Joshua Rogers | 77 Posted October 25, 2020 Share Posted October 25, 2020 24 minutes ago, bowser said: Uh oh, looks like Mr Mahesh just shot himself in the foot there with that picture then By the way, isn't the existence of that Samurai micro genius ad enough proof that Samurai was selling famiclones? Or is it within the realms of possibility for pirate groups to have the audacity to put out ads for their products? I tried to ignore the advertisement for sake of believing Mahesh, but you know.. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThePhleo | 2,179 Posted October 25, 2020 Share Posted October 25, 2020 This is some amazing detective work here. This is basically the exact same story as the Phantom System & Playtronic NES in Brazil. They sold illegitimate games and clone systems first and then went legal once they made their money. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Joshua Rogers | 77 Posted October 25, 2020 Share Posted October 25, 2020 6 minutes ago, ThePhleo said: This is some amazing detective work here. This is basically the exact same story as the Phantom System & Playtronic NES in Brazil. They sold illegitimate games and clone systems first and then went legal once they made their money. The same as Dendy in Russia/CIS countries. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nescommando | 1 Posted October 26, 2020 Share Posted October 26, 2020 I love this thread! 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Indianvideogamecollector | 1 Posted October 28, 2020 Share Posted October 28, 2020 On 10/25/2020 at 8:21 PM, Joshua Rogers said: For reference, this is the photo he sent me (see the attached image.) Also for reference, in talking about the posibility of Samurai selling Famiclones/pirate carts, Mahesh had this to say: "Samurai could only source from Nintendo. After 7 years Samurai sold console with one free official cartridge. Rest the grey market [ Parrallel] Market supplied. Most of samurai Distributors and Dealers started stocking and selling Pirated versions and there was no Option for us to do this" "All Games were always from Nintendo. After about 5 Years Nintendo did allow Samurai to source directly from developers but it was too late and Original cart sale was virtually ZERO. Samurai Consoles were selling with one free cartridge but all consumers purchased extra Catrts from Grey market." "Samurai initiated several Court cases to stop all this Piracy and misuse of Brands and it did result in stopping use of Samurai with Microgenius but Microgenius all alone was already selling very well due to very low Price and steady quality" "Nintendo Officials visited India and we took them around to dealers / wholesales selling Pirated Carts in Bulk . Photographs were taken but nothing could be done to stop them " "Samurai only sold official Nintendo Chips in Nintendo Plastic Shells with Samurai Label" After 6 years in 1993 Taiwan and China introduced imitation Consoles at 25% of Samurai Price and multigame cartridges at 10% of Samurai Price resulting in steep drop in Samurai Sales . After 2 years trying to Fight China . As Mr S.K. Lal had other countries as an agent he always resisted sale of Imitation Consoles in India . No Nintendo did not cancel contract as they could understand that NES can Not sell at the price we had once China came in with Pirated Version. Due to very Poor Piracy law implementation in India at that time no one could do anything and Nintendo sales died down automatically resulting in Huge Losses to SAMURAI . Microgenius was a Taiwan Brand introduced in India by another parallel Video Game Distributor . " "Samurai never moved into Piracy and closed down Operations due to heavy Losses trying to fight Piracy" Clearly, these were all lies. Also it's great to see you included the Samurai advertisment But I also would like to now add this Which, your photo has just confirmed Samurai was indeed behind! Thank you very much, as this 'closes' the Indian chapter of my book, since the only thing I had left to write in it was an analysis of whether Samurai were selling pirate products. No analysis needed: the answer is yes! Wow, never thought Samurai would go non-legit, yes we can see the micro-genius at 11:05 in my video (Credits section) and these photos were provided by Mahesh. My questionnaire wasn't as detailed as yours maybe thats the reason why Mahesh did not include that information; moreover I was mostly interested in documenting the Nintendo Samurai NES first and foremost. I can share the details over Private message if required, along with the photos. Lastly are you "of games" from nintendoage; it was your post over there that pushed me to find and get in touch with someone from Samurai Electronics to get more details for the video, the information we had before hand was from nintendoage and tribal knowledge from Retro video game collectors in India. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Indianvideogamecollector | 1 Posted October 28, 2020 Share Posted October 28, 2020 On 10/25/2020 at 8:13 PM, Joshua Rogers said: Then, Mahesh lied to me in an email. Also see https://web.archive.org/web/20080918224605/http://samuraiindia-nintendo.com/index.html also cool video but some notes region lockout would have been 3196 then 3196A, not 3195/A. In terms of the 3,000 units per month number, Mahesh said this was the minimum order from Nintendo, which coincides with a number I have from a certain other distributor. But who knows, maybe Nintendo wasn't as cruel as one mayt hink. There were two companies. Samurai Electronics, which handled assembly of consoles, and Samurai Software which handled assembly of cartidges. I guess, like you, Mahesh refused to answer as to whether Samurai ever sold pirate games or consoles themselves, given https://www.indiatoday.in/magazine/economy/story/19911015-indian-entertainment-electronics-industry-goes-through-turbulent-times-814947-1991-10-15 and https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:IdrxHA9MnCEJ:https://www.quickcompany.in/trademarks/540483-miclo-genius+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=pl&client=firefox-b-d Mahesh sent me a similar picture used in the last couple of seconds in your video as well which I thought was amazingly cool, but he never sent that pic of the kiosk. However. Those last two pictures are important (at 11:03 in your video), and I think they clear up the question as the whether Samurai sold pirate consoles/games. It is very clear from the first photo in the video, that the posters have the Famiclone (pictured here: on them. NOT original Samurai NES consoles. This puts any doubt in my mind that to rest, and I can say with certainty that Samurai did indeed sell Famiclones. Did they do it with Nintendo's unofficial approval though, is a good question (like Dendy in Russia.) Dont know why, but I was in a rush to complete the video, the information had been lying around with me since June 2020, same time as I had requested @bowser for the photographs offline. In the interim I ended up losing the email, however the questionnaire and 2 out of the 3 photos Mahesh had shared with me were downloaded on my older phone, which helped me complete the transcript and the voice over, due to which I could go ahead and complete the video. Ended up pushing 3195A instead of 3196A (Asian Nes lockout) in the video, thank you for your observation He never said that Samurai was involved in Piracy, I was told that Piracy hit the business harder than anything else. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Joshua Rogers | 77 Posted October 28, 2020 Share Posted October 28, 2020 2 hours ago, Indianvideogamecollector said: He never said that Samurai was involved in Piracy, I was told that Piracy hit the business harder than anything else. Yeah, for the positive! Ha! Anyways yeah I am 'Of Games' on NA. I will message you one day asking some questions probably 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
angad gill | 0 Posted January 10, 2021 Share Posted January 10, 2021 so did samurai sell the famiclones before the legit samurai nes release or after Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bowser | 598 Posted January 11, 2021 Author Share Posted January 11, 2021 8 hours ago, angad gill said: so did samurai sell the famiclones before the legit samurai nes release or after I believe it was after. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bharath | 0 Posted January 15, 2021 Share Posted January 15, 2021 On 7/26/2020 at 8:40 PM, bowser said: I have a pic of that. Couldn't find the original high res pic that I had. I'm not surprised with the poor quality. They cut corners and used the cheapest materials possible. According to the info from Joshua above it was sold for 4800 INR which converts to about $370 at that time. This corresponds to what I heard from a friend that it was sold for around 4500 INR ($345). May I know where I can purchase this, I had same model but different color (White and black) but lost it somewhere, how stupid of me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Indianvideogamecollector | 1 Posted January 22, 2021 Share Posted January 22, 2021 On 1/10/2021 at 11:09 PM, angad gill said: so did samurai sell the famiclones before the legit samurai nes release or after Would be afterwards, as they said the firm was incorporated to assemble and sell NES in India Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wyansas | 131 Posted June 27, 2021 Share Posted June 27, 2021 posting on a dead thread, hoping i can get some answers. Does anybody know if Super Mario Bros for the Samurai came in a black cart? If it did, I would love to get my hands on one. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bowser | 598 Posted June 28, 2021 Author Share Posted June 28, 2021 17 hours ago, wyansas said: posting on a dead thread, hoping i can get some answers. Does anybody know if Super Mario Bros for the Samurai came in a black cart? If it did, I would love to get my hands on one. I think you've been looking for one of these for years. I think I remember your WTB thread on Nintendo Age. But to answer your question I think they randomly used whatever parts they had lying around so there's a good chance there is an SMB in black. However whether the PCB inside is legit or pirate is another matter entirely. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wyansas | 131 Posted June 28, 2021 Share Posted June 28, 2021 (edited) Thanks for the info. I love your samurai collection. Edited June 28, 2021 by wyansas 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tyree_Cooper | 720 Posted July 2, 2021 Share Posted July 2, 2021 On 7/19/2020 at 2:45 PM, bowser said: I've had at least 20 different Samurai consoles pass through my hands. india wants them back !!! 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fcgamer | 4,681 Posted July 2, 2021 Share Posted July 2, 2021 4 hours ago, Tyree_Cooper said: india wants them back !!! One should make a detour to Taiwan 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
phart010 | 1,705 Posted July 2, 2021 Share Posted July 2, 2021 Awesome thread. Now find out what’s up with Venezuelan NES stuff 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EarlyWorm | 2 Posted July 6, 2021 Share Posted July 6, 2021 On 6/27/2021 at 4:55 AM, wyansas said: posting on a dead thread, hoping i can get some answers. Does anybody know if Super Mario Bros for the Samurai came in a black cart? If it did, I would love to get my hands on one. Samurai for sure had a black Mario cartridge. I sold one to a guy on NA years ago, and had a second request for another from someone else. I may even still have pictures of it if NA has those pictures stored from PMs. I sent him pictures of three different marios... one black cart and two grey carts with different style labels. The labels had the same art, but were on different paper and of different print quality. I too have about a dozen Samurai consoles and a box of games.... from about twenty years ago. Plus another different 72-pin console from India. I collected 72-pin NES consoles and NESclones from around the world, and India was the toughest nut to crack. And that country didnt take paypal then. 1 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DK | 256 Posted July 6, 2021 Share Posted July 6, 2021 12 hours ago, EarlyWorm said: I too have about a dozen Samurai consoles and a box of games.... from about twenty years ago. Awesome! Have any pics? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bowser | 598 Posted July 9, 2021 Author Share Posted July 9, 2021 Yeah I would love to see some pics too @EarlyWorm Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pika_pikachu | 3 Posted September 8, 2021 Share Posted September 8, 2021 (edited) Samurai india also made Mega Drive MK1 clone called Samurai MG-16. Same console was available under different name like Scorpion XVI, Froggy System 16 and Magic 2 depending on region. It works like real mega drive and has expansion port also. Samurai Software ltd had a trademark on SAMURAI MG-16 name according to this website. https://www.zaubacorp.com/company-trademark/SAMURAI-SOFTWARE-PRIVATE-LIMITED/U72200RJ1988PTC004703 Edited September 8, 2021 by pika_pikachu 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EarlyWorm | 2 Posted November 4, 2021 Share Posted November 4, 2021 On 7/6/2021 at 11:31 AM, DK said: Awesome! Have any pics? Here are a couple of pix. I cant add much to the discussion, other than the black mario existing.... the OP has covered way more than I could offer. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nick | 61 Posted November 6, 2021 Share Posted November 6, 2021 Extremely cool thread. I was just telling an Indian friend about the Samurai and this is the thread that popped up on Google and I was showing it to them. I have never seen that many Samurai games all together in a single pic, let alone boxed/CIB games, let alone a CIB Super Mario Bros - amazing! Extremely cool stuff! 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DK | 256 Posted November 8, 2021 Share Posted November 8, 2021 On 11/3/2021 at 9:17 PM, EarlyWorm said: Here are a couple of pix. I cant add much to the discussion, other than the black mario existing.... the OP has covered way more than I could offer. Thanks, is it only me or are these pictures not showing up? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bowser | 598 Posted November 9, 2021 Author Share Posted November 9, 2021 22 hours ago, DK said: Thanks, is it only me or are these pictures not showing up? The pictures are definitely not working. @EarlyWorm Can you please upload the pictures again? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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