NES Release for SMB2j?

[133MHz]

Look! I knew it! The ridiculously high amount of logic chips at the top! I was correct!
And yeah, very odd looking PCB, like a pirate. Does anybody have any Asian Version carts to see and compare with this one?

Also, I'm too lazy to register at NintendoAGE . Could somebody direct steven78 here so he can read why his status bar is scrolling and hopefully get to know more about this?



....and the SCORE thing is still setting off my pirate detector alarm.

[133MHz]

Never mind, I registered there just to tell the guy to come and take a look here .

[steven78]

hi i am here

well i have a smb euro version i can open up?

[MarioMania]

I didn't think Nintendo would release SMB2j outside of Japan on Cart

[steven78]

isnt it possible that its a only in japan try out or something...??

[133MHz]

I'm recording a video and I'll post it on Youtube

[MarioMania]

I'm recording a video and I'll post it on Youtube

Sweet..Can't wait to watch it

[133MHz]

The video is here!

SMB2j Pirate cart Overclock Test (Status bar glitch)

[kite200]

weird pcb

[JC]

Jabra's now deleted post had asked if this cart is a pirate. Some people think so, including 133 and a few reputable dudes on NintendoAGE. I think it's legit and I have my reasons:

1. NES collectors don't know much about the Asian NES market because it's largely untapped (hard to communicate, few places to buy retro stuff). There was a Bubble Bobble 2 discovered from that market recently...some said it's a pirate as well, but again, I think it's real and people just call it a pirate because they don't know much about what was released in Asia/Hong Kong.

2. The look of the cart and box are spot on what a real cart and box from Nintendo would look like. I've never seen a pirate company perfectly mimic the real thing...they just aren't capable. I've never once found a pirate that looked like the original on close inspection, particularly when you put the real thing next to the pirate.

3. No obvious hacking. Usually pirates of Mario games are hacked. For some reason, pirate companies thought they could take out the copyright or the name of the game and not get into trouble reproducing the game. So, usually pirates have something hacked...often the whole title screen is removed. With Mario games, usually the name Mario is changed to "Mari" or "Mary". There has been talk about a word change (I think "Mario" to "Score" or something).

The case for it being a pirate is the wording "hack" and the board. The board does look way too complex for Nintendo to have produced a bunch of them. But who knows...I hear this game might be dumped and analyzed in the near future.

[133MHz]

And one of my deleted posts said I'm not jumping to any conclusions at this moment, we need more information like higher resolution pictures of the cart and the circuit board, and if possible, pictures of a similar Asian Version cart for comparison.

There are some things that bug me though:

* SCORE replacing MARIO and LUIGI on the status bar.
* The board looks messy, looks like it has no CIC and it uses EPROMs (though somebody mentioned some original Nintendo production runs could have used them). Again, only better pictures will tell.
* No battery! The 8 starts appear to be hard-wired onto the ROM.

Some people at NintendoAGE questioned the scrolling status bar thing. I proved (with a video) that it was caused by the slight difference in CPU speed between NTSC and PAL consoles (the game being NTSC and the console being PAL), so it doesn't correlate with its authenticity.

EDIT: Something I haven't mentioned (well, sort of): The disk version of SMB2j uses the interrupt provided by the  Disk System to clear the scroll registers and therefore keep the status bar in place. Pirate SMB2j carts, in absence of the FDS and its interrupt, need to recreate it through a crufty combination of logic chips, diodes and resistors. This yields a cheap ripple counter with a high chip count on the board, and its very fragile and dependent on the CPU clock signal. The SMB2j original cart appears to suffer from the same problem (high chip count according to the picture and scrolling status bar). Nintendo owns the source code of SMB2j right? Isn't it easier to fix the status bar code before putting it on a cart instead of recreating a FDS interrupt through an overly complicated and crufty method?

[FamicomFreak]

And one of my deleted posts said I'm not jumping to any conclusions at this moment, we need more information like higher resolution pictures of the cart and the circuit board, and if possible, pictures of a similar Asian Version cart for comparison.

I was just about to mention about the similar Asian version cart...you beat me to it!

[MarioMania]

Looks like a Prototype Board...Used in Beta NES Games

[133MHz]

Could be, but a proto has socketed EPROMs, those are soldered directly.

[steven78]

can some body please tell me how to cover op that window.... any sticker will do? before i will take beter pics i have to close the chips.