the cutting room mirror

200-in-1

This article has a talk page!This article has a talk page!
view on tcrf.net

This exact 200-in-1 game list has become extremely common on cheap gaming devices, but this one includes some Inventor hacks of legitimate Famicom games (including several fan-made hacks) among the typical Nice Code junk. It has over a dozen known variants from a multitude of manufacturers; generally with no software changes whatsoever compared to the original version.

The very same ROM was used in the mini arcade machine Thumbs-Up! 200-in-1 Retro TV Game.

Unused Graphics#

Found at ROM address $07A010.

200_in_1-symbols.png 200_in_1-comma.png

The menu includes five of the first ASCII symbols and a comma which are never actually used.

Also unused is a lowercase font, despite most of the names in the menu being written with lowercase ASCII letters internally. Found at offset $4D0.

Unused Text#

8BIT TEST

This string immediately follows the list of games, found at $07CCCA. It refers to the test program hidden in the unit, as shown below.

Main Device Test#

Hidden in the ROM is a program used to test the unit, which can be accessed by holding A + B and resetting it. Oddly, it's credited to Aaronix, a company that produced Famiclones in the 1980s but seemed to be defunct by the time this unit was made.

Funnily enough, all variants got the accessing method wrong; now it can be accessed by holding A + B on the menu itself.

Revisional Differences#

While most republished 200-in-1 variants do not change the software, there are a few releases that do feature various changes (such as adding or replacing games). Most of these upgrade the system to VT368.

Dark blue variant#

A version of the 200-in-1 with the background color changed to dark blue, found in a console with the exact same name as the Thumbs-Up one, but without the Thumbs-Up branding.

International version#

Please elaborate.
Having more detail is always a good thing.
Specifically: What are the bytes that were changed meant for?

This variant is found on the My Arcade Retroplay Controller, as well as the My Arcade Retro Machine (both from the USA) and the Retro Games Controller (from the UK), all from 2015, and is a minor revision of the dark blue variant, where only bytes $07F4CD to $07F82F were changed.

Lexibook Cyber Arcade#

Revision 0 of the Lexibook Cyber Arcade (serial code JL2940), based on the original dark blue version and not the international one, has a version of this set with five changes total:

  • Through-Man is replaced with a hacked version of Sqoon which skips the title screen almost immediately, though the name is unchanged on the menu.
  • Airial Hero is replaced with a title screen hack of Wisdom Boy, by Gamtec, lacking copyright information and a Chinese name.
  • High Card is now spelled properly instead of as "HIGHCARD".
  • Turtles has been changed to Grot Kid.
  • Smackdown (a Tag Team Pro-Wrestling hack) is renamed to just "Wrestling" in the menu, and has its title screen blanked out.

240-in-1 variant#

A 240-in-1 revision can be found in systems such as the Red5 Mini Arcade (serial code 72842). The extra 40 games are merely duplicates of games already present in the menu, making this extra game count completely worthless. Despite this, many further alterations were also made, including the following:

  • A Red5 logo was added before the menu appears.
  • Space Base is replaced with Calculator (labeled as "Calcul").
  • Through-Man is replaced with Boat Race, a Road Fighter hack.
  • Video Poker is replaced with a duplicate of Strong Pill (albeit a different revision).
  • Blackjack is replaced with a duplicate of Bug Catcher.
  • Texas Hold'em is replaced with Greedy Snake, a title screen hack of Greedy.
  • Jump Jump is replaced with Falling Blocks.
  • Airial Hero is replaced with Difference.
  • Highcard is replaced with a duplicate of Air Alert (labeled as "Antiquarium").
  • Slots is replaced with Boxworld.
  • Smackdown suffered the same fate as in the Lexibook Cyber Arcade.
  • Rescue Kuck (a Donkey Kong Jr. hack) is replaced with Fighter.
  • Risker (an Excitebike hack) is replaced with The Farmer.
  • Baccarat is replaced with Bomb King.
  • Boxes is replaced with Cannonade.
  • First Defender is replaced with Convection.
  • Dominoes is replaced with Undersea Arena.
  • Jumping Kid is replaced with River Jump (labeled as "River River").

Cheertone Gaming Tech CT-885#

This console uses the 240-in-1 set, but with the unnecessary 40 entries at the end of the list trimmed down.

220-in-1 variant#

A 220-in-1 revision is seen in systems such as the dreamGEAR MyArcade Retro Micro Controller (serial code DGUN-2869).

It uses a completely different codebase since the binary data as well as VRAM are different, only loading in (mostly) all the graphics necessary. The ZYX-8B string is also no longer in the data, indicating a lack of involvement from Zheng Yaxin.

This console actually bothered to add 20 new games instead of just duplicating them, and has several additional changes:

  • The menu features Mighty Final Fight music, and has the "220 in 1" title written in a different font from the menu. The selection cursor is also altered.
  • Some game titles in the menu were slightly altered, particularly to fix spacing (e.g. "Hitmouse" to "Hit Mouse").
  • On the 200-in-1, game 31, Fishwar, was a hack of Balloon Fight. On the 220-in-1, this same game slot is used for a different Fish War game - a reskin of the Famiclone Shark! Shark! port.
  • Memory Test, originally game 60 in the 200-in-1, is moved towards the end of the list in the 220-in-1; this shifts the original menu order up by 1 (from games 60 onward).
  • On the 200-in-1, Hoodle mistakenly loads an unhacked copy of Pinball; the 220-in-1 replaces this with the proper hacked version.
  • Smackdown is renamed to Wrestling in the menu, though unlike the 240-in-1, its title screen is intact.
  • As in the 240-in-1, Rescue Kuck is replaced with Fighter, and First Defender is replaced with Convection. Curiously, Risker is replaced with Fisher, a variant of The Farmer.
  • Snowball is replaced with Shift, a hack of Porter.
  • The following 21 games (in order) were tacked onto the end: Fishing, Primitive Man, Super Hero, Backgammon, Highway Rider, Wonder Rabbit, Hearts, Hurry Burry, Masked Man, Masked Man 2, River Jump, Toy Bricks, Trounce, Cute Fish, Defensive, Edacity Snakes, Jungly Guy, Memory Test, Patternmaker, Radish Field, and Tactful.