Back in August 2005, the biggest player on the danish retail store market, called Dansk Supermarked (Danish Supermarket, aka. DS), featured nothing less than a pirate
Famicom console in their weekly phamplet of weekly offers.
I of course had to pick one of these up, to see what it was about and wether it featured illegale games
or not. The price was DKK 99.95, which is about US$17.
When I got to the nearest Bilka store, one of DS' store branches, they had no less than 4 pallets of these clones, making a gigantic tower of pirate gear, wow - hehe.
The clone comes with 2 controllers, lightgun, an extra cartridge with 12 games and of course the main unit itself, look a little bit like a Commodore CD32. The funny
thing about this clone, and the biggest downside about it - is that it runs on 4 size "D" batteries, yeah those big ass batteries, and doesn't feature the option of
using a powersupply . This was most likely chosen to keep the production cost down.
While the clone obviously is made in china, it was imported to Europe by Halsall (www.time4toys.com), I have earlier
"reviewed" another toy of their's, the Soccer Shootout. Anyway it seems that DS' might've contacted Halsall about buying a great deal of these
clones, reason being that the box and manual has danish text written on it.
Okay, so on to the clone itself, which is indeed cheap made, just look at the internals.
The clone comes with 21 games built-in and has a very cool looking menu.
 
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FUN CLICK
Can't say for sure wether this is a hongkong original or not, I've never seen the game before. |
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BOX WORLD
Seems to be "hongkong original" version of boxxle, aka. Shokoban. |
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DIAMOND
A hacked version of Taito's Arkanoid game. PIRATE!! :-) |
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STRANGE POP POP
A strange version of Tetris, using bubbles, seems to be a pirate original, or Nintend's tetris with altered graphics. |
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MATCHING
A game of matching picture cards, most definately a hongkong original. |
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SOCCER
It's Nintendo's soccer game, and they're not even trying to hide it these damn game pirates, PIRATE!! :-) |
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PANDA
A Panda has taken over the world of Super Mario Bros., clearly a PIRATE game:-) |
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FUTURE TANK
Yet another PIRATE game, here we have the Famicom game by Nintendo, called Tank City. |
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FOREST GUARD
Funny title for Hoogan's Alley. |
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COW BOY
Actually this is Wild Gunman, if you hadn't guessed it already :-) |
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SPACE 2050
Duck Hunt, dressed as a space game.... how nice :-) |
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UFO RACE
Yet another pirated game, F1 Race. |
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SKY INVADER
Original title being Sky Destroyer, more illegal stuff here. |
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TENNIS
Haha this one is too cool. Nintendo's old Tennis game with the graphics changed. One can only wonder what wonderboy is doing here,
instead of fooling around in the Adventure Island games :-) |
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OBSTACLE RACE
I'm pretty sure this also is a pirate game, but forgot the original title. |
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MARS
Not really sure which game this is, could be Star Force? |
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BASE BALL
Pirate, pirate, pirate, as this is yet another first generation Nintendo game, baseball. |
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TUNNY
This isn't City Connection?.... is it? |
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SUPER ELF
Circus Charlie, only this guy isn't Charlie, but B.C. Kid., hmmm.... |
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AETER TIGER
The game with the most graphic changes, this game is actualy 1942, originally released by Capcom. |
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BOAT RACE
Originally this game is known as Road Fighter and was released by Konami |
But that is not all. As mentioned earlier, a cartridge with aditional 12 games is also included in the package. I'm pretty sure the cart also includes some pirate
games....
 
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SUPER FIGHTER
Pirate game, Super C ... originally released by Capcom. |
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ALPS SKIING
Original Nintendo game, but forgot the title. |
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X-WAR
Originally released by American Sammy, as Silkworm. |
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SHOOT GLASSES
Duck Hunt, again again.... |
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ARCHERY
Not sure about the title of this one, but definately an original Nintendo/Famicom game. |
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ZERO GRAVITY
Balloon Fight with some crazy artwork.... |
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BOMB HELICOPTER
I could be wrong, but I think this game is Twin Eagle. |
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GOLD DIGGER
No idea what game this is, but it's definately not made by pirates (not a hongkong original) |
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HOODLE
What a strange name for Pinball.... |
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RISKER
Ummm... Excitebike.... :-) |
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SPECIAL MISSION
Super Contra, starting at level 5. |
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SHOOT COPTER
Duck Hunt.... yes again |
It is clear that Danish Supermarket (DS) is violating Nintendo copyrights. Last year I actually tried contacting Nintendo agent/distributor in Scandinavia,
Bergsala, and while they promised to look into it, I don't think anyting ever was done to prevent this crap being sold.
How can I be so sure? well here, a year after, August 2006, the clone was once again in their weekly offers phamplet, though the price had gone down a bit, to
DKK 47,95, which is about US$8.
Not a whole lot of clones were left when I visited the nearest Bilka store yesterday, maybe it was time to clear the stock.
Danish Supermarket isn't done selling Famicom clones though, but you'll have to wait a little with part two of the story :-)
Over and out....
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