Conker's Bad Fur Day (N64) Reproduction Cart Teardown
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- čas přidán 24. 11. 2017
- Wow a non-xbox video! I got this chinese repro cart in the mail and decided to make a quick, script-less video on what it looks like, inside and out. I figure some people might be interested in the build quality and look of these repros.
Now, if there is demand for a cheap reproduction of a rare cartridge, I'm all for it. Unfortunately, there is a danger of mistakenly buying them for the price of the real thing. You should always be careful with sellers and ask them to let you inspect them closely.
Thanks for watching.
I agree with this guy, I got one for 30 bucks and it works just fine. I don’t care that it’s a reproduction. As long as it plays like the iriginal
Thewigon sees you Yeah that’s true, a lot of people don’t want to spend that much money on one game
Well thats fine if the seller TELLS you that it was a repro.But I´m a collector and I´m looking for the real games :)
@@Prosercunus My point. But its sometimes hard to find (and pay) the real game.
Get a everdrive n64, load games of off a sd card
@@tailsprower117 I have authentic 1
I got one for $16 because I wanted it in my collection. It looks clean and plays the same, so no one would really ever know the difference. I wrote "Chinese knockoff' on it in sharpie so no one would mistake it for the real deal.
Excellent video. Keep them going, very informative.
The definitive giveaways of fake chips - are :
- Small (micro) pins out of the IC chips as they didn't make games with those - they had larger hand-solderable IC chip pins..
- No resistors in the board
- No NINTENDO Logo - and game SKU number|
- Bright shiny golden connections at the bottom
- No XM Logo on the IC chips
- No Capacitor sticking up off the board
The batteries were actually put into 12 US released games, which powered the SRAM-
These games include :
1080º Snowboarding
F-Zero X
Harvest Moon 64
Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, The
Major League Baseball featuring Ken Griffey Jr.
Mario Golf
New Tetris, The
Ogre Battle 64: Person of Lordly Caliber
Resident Evil 2
Super Smash Bros.
WCW/NWO Revenge
WWF: Wrestlemania 2000
These games used the battery to save games, so once they die - the data may delete, and the game will no longer be able to save.
While this would seem like a disadvantage, all other N64 games save to flash & the flash memory will eventually wear out with more and more usage, so eventually, with enough saving and erasing of data's - these games will too no longer be able to save data's.
Just thought I'd drop some info on ya'll lol.
Thanks for readin'
Taylor Clark thanks for the info. Hopefully the flash chips keep on going for another few decades
Alot of games use batterys ig they dont you need a memory card
@@JasonFolk07 Not true. SNES, Game Boy, and NES typically used batteries for built-in save but many N64 games with built-in save used EEPROM (two different sizes) or FlashRAM instead. Battery-backed SRAM was the least popular internal save type. Some games also used a battery for an RTC (internal clock), like Animal Forest, but even that game used a different save type.
@xxGodx It's clearly real.
So that means when the green chip has the words: 1996 Nintendo" in shiny golden letters then its a real game?
About the label: To my eyes, it looks so "perfect" because it's a decent-quality scan and re-print of the original. The label on my original cart is in pretty good condition, and, well, the repro just looks less sharp. You can really see it in things like the ESRB rating. Those would normally be razor-sharp in an original print. The repro team probably moved the Rare logo and ESRB rating in closer out of fear of having them cropped in print/cutting. The little difference in the F and D is probably because they ran the scan through some kind of cleanup filter that slightly changed the letters' edges unintentionally.
you can tell off top that the label is too glossy.
the dot in the "I" in nintendo on the back is typically a circle if its fake but the dot on the original carts is actually square
I just checked and they're all square actually
I recently bought a cartridge of CBF that did not have Conker and Berri on the front, the game worked fine through the opening cutscenes until I get to the part with the scarecrow in the beginning, the game would then freeze but the bgm still played. My first thought was the N64 console was dusty and needed to be cleaned, so I used 70% alcohol with a cotton swab to clean the contact points. The game worked fine now until I get to the part where you blow up with rock after knocking the gargoyle off the the cliff. After the explosion and you gain control of Conker again, the game froze again with bgm still going. I then thought the console itself was completely defective, I decided to play other games such as DK 64 and OOT. Both of which worked fine with no freezes. I returned the possibly defective cartridge and got a new one today that had Conker and Berri on the sticker. The game seemed to run smoother then the other cartridge. Of course though, the game froze after Conker got cleared of his hangover and jumped into the river.
Is it because of buying these cheap cartridge's (47 dollars and 20 dollars) that the game keeps freezing? Will I have to invest in a higher priced cartridge instead?
TL;DR Bought two cheap copies of CBF that freeze with bgm playing, will I have to invest in a higher priced one?
A legit copy normally goes for like 70 plus. It's possible not all these repros are thoroughly tested
About the cartridge art: Apparently, official releases of CBFD outside of North America had different cart art and box art. So, it's tough to say, but there's the possibility that you have an official cart but it doesn't play nice on your console because it's made for another region.
At the filming of this video, multicarts were very much in their infancy (ie Everdrive) but today there just isn't a good reason to buy a Repro with all the option out there. Buy a single cart (and maybe a cheap sd card) and you have no recurrent costs and the entire N64 library (including imports and many hacks) can be played on it. Even at the $20 price point the cost of Repros adds up fast. Only takes about 3-4 Repros/Hacks to exceed the cost of a Super 64 or ED64. For the cost of 10-11 Repros/Hacks you can even afford an Everdrive X7. Add in the consistently inconsistent quality control standards and the trouble prone areas (ie on board memory failure, bad rom flash) and the Repros are arguably the worst option for the money at this point. Keep in mind I am saying this as someone who owns a handful of them.
Do you have to remove the memory battery to check continuity on the traces?
any problems with it later on did it ever freeze up or glitch? you should follow up this vid with any findings
It's a shame they couldn't include solid-state memory for the saves, but at least the battery holder means you can swap the battery out without losing your saves by hooking up another 3 volts in parallel.
Alligator clips holding magnets on one end should work nicely.
Thank you! the one I bought had the back replaced but the inside is legit!
How did you know the back was replaced?
Pretty good repo
I still own my dad's original copy of this game
You're making me feel old. I still own my original copy that my brother and I bought and played together 21 years ago. Man, I spent way too much time playing the game that should have been spent on college homework....
Is the repo censored? Heard some versions are and some aren't
will the repro save properly
The Nintendo logo engraved in the back of the cartridge is a little bit off, especially the bottom part of the "e". Also in the label on the back, in the French translation, third line from the bottom, there's a space after the apostrophe: "L' INTENTION".
I just bought a repo car like that and it didn't have a battery in it?
They did use the battery in the memory packs and just a few games
About the battery: A lot of games on NES, SNES, Genesis, etc. used SRAM for gamesaves because it was economical and readily available. However, SRAM needed a battery to be able to retain its data. By the era of the N64, EEPROM and floating-gate flash storage had become economical enough to use in first-party game cartridges. But hey, even all these years later, SRAM _is_ still more economical, so it would be the technology of choice for bootleg stuff. So, without doing any in-depth analysis of the PCB design, that would be my guess as to why the repro has a battery and the original doesn't. Something that fascinates me is how the original cart uses pretty much entirely through-hole chips, whereas the bootleg is pretty much entirely surface-mount. I mean, they definitely _were able to_ use surface-mount components in the N64 era... they just chose not to. I guess surface-mount manufacturing was still a little too pricey back then, whereas nowadays it's probably the same price or maybe even cheaper since it doesn't require drilling holes through the PCB.
Actually the battery on the Repros vs not on the original has more to do with the increasingly generic nature of the repro boards themselves. Rather than trying to mass produce reproductions where you have to manually select the correct CIC Authentication Chip and Memory type to match the given game title, it's actually more practical for them to just mass produce boards that support every type of CIC Chip and Memory and simply program them with whatever title they desire since all types are supported on each board. As someone who has made his own Repros in the past, I can verify that at least one company does this for sure on all their Repro Boards (Retro Stage). Every Board I get from them has a fully programmable CIC chip and comes with all the different types of memory on each board and each board comes with a battery regardless of whether or not I ever use one for an SRAM title.
I have now ordered a reproduction, is this reproduction bad because of the battery I am not a technician but you seem to know your way around or is this processing class of reproduction also perfectly OK?
Dude why would the font of the cover art on the cartridge be different? These people have learned how to reproduce games but don't know how to copy and paste a picture onto cartridge? They look the same to me boyo
Xaylius that's a good question: so I ended up getting a legit cart with a nice label and compared again. The repro label is noticably darker and the logos are improperly sized. So, you would think you can copy it these days no problem, but you'd be wrong.
Do you know why some of the authentic PCBs have a marker A with a circle around it as seen in the video on the real board and some other boards have a YG with a circle around it also a real board?
I have the same authentic board as you, when you boot it up is the aspect ratio seem off, I have slight black border on the left, top and bottom, wondering if this was just how the game played, also noticed bad frame rates with the game was that common as well?
Most repro carts use scanned labels freely available online. Scanned labels are very easy to detect, they look blurry, brightness reduced, increased contrast and increased color saturation to try and hide fuzzy scan artefacts. This is all evident in Conkers Bad Fur day on the left, however the original game is badly faded.
I believe on manufacturing runs Nintendo et all do sometimes adjust artwork so that may account for a slight change in logo size and position, I've seen this label free to download online and it is a straight up scan.
I also have no issue repros aslong as the seller says reproduction in listing. But a photograph is a dead giveaway. If it's too dark and far too over saturated it's a repro.
good to know! I'll keep that in mind
I got a repro but the only way it plays is if we either hold the cart all the way to the back or tape it down with T-Rex tape. Any ideas how to fix this?.its like the chip doesnt reach the n64 reader
I'm sure the shell design is slightly off. And doesn't fit
Do they save game progress like normal n64 games?
Yes
Put your real game in the new fake case. Bam!
Id pay 50$
That reproduction cart even had the Nintendo logo on the back to make it look authentic. Very deceptive.
Blitzkrieg not on the PCB though
I like the idea with reproduction carts and discs but what pisses me off about the people who are creating and selling these repro's is the fact that many of the people doing it are not putting "Reproduction" anywhere on the cartridge or disc. That's what pisses me off and it could harm the high end video game market.
I wonder how many gamers out there are getting ripped off by people intentionally selling these reproduction carts and discs that are not labeled as such? A thing I've learned is that the authentic Nintendo carts will have the Nintendo logo on the circuit board somewhere, whereas the reproduction circuit boards do not.
If I was to purchase a reproduction game on any system... the most I would probably offer a person is $5 to $10 bucks for any reproduction title. I would be very cautious buying loose, very clean cartridge based games that are older titles. I would also go on to say that if anyone is going to but a cartridge based game from anyone for a good amount of cash, open the game up and take a look at the inside to verify that it is not a reproduction cart.
Blitzkrieg you're totally right, there have been unmarked repros being sold for lots of systems, especially for the Pokemon series. This isn't a new thing. The seller bought from clearly states that these are repros and thats crucial for consumers who don't want to be ripped off.
That being said, since there's no mark on the label showing that it's a repro, I could theoretically try to sell this as authentic. Before long, inspecting the PCB will be a common courtesy
Check the Nintendo logo on the back. Number stamp on the back right. L kn the bottom left and nintendo has gold printing on the bored it self good way to tell
Especially since with most disc consoles you need them modded
About the battery, does it save without it inside, or does it actually need it?
Agu Fungus the battery is absolutely required for saving your game
OK, I see. I hope that the battery actually works, because I've recently saw a video about a repro cart that failed to save Conker's save file. Either the cartridge was faulty, or the battery was dead on arrival. At least it can be replaceable, right?
Battery should be easily replaceable due to the battery holder. I haven't had the game long enough to test though
I've fallen victim to a repro Super Smash Bros game that didn't save any of my progress. It was also much lighter than the authentic N64 games I have.
Glossy is reproduction and the i is circle not square for easy ways to tell.
Does it work?
i got one conker repro, but it doesnt saves, if i change the battery could i save again?
Yeah there should be a battery holder. Should be easy to swap
@@retro_vg_repairs3339 thanks man youre awesome will buy the tool to open and change , looks easier than GBC games
Oh cool Conker's Bad Fur Day! my favourite Vedio Games accessory!
i still play old nintendo games
Can you play multiplayer?
Did the repo work like a normal cart?
Chris Pielacha sure did
@@retro_vg_repairs3339 awesome I found these online a few days ago and wanted to get some. Can't beat the price that's for sure. The actual game's are mad expensive lol
Chris Pielacha I completely agree that prices are out of control. There is an obvious grey area in that the cover doesn't immediately reveal if it's real. I advise anyone who is into collecting to always check the actual circuit board and verify real carts
@@retro_vg_repairs3339 Did it save? I'd like one but I hear stories of them not saving.
bought one of these for HM 64 and game doesn't save. T_T
I have 2 real deals! Got them back in 2005😁😎 one is in mint condition the other one is a little beat up.
Thank you for this! I got worried that maybe I had a fake Conker's Bad Fur Day but you've arrested my fears - it is indeed a legit copy!
The legit one looks like one of my old catridges that I wouldn't play because i didn't know what it was
Nintendo did use those round batteries on a few of their games.
Ben Gomez list is above 👆🏻..
Not with a battery holder
70 to 80 bucks 😆. Try over 300 these days to up to 1k or more lol. I know this was 4 years ago.
I got one of those but it’s paper Mario
Eric Isfeld Has your paper mario cartridge worked well? I just ordered a paper Mario one as well, waiting a few weeks for it to come from China lol
Bro I just found a mint one I bought my kids
You want it 100 bucks it has a wonderful crisp sticker
I was think of getting a repro but I'm worried about the saves disappearing when I turn off the console
Connor Classic2 saves seem to be working fine. Had it for awhile now. You can always throw a new battery in there since there's a battery holder
Okay because the Mega Man Wily Wars reproduction cartridge I have has that issue of the save files disappearing
Connor Classic2 I've heard that can happen on everdrive carts due to the use of incorrect save format. The N64 uses lots of different save systems for their carts: sram, 16k eeprom, flash, etc. Using the wrong type will confuse the game when saving. Anyways, I haven't run into issues yet
@@connorplays6263 where did you buy your repro from?
I recently got a fake Mario 64 works fine for me I don’t mine if it’s fake or real just as long it works
In 20 years from now when Mario 64 is worth 500 bucks you will mind.
Why does people make it harder for big time collectors?.…...
Well to be fair the only reason it's even a thing is because games are overpriced. I'm ok with it as long as they don't try to pass it off as real and the price is cheap
I would switch the metal plate and the pcb over into the reproduction cart, and sell it online or take it to a pawnshop, they will never know it's a fake unless they have an authentic version to compare it to. Most shops will only inspect the pcb, when they see Nintendo on the pcb they will think its the real thing.
Bit of a dick move, but sure, I guess it's a reasonable thing to do for people who don't want to work in a productive job.
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