What is this? Paladin's Quest Cartridge SNES

[ImMelody]

My husband bought a cartridge of Final Fantasy III (US) on ebay I guess a year ago? When it arrived it had a sticker on the back:

http://img17.imageshack.us/img17/5644/img20120123200547.jpg

We cleaned up the connectors and put it in the SNES. When we put it in, it was indeed Paladin's Quest. So we're pretty confused on what we got here. Any explanation on how this happened? Seen something like this before?

[Schiggidyd]

Is the front label FFIII?

If so, it could be a Paladin's Quest prototype, which was placed in a FFIII cartridge just for protection and testing when it was in the hands of Square.

According to Wikipedia, Paladins Quest was published by Enix. However, also according to wikipedia, Square and Enix didn't merge until 2003. I'm confused.

[theclaw]

There's a slim chance it could have differences from final. Either way this surely would interest the right Square / Enix collectors out there...

[SparTonberry]

Yes, Square Soft was not at all involved in the creation of this game.
Asmik made the original Japanese version, Enix only made the translation, and they released it about a decade before they merged with Square Soft, Inc. :P
(now, a copy stickered "property of Square-Enix" could at least have some plausibility as an archive copy)

[Bojay1997]

Yes, Square Soft was not at all involved in the creation of this game.
Asmik made the original Japanese version, Enix only made the translation, and they released it about a decade before they merged with Square Soft, Inc. :P
(now, a copy stickered "property of Square-Enix" could at least have some plausibility as an archive copy)

I've seen similar items before. It's possible that Asmik simply provided a copy to Square Soft in hopes of having it picked up for publishing in the US or other markets. Not sure why they would place it in a FFIII shell, but it's possible that whoever handled the archives for Square at the time wanted to protect the game board and had a FFIII case handy and took it upon themselves to place the sample board in a case and then applied the sticker to the back.

[theclaw]

Paladin's Quest was released a year before FFIII, not after. There shouldn't have been any cases available.

[Bojay1997]

Paladin's Quest was released a year before FFIII, not after. There shouldn't have been any cases available.

You're assuming it was put in the case at the time it was received. It's very possible that whoever was running Square's corporate archive decided years later to place it in a case. It could have been that someone new came on board who better understood the fragile nature of the exposed board or maybe they moved facilities and they did it then. I doubt this is some kind of forgery as what would be the point?

[ImMelody]

As a big Square/Squaresoft/Squeenix fan, I am more than aware of the fact that this was definitely before the merge, and that FFIII(us) came out after Paladin's Quest. We're more confused on why would it be in an FFIII case. I don't think there's any value in it since someone pretty badly marked up the front of the game.

Thanks for all your thoughts. I also found this thread (http://www.digitpress.com/forum/showthread.php?159199-Property-of-Square-Soft-Inc-Product-Development) which makes me think it's something similar.

Perhaps the front of the case was broken at some point and they just put something else on.. Or maybe some kid did once it got into circulation.. Who knows.