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Defender - strange/rare cartridge?


Stimpy

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Just went to an fleamarket this weekend and picked up an 2600jr. with 16

cards.

 

Among them was a DEFENDER game cartridge.

But the cartridge doesn´t have the look of the normal Atari cartridge.

It has gripps on both sides and grooves on the back :?

 

The labels are the original Atari ones.

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post-2341-1033389796_thumb.jpg

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Wow, that's really bizarre. Either Atari made a (tiny?) run of carts with these grips on them, or it's a pirate version of Defender and someone went through great care to carefully reproduce the label. Except for the grips, it looks very similar to a normal Atari cartridge. It would be interesting to open the game up to see what the board looks like, but that would involve cutting through the label to get at the screw hole.

 

Perhaps some other European collectors have seen cartridges like this?

 

..Al

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That looks like an EPROM, and you can see the pins for what is probably a hex inverter on the other side. And yet it still has the RF shield over the chip as you'd expect on a real Atari board. It's unusual for EPROMs to be used in production carts, so this leads me to believe that it's probably a pirated cart of some type.

 

..Al

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Didn't know these were all that rare. I actually picked up a Defender exactly like this one and was told when I posted a scan of it before that it was a known version that is pirated. Look at the name Atari in the copyright...it says "ATRRI" instead. Even though the "P" is in the end of the label...the one I have is NTSC as it works fine on all the TVs I have tried it on...including some that didn't like PAL stuff. So if it is a Pirated copy it must have originated from somewhere where NTSC was the prefrence.

 

;)

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Looks like a European realease due to the P on the end label..  

 

Speaking as a european, none of my european Atari carts have this.

 

 

Are you sure? An awful lot of Atari releases do........... - particularly the picture and silver label ones..

If not that, then a P after the product number on the front of the cart in the small text - eg CX26123P, or a P sticker on the back of the cart (more common on red label carts)

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That looks like an EPROM, and you can see the pins for what is probably a hex inverter on the other side.  And yet it still has the RF shield over the chip as you'd expect on a real Atari board.  It's unusual for EPROMs to be used in production carts, so this leads me to believe that it's probably a pirated cart of some type.  

 

..Al

 

It actually looks like the hex inverter is under the EPROM. Another interesting thing is the four copper jumper pads in front of the EPROM. These looks just like the jumper pads Atari used on the 7800 carts.

 

Dan

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After you say this, I have again look at my Pac-Man. And yes, it say too ATRRI. :o :o :o

 

I never see this before. :?

 

Here a lable scan from mine, and the case look like the Defender from Stimpy.

I have get mine in an eBay auction. But I have nor bid on this. But after I see the strange case, I have old it for my collection. :D

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I have a Parker Brothers Frogger cart like this. The label has the logo of Parker Germany on it. The case is indeed identical to the one Homevision used. My theory always was that for the popular titles, like Frogger, Parker Gernamy outsourced some production to Homevision to be able to meet the high demand.

 

But since there are several Atari titles showing up here in Germany as well, maybe they were licensed products for the Bertelsmann book club or something? The books they sell through their club are almost all licensed reprints, so maybe they did the same thing for their video game section as well? I know that Bertelsmann sold Atari games back then, but I have no prove to link these games to them.

 

 

Ciao, Eckhard Stolberg

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perhaps homevision sold pirate carts before they began to produce their own games.

 

here two pictures of the board inside my robot-fight cart

 

dash

 

My Peter Penguin (HomeVision) looks like these Boards too. But this came too with a strange lable. So I have think, thats this is maybe a Prototype.

 

You can see pictures here:

 

Peter Penguin Prototype?

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Dash, your pics didn't come out. I normally chock up the P on the end label as PAL. I now have to dig through my thousands of extra games to see if I find any with this. Just to make sure I didn't get one of these uncommon finds. I know I had a Berserk with a P on the end label, but can't remember if it had grooves on the ends. I'm heading to the warehouse tomorrow to bring home a few more boxes of games that have been stored there for years. I'm hoping to find more stuff to add to my website or possibly something a little rarer to pop on Ebay.

 

Phil

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Looks like a European realease due to the P on the end label..  

 

Speaking as a european, none of my european Atari carts have this.

 

 

Are you sure? An awful lot of Atari releases do........... - particularly the picture and silver label ones..

If not that, then a P after the product number on the front of the cart in the small text - eg CX26123P, or a P sticker on the back of the cart (more common on red label carts)

 

I didn't mean the P, i meant the grips :)

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perhaps homevision sold pirate carts before they began to produce their own games.

 

This might be possible, but if that were the case, why would they try to recreate the Frogger label as exactly as possible, and then add the German Parker logo, when even Parker Germany didn't use it by default? If the German Parker logo is on a Parker game, it's ususally an extra sticker applied to the main label.

 

 

Ciao, Eckhard Stolberg

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maybe the P stands for Prototype ?....

 

haa haoo ho I crack myself up.  :|  

 

I've never seen a cart like that.  :(

 

No, the P on the cartridges stand only for PAL. You find it often on PAL cartridges. Sometimes on the endlable, sometimes on the lable behind the number and sometimes a P sticker at the back from the case.

 

So if you don't live in germany (a PAL country) its hard to get PAL games for you. :D ;)

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maybe the P stands for Prototype ?....

 

haa haoo ho I crack myself up.  :|  

 

I've never seen a cart like that.  :(

 

No, the P on the cartridges stand only for PAL. You find it often on PAL cartridges. Sometimes on the endlable, sometimes on the lable behind the number and sometimes a P sticker at the back from the case.

 

So if you don't live in germany (a PAL country) its hard to get PAL games for you. :D ;)

 

I was being sarcastic, I know the P stands for Pal..... :roll:

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Ok, well ive picked up even another variation of this defender. The cart is the same in that it has the grip, Differences are the end label "Defender" is in white not blue. Also the label has the picture and says defender in blue, However thats all it does say. No copyright or atari or anything.

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