Sintax and their 93+ games

[taizou]

just compiled a few Sintax ID numbers from various sources: (now updated!)

ST-0206002E Harry Boy Second Edition: The secretx of the chamber of secrets (english)
ST-0206003E True Thre Kingdoms (english)
ST-0206005E Donkey Kong 5: The journey of over time and space (english)
ST-0206007 指环王 (Lord of the Rings) (Chinese)
GT-0210009C Star Wars 2 (Chinese)
ST-0210010C 真三國無雙II (True Three Kingdoms II) (chinese)
SAT-0212014C Tai Kong Bao Bei (Lilo and Stitch) [Jump Technology]
ST-0211015E 2003 Digimom Sapphii (english)
JP-0301018C Crash Bandicoot 2003 [Jump Technology]
ST-0301019C Lion King 3
ST-0301020C Quan Ba Tian Xia
ST-0210021C Super Robot War X
ST-0211022E 2003 Pocket Monster Carbuncle (english)
ST-0304027C 神鬼帝國之惡魔城 ("Castlevania of the Ghost Empire" or something) (Chinese)
ST-0306030C 重装机兵/METAL MAXⅡ
ST-0306034C Dragon Ball Z3
ST-0310041C 大话西游/Saiyuuki
ST-0425072C 口袋宝贝火红/Pocket Monstor-Red (Fire Red)
0405073C Pokemon Leaf Green
ST-0405075C Metal Slug II
ST-0405077C 越南战役3 (Metal Slug 3) (chinese)
ST-0409078C Super Sonik II (chinese)
ST-0409084C 口袋妖怪-白金版/Pocketmon-platina
ST-0409085C 口袋妖怪-绿宝石/pocketmon-emerald
ST-0502092C 勇者斗恶龙/Dragon Quest
ST-0504093C 口袋宝贝-珍珠/Poketmon-pearl

GBA:
ST060112C Ge Dou Jian Shen

im guessing the format is ST-YYMMXXXL, where L is E/C for English/Chinese, YY=year, MM=month, XXX is a sequential ID no. which would mean Sintax made at least 78 84! 93!! games. and that probably doesn't even include their GBA stuff. so even given their habit of rehashing old shit, thats a lot of damn games out there. And i want to find them!ooh yeah, one other thing about Sintax. Even though their first known games seem to have been released in 2002, this old version of their website:
http://web.archive.org/web/20030603184947/www.st168.net/esintax.htm
says they've existed in Taiwan for over 10 years before focusing on the China market, and that they have "experiences more than ten years in TVGAME(GB/GBA/FC/SFC/SEGA) designing,  developing and hardwares producing."

a Taiwanese trademark search does indeed reveal this:
http://tmsearch.tipo.gov.tw/TIPO_DR/servlet/InitLogoPictureWordDetail?sKeyNO=083067692
a trademark registered by Sintax in Taiwan from late 1994, with an address in (where else) Taichung!

so they clearly weren't bullshitting when they said they'd been around for 10 years, or that they had Taiwanese origins.. and itd explain their ties to Gamtec and Vast Fame if they started out as part of that whole Taichung cluster of companies. question is, just what the hell were they doing until 2002? I guess with them saying "hardwares producing" they might just have been a generic clonemaker, but nothing like that has ever turned up (to my knowledge) with their name on it.oh yeah, one final thing. THIS.
http://popbuying.com/detail.pb/sku.2.8__LCD_GBA_NEG_GEO_GBC_SFC_MES_Emulator_Game_Console_Media_Player-28794
check out the box! its even written with the same chinese characters. same company? yknow.. i hope so. it'd be nice if those bastards were still out there somewhere. even if they don't have a website anymore.

[Barver]

Neat, I always looked at those IDs and somehow never was able to make them out. Here's the only other Sintax games I own, which I haven't posted about since I wanted to wait till I try to dump them heh.

SAT-0212014C Tai Kong Bao Bei(Lilo and Stitch)
JP-0301018C Crash Bandicoot 2003
ST-0301019C Lion King 3
ST-0301020C Quan Ba Tian Xia
ST-0304028C Metal Gear II

No doubt JP Means Jump Technology, and SAT is Saturn Technology.  Kind of odd, since even though Lilo and Stitch says SAT in the number, it's credited to Jump Technology on the box.

The one GBA game I have from them, Ge Dou Jian Shen, has an ID of ST060112C. Kind of shorter than the GBC ones.


Anyway this is big news, I remember when I first saw Sintax's site and was under the impression there's only like 32 games. Looks like I've got a lot ahead of me now

Edit: Was looking at the wrong serial codes at first, corrected everything now.

[taizou]

do you have any ideas about dumping them btw? i'm still having no luck with pretty much all my unlicensed stuff. i've been in touch with Martin Nielsen of 64scener/NES World, he owns a bunch of different GB copiers but he still hasn't been able to dump any of his Sintax games.

[codeman38]

Incidentally, a bit of Taiwanese calendar trivia, to make further sense of that trademark registration:

The Taiwanese government uses the Minguo calendar, which is the same as the Gregorian calendar except that the year 0 is 1911, when the Chinese republic was founded.

So "094/11/30" is actually 30 November 2005.

However, the trademark was initially registered on "084/12/01" - which is 1 December 1995. So it's still valid evidence that these guys were around in Taiwan during the 16-bit era!

[taizou]

094/11/30 is the expiry date I think - i was looking at 083/11/04, the initial filing date. which would be 4th November 1994 afaik.

[codeman38]

taizou

Sep 22 2010, 09:55:26 AM

094/11/30 is the expiry date I think - i was looking at 083/11/04, the initial filing date. which would be 4th November 1994 afaik.[/quote]Ah, right. Still, this is something that needs to be explained for the other forum members who aren't familiar with Taiwanese dates-- it confused me at first, to be sure!

Edit: Now I want to know what these guys were doing during the 16-bit era. Maybe they published some of the the SNES/MD ripoffs of licensed properties (Mulan, Pokemon, etc.) that we've been crediting to Chuanpu? Would make sense, given their GBC output primarily consists of knockoffs of licensed properties...

[taizou]

Yeah, true - the first time I encountered that system was on Gamtec's old site I think, it was quite a while before I realised they werent founded in 1978.

codeman38

Sep 22 2010, 09:56:54 AM

Edit: Now I want to know what these guys were doing during the 16-bit era. Maybe they published some of the the SNES/MD ripoffs of licensed properties (Mulan, Pokemon, etc.) that we've been crediting to Chuanpu? Would make sense, given their GBC output primarily consists of knockoffs of licensed properties...[/quote]Yeah, maybe.. X Boy seems to have published a lot of those though. but it wouldnt surprise me if Sintax was involved *somehow*.

edit: though i still find it odd that absolutely nothing has surfaced pre-2002 with Sintax's name on it - they were certainly never shy about using it after that.

[codeman38]

Ooh, I'm finding even more interesting stuff:

Apparently Sintax makes car stereos and video CD players. And, of course, MP4/game players, but we knew that one already. Definitely seems to be the same Sintax, given that they're in Guangdong and that they mention making video game software.

This page for nominations for an educational software award in Bologna mentions "Enjoy With-Me, Sintax Technology Co., Ltd., Taichung, Taiwan. R.O.C." This is from 1997. So finally, something that's surfaced before 2002 with their name.

[taizou]

ooh nice find. Maybe they were mostly PC developers before 2002 - i know pretty much nothing about Taiwanese PC games, so that'd explain a lot.that said, their trademark filing does specifically mention cartridges. Hmm.

[codeman38]

More proof of Sintax's existence in Taiwan prior to 2002: this page from a Taiwanese educational software exhibition in 1999. The characters in the 4th entry in the list should look familiar.

Interesting that all the hits I'm finding relate to educational PC software...Another one for the listing: ST-0304027C, a Castlevania game that is apparently not the same one as Castlevania EMO Demo. http://blog.yam.com/fujishima/article/2176634

[taizou]

one version of their site definitely mentioned both Castlevania DX and Castlevania R.. maybe that's R?  Or a completely different one, even.

I'll keep the list updated with people's findings, anyway.

[Awesome Panda]

On that trademark page, I've got no idea what the 4th November 1994 (083/11/04 if you don't know) date means seeing as I don't have the Chinese typeface installed on Firefox but I think that'd date the company to have originated before then. Also, I don't know much about trademarks, but if Somari's trademark was registered in a few months then why did it take 10 years to register Sintax's? BTW, I just noticed that on their website it says that they had more than 10 years experience in "TVGAME" which (as long as it isn't a translation error) would mean that they've been around since at least 1993.
BTW, has anyone actually tried sending an e-mail to them?

[taizou]

you can see what all the dates mean on the english version:
http://tmsearch.tipo.gov.tw/TIPO_DRE/servlet/InitLogoPictureWordDetail?sKeyNO=083067692
it just doesn't include as many details.

that email address didn't even work in 2004 though (when they were presumably still in business) - http://64scener.com/gb/unl-3king.htm

edit: they had a new email listed in 2006 - http://web.archive.org/web/20060206032636/http://www.st168.net/
sintax@vip.163.com, could be worth a try.

edit2: nevermind.

Quote:

 

Delivery to the following recipients failed.
sintax@vip.163.com [/quote]

[codeman38]

There are more e-mail addresses on this 2004 version of the site - but they, too, are both invalid. sintaxtrade.com doesn't even have a DNS entry, and the Hotmail one bounces as inactive.

Edit: LOL, they also flat-out nicked the wording of that page off of Nintendo's site, and forgot to change all the references to Nintendo.

[Awesome Panda]

Sintax

 

Where better to get your game tips than straight from the pros at SITAX?[/quote]

Sintax

 

SITAX offers a comprehensive game play counseling service[/quote]

Good to see that their typos have consistency. Also, what's with the Super Tortoise banner at the top? Did Sintax make a ripoff of one of the TMNT arcade games or something?

Quote:

 

Over the phone
To order Player's Guides over the phone, call Nintendo's Customer Service Hotline at (86) 750-6580880.[/quote] :lol: