Have these prototypes been found yet?

[Speedy_NES]

Hi there,

I was checking through some old gaming magazines, and came across a few articles that mentioned two NES prototype devices (both to be published by Camerica) - a Gameboy to NES adapter & a handheld NES called "The Express." Apparently they had fully functional prototypes before they were discontinued (developed by Biederman Design Labs). My question is, has anyone ever found one of these prototypes? And if not, does anybody have more information on these devices? I have scanned the three articles for those interested in reading them and checking out the pics:

EGM 17: Dec 1990
http://users.skynet.be/am035782/EGM%2017%20-%20Dec%201990%20-%20Article%20on%20Gameboy%20to%20NES%20converter.j pg
EGM 23: June 1991
http://users.skynet.be/am035782/EGM%2022%20-%20June%201991%20-%20Article%20on%20Gameboy%20to%20NES%20converter%2 0and%20The%20Express%20-%20handheld%20NES.jpg
GamePro October 1990
http://users.skynet.be/am035782/GamePro%20October%201990%20-%20Article%20about%20BDL%20Nintendo%20Handheld.jpg

-Speedy

[slapdash]

I've never heard anything about them being found, but IIRC Nintendo might have actually taken legal action to prevent them from coming out. As such, it's possible that they were ordered destroyed, or were given to Nintendo.

[Famidrive-16]

I saw a site about bootleg games that had something similar to that NES handheld that played NES games. It was probably a shoddy knock-off though.

[leonk]

The first article seems very interesting. But that picture seems to be a fake mockup. I strongly doubt a working prototype was ever made.

300-500$ for the unit? WOW. Sounds like a hacked gamboy inside an NES cart (can't imagine it done any other way since the NES CPU is just to weak to emulate the gameboy). Think of it this way, the dragonball CPU inside a palm pilot had to be overclocked to 16mhz to be able to somewhat emulate a gameboy!

And that's 12 years after this device was "made".

Nice to dream anyways.

[Speedy_NES]

I've never heard anything about them being found, but IIRC Nintendo might have actually taken legal action to prevent them from coming out. As such, it's possible that they were ordered destroyed, or were given to Nintendo.

That would be a shame ;) Thanks for the input.


The first article seems very interesting. But that picture seems to be a fake mockup. I strongly doubt a working prototype was ever made.

300-500$ for the unit? WOW. Sounds like a hacked gamboy inside an NES cart (can't imagine it done any other way since the NES CPU is just to weak to emulate the gameboy). Think of it this way, the dragonball CPU inside a palm pilot had to be overclocked to 16mhz to be able to somewhat emulate a gameboy!

And that's 12 years after this device was "made".

Nice to dream anyways.

The 300-500 $ unit that they are speaking of is not the Gameboy to NES adapter in the picture...they are speaking of the WideBoy, which was released to magazines and other media companies that required GameBoy games to be playable on a TV so that they could take screenshots. The WideBoy is a Gameboy to Famicom adaptor, and a very bulky one at that. If you search on google, I'm sure you will be able to find some pics of the device.

As for the Gameboy-to-NES adapter from Biederman Design Labs, it states in the second article that "the quality of the work, even in the prototypes, was extraordinarily good."

Also, in the first article, it states "instead of using a WideBoy-type unit, which is loaded with more circuitry than your Nintendo, the BDL GameBoy to Nintendo convertor takes the Z-80 code from the GameBoy carts and then, using a special cart that serves not only as the delivery system but also the translator of the information, changes it into the native 6502 language the Nintendo can instantly recognize." I don't think that they simply fitted a GameBoy inside a NES cartridge, to emulate it. But I don't know enough about this kind of stuff to make any strong arguments, so I'll leave it at that.

Thanks for everyone's input so far :)

-Speedy

[NESaholic]

Wow never heard of this either,looks mega cool though.
Very interesting stuff to read, but i guess it's sort of a haux!?

[slapdash]

Very interesting stuff to read, but i guess it's sort of a haux!?

It seemed pretty real at the time. I'm pretty sure BDL got covered by enough sources (EGM and GamePro, possibly VG&CE too?) to make it seem legit to me anyway. I mean, if I remember correctly, some BDL technology was used by Camerica (?) and Nintendo sued to block it; if the big N steps in, there's a little legitimacy added to it. :-)

[NESaholic]

Yeah when big brother \"N\" is mad they totally go for it.It would be great to just see a cart like this.

[MASTERWEEDO]

I REMEMBER MY AUNT HAD SOMETHING THAT SHE PLAYED GAMEBOY GAMES ON THE TV, BUT THE COLOR WAS USALLY FUCKED UP. I CANT REMEMBER IF IT WAS NES OR SNES

[nesman85]

must have been snes - super gameboy