Talk:Famiclone

It'd be nice if someone included information on some of the higher quality Famiclones, such as Gametech's NeoFami and PokeFami, and the other sought-after handheld clones like the Game Theory Admiral (you gotta love that name! ^_^). I haven't used them and don't know too much about them. Also, did I hear somewhere that it's legal to make Famiclones now, due to the expiry of the original's patents or something? --Zilog Jones 17:54, 1 Apr 2005 (UTC)

The Famicom was introduced in 1983; patents last 17 years from when they were issued (later changed to 20 years from when they were filed). So the patents should have expired.

(I haven't added this to the article because it's always possible there's some weird situation in Japan which may make the 17 year figure wrong, but it's close.) Ken Arromdee 18:41, 19 August 2005 (UTC)

Take a look here:http://www.gamasutra.com/features/20051111/boyd_01.shtml In summary, expired patents don't necessarily make copying the design legal. That article references this wikipedia article as an example. I'm going to edit to reflect the situation more accurately.84.43.1.92 23:33, 11 November 2005 (UTC)

Do not wade into the patent issue unless you practice patent law, or have spent a reasonable amount of time studying it. You cannot determine when a patent expires merely by looking at when a product covered by that patent was introduced. In short, a number of the patents on the NES have not expired, including patents covering the cartridge authentication system, which do not expire until January 24, 2006. Obviously, a truly legal clone would not need a cartridge authentication system, but the patents cited in the Gamasutra article also suggest that there are claims on a controller (the basic controller?) that are still in force. Note: I do not trust the GamaSutra article. It is clearly a P.R. piece that provides nothing of analytical value. What patents are marked on the system? When do those patents expire? Why does the article fail to mention that design patents only protect the ornamental design of a product, and are trivial to design around? DrWitty 00:27, 12 November 2005 (UTC)

Twin Famicom

I've removed the twin famicom from the clone list, as it is a legitimate piece of Nintendo/Sharp hardware. Kufat 18:46, 14 January 2006 (UTC)

Brazil

I added the section Brazil. Here, we never saw a original and genuine NES console, since 1989/1990 we ever played with national manufactured clones with the Nintendo license. I don't know why Gradiente or Dynacom don't embeded the Nintendo Seal of Quality in their cartridges, but only your corporate logos. Thanks

Original content in sections 2 and 4.2

I rewrote sections 2 and 4.2 of the article, following is the original.

S. 2: Since 1989, the Nintendo consoles was manufactured and released in Brazil by national holders with proper cartridges and techinal support. The first NES based system (1989) was Dynavision made by Dynacom and used Japanese slot cartridge. Top Game was manufactured by CCE and released in 1990, using American slot cartridge. BitSystem (with the same American NES design), was manufactured by extinct Cougar. The Phantom System was released by Gradiente in 1991 and the most notable console in the market - and a controversial joystick that was a clone of Mega Drive. In 1993 Nintendo arrives officially in Brazil and launching the official NES with same American design.

S. 4.2: will rewrite later due to time constraints.

Family Game

In Argentina, as i recall from my childhood, most kids had what was known as "Family Game", which used some cartridges that as far as i know, weren't compatible with NES games, although what was available was exactly the same you could get in the original NES, only with misleading names, such as "Mario 6" or even ridiculous names as "Mario 14", being a rip-off of looney toons game, with Mario embedded in the game, having awful integration and causing mario to get stuck in different places.

Well... does anybody know anything about this "family game" clone? I'll try and get a snapshot of my long abandoned system.

If the cartridges weren't NES-compatible, they probably used the 60-pin Famicom connector. In this case, a simple 60-72 pin adapter would allow you to play these games on a NES, and the opposite adapter would allow the reverse. From the name, I'd guess its design is a copy of the Famicom. It would be good to get a picture of a Famicom-looking clone. boffy_b 13:53, 4 August 2006 (UTC)

A friend of mine has a Family Game, and yes, it's actually a Famicom clone, the design is quite similar to that of a Famicom. Also note that in Argentina, "Family Game" is a synonym for Famiclone, since people keep calling any Famiclone a "Family Game" in Argentina. Japan became a first-world country after a bomb wiped out everyone. We Argentinians only managed to get two dictatorships and 10 million of poor people since WWII. 21:41, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Famiclones in India

I am adding two of the systems I grew up with in the 90s in India because after reading this article I realised they must have been Famiclones since I played many Nintendo copyrighted games on them available on their own custom cartridges. These two systems are the WizKid and Little Master.

221.135.244.56 22:45, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

Are there clones of other consoles (Genesis, PlayStation, SNES, etc.)? If so, can we have articles on these too? --24.154.173.243 16:11, 2 December 2006 (UTC)

Pandamar

i wanna get pandamar, where can u find it?