WARNING! Fake Copies of Heart Gold in Circulation

EDITED 27/03 with new info, see bottom of article.
Thanks to my buddy Toothache for the heads up on this. A Dutch site insidegamer has posted a blue screen glitch is occuring in copies of Heart Gold. This is the result of the game being a fake copy of the game. The following is directly translated (badly) from http://www.insidegamer.nl/nintendods/pokmonheartgold/nieuws/29248/Intertoys-Pokmon-HeartGold-uitgesteld-vanwege-bug.html

News | March 23, 2010 – The release of Pokemon Gold Heart is under an employee of Inter Toys indefinitely postponed by an error somewhere. According Intertoys appears a bluescreen while playing. This makes it impossible for the game at all for the first time to start without error in the following image.

We can confirm that from my own research Heart Gold indeed an error on startup. The error message displayed stored data can not be read to the Nintendo DS and restart, the same message back into view. Soul Silver is doing as far as we have to test it properly.

We have contacted Nintendo Benelux, but they can not yet confirm this bug. At present there is still no confirmation from Nintendo on the postponement of Pokemon Gold Heart. We hope as soon as possible to get clarification from Nintendo.

Its scary how quickly fake copies of the game has come out, and that they are in curculation. Basically the copies use an imported ROM version of the game which breaks down on the cart, causing it to be unplayable (thus the message).

Basically be carefull where you buy your copy of HeartGold (or SoulSilver for that matter, although that’s not effected yet) – make sure its a recognised shop and you will be able to go back to it if anything goes wrong, especially on the Internet. Be very careful with Ebay, as that is where the fakes turn up quickly and easily. If your in the UK, Roy’s Toys is a good place to buy from, plus TPC visitors can get 10% off when pre-ordering by using the promo code TPC4EVER at the checkout, but you better be quick – the game is released Friday.

EDIT 27/3: as Sol has pointed out in the comments, it turns out this isnt a problem of fake copies (although fakes can and will cause the same problem). Nintendo of Europe yesterday posponed the release of the games in Netherlands and other dutch speaking areas, and recalled any early dutch copies as they are causing an error where they dont detect save files. All other languages do not seem to be affected.

Read 3 comments

  1. This is actually not a fake copy and a problem with the Heart Gold and Soul Silver batch provided in the Dutch part of the Netherlands and Belgium.

    Nintendo has gone as far as recalling ALL the copies of Heart Gold and Soul Silver in these areas and delaying the release.

    I own a copy of Heart Gold (Yes one of the buggy batch, I got it before the release date) and it’s working fine. If it doesn’t give this bug at the start of the game, your copy should be in working order according to Nintendo. It’s likely to be a production mistake in the cartridge and not actually a software bug.

    Once again, it was only revealed by Nintendo today so no one knows.

  2. Hi. I did not get it. I have been wailing about it. But, when life bites you on the butt, you move on!
    It was probablay (don’t know) because I have an edinburgh accent and every one else had a london accent. They said I was good and descriptive so that could also in they’re online game tutorials. Instead of being all excited (I WAS THOUGH!) and going “I love Pokewalker!”I just explained things in a calm and cool way and what I said did not flow with the rest of them.But thank you! I still got £150 and a FREE trip to London and they have kept me on file if somthing promosing comes up.

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