Unofficial Reproductions

[The Riddler]

Not sure how many of you have heard of these,  but it's only a recent discovery for me. There are websites out there that make legitimate cartridge games for NES, SNES, and Genesis translated from their original Japanese Releases. They also do games that were unreleased, prototypes, homebrews, hacks, etc, but all on actual cartridges that you can play on your original consoles.

To me, this is intercourse ing awesome. I've found three good sites, one cheaper than the other but you need to provide a "donor cartridge", one where it's more expensive and the games look legit, and another where it's a little more customized to their tastes (transparent cartridges and stuff like that.) The second I mentioned has some particularly great reviews, and I emailed them with some questions.

The best part about this to me is: Games like Final Fantasy II, Final Fantasy III, Mother, and Sweet Home all have had fans translate them to English. These people take these translations and put it onto a working cart.

The site I emailed was http://www.thenesdump.com/ , and they told me that they can do Final Fantasy III for 55 bucks and Final Fantasy II for 30 bucks. I can't decide if it's worth it or not, but it's intercourse ing awesome that this is doable. I'd love to own a physical copy of this game rather than just play it on a rom.

other sites include
nesreproductions.com - cheap, but you need to send a "donor cart"
retrousb.com - transparent carts for most games and less selection

Would you ever spend money on something like this?

[zephilicious]

for that cost you could buy everything you need to hook up your pc to an old crt, connect real nes/snes controllers via usb, and have exactly the same experience minus the act of inserting the cartridge.

and none of the money is going to the developers/publishers so its no more legal or moral than emulation, and they're not originals so they're worthless from a collector's standpoint.

so what the intercourse  is the point

[Tupin]

First off, do not waste a single cent on the Japanese Final Fantasy II. Square had to package it into future runs of Final Fantasy as an extra just to get people to play it.

I suppose this all could be done with emulation, but then so could anything. Playing it on the original hardware is always the best option.

Both of the sites you mentioned are very reputable, and retrousb is good if you want modern homebrew. There are a few recently developed NES games out there, like Battle Kid: Fortress of Peril.

[Kayo]

I'd prefer playing/owning it physically to using a ROM. It would really depend on the game, though. I wouldn't use sites like that just to expand my collection unrestrained, but I may use it to get a few games I really want to own.

[The Riddler]

I'd personally only use it for unreleased games and english translations (FF3, Mother)

[Tupin]

Reproductions of prototypes are probably the best starting point.

MOTHER was going to be called Earth Bound in the US, not to be confused with the SNES game EarthBound that really is the second in the series. Nintendo didn't want to even try selling the first one in the US despite translating it completely because the Dragon Quest series sold horribly every time they brought one over. Americans apparently didn't "get" it, they had to give away copies with subscriptions to Nintendo Power.

You'll probably see it called EarthBound Zero, that's the name the people who found it gave to their release. It's probably the best reproduction you can get.

[The Riddler]

I know what Mother/Earthbound is lol

[Tupin]

Good, enjoy the repro, because it has a very small chance of ever being re-released in any form officially. Same goes with the rest of the series.

Gimmick! is a fun game, it's on retrousb. It's a Sunsoft platformer that is one of the best looking NES games.