Bootlegs!! Good stuff...

I was looking at my Metal Slug 1 MVS today and something seemed odd about it. I realize I have never opened it before, so I pop it on open, and it's gotta be a bootleg. The Prog board is PROGGSC the same one as my Fatal Fury Special, and there are two ROM chips stacked on V2 with a wire running from pin 13 of the top chip to pin 7 of LS139!!

I don't know if these are masks or proms V chips are labled MS16M-W1 through MS16M-W4 ( I assume W2 is under W4). P1 is labled MS16M-Q1, C1-C4 are MS32M-D1 through MS32M-D4. M1 and S1 are EPROMs.

So I start reading about boots and decide to pop open my Puzzle Bobble bc it has a fake label and I havn't done it before. All EPROMs and Power Strikes 2 chips. Get this though, I am putting the boards back in so the label is bent some. The label actual popped off and fluttered to the floor leaving behind a perfect orginal KOF 98 label complete with serial numbers and holographic stripes.

Heh.


...........
Where'd you get the Metal Slug..(Ebay)

I remember Casey/Japhie was selling Metal Slug boots awhile back on Ebay.(not that you bought it from him)
..Those boots are possibly still floating around,resold on ebay,got into peoples collections and realized later were boots...(if even checked)

I would of never knew what a bootleg cart was if I hadn't came to this site..I figure many other people out there still don't know till this day..

How do they work..?.
I figure they work good since you never had a reason to open them..

I've had both carts since last summer sometime. No problems with either, both pass CRC check in UNI Bios 1.3 and 2.0. Both have very clean looking cases, I was always suspicious of the inkjet printed label on the puzzle bobble but figured someone got tired of stains or serial scratchouts.

I've played the puzzle bobble lots (bc it's the best game ever!!!) with absolutely no problems at all. Havn't really spent time with MS yet. Have seen no glitches with graphics or sound in either.

I did get them on ebay (of course) don't remember who I go them from. I'd say something like 75-85% of my carts have come from yaton, but I specifically remember buying the metal slug from someone else. No idea who the seller was on the puzzle bobble, but i'd bet it wasn't yaton because he checks his carts pretty well i think. I have at some point opened all of my carts now to see if they are boots and these are the only two.

Thing about the Metal Slug is, the label looks damned real. I've never seen a fake label look this good, and I have lots of carts bought with fake labels. Also, the SNK boards are real, and the Serial numbers are not scratched out, they were cut out like with an X-acto knife.

Has anyone ever heard of someone doing an AES conversion to sell and then making a bootleg version with the old MVS boards? Then this sleezy person could sell two metal slugs, the AES conversion bringing waaaay more money than the MVS cart. Does this sounds like a possibility? Is the Prog board for MS1 supposed to be PROGGSC?

thanks again
-DT

puzzle bobble

i got a puzzle bobble mvs made from a power spikes 2
i bought it from baut389

i'm currently trying to give him back the cart (and a slug 3 too) and get my money back.

luke2fr said:

i got a puzzle bobble mvs made from a power spikes 2
i bought it from baut389

i'm currently trying to give him back the cart (and a slug 3 too) and get my money back.

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Most likely your puzzle bobble is legit. Most original PB MVS carts were actually made by SNK themselves using spare Power Spikes 2 (that game sucked so hard they had to do something to clear the stock).

Amano Jacu said:

Most likely your puzzle bobble is legit. Most original PB MVS carts were actually made by SNK themselves using spare Power Spikes 2 (that game sucked so hard they had to do something to clear the stock).

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maybe, but the PB roms should be of the same type and marked with the NGH number and the name of the rom : and i don't think eeproms should be found on it.

i'll post pictures in 4-5h (as soon as i'm back home).

thank you to correct me if i'm wrong amano

luke2fr said:

maybe, but the PB roms should be of the same type and marked with the NGH number and the name of the rom : and i don't think eeproms should be found on it.

i'll post pictures in 4-5h (as soon as i'm back home).

thank you to correct me if i'm wrong amano

Click to expand...

This is true in most games, but Puzzle Bobble is an exception. As I said it is normal for them to have some EPROMS (usually 2 I think) and roms with the Power Spikes 2 NGH number. Post pics if you want.

Anyway, PB carts like yours have surfaced and been asked about it's legitimacy a lot of times in this board, for example here:

http://www.neo-geo.com/forums/showthread.php?t=110773

Check if yours looks like this, which we determined as legit.

It's the first time I hear about the Power spike chip reuse story.
Just my two cents but if you have a boot than you didn't overpaid and you know that it's one, if it works perfectly and if you don't plan to resell it for a premium, I don't see where the problem is.

thanks a lot amano

i don't remember exactly but it seems to be the same one.
i'll check at home.

sorry for not having searched correctly the forum

Robert said:

It's the first time I hear about the Power spike chip reuse story.
Just my two cents but if you have a boot than you didn't overpaid and you know that it's one, if it works perfectly and if you don't plan to resell it for a premium, I don't see where the problem is.

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Neo Geo and gaming fans in general do find it a problem, arcade vendors do not. An operator would rather buy a bootleg if its cheaper (this is the reason for the * boots at cosmicco, they supply to arcades)

The sad thing is that so many unwittingly play boots at arcades, but drop the same coins into the machine believing they are playing the real thing- that bugs me.

Yeah, my puzzle bobble looks exactly like the ones in that other thread, so I suppose it is also a legitimate cart. Sort of odd for SNK to make their own bootlegs like this, especially with all that sloppy solder flux everywhere. The metal slug is def. a bootleg though, but it plays well and I don't remember who I got it from so I suppose I'm stuck with it.

Why would you stack V chips?? Other than there are supposed to be 4 and only 3 slots on this prog board, but how does the stacked rom still get addressed?

-DT