VGS rare variant/error thread Nintendo edition

[PII | 1,885]

42 minutes ago, NeonBros said:

 

 

There are some other games in the NES library that have variation in background color.  Gyromite for example has a lighter blue backround and darker leaning toward purple slightly.  I believe the reason in this case has something to do with the little purple rob the robot icon in the bottom left of the label -that some how or other during the "screening" of  each color onto each label, one color would sometimes grace a non-designated area.

I would imagine with Adventure Island II that the yellow portion of the color simply fades more readily than the blue..

The Mario 3 manual would seem to back that up.  Looks like someone laid a stencil over it and left it in the sun.  

If I had to guess, I would say that the Mario 3 Cartridge was placed in a box or something with a little hole over that spot..

[bowser | 598]

Not sure about NES but for SNES, Super Mario World most definitely uses a lighter blue for the -1 variant. I've seen multiple copies where the first print uses a dark blue.

[Stormarov.45 | 32]

Color variations aren't worth tracking because essentially it may have different hues throughout the life cycle of toner carts during printing without an actually change to the intended color. 

[Stormarov.45 | 32]

20 hours ago, PII said:

?????? How do you tell?

It's simple. The first Silent Sevice carts were released in 1987. 5 screw carts ended commercial release in 1988. Both boards have 1989 year chips, late 89 even. 

When the assembly line machines were refitted for 3 screw carts, extra  5 screw clamshell stock was sent to the repair depots because they assembled by hand anyways. So when carts with broken clamshells came in they got a 5 screw one.

 

The late chip dates makes me think it was a repair/refurb cart from a 3 screw cart first assembled in 1990 or later.

Edited November 28, 2020 by Stormarov.45

[PII | 1,885]

3 minutes ago, Stormarov.45 said:

It's simple. The first Silent Sevice carts were released in 1987. 5 screw carts ended commercial release in 1988. Both boards have 1989 year chips, late 89 even. 

When the assembly line machines were refitted for 3 screw carts, extra  5 screw clamshell stock was sent to the repair depots because they assembled by hand anyways. So when carts with broken clamshells came in they got a 5 screw one.

 

The late chip dates makes me think it was a repair/refurb cart from a 3 screw cart first assembled in 1990 or later.

The NES port of Silent Service came out in December of 1989.  If it had come out in 87 there would be official 5-screw silent service carts around, complete with a back label and black seal.  From what I know, Mega man 1 was the last game to get an official 5-screw release in late Dec. 1987. 

8939 and 8952 as well as 8949 would all be consistent with a late 89 release.

[Code Monkey | 2,010]

I'm not sure how I never knew this thread existed until now, this is exactly the kind of thing I've been documenting.

Here is a variant of Batman: Return Of The Joker. It was the only NES box with a 2 digit code in the middle and I'm guessing it was a mistake because they later changed it to 3 digits.

 

Here are my later print Mike Tyson's Punch Out!! cartridges. All changes are visible from the front except for one that only has a different back label. I'm not sure if it's a back swap or not. 

- circle seal, no code

- circle seal, CAN code, date on rear label

- circle seal, CAN code, no date on rear label

- oval seal, USA code

 

 

Regarding the cartridges without a back label, I'm surprised nobody has suggested this scenario before. Companies go through a lot of quality control prior to sending products out to retail and often times they'll be assembled in multiple different stages. After ordering a sample of the finished product from the manufacturer, the receiver will usually open them up to provide a copy to the big boss for approval. He'll leave it on his desk until he has a chance to review it which might be a day or two later. Then it'll get chucked into a drawer until he changes offices and gives it away to someone. There's no reason for this to have a back label if it isn't going out to retail.

[NeonBros | 5]

19 hours ago, PII said:

 

There are some other games in the NES library that have variation in background color.  Gyromite for example has a lighter blue backround and darker leaning toward purple slightly.  I believe the reason in this case has something to do with the little purple rob the robot icon in the bottom left of the label -that some how or other during the "screening" of  each color onto each label, one color would sometimes grace a non-designated area.

I would imagine with Adventure Island II that the yellow portion of the color simply fades more readily than the blue..

The Mario 3 manual would seem to back that up.  Looks like someone laid a stencil over it and left it in the sun.  

If I had to guess, I would say that the Mario 3 Cartridge was placed in a box or something with a little hole over that spot..

Thanks so much for shedding some light! That SMB3 manual definitely looks like the same sort of thing. Also your box-with-a-hole is something I hadn't thought of at all, but it makes a ton of sense! Would be funny if that manual and this cart were part of some swiss-cheese-hole Mario box at some point haha

As for the slight tint variations for games like Adventure Island II, that's good to know too. The differences were definitely subtle, but noticeable side by side. I like using "intended" color as a good rule of thumb - I'll keep that in mind. I'm working through sorting a couple hundred more NES games so I'll keep an eye out for anything else interesting!

[Dr. Morbis | 2,088]

The reason some weird 5 screws have no back labels is most likely because extra shells were sent to repair centers and whatnot after the assembly line switch-over to 3 screw production, but it didn't occur to them (or didn't matter) to send over any back label stickers to go along with them.  Then, months/years later, when these repair centers are sending back repaired or refurbished carts, they use the casings they've got on hand that never had a back label applied because they were taken from stock *before* they originally completed the manufacturing process...

[guitarzombie | 924]

58 minutes ago, Dr. Morbis said:

The reason some weird 5 screws have no back labels is most likely because extra shells were sent to repair centers and whatnot after the assembly line switch-over to 3 screw production, but it didn't occur to them (or didn't matter) to send over any back label stickers to go along with them.  Then, months/years later, when these repair centers are sending back repaired or refurbished carts, they use the casings they've got on hand that never had a back label applied because they were taken from stock *before* they originally completed the manufacturing process...

Are we sure about this?  You would also need a 5 screw front shell as well.  Did they print a new label just for that?  I mean I guess its possible, because the 3 screw DKJR Maths have 3 screw front shells too.  Those were documented to be printed in 86 along with the rest of the DKJR Maths

[PII | 1,885]

I presume that when someone had a game with a faulty or damaged shell, they'd just send it to a service center in their state where the circuit board would be popped out and placed inside a new shell with a new sticker.  I can't imagine that every game in need of cosmetic repair would get shipped all the way back to Japan to it's 3rd party developer so they could do this personally.  BUT ONLY KONOMI / ULTRA GAMES SPORT THESE 5-SCREW ODDITIES (r.c. pro-am being the only exception.)

If a game had a problem on the circuit board it would need to be repaired, but would not necessarily require a new shell...  Maybe a new shell would be used anyway in order to assist in keeping track of games that were repaired?   

Is there any known instance that would require a game to be sent back to its company of origin in Japan?  

WHY ARE THERE NO GAMES FROM COMPANIES OTHER THAN KONOMI / ULTRA THAT LACK BACK LABELS?

Was each 3rd party company in Japan individually responsible for supplying every repair center in every state of the U.S.A. with spare shells for games in need of repair?

It seems like refurbs would be most likely to show up in the form of 5-screw only games that were transferred into a 3-screw shell - Donkey Kong Jr. Math for example...

On a somewhat related note, I have a shipping box, just the right size for a NES or SNES console that was shipped from Nintendo of America in Redmond to an individual's home in early 1995.  It has an official N.O.A. shipping label on it.  I've always figured that someone sent their console in for repair and got it back in this.

Did some things have to be sent to NOA headquarters?

Anyone here ever actually work at a service center or NOA or know anyone who did?

[Dr. Morbis | 2,088]

Speculation: Konami is the only company that I know of that had custom first-party chips in *licensed* games manufactured by Nintendo, so maybe part of the deal was Nintendo saying, "Okay, we'll use your custom chips, but we're not dealing with any support issues.  Here take these empty shells and get lost..."

[guitarzombie | 924]

3 hours ago, Dr. Morbis said:

Speculation: Konami is the only company that I know of that had custom first-party chips in *licensed* games manufactured by Nintendo, so maybe part of the deal was Nintendo saying, "Okay, we'll use your custom chips, but we're not dealing with any support issues.  Here take these empty shells and get lost..."

Acclaim did as well towards their later release games.

[Code Monkey | 2,010]

There are a lot of Mike Tyson's Punch Out!! box variants.

 

[Dr. Morbis | 2,088]

2 hours ago, guitarzombie said:

Acclaim did as well towards their later release games.

Are you talking about games Acclaim manufactured themselves?  Because I'm explicitly talking about Konami being the only company I know of with custom chips on pcb's manufactured by Nintendo...

[guitarzombie | 924]

7 hours ago, Dr. Morbis said:

Are you talking about games Acclaim manufactured themselves?  Because I'm explicitly talking about Konami being the only company I know of with custom chips on pcb's manufactured by Nintendo...

They did that too.  Aside from the CIC chip, practically everything from those later era Acclaim games are self made.  The shells (which is why they look terrible when they age, they're cheap), the labels (also cheap, which is why the glue seeps in), the PCB, and also the MMC3 clone chip Acclaim-MMC-ACC  

http://bootgod.dyndns.org:7777/profile.php?id=719

[Dr. Morbis | 2,088]

That link isn't working at this moment, but is it a link to a game manufactured by Nintendo that has custom Acclaim chips?  I'm well aware of the fact that Acclaim manufactured some of their own games (along with some late era LJN ones); I'm saying that the 5 screw/no back label games from Konami/Ultra may have been because of a unique arrangement between Nintendo and Konami specifically in regards to support services due to the use of first-party non-Nintendo chips on Nintendo-produced pcbs.

[guitarzombie | 924]

7 minutes ago, Dr. Morbis said:

That link isn't working at this moment, but is it a link to a game manufactured by Nintendo that has custom Acclaim chips?  I'm well aware of the fact that Acclaim manufactured some of their own games (along with some late era LJN ones); I'm saying that the 5 screw/no back label games from Konami/Ultra may have been because of a unique arrangement between Nintendo and Konami specifically in regards to support services due to the use of first-party non-Nintendo chips on Nintendo-produced pcbs.

Thats so strange?  The link actually worked a couple of hours ago.  Anyway, yeah Acclaim used their own MMC3 clone chips.  If you have a Roger Clemens MVP open it up, theres a good chance its in there.  When I clicked the link for other games, it showed plenty of others, like Alien 3, George Forman, Super Smash TV, Bart Meets Radioactive Man (anything released after 91).  I think every copy of Rollerblade Racer has it.

Edited November 29, 2020 by guitarzombie

[Dr. Morbis | 2,088]

7 minutes ago, guitarzombie said:

Thats so strange?  The link actually worked a couple of hours ago.  Anyway, yeah Acclaim used their own MMC3 clone chips.  If you have a Roger Clemens MVP open it up, theres a good chance its in there.  When I clicked the link for other games, it showed plenty of others, like Alien 3, George Forman, Super Smash TV, Bart Meets Radioactive Man.  I think every copy of Rollerblade Racer has it.

For all those games you listed, the pcbs were manufactured by Acclaim - that's the difference.  I'm specifically talking about custom third party chips (ie: from Konami) on pcbs manufactured by Nintendo themselves.  Open any of those games you've listed and you'll see Acclaim's stamp and markings on the pcbs, not Nintendo's.

As such, my speculation about the 5 screw Konami/Ultra carts is based on my hypothesis outlined above in my earlier post...

[guitarzombie | 924]

3 minutes ago, Dr. Morbis said:

For all those games you listed, the pcbs were manufactured by Acclaim - that's the difference.  I'm specifically talking about custom third party chips (ie: from Konami) on pcbs manufactured by Nintendo themselves.  Open any of those games you've listed and you'll see Acclaim's stamp and markings on the pcbs, not Nintendo's.

As such, my speculation about the 5 screw Konami/Ultra carts is based on my hypothesis outlined above in my earlier post...

Which Konami games have those?  Do you mean the VRC chips?  Those were only exclusive to Famicom games.  Also Sunsoft Return of the Joker uses a custom MMC3 mapper chip (Forget the name, I think FMV?)  It was the same chip that is used for the PAL Mr. Gimmick and the NTSC prototype

[Dr. Morbis | 2,088]

9 minutes ago, guitarzombie said:

Which Konami games have those?  Do you mean the VRC chips?  Those were only exclusive to Famicom games.  Also Sunsoft Return of the Joker uses a custom MMC3 mapper chip (Forget the name, I think FMV?)  It was the same chip that is used for the PAL Mr. Gimmick and the NTSC prototype

Numerous games have custom Konami chips.  Open up your Life Force cart, for example, and you'll see that it is a Nintendo produced pcb, but also has Konami's name and symbol stamped on the pcb itself and contains a custom Konami chip with Konami's name stamped right on the chip.  I don't know of any other licensed publishers with this sort of manufacturing relationship with Nintendo, hence my theory on the 5 screw carts...

[guitarzombie | 924]

Oh, I didn't remember seeing Konami printed on the PCB.  I'll have to look into that.  Actually im not even sure if I have Life Force haha

[guitarzombie | 924]

5 minutes ago, Dr. Morbis said:

Numerous games have custom Konami chips.  Open up your Life Force cart, for example, and you'll see that it is a Nintendo produced pcb, but also has Konami's name and symbol stamped on the pcb itself and contains a custom Konami chip with Konami's name stamped right on the chip.  I don't know of any other licensed publishers with this sort of manufacturing relationship with Nintendo, hence my theory on the 5 screw carts...

I do have life force but it has the normal Konami board, the one where the '24' is printed on the back label, unless thats what you mean.  The chip DOES say Konami, but I think its just how they printed it, as other games that dont use the NES-XX-PRG format were printed by their own developers (Like Acclaim). 

I want to say though that those '24' printed carts were ONLY for games that used discreet logic 74xxx mappers (Mainly UNROM), and no MMC1/MMC3 chips which some of those 5 screw 'refurbs' would have.

[guitarzombie | 924]

Just to update, I found this list I wrote.  I need to find if I made a list of all the '24' back printed, aka custom Konami PCB games, but I'm still certain they're only for simpler, 'UNROM' games.  Basically any game on this list printed before 1988.

With this list, it shows 5 screws being found for games that im PRETTY sure didn't have that '24' custom Konami PCB, like Tiny Toons (MMC3), TMNT 2 and 3 (MMC3), Base Wars (MMC3), Carmen Sandiego (MMC3) and just by using the Wayback Machine for bootgod, it only shows those 5 games only having Nintendo printed PCBs.

Of course bootgod isn't the be all, end all but its the best cross section of games we can find.

 

These are normal 5 screw Konami games officially released. All 87:
- Gradius (1987)
- Track and Field (1987)
- Stinger (1987)
- Top Gun (1987)
- Rush n' Attack (1987)
- Double Dribble (1987)
- Goonies 2 (1987 Very uncommon)
- Castlevania (1987, a little uncommon)

Konami:
- Castlevania 2 Simons Quest (1988)
- Contra (1988)
- Jackal (1988)
- Adventures of Bayou Billy (1989)
- Track and Field 2 (1989)
- Super C (1990)
- Top Gun 2 (1990)
- Bill Elliots NASCAR (1991)
- Where in Time is Carmen Sandiego (1991)
- Tiny Toons (Dec 1991)
- TMNT 3 (1992)

Ultra:
- Metal Gear (1988)
- Skate or Die (1988)
- Q*Bert (1989)
- Silent Service (1989)
- TMNT (1989)
- Defender of the Crown (1989) **UPDATED**
- Kings of the Beach (1990)
- Rollergames (1990)
- Snakes Revenge (1990)
- TMNT 2 (1990)
- Mission Impossible (1990)
- Cyber Series Base Wars (1991)
- Ski or Die (1991)

These games have not been found to have a 5 screw demo/refurb carts before 1992:
- Life Force (1988)
- Blades of Steel (1988)
- Jack Nicklaus (1990)
- Castlevania 3 (1990) *RUMORED TO EXIST*
- Laser Invasion (1991)
- Lone Ranger (1991)

Ultra 5 screw demo/refurb carts not yet found:
- Gyruss (1989)
- Pirates! (1991)

 

 

*EDIT* 

Also using bootgod heres a list of all the games that use Konamis PCB boards.  Might as well have everything in once place:

 

351258 (Konami's UNROM board)

- Blades of Steel

- Life Force

- Silent Service

- Skate or Die!

 

351298 (Another Konami UNROM board)

- Double Dribble

- Skate or Die!

 

351320 (Another Konami UNROM board)

- Jack Nicklaus' Golf

- Metal Gear

-Skate or Die!

 

UNK-Konami-ME-USA

- Metal Gear

 

351908 (Konami's SLROM/MMC1 board)

- Adventures of Bayou Billy

- Ski or Die

- TMNT

- Track Field 2 (Rev A)

 

352056 (Konami's TLROM/MMC3 board)

- Mission Impossible

- Super C

- Top Gun The Second Mission

 

 

Edited November 29, 2020 by guitarzombie

[Dr. Morbis | 2,088]

I can make you a list of all Konami games with a 24 on the back if you'd like, but that's not the point.  My point is that the reason ANY non-traditional 5 screw Konami/Ultra carts exist is (hypothetically) because Nintendo gave Konami empty casings early on to deal with support issues because of the fact that SOME Nintendo-manufactured games contained custom Konami chips.  Once Konami had the casings, they used them whenever and wherever needed, regardless of the title of the game they were dealing with...

[guitarzombie | 924]

11 minutes ago, Dr. Morbis said:

I can make you a list of all Konami games with a 24 on the back if you'd like, but that's not the point.  My point is that the reason ANY non-traditional 5 screw Konami/Ultra carts exist is (hypothetically) because Nintendo gave Konami empty casings early on to deal with support issues because of the fact that SOME Nintendo-manufactured games contained custom Konami chips.  Once Konami had the casings, they used them whenever and wherever needed, regardless of the title of the game they were dealing with...

Im not totally discounting your idea.  Its the more probable one than anything else.  So when a game goes bad, who were you to contact, Nintendo?  Then they'd ship the game to the publisher/developer?  Your theory can hold weight, but i'm trying to figure out where there would be a 5 screw TMNT 2 cart then? Everything inside and outside of it is 100% Nintendo 'branded', like all the other licensed Nintendo carts, as opposed to Silent Service, which was put together by Konami/Ultra.