game systems from Africa

[Player-2]

Does anyone have any info concerning the gaming machines that were available in Africa? Especially the NES/famicom. Did they just have access to the famicom, or was there a different NES there? Surely that continent has not been left out of the gaming scene...that just would make no sense.

[hydr0x]

the only thing i know is that a have got a Famiclone from Tunisia, and i think they didn't get the official console, you gotta ask Nintendo and Sega about this ;)

[Querjek]

I highly doubt that Africa has had very many official game releases, if any at all.

[anagrama]

I've heard of Atari clones from South Africa, but not much else.
I'd imagine that certain areas probably had some licensed releases of older consoles, but that Famiclones generally ruled the roost.

Current-gen stuff (at least Xbox & PS2 anyway) is available in South Africa, and no doubt some other countries aswell.

[drummy]

I've heard of Atari clones from South Africa, but not much else.
I'd imagine that certain areas probably had some licensed releases of older consoles, but that Famiclones generally ruled the roost.

Current-gen stuff (at least Xbox & PS2 anyway) is available in South Africa, and no doubt some other countries aswell.
What kind of region code do they use? This is quite interesting.

[hydr0x]

this is getting really interesting

so South Africa has official current gen stuff? i assume they have PAL?? anyone know if there maybe are some unofficial or official games only released over there? anyone know the packaging? i assume it's in English and Dutch, right?

[poloplayr]

I heard Live Aid sent them a big truck filled with Atari Jaguars and Lynxes. Poor sods.

[anagrama]

Not too sure whether everything is just imported there from elsewhere or not, but this site: http://www.xboxsa.co.za/ might be of some use - they claim to be "South Africa's leading XBox authority".

I wouldn't be surprised if some European systems & games were available in some of the Northern African countries aswell.

[christianscott27]

i've asked north africans/mideastern folks i've worked with about this and it seems like computer gaming is pretty much what they got. people talk about playing games on computers at schools and that seems to be it. israel, which is almost north africa has fully developed gaming scene but i'd hazard that gaming doesnt go over big in african muslim countries.

[hydr0x]

ok, i searched a little bit for interesting sites from that region, here they are

http://www.subterrania.org/default.htm

http://www.4gamers.co.za/index.php

http://www.take2.co.za/index.php?type=2

http://www.entertainmentafrica.com/site/handler.php?action=games&sub=home

[WanganRunner]

I can't imagine that S. Africa DOESN'T have access to current-gen stuff. Ever been to Victoria in Cape Town? it feels like Bermuda, only with less pink. If they've got a BMW dealership with a Z8 out front and an IMAX, the I'm sure they have a store that sells PS2s.

[SoulBlazer]

Basicaly what everyone else has said. South Africa is the only country there that has any kind of a gaming scene because it's one of the richest and most developed nations and people can afford money on luxieres such as this.

I know there is some in northern Africa as well -- Egypt, Tunisia, Algeria -- and small pockets in some of the larger cities, but it's not as developed.

As for format? I DO believe South Africa is PAL.

[Raccoon Lad]

I work with a guy from South Africa, he said that he played Atari 2600, and after that, gaming consoles seemed to disappear untill the Playstation arrived.

[rbudrick]

I've heard of stories from Egypt, but not much else. 've heard you can find some strange pirate stuff in Arabic countires...

-Rob

[Lord Contaminous]

This stuff about gaming in Africa has really caught my attention, considering I'm Afro-American, and one of my sisters (who used to work for the BBC as a free lance journalist) had one hell of a ordeal in Sierra Leone over a few years ago, but she loves that continent.

I wonder if they got a good fighting game scene there. I'm always interested in Street Fighter, Tekken, VF, KoF, or Guilty Gear in other places than Japan and America.

[WanganRunner]

If anyone has/can get pics of pirate hardware or software unique to the Arabic countries, I'd love to see it, or from the African countries, for that matter.

99% of what I've seen is Asian make, and then the other 1% is South American (not counting the most recent wave of US-released pirate gear).

If there's some Famiclone cart out there that's like an Islamic Bible Adventures (Quran Adventures....I guess??), I WANT it. No one seems to know anything about gaming in these areas, but it's not like there's no money there, I mean especially in the Middle East. I refuse to believe that in all of rich-a$$ Brunei or Saudi Arabia, there isn't one place that makes videogames.

[grayejectbutton]

Yeah, I am also pretty certain (about 90% sure) than South Africa uses PAL.

[Player-2]

This topic has gotten more interesting....but I am mostly curious about the NES/famicom days in Africa. Anyone know if Africa had 72-pin NES carts available (official or pirate). And I was surprised to hear Atari made it there...very cool!!

[mizarkgram]

I remember when I went ot Egypt a few years back (wait a minute... that was 4 years ago... damn how time flies) and our hotel room we stayed in with the tour group had for rent what was called a "Gaming System" and that was it.... no mention what kind or what games.... it was outrageuously priced (Something like 75 Egyptian Pounds) and I really wasnt that into video gaming at the time, or I woulda dropped the cash and at least looked at it....

[hydr0x]

I refuse to believe that in all of rich-a$$ Brunei or Saudi Arabia, there isn't one place that makes videogames.

the only thing i know that Saudi-Arabia did forbid the Pokemon games in 2002, so there must be some gaming culture over there, Qatar and the Emirates should have plenty of video game imports...

i'll try to check my famiclone and see where it really comes from and if it's from Africa i'll take pics...

[WanganRunner]

Does anyone know if anyone on these boards is from there?

I know on my Nissan board we've got a couple of Skyline GT-R owners from the UAE, I should ask them too. If I find out anything, I'll post about it.

[RangerG]

African/Middle East gaming is an interesting topic. I was in Lebanon last Christmas and they had X-Box, PS2, and Gameboy Advance for sale in major cities for about twice the price of what it would be in the U.S. and Europe. However, in a few local stores they had knock-off Gameboys and multi-carts and copied games for sale which I suspect is what most people could afford. Surprisingly, the N-gage was advertised everywhere and something the young wanted because cell-phones and text-messaging is huge. A friend of my wife's told me that she had an Atari 2600 as a kid. An interesting sidenote is that the Atari and games were SECAM and many of the countries in Africa (those that were French colonies) would also be SECAM.