Friday

Nes And Famicom Multicartridgese

Piracy has always been a huge part of the videogame industry. Especially the Famicom was nothing but pirate stuff in most parts of the world, and actually still is. Because in most of the eastern world countrys the Famicom is still going strong with new games being still being released, not by Nintendo though.

Because of low production cost of Famicom/NES clones, children in the less rich countries are able to enjoy the game we all once loved because pirates are able to make the carts much cheaper than Nintendo ever could(would), and we all know graphics aint what makes a game (just look at the N64, kickass graphics but only a handful *good* games).

Most pirate cartridges are so called "Multicartridges" rangeing from 2in1 to 9999999in1. But the secret of multi's are the less numbers-in-1 on the cart the more different games you get, not forgetting the lower price. The high number multi's mostly only carry 6 - 8 different first-generation Famicom games while carts below 150in1 mostly cary 50-60% different games. My favourites are the 4in1 which always carries 4 kickass games, like the bootleg FC Street Fighter 2, Mortal Kombat, Earthworm Jim 2, Aladdin, Somari, Fatal Fury 2 and Star Wars Galaxy of Heroes hack I could go on, all ported from either GB, SNES or GENESIS by the pirates. The 4in1's always carries large games (late-era), but mostly go at low prices.

My advise, if you visit one of these street dealers in one of the eastern countries, take your time looking at the carts (check the game list of the multi twice). No matter how fast the dude wants the deal to go, take your time. These dudes are somehow able to confuse you a lot, if you dont keep it cool, that you'll buy a shitty cartridge for a lot of money. Also remember to go for the carts writing 150in1 or below, this way you wont regret the buy when you get home and pop in the cartridge (mostly).FAMICOM MULTICARTRIDGES2 IN ONE Russian Famicom(Dendy) cartridge with two rather large games. One is an illegal pirate copy of Konami's Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 3: Manhattan Project. The other is not an original Famicom/NES game, it's made up by some pirate company (I guess) and called Somari, a mix of Mario and Sonic, where Mario is running around in Sonic's world. Both games are in english.

A Russian Famicom/Dendy cartridge, from the same assembly line as the one on the left. This cart features two unike games ported by pirates to fit on the Famicom. One is Aladdin, called Aladdin 2, which should be a port from the Megadrive version. The other is LionKing, called Super
LionKing, which should be the same as the SNES version. 

5000 IN ONE.  
A multi created in 1998. It has the typical first-generation games on it, plus a few highlights such as Mortal Kombat 3, Street Fighter 12 People edition and a totally screwed version of Super Mario Bros (you start at in the middle of level 1-2, but scrolling a wrong). Another goodie is Binary Land, eventho its a first-generation game.

Another multi from 1998, bought in Turkey along with the other. This one is a bit trickey as it doesnt say on the front how many games it's supposed to have. It sucks quite a lot, but does have one good game on it, Dr. Mario (without Dr. Mario logo on the titlescreen). The rest is just a bunch of first-gen crap, thought it does feature an unusual game from that time, Tennis, which used to enjoy a lot, actually I still believe its one of the better NES tennis games.


4 IN ONE
A cart which kicks ass, not only because of it's purple color, but also because of it's 4 briliant uncommon multi cart games, which are: Robocop 2, Rescue Rangers (japanese), Final Mission and Silkworm. The cart has no menu, games are selected by pressing the reset button until you reach the game you wish to play, thats not a common thing among NES multi's either (I've only seen it on Genesis multicarts).

4 IN ONE
A very weird cart, as this sticker was used for quite a few different 4in1's, where one had Parodius on it. This one however doesnt have PArodius on it, but 1942, Super Mario Bros, Spartan X and B-Wings, all very common multicart games. The cart is a but unusual though as games are selected by tampering with two small switches on the front of the cartridge. The pastel color cartridge is kinda nest too isnt it? :)

6000 IN ONE
On the front of the cart it claims to be outstanding rare, and it DOES include some very cool games along with the common stuff, such as Mortal Kombat 3, Tecmo World Cup (renamed to International Fifa Soccer '97), Mickey Mousecapade, Karate Kid and Dr. Mario, but a rarity? naah!

3 IN ONE
Another cool cartridge. This one has two ports on it, Street Fighter 2 and Batman & Flash and an official game by Konami, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 3: Manhattan Project. I'm not the owner of this cartridge, so I really have no idea of what Batman & Flash is like.


200 IN ONE
Click here for a scan of the PCB.Click here for a scan of the gamelist.288 IN ONENo info Click here for a scan of the PCB.

300 IN ONE
 First multicart, and Famicom cart I ever got. I bought this for £30 (pounds) which is like
$50. Anyway I had been looking for Street Fighter 2 for the FC for quite some time and this one had SF2 characters on the frong, so I though I had finally made it. But no, the cart only has 6 different bad games on it, although one if the unusual Mario Lottery which aint an official game.