FC Weird Star Soldier

[fcgamer | 4,954]

So I got this Star Soldier in a lot. Although the cartridge felt real, it's missing a back label and the front label is missing anything aside from the game's name. Opened it up, legit board, must be a legit cart .

Thoughts regarding the label? Sample? Sun fading? Variant?

[phart010 | 1,778]

Lots of weird stuff in Asia. Could be a grey market product

[Tulpa | 3,674]

3 hours ago, phart010 said:

Lots of weird stuff in Asia. Could be a grey market product

Yeah, maybe someone got ahold of the boards and shelled them with blank shells and a quick and dirty label. Maybe removed the Japanese from the label to help cover their tracks.

[Hybrid | 445]

Looks like the missing elements of the label were colored in with marker

[fcgamer | 4,954]

19 hours ago, Hybrid said:

Looks like the missing elements of the label were colored in with marker

It's definitely not a case of marker colorage.

[Tyree_Cooper | 833]

Then it's a rare Soldier Star!

[Gloves | 12,220]

Yeah that's been markered up. 

[Khromak | 835]

There are lots of other abnormalities near the letters and the corners of the box on the right. Really looks like someone couldn't figure out how to color outside the lines and accidently knicked the corners of the Rs, for example.

Hard to tell from just pictures, but it definitely looks like someone took something to an original cart and tried to cover up those elements. Might've been a production company with a really bad artist, but I'm also inclined to say sloppy marker, paint, etc. job

[Gloves | 12,220]

5 minutes ago, Khromak said:

There are lots of other abnormalities near the letters and the corners of the box on the right. Really looks like someone couldn't figure out how to color outside the lines and accidently knicked the corners of the Rs, for example.

Hard to tell from just pictures, but it definitely looks like someone took something to an original cart and tried to cover up those elements. Might've been a production company with a really bad artist, but I'm also inclined to say sloppy marker, paint, etc. job

The foot is a pretty dead giveaway, beyond the horribly done marker job around the letters:

They look to have only gone over it once so you can still see the yellow coming through the marker/paint/whatever. It's nothing more than a horribly botched coverup job.

[spacepup | 2,481]

Yea, definitely looks like covered up with marker.  You can see components of the text toward the top that are normally over his head, also.

I'm not sure why they would do that, but who knows hah!

If you're really curious you can use the dry-erase method to remove marker and try to reveal the text underneath.  I'd probably do that just out of pure curiosity, not that it matters much.  This isn't a rare game so maybe someone was having fun with it, or maybe the label was damaged and they wanted to color the rest in, who knows.

 

[fcgamer | 4,954]

On 6/12/2024 at 11:32 PM, spacepup said:

Yea, definitely looks like covered up with marker.  You can see components of the text toward the top that are normally over his head, also.

I'm not sure why they would do that, but who knows hah!

If you're really curious you can use the dry-erase method to remove marker and try to reveal the text underneath.  I'd probably do that just out of pure curiosity, not that it matters much.  This isn't a rare game so maybe someone was having fun with it, or maybe the label was damaged and they wanted to color the rest in, who knows.

 

See that's the thing though, a marker is going to give off a certain shine or look to it when it's finished, but in-person, this just doesn't have it. I've seen tons of marker jobs before, similarly you suggest a paint job, but that would be obvious from a tactile perspective, and this just doesn't have it.

I know a lot of you guys have personal issues against me, let's not pretend it, but there's no need to make me out to be an idiot either. 

Pup, what's the dry erase method you speak of? Writing over with dey erase and then erasing? I'll give it a try this weekend, then we'll see who is right. 

[fcgamer | 4,954]

On 6/12/2024 at 10:40 PM, Gloves said:

The foot is a pretty dead giveaway, beyond the horribly done marker job around the letters:

They look to have only gone over it once so you can still see the yellow coming through the marker/paint/whatever. It's nothing more than a horribly botched coverup job.

Jank alert, jank alert! Oh wait, that's like N64 and everything Xbox and beyond where patches are necessary to run licensed games.

[Gloves | 12,220]

15 minutes ago, fcgamer said:

Jank alert, jank alert! Oh wait, that's like N64 and everything Xbox and beyond where patches are necessary to run licensed games.

What the hell are you on about? Your games all markered up and not something special so you're mad now? 

[Tanooki | 5,079]

@fcgamer I'm confused, I don't think they're ripping on you, just suggestions at this point at least.

It does look like something, and not factory something, but maybe it is.

Do you have like I do a large magnfier or a jewlery loop?  I'd zoom in on the work and see if you can see a dot pattern like it ran off some old vintage or more modern label printer, if it were any type of marker, felt pen of sorts, paint, paint pen it will have some fuzziness of sorts that stands out.  I'd start with that.

The dry erase bit, I've not had luck with it but some think it is a miracle.  You run a black dry erase marker over the old marker and it should counteract it kind of like canceling it out like how two negatives make a positive in math.

 

...well that was written before the above post, great timing.

Edited June 13 by Tanooki

[toma | 71]

Definitely a kid trying to be absolutely thorough with a marker because they didn't want the extra text there. You can't see the difference between the marker black and the label black because they colored all of the black over with the marker as well. It's really obvious when you look at the logo and the edges of the artwork. It just screams hand-drawn edges.

[Khromak | 835]

Comparison between the label above and a sample of the original label. This is why I think it's marker; pretty much every letter of Star Soldier was nicked and screwed up. As I said earlier though, it could just be a REALLY bad edit by a "professional" company making a knockoff.

Edited June 13 by Khromak

[Gloves | 12,220]

3 minutes ago, Khromak said:

Comparison between the label above and a sample of the original label. This is why I think it's marker; pretty much every letter of Star Soldier was nicked and screwed up. As I said earlier though, it could just be a REALLY bad edit by a "professional" company making a knockoff.

If a "professional" company were doing this, why would they colour in between the letter gaps? 

The most obvious reasoning here is that the cart is/was busted up, there were probably white spots all over including on/through the text, and so they tried to cover it up on the black areas with a black marker. They overcompensated when they tried to fill in the black. 

[spacepup | 2,481]

1 hour ago, fcgamer said:

See that's the thing though, a marker is going to give off a certain shine or look to it when it's finished, but in-person, this just doesn't have it. I've seen tons of marker jobs before, similarly you suggest a paint job, but that would be obvious from a tactile perspective, and this just doesn't have it.

I know a lot of you guys have personal issues against me, let's not pretend it, but there's no need to make me out to be an idiot either. 

Pup, what's the dry erase method you speak of? Writing over with dey erase and then erasing? I'll give it a try this weekend, then we'll see who is right. 

I was just trying to be helpful and contribute my idea.  Good luck - I'll be staying out of it from this point forward.

[Tanooki | 5,079]

The thing is, this isn't a professional company, it's a decades old bs pirate operation in a sketchy plant I'm sure with the cleanest of environments with the top people meticulously working on those stickers (and the rest.)

I got a bit curious as I could have sworn I've seen something weird like this before in the selection of mostly vintage but also a few modern bootleg FC carts I have.  A good number did have what I said about the dot matrix ink splat pattern right up into the darkest of blacks, and others well...it gets interesting.  It's not conclusive to me but creates doubt, and to capture these I used my iphone at 5x then my 10x20.5mm jewelery loop over my lens to really go in on this to capture what I was seeing.

1, 2, and 3 here.  The first two are old school, the last one is a modern game made in the last 5 years, a 1of1 cart I have.

1 = Whirlwind Manu/Quest of Ki - This one shows both situations of the dots on the black, but interestingly enough, if you follow the lines on the vest, letters a bit too, it looks more like a black marker but it isn't it's original, has a smeary effect instead of dots yet right along side, dots.

2 = Queen Bee V (Insector X) - Between some of the lettering it looks again solid, no dots, even strays beyond just black into some darks next/meshed into it and again solid and looks inked in there but it's not.  A simple test with alcohol and paper towel no matter the age of the ink still would lift vs the rest.

 

And that last one is my Super Mario Allstars MMC5 Hack by Infidelity.  This is a more modern grade and style of printing and sticker, the only reason that's there, the black encroahing on the white letters there saying SUPER.  Some of it clearly dot matrix again, but other bits look like marker tips into the white, nothing is quite consistent nearly side by side there.

 

That Star Soldier sticker has that look of the SMAS cart lettering but also some of the vintage color problems too.  The only thing to measure this against now would be the original cart he's got, a very sharp very well zoomed image of the print with a good light on it to see if it's marker, paint pen, or original god awful print work from some sketchy sticker maker much like the inconsistency there in Imajin's vest on that first pic looking like a crayola marker drew bits of it.