A Quest

[Black Squirrel]

Ay up,

I come from the land of Sega Retro, and apparently I get a kick out of self-harming, as I've spent the last few weeks on a project widely considered impossible. I am, among other things, attempting to document every single Sega-related bootleg in existence.

Yes, really.


Here's the thing - many eons ago I spotted some preliminary attempts at cataloguing knock-off Famicom cartridges. Granted, there was some genuine merit to this, as most of the ROMs weren't dumped (and thus it would act as a way of tracking down specific cartridges), but interesting side effects included being able to discover which companies were responsible for development and production, and by extension, pinpoint where these cartridges actually came from. Turns out piles of plastic tat actually had a story attached to them, who knew.

We're trying to do the same for Sega consoles, although by that I mean "mostly the Mega Drive, sometimes a bit of Game Gear". Statistically you'd expect far fewer Mega Drive bootlegs than Famicom ones, and as Sega Retro focuses on documenting the Sega story across the world, it's unfair to ignore markets comprised of this unlicensed tat. You could have developed a childhood love of the Mega Drive without touching any licensed produce - turning a blind eye isn't a great option, hence this stupid task.

This is how far I've got - it's the biggest collection of Mega Drive bootlegs in existence! (and missing hundreds - it takes a while to crop up crappy photos) I'm also working on multi-carts and, when I can stomach it, tat from Russia (because that's recent!). However, I don't know a huge amount about these subjects, and there isn't much appetite for this sort of thing from my neck of the woods, hence why I've traveled here.

So, has anyone attempted something similar to this before, so I can build up a more competent picture of the situation? I've found a few patterns, but vast chunks of these things have no external clues at all. This is the only place on the internet I can think of were people might actually care.

[Awesome Panda]

I don't think anyone else has a database (or anything like that) of Mega Drive pirates. I own at least a dozen pirated carts and a couple of them came in a case; some are pirates of legit games, some are originals and some are pirate multicarts. I could take pictures of those if you want, but they'll be in pretty poor quality as I'd have to use my phone. (I have a camera but it's out of battery and I've lost the charger for it)

Also, this is the same cart as one I own, except mine comes in a western cart shell and replaces Sonic & Knuckles with Sonic 2.

Also, aren't you the guy who used to run TORP? I remember finding out about a fair few bootleg games from that site back around 2008.

[Black Squirrel]

Awesome Panda

Sep 5 2014, 06:05:47 PM

Also, aren't you the guy who used to run TORP? I remember finding out about a fair few bootleg games from that site back around 2008. [/quote]I am indeed - guess it had a bit of a legacy after all!

We are collecting scans and photos - a crappy photo is better than nothing at all, although we'll be wanting to replace it at the first available opportunity with a better one. It's the joy of wikis - things getting progressively better over time.

[fcgamer]

You honestly missed the boat on this, as I had recently (maybe 4 months ago) sold a large set of approximately 70+ Sega MD bootlegs.  I still get those carts from time to time, though only the good ones (i.e. multicarts, not single releases).  If you are interested in purchasing these things and making your own (hi res) scans, then please contact me, and we can work out some fair price.

[Awesome Panda]

I've uploaded pictures of all of the multicarts I have. Several of the pictures are upside down though for some odd reason.

http://i61.tinypic.com/2dtyvl5.jpg
http://i60.tinypic.com/jrsfp1.jpg
http://i60.tinypic.com/2edo7dh.jpg
http://i59.tinypic.com/24qvk20.jpg
http://i61.tinypic.com/5os5ft.jpg

[Azathoth]

Black Squirrel

Sep 6 2014, 05:28:37 AM

Black Squirrel

 

I am indeed - guess it had a bit of a legacy after all![/quote][/quote]Legacy indeed, such a ton of information on the site that you can tell an incredible amount of work went into it. Nice you see you around and still interested in unlicensed rubbish.

Black Squirrel

 

So, has anyone attempted something similar to this before, so I can build up a more competent picture of the situation? I've found a few patterns, but vast chunks of these things have no external clues at all.[/quote]

A lot of carts have a stock ID printed straight on the label (DK-XXXX, DT-XXXX). DK's are single game carts, DT's are multi-game carts. Often the multi-game carts will have this same stock number on the game menu selection when you start the game.

The numbering of DK's sometimes coincides with the ROM size, for instance a 16m game would be DK-16XX. Single game carts with an ID that ends in either A or B (like DK-1604a & DK-1604b) are either title screen variants of the same game or better yet only label variants with no difference in game content. Multi-game DT carts go up to 64m and sometimes (not always) have a similar numbering method that corresponds with the cart size.

It's hard to tell which manufacturer these ID's originated from as different manufacturers across the globe use/steal the same assets from each other (both ROMs and label art). As an example I have several copies of one game, both directly from the manufacturers, some from China and the others from Argentina. Both use the same exact label assets and ROMs, the only clue that they didn't come from the same place is that one shell has "manufactured in Argentina" on the back while the other has only the usual cart handling warnings.

[Black Squirrel]

Awesome Panda

Sep 8 2014, 02:09:58 PM

I've uploaded pictures of all of the multicarts I have. Several of the pictures are upside down though for some odd reason.

http://i61.tinypic.com/2dtyvl5.jpg
http://i60.tinypic.com/jrsfp1.jpg
http://i60.tinypic.com/2edo7dh.jpg
http://i59.tinypic.com/24qvk20.jpg
http://i61.tinypic.com/5os5ft.jpg[/quote]Sweet. Do these carts have names - just makes it a little easier to sort.


My understanding is that some of these cartridges came in parts, i.e. there was a factory in Taiwan or mainland China or wherever producing the boards (and maybe the artwork?), while the cartridge shells were produced locally. I'm guessing the costs skyrocket when you start shipping plastic around the world, although some people seem to have done that anyway.

(This still happens with things like the Everdrive (i.e. the cartridge that lets you use SD cards). Everdrives are sold without shells - distributors have to sort that noise out... although in that case they have to do the art too. That's why there's a bazillion variants of those things.)

But yeah it's surprisingly common to see the same cartridges pop up all over the world. Though we might struggle to keep track of where the shells were produced (spoilers: this is the same for the legitimate stuff - Sega had plants all over the world), I think it's possible to document the ROMs and labels. Or at least have a decent stab at it - I'm fairly satisfied with the attempt at documenting consoles and those had much the same problems.

[Awesome Panda]

Black Squirrel

Sep 9 2014, 02:46:15 PM

Awesome Panda

Sep 8 2014, 02:09:58 PM

I've uploaded pictures of all of the multicarts I have. Several of the pictures are upside down though for some odd reason.

http://i61.tinypic.com/2dtyvl5.jpg
http://i60.tinypic.com/jrsfp1.jpg
http://i60.tinypic.com/2edo7dh.jpg
http://i59.tinypic.com/24qvk20.jpg
http://i61.tinypic.com/5os5ft.jpg[/quote]Sweet. Do these carts have names - just makes it a little easier to sort.[/quote]These are the names on the end labels:

Super Arcade 96 Shotting 8 in 1 [sic]
Super 59 in 1
4 in 1
Super 4 in 1
5 in 1

[Azathoth]

Black Squirrel

Sep 9 2014, 02:46:15 PM

My understanding is that some of these cartridges came in parts, i.e. there was a factory in Taiwan or mainland China or wherever producing the boards (and maybe the artwork?), while the cartridge shells were produced locally. I'm guessing the costs skyrocket when you start shipping plastic around the world, although some people seem to have done that anyway.[/quote]Most carts in my experience are manufactured in the same area, the big electronics manufacturers have their own molds they use so they don't have to rely on outside sources.

If it helps you any, I have pictures of every pirate game I've owned, plus a ton I've just got pics of. A lot of them I uploaded to the Bootleg Games Wiki pictures section so feel free to browse there and grab all them and I can also send you those from my personal collection. I really support this endevor whole heartedly since it's a very niche subject that I find immensely interesting.

I also have stock lists with stock ID's that use the numbering method I mentioned before. I can provide you these along with corresponding pictures to some of them if that information would help you any.

Also, the vast majority of the multi-game carts produced after the mid-90's are designed for clone systems sold in their own areas so they do not work on normal MD/Gen units because they lack the TMSS check to get the cart to boot. Those made with the Tomsoft SDK are a complete crapshoot to get to work, but a lot of the multi-game carts without TMSS will boot in an older non-TMSS MD/Gen or will boot in a newer TMSS machine if piggybacked on a Game Genie since it will use the TMSS routine programmed in the GG to get it to work.

[Black Squirrel]

Azathoth

Sep 9 2014, 11:04:08 PM

Black Squirrel

Sep 9 2014, 02:46:15 PM

My understanding is that some of these cartridges came in parts, i.e. there was a factory in Taiwan or mainland China or wherever producing the boards (and maybe the artwork?), while the cartridge shells were produced locally. I'm guessing the costs skyrocket when you start shipping plastic around the world, although some people seem to have done that anyway.[/quote]Most carts in my experience are manufactured in the same area, the big electronics manufacturers have their own molds they use so they don't have to rely on outside sources.

If it helps you any, I have pictures of every pirate game I've owned, plus a ton I've just got pics of. A lot of them I uploaded to the Bootleg Games Wiki pictures section so feel free to browse there and grab all them and I can also send you those from my personal collection. I really support this endevor whole heartedly since it's a very niche subject that I find immensely interesting.

I also have stock lists with stock ID's that use the numbering method I mentioned before. I can provide you these along with corresponding pictures to some of them if that information would help you any.

Also, the vast majority of the multi-game carts produced after the mid-90's are designed for clone systems sold in their own areas so they do not work on normal MD/Gen units because they lack the TMSS check to get the cart to boot. Those made with the Tomsoft SDK are a complete crapshoot to get to work, but a lot of the multi-game carts without TMSS will boot in an older non-TMSS MD/Gen or will boot in a newer TMSS machine if piggybacked on a Game Genie since it will use the TMSS routine programmed in the GG to get it to work.[/quote]Can I persuade you to register an account on Sega Retro and post/upload this stuff yourself - I'd hate to take credit for what sounds like valuable work  

[taizou]

oh cool - I always wanted to do something like this (for all systems) but I never really got around to it, good luck!

here's something random I noticed: on the carts with a number in plain black text in the bottom right, the letters seems to correspond with a Chinese name for the game or franchise, for example:

Fantasia ML009 = Mi Lao Shu 米老鼠 (Chinese name for Mickey Mouse)
Sonic YS001 = Yin Su Xiao Zi 音速小子
Jurassic Park ZL002 = Zhu Luo Ji Gong Yuan 侏羅紀公園

so that probably points to them being part of the same series.

[Azathoth]

On a similar subject has anyone verified that a pirated game actually came with pirated instructions? I'm not talking about unlicensed originals, I mean a genuine counterfeit of a commercial product that came with a reproduced manual.

The closest thing I ever found was a boxed copy of SFII:SCE for MD. There's a scan of both the box and cart of a similar version on the Sega Retro site listed above but both my box and cart are slightly different. The ROM itself is actually a pirate of the Japanese version (Street Fighter II' Plus) and at the time I purchased the cart it was apparently undumped because Goodgen couldn't label it and no other list had a [p] version of the ROM. It came with a manual, but the manual could have been swiped from the HK/Asian version. Paper wise the manual seems legitimate, but there's a few oddities here and there (like lack of warnings or TM's) that make me think its a fake, but I've never been able to find someone with an original copy of the Asian variant to verify it.

Edit...

Also Awesome Panda, on those multi cart picks what is #8 on the shooter named Desendu? And the other with Doremon named Ding Dong?

[Awesome Panda]

Azathoth

Sep 12 2014, 12:24:34 AM

Also Awesome Panda, on those multi cart picks what is #8 on the shooter named Desendu? And the other with Doremon named Ding Dong?[/quote]Daisendu is apparently called Daisenpu in Japan, although when I play it the title screen calls it Twin Hard. The Doraemon game is a platformer.

[Black Squirrel]

"Doraemon: Yume Dorobou to 7 Nin no Gozans"

I haven't seen any Mega Drive bootlegs or multi-carts or whatever ship with manuals, although there might be one or two for the Game Gear? South Korean stuff too, although the situation there is a lot more organised and self-contained.

The problem with manuals is that you usually have to write things in a language people might understand, but the games themselves are shipped all over the planet. Traditional Chinese or broken English doesn't really suffice if you're selling it in South America, where most speak Spanish (except Brazil, which is Portuguese).

[taizou]

GBC and GBA pirate carts often come with abridged copies of the original manuals, with maybe four or so pages (just covering basic controls and stuff). Although sometimes if they didn't have the original manual they'd include a "manual" that was just the text from the back of the box, or one for a related but completely different game. And the more "professional" pirate Chinese translations (e.g. the ones by Li Cheng) would often include a manual in Chinese - whether they wrote it from scratch or translated the original I'm not sure. But Li Cheng also translated a ton of Mega Drive games (under their former name of Winsen/Yongsheng) so I'd imagine they did the same thing there too.