Snes Proto Pics!! Mario Allstars and Earthbound!!

[Predatorxs]

I was mean't to post these pics awhile back sorry for not getting them up alittle quicker..

A few people asked me about them, so here they are..

The first few are Earthbound! Also the EarthBound Board is very very close to the Retail version, but all the chips are Numbered differently to the retail version (this proto is the final Ntsc version before general release) also there is some manual soldering on the back of the board, i'v marked this with 2 white hoops!!

http://mysite.freeserve.com/browncow/eb1.jpg?0.2576109726017778http://mysite.freeserve.com/browncow/eb2.jpg?0.04382134215781475


http://mysite.freeserve.com/browncow/eb3.jpg?0.31954426121018836http://mysite.freeserve.com/browncow/eb4.jpg?0.7730164202437021


http://mysite.freeserve.com/browncow/eb5.jpg?0.4646748106065424


Here's the Allstars Pics, also a few people have asked if i'd sell them but i'm a Huuuge snes collector and i don't have any interest in selling them.. :P

http://mysite.freeserve.com/browncow/sma1.jpg?0.654822909890111http://mysite.freeserve.com/browncow/sma2.jpg?0.9250923511841467


http://mysite.freeserve.com/browncow/sma3.jpg?0.12459241467340598http://mysite.freeserve.com/browncow/sma4.jpg?0.6051036089764181


http://mysite.freeserve.com/browncow/sma5.jpg?0.2927170580037364

Anyway hope you like the pics even thou there's not alot to them :roll:

Also rbudrick thanks for leaving me a message awhile back and sorry i didn't reply i only saw it recently sorry! :-D

[ragtime_tgs]

cool stuff.
i guess i'll have to get a new digicam,the pics of my targa proto look shitty ~_~
i generally dont like these pre-production samples,they are so easily fakeable....
but the allstars proto....us version AND nintendo 1st party,that has to be one of
the more difficult ones to get congrats.
hope you dont get any trouble

[TheRedEye]

These came from Europe, didn't they?

[Predatorxs]

Yeah (they where found in europe), although i think they are made in japan! then sent to various magazines "previews/promos" / nintendo europe as preview carts etc / if you look at the front of both carts there is small amounts of jap text..

I can only imagine there are many of these floating around with / collectors / ex-employes of snes magazines / also when alot of snes mags closed in the UK they probably thru most of these carts away!! DoHH!! :(

They are a nice addition to any snes / nintendo collection (like mine ;) ), since i got these 2, i'm gonna really start a search for more!! :D

[Buyatari]

The Mario All Stars is that PAL or NTSC ?

Adam

[Predatorxs]

Hey Adam it's Ntsc (Final version) :roll:

[Buyatari]

Now are these ROMs or these EPROMs and if they are ROMs do you Nintendo collectors consider these to be prototypes or demos?

Adam

[TheRedEye]

Mario All-Stars has EPROMs.

I've gone through about three first party NES protos just like these, they're legit. I think that Nintendo's not as strict in Europe as they are in America, where magazines literally reviewed games as a Nintendo employee was handcuffed to the unit. I'm pretty sure they just burn final NTSC versions and ship them to Europe.

[ragtime_tgs]

from what i know( a friend of mine works at NOE)
they put most of the protocarts together themselves.
he said they still have some barebone protocarts(even sa-1 and super fx XD)
but according to him,there is absolutely no way of getting that stuff ~_~

[Predatorxs]

Mario Allstars i'd say it's a proto, mainly becoz it's board and eproms are nothing like the retail Mario Allstar US cart..

Plus i haven't played the games right thru (all the games mario 1,2,3 etc so there could be bugs, maybe only a few levels!?! not sure i'll have a play later today..)

I'd call it a proto / demo but to general Video games mags and Nintendo staff it would probably be viewed as simple a preview cart...

It's also quiet heavy..

And with the EB Cart i'd have to same the same it's a proto, the board looks nearly the exact same (as the retail version) but all the chips are numbered differently.

So this was probably a preview / demo that was used very close to the launch of EB in the states, with the different chip numbers, it might not be the whole game.

But as i keep refering to the cart labels they both say NTSC Final Version!!

So maybe there are bugs etc, who knows (until i have along play with them :P )

Hope that helps!!

[ragtime_tgs]

although there is no strict definition for the terms prototype and sample and the likes,
i'd say a prototype represents a game at the time it was still in development and therefor is incomplete/has bugs/lacks features compared to a retail game.
a sample is either identical to the equivalent retail game datawise,or represents
the somewhat finished game,perhaps missing the last betatesting.
the difference is that the prototype is meant for in-house evaluation/testing only and the sample is a preview copy that gets shipped when the game is nearly done, for magazines etc...
by this definition,your games are both preview samples.
ecspecially the earthbound cart.
before you hand over a file to the company that produces the maskroms for you,you want to check more than once that the gamedata is flawless and ready to be used in a retail game,because the manufacturing process of the master mask that is used to make the maskroms is very expensive.
i expect your earthbound to be the same as the retail game version 1.0,byte for byte.

[TheRedEye]

I've dumped three "final NTSC" version carts, all of them were byte for byte identical to their released counterparts.

[Nespit]

They r the real deal.

Pal review cartridges don't have to be with just eproms. I got a bunch of them myself from an employee of a big review magazine that took every proto cart home they got back then.

[psxknow]

about maybe 5 months ago i saw a bunch of these carts on ebay.de .. they were all the lightgun games including yoshi safari or some crap.. as they had this suspicious label with chinese (i think its not japanese) on it i thought they were pirates.. however all of them ended around 30-50 euro..