New NES Region: South Africa SAF

[Joshua Rogers | 77]

Hi all,

Years after it was briefly discussed on Nintendoage, I decided to write everything about the South African NES region. Yes, the console and games were released in South Africa, officially! A -SAF console exists, and SAF games exist(sort of) too.

Here is my article about it: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/video-games-around-world-south-africa-joshua-rogers/

I know Linkedin is quite a strange platform to be posting this sort of stuff, but that is where I will be doing it for the time being. Feel free to follow.

 

If you're not interested in reading about the history of the NES there, here are some photos:

Edited April 19, 2020 by Joshua Rogers

[ThePhleo | 2,309]

Well there it finally is!

Been waiting for years to see something like this

So we've got NTSC-USA/CAN, PAL-A, PAL-B, Hong Kong, Asia, Comboy, Famicom, Samurai, and South Africa which is just an extension of PAL-B just like Greece and Israel.

Edit: Also forgot about Brazil by Playtronic which, by the way I still don't know which lockout chip they use 100%, but I'm thinking its NTSC.

Edited April 16, 2020 by ThePhleo

[Joshua Rogers | 77]

1 hour ago, ThePhleo said:

Well there it finally is!

Been waiting for years to see something like this

So we've got NTSC-USA/CAN, PAL-A, PAL-B, Hong Kong, Asia, Comboy, Famicom, Samurai, and South Africa which is just an extension of PAL-B just like Greece and Israel.

Edit: Also forgot about Brazil by Playtronic which, by the way I still don't know which lockout chip they use 100%, but I'm thinking its NTSC.

There are a few more PAL-B extensions that I'll be revealing, a couple which have never been brought up before.

[bowser | 600]

Wow that's really something. Nice write-up!

A friend of mine recently found an SNES officially released in India by Media Games. My mind was blown because I thought only the NES was released by Samurai before Nintendo left that market. Must be as rare as this SAF region NES.

@ThePhleo

You might be interested in this information

By the way, I managed to get a boxed Samurai in decent condition.

Edited April 17, 2020 by bowser

[OptOut | 9,261]

Amazing write-up, well done Josh! 

Fascinating stuff, can't wait to see some more from you soon!

[ThePhleo | 2,309]

4 hours ago, Joshua Rogers said:

There are a few more PAL-B extensions that I'll be revealing, a couple which have never been brought up before.

What else can there be?

All I can think of is Venezuela, and ive heard whispers of Portugal.

Ive never seen anything for any other county, but besides those just randomly guessing. Maybe Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Mexico, and USSR...though they had Dendy/Pegasus 60-pin stuff so I doubt it.

I know that in the USA the game “World Games” by Milton Bradley has a really common oval seal variant with SPANISH text instead of English which may mean there’s probably a ton of other stuff in Mexico.

Also... does anyone have any idea if those “Official” Venezuelan games are legit?

[fcgamer | 5,124]

The FC Venezuela stuff is fake, not official, no idea about any 72 pins stuff though

[ThePhleo | 2,309]

13 hours ago, fcgamer said:

The FC Venezuela stuff is fake, not official, no idea about any 72 pins stuff though

I figured it was since there's third party stuff too, and not just first party. But it's worth wondering since it looks semi-legit.

 

4 hours ago, N64 Gamer said:

Doesn't Scandinavia also have it's own region? I believe it's SCN, unless you consider that an extension of PAL-B.

SCN as far as I'm aware is just an extension/subcategory of PAL-B.

Fun thing about SCN though, they have those "Yapon Rentals" which are officially licensed! Again, as far as I know, no one (except maybe Braveheart69) knows how many titles are in that collection, but I'd guess that all 339 PAL-B titles are subject to be a part of the set.

[Joshua Rogers | 77]

On 4/17/2020 at 7:19 AM, ThePhleo said:

 

Ive never seen anything for any other county, but besides those just randomly guessing. Maybe Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Mexico, and USSR...though they had Dendy/Pegasus 60-pin stuff so I doubt it.

Speaking of Pegasus, I live in Poland these days and never thought about the possibility of there being an official NES for Poland.

To be honest, nearly every country in Europe had the NES  somehow, even ex soviet/socalist countries. Check this out: https://segaretro.org/Beosoft Also if you go here https://segaretro.org/History_of_Sega_in_Romania and go to the bottom you can see Sega was in nearly every region as well.

The difference of course is whether Nintendo made a new 'region' for them. In the case of South Africa, they made a new region because the power plug is unique to South Africa:

 

So, now we can go find other countries with different power plugs and look for the NES

[KillScreenGames | 2]

Oh Christ, now I have another region to hunt down.  Very cool and I look forward to reading your write up on LinkedIn. I rarely come on here but it is nice to see interesting things like this still popping up.

[tordur | 28]

On 4/17/2020 at 9:29 PM, ThePhleo said:

Fun thing about SCN though, they have those "Yapon Rentals" which are officially licensed! Again, as far as I know, no one (except maybe Braveheart69) knows how many titles are in that collection, but I'd guess that all 339 PAL-B titles are subject to be a part of the set.

If you're talking about a list over which games are available as Swedish Yapon, the best updated list is available on sndb.se - Their list counts 180 Swedish Yapon games, plus 7 more for Finland / Denmark.

I've tried doing the Spoiler thing here below to not use too much space.

 

Adventure Island II, The
Adventures in the Magic Kingdom
Adventures of Bayou Billy
Adventures of Lolo
Adventures of Lolo II
Adventures of Lolo III
Adventures of Rad Gravity
Anticipation
Athletic World
Barker Bill's Trick Shooting
Ballon Fight
Batman
Batman: Return of the Joker
Battle of Olympus
Battletoads
Bigfoot
Bionic Commando
Blades of Steel
Blaster Master
Blue Shadow
Bubble Bobble
Bucky O' Hare
Captain Planet
Castlevania
Castlevania II - Simon's Quest
Castlevania III
Chessmaster
Chip 'n' Dale - Rescue Rangers
Clu Clu Land
Cobra Triangle
Crash Test Dummies
Days of Thunder
Defender of the Crown
Deja Vu
Devil World
Die Hard
Donkey Kong 3
Donkey Kong Classics
Double Dragon II - The Revenge
Double Dragon III - The Sacred Stones
Double Dribble
Dragon's Lair
Dr. Mario
Duck Hunt
Duck Tales
Duck Tales 2
Eliminator Boat Duel
Excite Bike
F-15 Strike Eagle
Faxanadu
Fester's Quest
Flintstones - The Rescue of Dino & Hoppy
Flintstones - The Surprise at Dinosaur Peak
Gauntlet II
Ghostbusters II
Ghosts 'n' Goblins
Gold Medal Challenge
Golf
Goonies II
Gradius
Gremlins 2: The New Batch
Guardian Legend
Gumshoe
Gun.Smoke
Hammerin' Harry
Hogan's Alley
Ice Climber
Ice Hockey
Ikari Warriors
Ivan 'Ironman' Stewart's Super Off Road
Jack Nicklaus' Greatest 18 Holes of Major Championship Golf
Journey To Silius
Jetsons
Kabuki - Quantum Fighter
Kid Icarus
Knight Rider
Kung Fu
Lee Trevino's Fighting Golf
Legend of Zelda
Little Nemo - The Dream Master
Life Force
Little Samson
Maniac Mansion
Mach Rider
Mario Bros.
Mario & Yoshi
McDonald Land
Mega Man
Mega Man 2
Mega Man 3
Mega Man 4
Metal Gear
Metroid
Mike Tyson's Punch Out!!
Mission Impossible
NES Open Tournament Golf
Nintendo World Cup
North & South
Panic Restaurant
Paperboy
Pinball
Popeye
Power Blade
Pro Wrestling
Probotector
Punch Out!!
Puzznic
Rad Racer
R.C. Pro-Am
Rescue - The Embassy Mission
Road Fighter
Robin Hood
Robocop
Robowarrior
Rockin' Kats
Roller Games
Rush'n Attack
Rygar
Section Z
Shadowgate
Shadow Warriors
Shatterhand
Side Pocket
Silent Service
Simpsons - Bart vs. The Space Mutants
Simpsons - Bart vs. The World
Skate or Die
Ski or Die
Slalom
Snake Rattle 'n' Roll
Snake's Revenge
Soccer
Solomon's Key
Solomon's Key 2
Solar Jetman
Solstice
Spy vs. Spy
Star Force
Star Tropics
Star Wars
Stealth ATF
Street Gangs
Super Mario Bros.
Super Mario Bros. 2
Super Mario Bros. 3
Super Spike V'Ball
Sword Master
Swords and Serpents
Tale Spin
Tecmo Cup Football Game (står "soccer game" på insticket)
Tecmo World Wrestling
Teenage Mutant Hero Turtles
Teenage Mutant Hero Turtles II: The Arcade Game
Tennis
Terminator 2 - Judgment Day
Tetris
Tiger-Heli
Tiny Toon Adventures
Tiny Toon 2
To The Earth
Tom & Jerry
Top Gun
Top Gun - The Second Mission
Total Recall
Track & Field II
Track & Field in Barcelona
Trojan
Ufouria
Volleyball
Werewolf: The Last Warrior
Wild Gunman
Willow
Wizards & Warriors
Wizards & Warriors II - Ironsword
Wizards & Warriors III - Kuros: Visions of Power
Wrath of Black Mantha
Wrecking Crew
Xevious
Yoshi's Cookie
Zelda II: The Adventure of Link

 

Not all of the above were released in Denmark of Finland, but in addition to the above, Denmark got

R.C. Pro-Am II
Bill Barkers Trick Shooting

And Finland got:
Mega Man 5
R.C. Pro-Am II
WWF Wrestlemania
Super Turrican

So, 180 Swedish Yapon's available, and 187 Yapon availables throughout Scandinavia

I don't believe the list has been updated in a while, so might be some games found since, which aren't part of the list, but all in-all it should be very close to what's available.

Edited May 28, 2020 by tordur

[phart010 | 1,807]

On 4/17/2020 at 1:33 AM, fcgamer said:

The FC Venezuela stuff is fake, not official, no idea about any 72 pins stuff though

What do you know of FC Venezuela games? I have a bunch of these sealed. They are in big boxes like the size of Atari games, but I think the cart inside is a Japanese version.

Also got a converter that I’ve always been curious about. Is this thing official?

 

[fcgamer | 5,124]

The carts are all fake, they are the same as the bootlegs from Taiwan. Some were made by the Whirlwind Manu company, for example.

The adaptor is not going to be official either.

Edit: At one point bi thought about creating a list of these and then even trying to collect them all, but honestly, the boxes are very very boring, and the carts are boring too, I think the manuals (where they exist) are the most interesting bit.

Edited May 28, 2020 by fcgamer

[AlfPogs | 29]

When I first saw this thread topic my eyes weren't totally focused and I read it as "New NES Religion."

The thing is. I wasn't totally surprised. It seemed like the kind of post I might see someday.

[ThePhleo | 2,309]

On 5/31/2020 at 11:10 AM, AlfPogs said:

When I first saw this thread topic my eyes weren't totally focused and I read it as "New NES Religion."

The thing is. I wasn't totally surprised. It seemed like the kind of post I might see someday.

The three-in-one god, Nintendo EAD consists of Shigeru Miyamoto (the Creator), Takashi Tezuka (The Architect), and Koji Kondo (the Voice)

They are a subset of the other Pantheon Gods of Nintendo. The elder Gods of the Yamauchi line have all died long ago but their legacies live on through their disciples. No one likes or knows the current elder God, Furukawa or the forgotton elder, Kimishima.

Praise Iwata.