How can you tell if a GBA game is bootleg?

[Xantan the Foul]

My friend always says Ebay has too many bootleg GBA games, but how can you tell if one is bootleg? Is there a chance even if it's a sealed copy?

Thanks ^_^

[Cryomancer]

I once bought a copt of pokemon sapphire from ebay, and it ended up being in a plain grey cart instead of a blue one...my best guesses are canadian or pirate. I'd say that cart variants would be a good way to find pirates, they probably wouldn't have logos or serials either.

[ddockery]

Well, apparently if it boots up then says "Fuck off and die," then it's a bootleg! Actually this is a good question. Any dead give aways on the casing? I'd say most sealed games should be fine, but it's always possible to print boxes or reseal a pirate cart.

[mikeetler]

Unfortunately it is very difficult to tell on eBay since most bootleg carts are not shown in the auction, just stock photos from Muze or ripped from other sites. If you eliminate all GBA auctions shipping from Hong Kong and all auctions that claim "NEW" but then mention that it's cart only or cart and manual only, you'll narrow down the bootlegs a bit. There are also a number of sellers that list their games in UK pounds on eBay US that are selling boots, but their easy to spot since they tend to have all the latest games for 5-8 pounds, which is about half of retail.

That still doesn't help with the poor guy selling a handful of games that he picked up at the flea market for cheap, but it helps.

From what I've seen reseaching GBA, some 40% of "new" GBA games on eBay are bootleg, so it is a major problem.

-Mike

[Xantan the Foul]

Thanks for the quick response! :D

Now I have a good idea what to watch for.

[hezeuschrist]

I was told some time ago that when looking for a GBA pirate, there will be a stamped number on the label itself, not printed. If the stamped two-digit number is there, it's legit. If it's not then it's pirated.

I have no proof to back this up, but all of my GBA carts have it.

[Mayhem]

Obvious signs:

People selling in Hong Kong
No picture in auctions
Cart label not having serial number on it (the unique Nintendo product number)
Being sold as new but not necessarily complete in box
Very cheap opening prices

I'd say more than half all GBA games on eBay are pirate so caveat emptor...

[robotriot]

I read that they're original if you can read "(c) 200x Nintendo SERIAL" on the PCB, just below the pins. Tilt the cart under good light and you should be able to see it. If it's not there, it's a pirate.

[carnage6]

Even auctions that say it has the box aren't safe. I ordered 2 GBA Dragonball games off Ebay that said they had box & cart. When I got them they were bootlegs and the boxes were too. One was a direct copy of the Japanese game box and the other was an obvious fake with just pictures from the TV show on the box and no screenshots. That being said, I didn't pay much for them and I think bootlegs are kinda cool so I wasn't really disappointed.

[Sesshoumaru]

You can easily tell if it's a bootleg if the back of the cartridge says made in Japam :P

[MegaDrive20XX]

Obvious Sign:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v129/Akumajo22/Imnotaboot.jpg

[Lemmy Kilmister]

You can easily tell if it's a bootleg if the back of the cartridge says made in Japam :P

I'd say so. I mean who has ever heard of this Japam place? LOL

[Cauterize]

You can easily tell if it's a bootleg if the back of the cartridge says made in Japam :P

I'd say so. I mean who has ever heard of this Japam place? LOL

Yeah ive been there ;)

Another Obvious bootleg i have is called: Super Color Advance!

LOL

[Gemini-Phoenix]

eBay is full of bootleg GBA games! Believe me!

Seriously, I would strongly reccommend only buying GBA games if they have the original cellophane with the red tear strip on them (Unless you are American that is)

One obvious way to tell if it's bootleg is if the game is being shipped from Hong Kong. And especially if they tell you it will be shipped "Flat packed"!

Bootleg GBA games is big business over there, and you'll probably find half the sellers who sell mass GBA games are bootleggers. I have my suspicions on which sellers on there are selling bootlegs, and avoid them. I also regularly send them nasty emails saying things like "How fake is this game?"

Some of them are clear fakes! Take Kirby: Amazing Mirror for instance. There are a number of them on eBay which have the American rating logo on them, but will have European languages displayed on the top... Very suspicious!

[DDCecil]

... Or if it says Nintondo, NinLendo, or various crappy misspellings on the back. I'm pretty sure the 2 digit number and the (C) Nintendo below the pins are sure fire ways of telling if the cart is real or not.

ap.nintendo.com has some pics of pirates.

[Daria]

We accidently bought a Bubble Bobble Old and New off ebay and the first thing I noticed about it was it's cartidge was darker then any other GBA game we own. Also the logo wasn't quite right. Like it was a slightly different font then the real GBA logo and a shallower impression.

Also the cart didn't fit in our GBA, I litterely had to sand the fucker down just to play it. :P

[ddockery]

This reminds me of something I've meant to ask for a while... does anyone else have the GBA Space Invaders? When you save a game then power down, does it retain the save???

[TheRedEye]

Turn it on, see if it says "fuck off and die" anywhere.

[Ed Oscuro]

Well, apparently if it boots up then says "Fuck off and die," then it's a bootleg!
Unless there's ever a Green Day or George Carlin game released, yeah, that looks like a surefire guide LOL

Pretty much the guide should be...look for misspellings, wierdness in the molding of the plastic (though this was common on pirate FDS disks...probably not so much anymore), stuff ingame that shouldn't be there and so on.

[Querjek]

If you look at the back of the cart, where it would normally say "Nintendo", and it has ANY sort of misspelling, then it's obviously fake. I have a Mr. Driller Ace pirate that says "Nlntondo" on it, but it was hard to distinguish because of the font used.

[Cryomancer]

I'm thinking my second sapphire is pirat enow, the labelart is the same image as an original, but not shiny, it's in a grey casing, not blue, no digit stamp. However, nintendo is spelled right, there's a serial, pokemon company and nintendo logos, seal, security screw on the back....although the little sticker with a circled A, "Chen", and some numbers is obviously fishy.

Seems to work alright last time I checked it though.

[Bratwurst]

Something to be aware of is that Nintendo started publishing GBA carts with glossy labels around October of 2003 (maybe earlier?). Earlier games like Sonic Advance, Metroid Fusion etc. have a matte semi-gloss label much like the style of paper + coating they used for original gameboy/gameboy color carts.

At this point the only real indentifiers are the indented numbers and color of the plastic shell, and even then that's only when you can hold them in your hand to inspect up close. Makes it a pain to buy online for sure.

[DJ_DEEM]

not to threadjack but i bought a copy of kuru kuru kurin off ebay and it's fully translated and everything seems to be legit, but since then i haven't really been able to track down another european one in english, is this actually an official release? is there a legit english copy of this game?

[Querjek]

not to threadjack but i bought a copy of kuru kuru kurin off ebay and it's fully translated and everything seems to be legit, but since then i haven't really been able to track down another european one in english, is this actually an official release? is there a legit english copy of this game?
Well, the European release of this game had English as a language...

[Funk Buddy]

The screws should be the security "Y" type. I have bought tons of cheap GBA on eBay and they all seem legit, but at some point I'll have to open them up to be sure.

[Mr.FoodMonster]

'Nintondo' on the back. I have 2 of them to proove it :angry:

[Promophile]

Wow thanks for the heads up! I had no idea it was such a problem.

[zektor]

Sorry to bring up an old post, but you cannot just go by whether or not the cart has those imprinted numbers. I have some carts that were new, store bought and do not have those numbers. Bubble Bobble Old and New does not have them, and I bought that at TRU.

[Falcon]

This is the first that I've heard of this...

I know that if I were the buyer who received a GameBoy Advance bootleg in the mail, I would be really pissed off, so to avoid this do all of the obvious stuff and check feedback, and always remember to email the seller. I can guarantee you that the faster and well typed he responds to you, the better of a seller he is. Thats the way it usually is with me.

[calthaer]

I agree with the Hong Kong thing 100%. They're nothing but thieves trying to kill capitalism.

I got an Advance Wars cart from HK along with a Yoshi's Island. The Advance Wars cart would NOT save your game. The sticker was also blue (the real cart has a tan sticker).

Your manuals will almost always look like bad scans printed on a laser printer. The boxes will not even be assembled (i.e., the "flat packed" thing).

Best thing to do is report it to Nintendo (and ask them to re-release the games at the same time!), then to look around here or in your local game store.

[Simply Dave]

Sorry to bring up an old post, but you cannot just go by whether or not the cart has those imprinted numbers. I have some carts that were new, store bought and do not have those numbers. Bubble Bobble Old and New does not have them, and I bought that at TRU.

Damn, the imprinted numbers on the label is what I used to tell the fake versions from the real versions. Now you've thrown me for a loop.

Any other suggestions out there?

[PhoeniX]

... Or if it says Nintondo, NinLendo, or various crappy misspellings on the back. I'm pretty sure the 2 digit number and the (C) Nintendo below the pins are sure fire ways of telling if the cart is real or not.

ap.nintendo.com has some pics of pirates.

In China many of the bootlegs I came across also said "Nintondo" on the back. In addition when you put them in the cartridge slot, especially in the DS they are a little thicker. The color is also often a little off, they look (new) kinda like how a really beat up Game gear or SMS game and feel more grainy in texture. The edges are also slightly more rounded than real games.

[Jumpman Jr.]

Check the art on the boxes as well.
I remember somebody posting an auction in the Insanity forum about a box that had its front logo printed from the TV.
How could you tell?
It said "Press Start" on the box X_x
LOL

[mezrabad]

I've got two Metroid Fusion carts that I bought in S Korea. I think both of them are bootlegs, mostly because both save batteries died really quickly. The boxes on them seem "not quite right" and I would've thought that I'd've found the Japanese versions of the game before I found the US versions, but these were in english (more Koreans can read english than can read Japanese). I'll have to crack these open and see if they are legit based on the tips here. Thanks for those tips by the way.

[DDCecil]

Sorry to bump an older topic, but this was just too funny.
If your box looks like this, well, it is definately a pirate:

http://img197.echo.cx/img197/8/bootleg8dw.jpg

[Immutable]

I purposefully bought a bootleg of Scrabble (Ubisoft version) from the UK. The booklet was nothing more than a "folded piece of paper". It resembled a cover without the interior pages. I wasn't really expecting much from the booklet anyways, but that's a dead giveaway too.

I'm satisfied with the game though. :)

[PentiumMMX]

I read that they're original if you can read "(c) 200x Nintendo SERIAL" on the PCB, just below the pins. Tilt the cart under good light and you should be able to see it. If it's not there, it's a pirate.

Not excatly! I bought a New copy
of "Mega Man Battle Network 3 Blue Version"
from Gamestop, and I looked at the pins and did not see this!

Anyway, it's time for "How to tell if it's a pirated Game Boy game for Dummies":

- If the Box says "Offital Stratagy Guide", "Press Start", on
anything that should not be there, it's a pirate.
- If the label looks blury or pixely, it's a pirate.
- If the Nintendo logo and "Made in Japan" text looks wired
on the back, or says "Nintondo" or "Made in Japam", It's a
pirate.
- If the side of the box says "Game Advance" or "Game
Color", It's a pirate
- If your copy of "Doom" has Barney on the box, it's a
pirate.
- If you find porn in a "Dora the Explorer" game, then it's a
pirate.

That's all I have to say.

[Xantan the Foul]

I read that they're original if you can read "(c) 200x Nintendo SERIAL" on the PCB, just below the pins. Tilt the cart under good light and you should be able to see it. If it's not there, it's a pirate.

Not excatly! I bought a New copy
of "Mega Man Battle Network 3 Blue Version"
from Gamestop, and I looked at the pins and did not see this!

Anyway, it's time for "How to tell if it's a pirated Game Boy game for Dummies":

- If the Box says "Offital Stratagy Guide", "Press Start", on
anything that should not be there, it's a pirate.
- If the label looks blury or pixely, it's a pirate.
- If the Nintendo logo and "Made in Japan" text looks wired
on the back, or says "Nintondo" or "Made in Japam", It's a
pirate.
- If the side of the box says "Game Advance" or "Game
Color", It's a pirate
- If your copy of "Doom" has Barney on the box, it's a
pirate.
- If you find porn in a "Dora the Explorer" game, then it's a
pirate.

That's all I have to say.


And here I was hoping that my Dora the Sexplorer was legitimate. LOL

[Emily]

Yeah, I bought a copy of Street Fighter 2 Turbo Revival off ebay and Im still questioning its authenticity. Nothing screwed up about the game itself, but the box was flat and not unfolded and put togather. Plus I the manual...well it seems normal enough...but something isnt right. I think the colors on the book are too dark by a couple shades or so.

Without the box, at least you cant tell its a bootleg!

[calthaer]

Interestingly enough, Nintendo has a nice thread on this on their own boards:

http://forums.nintendo.com/nintendo/board/message?board.id=Bulletin&message.id=421

I'm not certain if they require registration to view the thread or not...I think not.

They have several pics of legitimate and illegitimate carts, compare them side-by-side, and show several dissected carts - that is, ones where they took 'em apart and showed the differences on the inside. Very informative.

There are also several threads on those pirate N64-looking famiclones that they were selling in malls across the U.S.