Noah's Ark 3D being re-released

[Gamereviewgod]

http://www.examiner.com/article/wisdom-tree-s-super-3d-noah-s-ark-to-be-re-released-on-snes

Can't say I would have seen this coming...

[Satoshi_Matrix]

Looks like a repro cart.

Insane collectors might be interested, but why would anyone else give this even a second glance? This is essentially a Christian themed romhack of the already censored SNES version of Wolfenstien 3D, which even if it wasn't censored, isn't a particularly good version of Wolf3D, which while historic, itself isn't a particularly good FPS.

$65 fro this seems absurd unless you're a maniac who absolutely must own every game regardless of quality.

[o.pwuaioc]

Looks like a repro cart.

Insane collectors might be interested, but why would anyone else give this even a second glance? This is essentially a Christian themed romhack of the already censored SNES version of Wolfenstien 3D, which even if it wasn't censored, isn't a particularly good version of Wolf3D, which while historic, itself isn't a particularly good FPS.

$65 fro this seems absurd unless you're a maniac who absolutely must own every game regardless of quality.

*cough*Action52*cough*

[InsaneDavid]

I love these poorly written columns on examiner.com. Comparing Color Dreams to Tengen, really? Tengen (Atari Coin) was sued by Nintendo because they, um, actually broke the law by lying to the US Patent Office to obtain the details on the 10NES chip, which they used to create their Rabbit clone chip. Yeah, there were other lawsuits but that's the one where Tengen flat out engaged in illegal activities.

[Satoshi_Matrix]

*cough*Action52*cough*

Well true, I do own a copy of Action 52, but only because I stumbled upon it, not sought it out, and also because well, Action 52 is the king of absurd games. Once you have Action 52...everything else is child's play. It's just like the power glove when it comes to absurd accessories.

[Tanooki]

This is not a repro cart at all. It's a legitimate release. Piko who has an account here got a deal together with the head of Wisdom Tree to officially re-release the game. They're new cart shells, new labels, new boxes, new manuals, trays, and most importantly new boards on the inside of the cart.

Piko is the only one out there using all brand new parts in all the stuff they do, and it's all licensed products for various old school systems. They got NES and SNES stuff in the pipeline right now, and there's other stuff coming for other systems in the future as well. He's been going around and picking up licenses off unlicensed games like Noah, licensed but unreleased stuff, and homebrews. It's a legit business, it's not like all the others who just shovel out warezy bootlegs lying and calling them 'reproductions' like it makes it legit.

[Pikointeractive]

Looks like a repro cart.

Insane collectors might be interested, but why would anyone else give this even a second glance? This is essentially a Christian themed romhack of the already censored SNES version of Wolfenstien 3D, which even if it wasn't censored, isn't a particularly good version of Wolf3D, which while historic, itself isn't a particularly good FPS.

$65 fro this seems absurd unless you're a maniac who absolutely must own every game regardless of quality.

I wonder how a game would not look like a repro if it is released these days?

[Satoshi_Matrix]

This is not a repro cart at all. It's a legitimate release. Piko who has an account here got a deal together with the head of Wisdom Tree to officially re-release the game. They're new cart shells, new labels, new boxes, new manuals, trays, and most importantly new boards on the inside of the cart.

Piko is the only one out there using all brand new parts in all the stuff they do, and it's all licensed products for various old school systems. They got NES and SNES stuff in the pipeline right now, and there's other stuff coming for other systems in the future as well. He's been going around and picking up licenses off unlicensed games like Noah, licensed but unreleased stuff, and homebrews. It's a legit business, it's not like all the others who just shovel out warezy bootlegs lying and calling them 'reproductions' like it makes it legit.

How in the hell does Wisdom Tree have the capital to do all of that, from scratch, in 2014? That sounds like an extremely costly endeavour.

[Bojay1997]

This is not a repro cart at all. It's a legitimate release. Piko who has an account here got a deal together with the head of Wisdom Tree to officially re-release the game. They're new cart shells, new labels, new boxes, new manuals, trays, and most importantly new boards on the inside of the cart.

Piko is the only one out there using all brand new parts in all the stuff they do, and it's all licensed products for various old school systems. They got NES and SNES stuff in the pipeline right now, and there's other stuff coming for other systems in the future as well. He's been going around and picking up licenses off unlicensed games like Noah, licensed but unreleased stuff, and homebrews. It's a legit business, it's not like all the others who just shovel out warezy bootlegs lying and calling them 'reproductions' like it makes it legit.

Sounds like a repro to me. It's licensed, but so are many repros. "Repro" is just short for reproduction which is exactly what this is unless there has been some kind of modification of the game to make it different than the original release. I agree with the comments above that I can't figure out what the market is for this. Collectors will want the original solely for collection completeness and it's not exactly the kind of game people are going to seek out a reproduction to play, especially at $65.

[Melf]

If it's licensed, then it's essentially another print run, not a repro.

[Gameguy]

How in the hell does Wisdom Tree have the capital to do all of that, from scratch, in 2014? That sounds like an extremely costly endeavour.
Is it actually more costly to do this now for SNES games than back when the SNES was still current? It's not like they had to write the game again, they already had the code. They just had to find a company to produce the carts and packaging, the same way Watermelon did with Pier Solar for the Genesis. With loose copies of the game selling for well over $100 it makes sense that they'd produce more copies, all they have are the old games that they've still been selling from their website as software PC releases.

It's neat to know that this new game doesn't require a piggy backed licensed game plugged into it, like the original release needed. Still I don't know if collectors will really seek out this version, nobody needs it for a complete set as it's just a new printing of an existing release.

It doesn't really sound like a reproduction if it's using all new parts. Usually with repro games someone will take another game and solder new chips(that can erase over time) to the old board and reuse the case, if this is using all new parts it's a bit better than a repro, hopefully using actual ROM chips. I'm not planning to buy this though.

[wiggyx]

^^^ At least a few repro makers are using new components now and not just donor shells and boards. I think repro has essentially become the blanket term for "not original release". Even the games which use new parts are doing so with shells that are reproductions of original parts that aren't licensed or anything like that, and new boards who's only purpose is to reproduce the function of an original board, despite employing largely different components than the originals. Very much like automotive restoration really. There are companies which produce brand new parts for classic cars, but even though they're new parts, they are simply reproducing something which is no longer in production by the original manufacturer.


How in the hell does Wisdom Tree have the capital to do all of that, from scratch, in 2014? That sounds like an extremely costly endeavour.

I think pretty much all of the stuff required can be easily sourced. Having boxes, manuals, and labels printed can be done with almost zero effort, new cart shells are available from various Chinese sources, and many repro makers are using new boards for a number of their games. All the components are already out there, and as such, there wouldn't need to be a ton of investment capital in order to get something like this up-and-running since nothing needs to be engineered/designed/manufactured from scratch.




If it's licensed, then it's essentially another print run, not a repro.

Licensing doesn't mean that this isn't a reproduction. In fact, the word itself is more applicable here than in most cases of what we call reproduction games. Many "reproduction" games are either heavily modified versions of existing games, translations of games that were never offered in a particular region, or simply games which were never released at all. Calling those reproductions is something of a misnomer, seeing as they never had a production run in the first place.

Now if it were nearly identical to the original and produced in the same way, with the same materials, using the original design (with a unique cartridge shell and the need for a licensed cart to be attached), then this would be something closer to a 2nd run. As it stands, it's not.

[Tanooki]

People want to throw around repro to cover up stuff being warez. As fr as costs go if piko who responded in here wants to say its his choice so ask him. wiggyx covered the rest there quite nicely.

[Gameguy]

Now if it were nearly identical to the original and produced in the same way, with the same materials, using the original design (with a unique cartridge shell and the need for a licensed cart to be attached), then this would be something closer to a 2nd run. As it stands, it's not.
It's the same as a re-release on the PS1 coming out in a slim case as a Greatest Hits version when it was previously released in a long box version. There's less debate on re-release versions when legit Nintendo games come with multiple versions of boards, or altered code with various revisions.

It feels more similar to a Player's Choice or Greatest Hits variant than a pure second run, usually additional runs for most retail games are identical to the original run. Then again, with Beggar Prince each print run had either different box art or bug fixes so these print runs weren't identical either.



As for the term "reproduction", it generally means bootleg. Someone reproducing a game onto a cartridge for someone that they did not write themselves, and without permission from the game creator, or license holder, or fan translator, or any permission at all from anyone involved with the game code in any way.

Homebrew is basically someone making games in their basement, or with a small team of hobbyists. The final game is their own code either released onto cartridges that are custom made from scratch(usually outsourced to a manufacturer), or the same way as reproduction cartridges are made using already existing cartridges(individually by hand). Either way it's homebrew.

Then there's the unlicensed games. Similar to homebrew games but made more professional, made by an actual company with the games being coded by them and manufactured from new materials, nothing is recycled from existing cartridges. These are made and sold for profit like with any business, not as a hobby for fun. These games aren't made with the hopes of just breaking even with production costs or making a small bonus, it's meant to profit big as a main source of income.

That's how I see them anyway.

[CastlevaniaDude]

For some reason, people see a site called "The Examiner" and automatically assume it's credible.

"The Examiner" is about as credible as Bleacher Report is for sports, in that it's not. It's just an SEO revenue machine that brings in aspiring writers (usually talentless or untrained) under the auspices of writing for a "major news site," but really, they're just being exploited because the quality of content doesn't matter.