In regards to the middle UMC era, you have to keep in mind that TONNES of the games were released with UMC stickers covering the old bit corp stuff, though some copies dont have the UMC stickers, which were obviously sold before UMC took over.

EVERY SINGLE GAME before #58 Heaven Clash is just random. Random development teams, games with or without credits, shocking differences in quality, and in most cases the designs were clones of other games. Would need to interview an old bit corp or UMC guy to get more of the story.

In regards to the grey cards, packaging changes and anomalies were common in heaps of games. No idea where those newer version grey cards originated and why.

What other games apart from baseball supposedly are link compatible?

In regards to Dinosaur Park - I'm mainly curious to know if its a strict VS fighter where you choose a character and fight through opponents, or is it you only play as a single character and fight a series of unplayable bosses? Thats the vibe I was getting from the box cover art, although if there is a 'VS Mode' along with the 'story mode' I suppose all the fighters are playable in that, or somthing.

Never played Kiki Island, but seen screenshots on the back of the box. Theres definitely a 'middle period' in the gamate's evolution where UMC probably took over and put out releases such as Kiki Island, Fist of Thunder, Fortune n' Luck, Incantational Couple, etc. Indeed they are much more solid games that the pure trash quality of the early bitcorp stuff, although lots of the graphics and designs are usually still copied from Japanese games (Kiki Inland copies from Adventure Island, Fist of Thunder copies from the Hiryuu no Ken games, Fortress of Fear copies from Ikari no Yousai, Flying Goblin copies from Red Arremer, even just recently I realized that Metamorphosiser is essentially just a kind of remixed version of the first Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles game on Gameboy with some sprite edits, and thats a game that comes in the final era UMC packaging.

With the exception of a couple odd titles the only real 100% original games are the final wave of Asian only releases (game #58 and everything onwards)

Is anyone able to give the chinese text of the Mega Duck as seen here? http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-MOxYS3HmaSU/Ui-zovMmHGI/AAAAAAAABJk/YxsEHC8vX4g/s1600/sachenflyer_backB.PNG

Will be nice to able to search that.

Trust me, I'm just happy its you that got the game. Even if the game had a $10 BIN and I didn't see the auction in time I wouldn't feel bad at all if I knew you were the one that got it. The most important thing to me is discovering these cool and unique games and sharing information and screenshots with anyone else that wants to know about them, far better than if some kind of collector with no intention to ever play the game for more than 30 seconds got it.

Side scrolling shooters tend to be less interesting to me than other types of action games like platformers or whatever, but Insect War does look pretty interesting due its theme and that crazy cover art hahaha. I would love to know what the bosses are like and if they are impressive at all in terms of size and design.

By the way thats the 2nd Incantation Couple to show up in a year, and meanwhile no copies of early UMC era stuff like Punk Boy and Metamorphosiser have shown up in 2+ years, so I guess a lot of this stuff has similar rarity after all, Incantational Couple just seemed to be super rare because Jonathon Lux never saw a copy in his 3-4 years of collecting the system.

Holy moly postman you sure are crazy, you should have waited till the the guy had put the price down to at least 200 or something cause no one else is willing to spend nearly that much, I should know cause up until this point I was always the highest bidder on gamate crap hahaha.

The info is much appreciated, I wonder if #70 was the last. I finished game #69 and I think the date in the staff roll was mid-late 1994. The slightly earlier Robin Hood was dated January 1994. If #70 was the last then it probably would have been very early 1995. If you finish it the staff roll will most likely have a month along with the year, like seemingly all the late-era UMC gmes have.

Did you manage to snag that recent BIN auction of the Incantational Couple btw? I'm still curious as to what genre of game it is so I can update my now almost complete Gamate list.