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Someone found a US version of the Nintendo 64 64DD

Mellahan

Concerned about dinosaur erection.
A collector in the Seattle area (where Nintendo of America resides) managed to find a US N64DD unit. It's in English!

zTLzn5p.jpg

The very existence of this unit heavily implies NOA had plans (or at least greatly considered) releasing the 64DD in the US.

More info and images here: http://assemblergames.com/l/threads/found-us-version-of-n64-64dd.62294/
 

FZZ

Banned
Before Pokemon GO, no US version of the 64DD existed

After Pokemon GO we get this

Pokemon GO ushering in the new era of gaming brehs

We finding lost treasures now

latest
 

Kastrioti

Persecution Complex
Fascinating stuff, it was best the 64DD wasn't released in the west because then Nintendo would've been going the Sega route of console add-ons and against the PlayStation that would've only hurt them.

The expansion pack and rumble pack were enough.
 

Danny Dudekisser

I paid good money for this Dynex!
Woowwwwww, that's kinda crazy.

Wonder how much something like that is even worth. It's the only known one in existence... right?
 
R

Rösti

Unconfirmed Member
Now we just need a US version of Super Mario 64 DD.
 
Please tell me there was an English version of the F-Zero X expansion pak in the works, either way the fact that someone found this is amazing.
 

Pancake Mix

Copied someone else's pancake recipe
Can't remember if the JP BIOS uses Month/Day. That might have been changed for this proto.

Releasing it worldwide was always the initial plan, but given how it's like the release model, I suspect this proto is as late as 1999. Would have thought they'd abandoned the 64DD by then.

Also, insert name joke here.
 

Pepboy

Member
It was originally planned for release in the west, thats nothing new

Yeah I agree. I remember reading reports on it at the time.

I guess those reports could have been scuttlebutt rather than official Nintendo PR, but it was acknowledged in such a widespread way I don't think anyone had real doubt that it was planned for release in west.

I think I sort of remember reading about some 64DD demos in english as well?
 
The very existence of this unit heavily implies NOA had plans (or at least greatly considered) releasing the 64DD in the US.

That's not public knowledge? I mean I was working on an N64DD project back in 1999. For North America.

We were not the only developer, either; games that were still going to make release had the option to switch over to carts (while still expensive, Nintendo upped capacity and dropped prices for publishers) or else basically wait on Gamecube. Nintendo wasn't exactly willing to keep paying people during the "wait" though so most folks moved on.

EDIT: I want to say that is a test kit or dev kit but honestly I remember very little about the hardware from so many years ago. The dev unit did look like an N64DD, that's about all I remember.
 
It was originally planned for release in the west, thats nothing new

I thought so too. I remember reading about this thing in Nintendo Power or Gamepro or some video game magazine back then. I thought it was a cd player. lol

EDIT: I should also say how awesome it was that this thing was found. How the US version got out in the wild is crazy.
 
They were planning to release this for a while, no? I remember it being a top wanted accessory in Nintendo Power for a while.

Regardless, fucking rad. My friend just bought an N64DD a few weeks ago so I finally got to try it in all of its "glory."
 

Pancake Mix

Copied someone else's pancake recipe
That's not public knowledge? I mean I was working on an N64DD project back in 1999. For North America.

We were not the only developer, either; games that were still going to make release had the option to switch over to carts (while still expensive, Nintendo upped capacity and dropped prices for publishers) or else basically wait on Gamecube. Nintendo wasn't exactly willing to keep paying people during the "wait" though so most folks moved on.

I believe the magnetic disks Nintendo used for the N64DD had an oddly low max capacity of 64MB. Well, cartridges were the same by 1999 with Resident Evil 2, even if they were more expensive to manufacture and thus a very rare size.
 
I believe the magnetic disks Nintendo used for the N64DD had an oddly low max capacity of 64MB. Well, cartridges were the same by 1999 with Resident Evil 2, even if they were more expensive to manufacture and thus a very rare size.

Yes, they were 64MB, but that was very large at the time they announced the DD. 64MB on cart seemed almost unthinkable given the price involved. But Nintendo had both the price pressure to drop and try to save the platform, and the benefit that solid state prices were dropping anyway.

We had the option to go 64MB as well, but the downside was that you lose all of the writeable disk space (64MB capacity, but 32MB+ writeable, depending on what you needed). So anything where you needed more than a save file was out of the question, game wise.
 
All the killer apps were re-shifted or cancelled. The delays made the hardware outdated and unnecessary. It should have featured a little more horsepower and kept some exclusives before any retail attempt.
A shame too. Weren't Final Fantasy VII and Dragon Quest VII supposed to be on the 64DD originally?
 

spookyfish

Member
It would be completely pointless but if Nintendo did a limited run of a N64 + 64DD, I would buy it.

I would, too. So fast.

A shame too. Weren't Final Fantasy VII and Dragon Quest VII supposed to be on the 64DD originally?

I don't know if that was the gaming media saying so, or if that was originally the plan. FFVII on the PlayStation had to have been in development for quite some time.
 
Was the 64DD like, good?

It has F-Zero X Expansion Kit and a bunch of Mario Paint successors of sorts, and that's about it.

Probably the most exciting thing about 64DD is that there were supposed to be Zelda: Ocarina of Time expansion for it, tentatively called "Ura Zelda." Mario Party 2 and 3 were probably supposed to be 64DD expansions for the Mario Party 1. And of course there was EarthBound 64...
 
I just learned today that the DD didn't come out in Japan until late '99. It's hard to think of a world where Ocarina of Time was supposed to come out on that like originally intended.
 
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