My Game Boy Tetris Minuet collection

[Ulrizza | 133]

Hi Guys!

One of my collecting goals is to have all the Tetris Minuet cartridges with different imprints.
AFAIK, this cartridge exist with only 4 imprints: 23, 20, 09 and 05.
Edit: @JVOSS theorized that 07 and 28 may also exist!

I presume that you are familiar with this special Tetris.
If not, you can easily find a lot on info online by searching "Tetris Minuet" or "Tetris 1.0".
Here is a link to the Cutting Room Floor website where the game differences are well explained: https://tcrf.net/Tetris_(Game_Boy).

I'll let you know when I found the missing one!

Update:
I finally found the 4 cartridges that I wanted: 23, 20, 09 and 05

I'm now happy with those 4 games and will stop searching for more.

If someone happens to found (have) one of the Minuet carts that @JVOSS theorized existed (07 or 28), please let me know 

Edited August 18, 2022 by Ulrizza
Found the missing one!

[RH | 4,903]

This is really cool to see.  I've considered doin this, but it's so hard to find these for a reasonable price in the US, I've not put much effort into it.

If you happen to ever get a double (or triple) of one that's in good shape, I'd appreciate the PM. I  still need to get any one for my collection.

Oh, and it's also to see that there are at least 3 imprints.  I've heard people throw around numbers like "only 20,000 were ever made."  I've been suspect of that count, and with multiple production line stamps existing, I'm sure there's more than 20,000 that were produced.

[Ulrizza | 133]

I bought most of them on eBay from Japan.
TBH they are relatively easy to spot when you know the label differences, you just have to buy them quickly because they don't stay long 

I'll PM you 

I agree with you, I've seen different production numbers for it and since I managed to find 10 of them in about 4 month, I think there is more than people believe!

[MegaMan52 | 2,445]

I'm familiar with this, due to my interest in imports. I've got a boxed copy with a Link Cable. Box says "DMG-TRAT" instead of "DMG-TRA".

Edit: In case you're wondering, the numbers on my copy are 05:

It was a little difficult to get a good picture, but you can just barely see the numbers above the J in "JAPAN."

Edited July 14, 2021 by MegaMan52

[croagunk | 798]

Pretty cool!

[Ulrizza | 133]

4 minutes ago, MegaMan52 said:

I'm familiar with this, due to my interest in imports. I've got a boxed copy with a Link Cable. Box says "DMG-TRAT" instead of "DMG-TRA".

Beautiful 

I'd love to have this one for a low price one day, but it's easy to spot so I think it'll be hard.
Right now I'm looking for the Minuet box, but they are rare and in 4 month of refreshing eBay every few hours of my awake time I've never found one (not listed as Minuet of course).

 

[Ulrizza | 133]

On 7/14/2021 at 5:48 PM, Ulrizza said:

Beautiful 

I'd love to have this one for a low price one day, but it's easy to spot so I think it'll be hard.
Right now I'm looking for the Minuet box, but they are rare and in 4 month of refreshing eBay every few hours of my awake time I've never found one (not listed as Minuet of course).

 

@MegaMan52 so there is one that popped recently on eBay... waaaaay too expensive for me

https://ebay.us/VBIEr2

[Tanooki | 4,933]

What are all the tells on the original one anyway other than those stamp codes?  I've read somewhere in the past the sticker art is slightly off from later copies with the standard music-A.

[MegaMan52 | 2,445]

1 hour ago, Tanooki said:

What are all the tells on the original one anyway other than those stamp codes?  I've read somewhere in the past the sticker art is slightly off from later copies with the standard music-A.

From Chris Covell's site:

The label is slightly different. Notice the copyright info is a little more to the right in version 1.0, and that the bottom left of the A in "TRA" is right above the star in version 1.1 but slightly more to the left in version 1.0. I bought version 1.0 in 2014, and had to compare the label art before buying it since there was no way I could see the numbers in the pictures that the seller provided.

[Ulrizza | 133]

9 hours ago, Tanooki said:

What are all the tells on the original one anyway other than those stamp codes?  I've read somewhere in the past the sticker art is slightly off from later copies with the standard music-A.

I invite you to check this link to see the differences in the ROM: https://tcrf.net/Tetris_(Game_Boy).

For the sticker, there is 2 parts that are relatively easy to differentiate between 1.0 and 1.1:

• The ball on the top of the the Kremlin is right below the 2 "L" of the word "ALL" for 1.0, and nearly touch the "R" of the word "RIGHTS" for 1.1
• The "MADE IN JAPAN" at the bottom right is nearly perfectly aligned with the background lines for 1.0 and not at all for 1.1

Here is a precise image where you can easily see the differences I listed above:

Easy, right? 

[Tyree_Cooper | 755]

ahh you're the reason i can't find a copy anywhere

[Tanooki | 4,933]

Now that @Ulrizza is what I kind of remember now that I think of it, the offset I was talking about.  I was thinking it was like one of the stars, but that makes more sense, the placement of that ball on the top of the tower.

[Ulrizza | 133]

@Tanooki I'm sure you can find other details in the sticker to differenciate them but IMO the ones that I listed are the most obvious, you just need to be patient because sometime multiple 1.0 pops on eBay in less than a month, and sometimes there are none in multiple months! 

[ninjamaster | 381]

Cool stuff!

[JVOSS | 1,762]

@Ulrizzaplease publish your cart's pcb data.  that would be help @RHproduction info.  i guessing it will have a DMG-AAA-01 date code 8922-8929  with a pcb date of 8907-8909  that is my guess. 

Edited July 28, 2021 by JVOSS

[Ulrizza | 133]

2 minutes ago, JVOSS said:

@Ulrizzaplease publish your cart's pcb data.  that would be help @RHproduction info.  i guessing it will have a DMG-BBA-01 date code 8937-8944  with a pcb date of 8907-8910  that is my guess. 

@JVOSS I'll do it as soon as I can 

Is there a thread dedicated to this? Because I have a lots of carts, some Japanese, and if it can be useful I could publish other ones.

[JVOSS | 1,762]

@Ulrizzanot per say on the data i have started the variant rom tracking for the NOA carts but not for world games yet.

if you look in the sig block you can find the topic. 

should you want to share you info on the carts then please send to me.  there is a website that tracks all data but i have yet to contribute it hard to do with i have to redo 3000 carts. 

[Ulrizza | 133]

12 hours ago, JVOSS said:

@Ulrizzanot per say on the data i have started the variant rom tracking for the NOA carts but not for world games yet.

if you look in the sig block you can find the topic. 

should you want to share you info on the carts then please send to me.  there is a website that tracks all data but i have yet to contribute it hard to do with i have to redo 3000 carts. 

Dang 3000 carts it would take a serious amount of time

Yeah it's been some time that I'd like to find a way to contribute to some kind of database to list and preserve all games! I'll search the topic you're talking about

 

Edited July 28, 2021 by Ulrizza

[bowser | 598]

I found a Minuet version imprinted with "20".

[JVOSS | 1,762]

for what i can see is that the following numbers could be

 

00

05

07

09

11

12

20

22

23

34

for this tetris.  happy hunting...

[Ulrizza | 133]

3 hours ago, bowser said:

I found a Minuet version imprinted with "20".

Lucky you! Did you find it on eBay? 

[Ulrizza | 133]

2 hours ago, JVOSS said:

for what i can see is that the following numbers could be

 

00

05

07

09

11

12

20

22

23

34

for this tetris.  happy hunting...

From what did you deduce this list?

It looks like nearly all the possible imprints of a v1.0 game (I also have "28" on some cartridge). From what I've found online those imprints correspond to the place where the game was produced but I cannot find where I've read that

But since Tetris Minuet has only been released in Japan and in a "small" batch, I'm very doubtful that some where produced around the world, so it's totally believable that only few imprints exists. I hope my explanations are understandable  

Note: I have around 20 Japanese DMG cartridges, and those that are v1.0 (imprint without letter) are confined in the "23, 20, 09, 05" list. 

Edited August 4, 2021 by Ulrizza

[bowser | 598]

38 minutes ago, Ulrizza said:

Lucky you! Did you find it on eBay? 

Yeah 

[JVOSS | 1,762]

29 minutes ago, Ulrizza said:

From what did you deduce this list?

It looks like nearly all the possible imprints of a v1.0 game (I also have "28" on some cartridge). From what I've found online those imprints correspond to the place where the game was produced but I cannot find where I've read that

But since Tetris Minuet has only been released in Japan and in a "small" batch, I'm very doubtful that some where produced around the world, so it's totally believable that only few imprints exists. I hope my explanations are understandable  

Note: I have around 20 Japanese DMG cartridges, and those that are v1.0 (imprint without letter) are confined in the "23, 20, 09, 05" list. 

From what did you deduce this list?
for the time from that the V1 was printed and assembled.

date codes will be from 8901-8922 and pcb will be from 8901-8906 during that time the code would have been 

23
20
05
07
09
28

the boards would be

DMG-AAA-01, and very very very rare DMG-BEAN-02  most likely with an I or B on back side and no year above the month code.

my bad on the 11,12 that is late 94 irc..

nope the label were only produced in JAPAN oops except Brazil and China.  The numbers are the id's of print shops that did the printing.  under Nintendo's strict control.

when you record the dates of the ROM chip and the PCB date you will understand more.  the time from for the "v1" was about 4 months.  and at the rate that NINTENDO produced that would 40000 if not higher.  now that is not to say they shipped that many.

Time for TMI: 

As for the music, a working theory is that Nintendo did not have the rights to the original sound track and had to produce something different for original production. However they had to change the song in order comply with the copyright and the agreement with Alexey Pajitnov (as the Korobeiniki was his favorite song.)  The song was original to Spectrum HoloByte and was used in the original production of Tetris for the (Amiga, Apple II, Apple IIGS, DOS, MacOS, Atari ST).  in late 1989 Nintendo's in house composer Hirokazu "Hip" Tanaka remixed the Korobeiniki to what is now. the CHIP Tune of Tetris A.

hope this helps

 

[Ulrizza | 133]

9 hours ago, JVOSS said:

From what did you deduce this list?
for the time from that the V1 was printed and assembled.

date codes will be from 8901-8922 and pcb will be from 8901-8906 during that time the code would have been 

23
20
05
07
09
28

the boards would be

DMG-AAA-01, and very very very rare DMG-BEAN-02  most likely with an I or B on back side and no year above the month code.

my bad on the 11,12 that is late 94 irc..

nope the label were only produced in JAPAN oops except Brazil and China.  The numbers are the id's of print shops that did the printing.  under Nintendo's strict control.

when you record the dates of the ROM chip and the PCB date you will understand more.  the time from for the "v1" was about 4 months.  and at the rate that NINTENDO produced that would 40000 if not higher.  now that is not to say they shipped that many.

Time for TMI: 

As for the music, a working theory is that Nintendo did not have the rights to the original sound track and had to produce something different for original production. However they had to change the song in order comply with the copyright and the agreement with Alexey Pajitnov (as the Korobeiniki was his favorite song.)  The song was original to Spectrum HoloByte and was used in the original production of Tetris for the (Amiga, Apple II, Apple IIGS, DOS, MacOS, Atari ST).  in late 1989 Nintendo's in house composer Hirokazu "Hip" Tanaka remixed the Korobeiniki to what is now. the CHIP Tune of Tetris A.

hope this helps

 

Thank you very much for this detailed answer!
I still haven't taken the time to take pictures of my Minuet PCBs 

So I'll update my first post with the new imprint numbers 07 and 28, but I never saw any of them, if someone has one, please post a picture

About the Minuet song, I find it way less dynamic, IMO it just doesn't fit the gameplay... (but maybe I am biased because Tetris was one of my first video game and Korobeiniki is engraved in my brain). I thought that was the reason it was changed. Thanks for sharing