This was an experiment that I've wanted to attempt for some time. As you may know, back in 1985 Nintendo was attempting to restart the quite dead American game market with a redesigned variation on the popular Family Computer that we all know as the Nintendo Entertainment System. In an attempt to distance it from previous game systems (that American retailers were weary of) along with measures to lock out non-licensed software and to prevent wanton importing of hardware and software, Nintendo gave the NES much different connections then the Famicom.

However Nintendo needed games before they started printing NES format boards, perhaps they wanted to play it safe in case the system bombed. So to save time they simply placed Famicom boards with converters attached in the cartridges, and now you know why NES carts are so disproportionally large compared to the circuit boards inside.

The important part here is that some first-wave NES carts (Gyromite and Stack-Up for the most part) have Famicom to NES converters inside them.

Now I figure that this really isn't news to most of you, but that's not the main point of this post. I've know about the converters for some time, but what I really wanted to know if this would work on a NES clone. Today I decided to put it to the test.



Here are the items for the experment: A Yobo NES clone, a multitool, a Famicom cart of the original Dragonball game, and a NES cart of Gyromite.



We begin by screwing open the copy of Gyromite. As you can see, the Famicom board and the converter are quite visible. The components are then removed and separated.



The Gyromite board is placed to the side and we will attempt to place the coupler on the Dragonball cart.



The coupler however is slightly too long to fit inside the cart. It is then decided to file down the sides of the coupler until the length will allow it to fit.



The converter board is reattached and the unit is ready to be inserted into the system.



The unit fits and the system is ready to powered on.



Let's flip the cart around.



Playable, but not quite right. Let's clean the connections.



Success! The converter works perfectly on a clone system.

I'd like to thank Yellow Oasis Games and their large selection of import titles for allowing me to carry out this test. If you're in the Columbus area, give them a look.