security. 

I take a photo of the transaction right before I send it because I document everything double and triple times.

 

I usually refuse to cover fees but I wanted these so badly I sent him another $57 after this to cover the fees he was charged on this transfer. He sent me this photo of the package and shipping slip, it contains his address and name:

 

(I've removed the photos of his address for now until I'm convinced who's innocent here)

 

November 12 - The package was shipped out with 2 prototypes (Crackout and Banana) and later that day he sent me photos of the Mario Bros. Classic prototype his friend brought over to show him. You can see a reflection in the television screen which matches exactly the lighting he has in his game room in his YouTube videos. He has since changed his name from nes_tunes_music to TheNESNerd.

 

We then discussed purchasing after I scolded him for not covering the ROM windows. He said he had to convince his friend NIK to sell it to him. I'm not sure if Nik exists or who the scanner is here. Maybe it's this guy, maybe it's not.

 

November 14 - He tells me it's not looking good and explains where the prototypes came from.

 

November 15 - He is now the owner of the cartridge and we settle on 600 Euros.

 

December 4 - He sent me a message asking if I wanted to buy one of his many decks of Hanafuda cards. We couldn't settle on a price with which I was happy.

December 9 - He tells me he's negotiating with another collector to obtain a Darkwing Duck 2 prototype. I immediately offer to buy it.

June 3 2022 - He sent me a message asking if I wanted to buy a PAL Lode Runner prototype. I offered $400 and he passed.

August 28 2022 - He asks me again if I want to buy the Lode Runner prototype for $555. Again I offer $400 and we can't come to an agreement. That's the last I heard from him until I emailed him last night asking about this whole fiasco.

 

Edited February 10, 2023 by Scrobins
Photo includes email address of another person

[Code Monkey | 2,008]

This morning I received a response to the email I sent him last night. I didn't accuse him of anything, simply asked if he had any more information since I'm still not sure who's who.

Quote

Hi Daniel,
I'm sorry to hear that and some other guy that I had sold cartridges to, also mentioned that these could be fake.
I took action and tried to contact the guy I bought them from in June 2020 - a guy by Name Madi A. Belida living in the States (at least what he told me) that originally comes from France.
Together with the fellow collector who bought the other cartridges from me, I investigated and we found out, that Madi Belida is a scammer and fake object seller that already scammed dozens of people - especially in the NeoGeo and Nintendo area. 
Together with more scammed guys (from Europe, USA, Italy), we created a Facebook Chat group and gathered information on this guy and everyone of us made a report at his local police.
Currently the police is investigating.
By now, we have the name, an address (a toy store in Normandy, France), a photo of his passport, bank accounts (some guys had to pay via Transferwise, some - like me - via Bunq, etc.) and other information that we all forward to the police.
I also got the cartridges from my fellow german collector pal back, so I can give them to the police as further evidence.
Most people just got a book in the packet they received from this guy. Others, that traded games/consoles with them never got anything back and their games/consoles popped up for sale, when he used other aliases in other groups. Even some games/consoles seem to have been sold via his french Toystore (address below).

How I got the cartridges:
Madi Belida offered several rare Nintendo consoles (Famicombox, Famicomstation), a Vectrex, CD-i etc. in a Facebook group (Rare and Obscure Video Games & Consoles) using the profile of a woman called "Jane Laporta" - a highjacked account from what I know now.
I contacted "her" and "she" wrote, that she and her husband were starting to sell their whole collection. I wasn't able to find any of the photos of the consoles/games via backwarts image search, so there was no red flag for me.
We negotiated on some consoles and then "she" came up with "hey, I have some NES prototypes - are you interested?" and of course I was.
We negotiated a price (I sent 2.500 EUR in the end for a handful of "NES Prototypes", including the Mario Bros. Classic) and sent the money via Bunq (a netherlands money transfer website) and some time later the cartridges arrived. Since they all looked real to me and worked and even the chip dates seemed to fit, I didn't smell anything rotten.
So I kept them for a year or more and then sold them - the rest is history, as it seems :( :(
I've heard. My fellow collector pal that bought the other prototypes had them validated by hiddenpalace. Even Frank Cifaldi and the guys at hiddenpalace first gave them the green flag and had them certified as being legit. Then, after a second review they had some doubts and now think, they might be fake.

When I started investigations, I found forums where scammed people wrote about Madi Belida - or other names he used, like Sofien Lotus aka Madi Belinda aka Madi Sofian Belid aka Marc Winteber aka Shiho Nakama.
A thread from a NeoGeo Forum: https://www.neo-geo.com/forums/index.php?threads/scammer-alert.269053/
He seems to be "active" for years now.
If you like, I can forward any evidence, screenshots, information that we gathered until this day.

https://www.verif.com/societe/BELIDA--MADI-AHMED-890885098/

Toy shop in France:
Toy's collection
24 RUE DE CLIEU
76200   DIEPPE
SIRET (business registration number): 890 885 098 00016
(https://goo.gl/maps/FLhQBhY7QkwzkZ3KA)

The two bank accounts I got from him were
Bunq: NL62 BUNQ 2044 2869 47     
TRANSFERWISE EUROPE SA/NV: IBAN BE41 9671 0951 7410

Unfortunately, "police is investigating" is everything that I can currently tell you - let's hope that they will act quick and get this asshole.
I also contacted Bunq but - of course - after more than 2 1/2 years I don't think that they can do anything for me.
The best thing we can do for now is spreading the word and warn people not to deal with him or any of his aliases.

If you like, I provide more information/screenshots and stay in touch with you, whenever I get any updates.

Ingo

 

[Code Monkey | 2,008]

ndiddy wrote above that the Lode Runner prototype listing he found was from a user by the name of Eternax. When I go to the NESTunes account on YouTube, I see the account's previous name was Eternax:

Here is his YouTube account (the guy I bought from): https://www.youtube.com/@NESTunes/videos

And here is an older video from that account in which he refers to himself as Eternax: 

 

[MrWunderful | 2,927]

This is pretty wild. Great job of documenting. Hope you get your money back. 

[a3quit4s | 4,097]

My gut says the guy that sold them to you didn’t know they were fake. There is no way a scammer doesn’t take your money on what you offered for Lode Runner. Either way you paid goods and services and have what like 180 days to open a case. I’d open and let PayPal deal with it. The person you bought from already admitted they are fakes. It’s up to him to get his money back. 
 

edit: oh damn I missed the year in the dates - 2021.

Edited February 8, 2023 by a3quit4s

[Code Monkey | 2,008]

I also forgot to mention, my total purchase price was $2160 CAD which I am now out.

The purchase was done in December 2021 and I just checked my PayPal account, it doesn't appear I can open a case so old.

[a3quit4s | 4,097]

Just now, Code Monkey said:

I also forgot to mention, my total purchase price was $2160 CAD which I am now out.

The purchase was done in December 2021 and I just checked my PayPal account, it doesn't appear I can open a case so old.

Yeah I missed the year in the beginning of the story. I thought this was 2022 not 2021

[Brickman | 3,983]

Wow sorry to hear that man  hopefully you can get your money back but normally in these situations it’s pretty difficult. 

Thanks for bringing it to the communities attention and with full details. One day someone could be browsing the Internet before buying some protos and this may save them if this scammer pops up again.

[Code Monkey | 2,008]

Someone commented on my YouTube video of game play and my reply is, "I noticed that too. I also don't understand."

[fcgamer | 4,723]

Send them to wata to get slabbed and verified?

[fcgamer | 4,723]

This really sucks though, really hope you can get things resolved

[GPX | 1,369]

Thanks for being honest and putting this alert to the VGS community @Code Monkey.

High end collecting is always a bit of a gamble, unfortunately.

[Kguillemette | 1,544]

Ouch. I feel for you. A long time ago I got burned with a fake Black Lotus, diddnt discover it was fake until a year later at a convention. I learned a lot about how to spot fakes after that. I ended up being out a little over $1000.

 

[DK | 260]

Sorry to hear this happened. I have had several positive transactions with Ingo over the years and am inclined to believe his response that he was scammed too. Sucks all around to have scammers in our hobby.

[twiztor | 850]

man, this sucks. sorry about the whole situation @Code Monkey. I hope there can be some positive outcome from all of this.

[ndiddy | 8]

Thanks for posting this, it's a shame what happened to you, especially that it's too late to get a refund. I haven't dealt with any of these people, but in my opinion the nes_tunes_music guy seems pretty suspicious. He changed his story on where he got the Mario Bros prototype from, and he knew he'd sold you a fake game and didn't say anything until you contacted him. I don't know what the standard protocol for this stuff is, but if I ever realized that I'd accidentally sold someone a fake game, I would immediately reach out and offer a refund, even if it was after the buyer protection period.

[EternaX | 1]

Hey folks,
I recently discovered this thread and want to take the chance to explain what the whole story is about.
I'm the seller, Code Monkey got the cartridges from and - to clarify things from the start: I got scammed myself in June 2020, when I bought that games from someone via the Facebook Group "Rare and Obscure Video Games & Consoles".

In the mail above, the one Code Monkey got from me", I tried to wrote the whole story, how I got in contact with "Jane Laporta", a highjacked Facebook account the guy used at that time to sell (non-existing or fake) games and consoles and to initiate trades with people.
The guy's real name seems to be Madi A. Belida (A. seems to stand for Ahmed) from Normandy, France. He didn't only scam people like me in 2020 but still until today from what my investigations show. I also joined a chat group with fellow scammed guys that gather information on him and try to get in touch with other victims of Madi Belida.
According to business registration data he seems to have a toy and game store in Dieppe, France where he also might have made the fake prototypes (or had them made?) or acquired them.

When I got in touch with him, he had quickly found a highly interested person in me, who he could sell them to.
He said that he lives in America and is from France and he is about selling his whole collection - so when I got asked about the games, I always said, I got them from a guy in America. He is known in the collectors community, knows Frank Cifaldi etc. etc.
I collect NES games and Nintendo Memorabilia for year, but my brain stopped working, when I read, that he had NES prototypes and I thought I was smart to get the first lot for around 2.500 EUR. I didn't see the (in retrospective obvious) red flags that they were so cheap 
I then had them for some time and started selling them - believing they were legit!! - to Dennis and Daniel (Code Monkey). When even hiddenpalace first approved them to be legit, when Dennis sent them there, everything was fine so far.
But when he reached out to me after they had them reviewed a second time and mentioned concerns about the games being legit, we started investigating and found out, that Madi Belida is a well known name in the hey-guys-I-got-scammed-community. He had told consoles and games, worth thousands of Dollars/Euros to so many people...

I made report at the police and investigations are made. I shared all the information I got from fellow scammed guys (like Madi Belidas passport scan, business registration information, addresses, bank accounts, etc.) with them. Since he is in France, it might be hard for the German police to proceed, but I hope they will exchange information with the local french police.
But since I bought them more than 2 1/2 years ago, it might be a tough job. But since this guy is still around scamming people until this day, there should be some trace leading to him.
I hope that he will be arrested and some money can be gotten back, so I can provide refunds. From my own pocket I currently can't, but will try!
The "prototypes" Dennis got from me (except one of them) were a trading deal and I immediately sent him back his games when it became clear, that the cartridges were fake. I will do my best to cut losses as best as I can from my side once I get refunded myself and/or as soon as I have spare money to make the first step myself.

If you guys here are interested, I will keep you all up to date on this.
I can also share documents, screenshots, etc.

One thing, i already wrote Code Monkey a mail about:
I need to deeply apologize for that "Nik-story". When Code Monkey and I were negotiating about the Mario Bros. cartridge, I made up the whole thing about a friend called Nik, because I wanted to "justify" the price, so that I could say "he wants xx Dollars for the game - it's not the price I want to have but the price he needs to get".
That was not smart and even no good "business behavior".
I apologize for that.

In the end it falls on my feet because it lets me look shady too to some degree and that's the point why I now join the conversation in public.

Edited February 9, 2023 by EternaX
added details

[GPX | 1,369]

The plot thickens..

I’m not a prototype collector, but as a collector, I can share the sentiments that scamming mofos are our common enemy.

Hopefully a lesson or a reminder for us to be more careful when spending big. Shady shit surrounds us all.

[Code Monkey | 2,008]

What do people think I should do? Should Ingo refund me out of his own pocket because he sold me counterfeit goods? Or if he can't afford it, should he send me some of his games I would like for my collection? Or should I let him off the hook because it wasn't (allegedly) his fault?

He has some PAL exclusives like Banana Prince, Ufouria, Cricket and he also has a Hong Kong Mah-Jong cartridge I have been looking for.

I think I should be made whole but I also want to do what people think is right in this situation.

[BlackVega | 583]

You are asking others a question on what you should do? After all this is your own business. Go with your gut man

[twiztor | 850]

this is just my take:

@Code Monkeybought a fake prototype game. It sucks, but we're past the point that Paypal/credit card/banks/whoever are going to do something about it. Caveat Emptor.

@EternaXalso bought a fake prototype game, but also subsequently sold it. Again, we're past the financial security periods. 

All that being said, the best way to settle this between yourselves. My recommendation would be to make another deal. Eternax could/should offer a better deal than he normally would. CodeMonkey gets a little bit more bang for his buck. What this looks like in practice is up to you, and i don't know if that's even something either of you are interested in. But a potential solution to alleviate some of what happened.

[Tulpa | 3,493]

22 minutes ago, Code Monkey said:

I think I should be made whole but I also want to do what people think is right in this situation.

I agree with twistor and BlackVega. It's a complicated situation that's past the normal recourses. It's just something you and Eternax will have to work out together.

Welcome to the human race.

[Scrobins | 1,725]

There’s a potentially unanswered question here unless I missed something. When did Eternax learn they were fake?

[EternaX | 1]

12 minutes ago, Scrobins said:

There’s a potentially unanswered question here unless I missed something. When did Eternax learn they were fake?

I learned about it 2 weeks ago (2 1/2 yrs after the deal with Madi Belida), when Dennis (the other guy I sold games to) got the information from hiddenpalace that the games might be fake. This is when he contacted me and in the same second we began to investigate on Madi Belida and found evidence and threads where other scammed guys (especially in NeoGeo groups and forums) wrote about their story.

I contacted two of the NeoGeo collectors that dealt with Belida and exchanged information with them and I got some more information on him (like passport photo etc.).

Right on the next weekday I turned to the police and asked how to report that case. I had to report via their online form, and so I did.

I additionally contacted them again to share the documents I got from the two NeoGeo collectors (toy store address etc.)

[G-type | 2,481]

 

4 hours ago, Code Monkey said:

What do people think I should do? Should Ingo refund me out of his own pocket because he sold me counterfeit goods? Or if he can't afford it, should he send me some of his games I would like for my collection? Or should I let him off the hook because it wasn't (allegedly) his fault?

He should refund you. Whatever actions he takes because "he got scammed too" are between him and the police.