After having sold more than two million units, Nintendo decided to end production of its NES Classic... and the entire market let out a scream of terror that still echoes in our ears. Many enthusiasts are still hunting for leftover units at absurd prices, but that could soon change with the massive invasion of clones coming from China. Beyond a few specific details, the copies of the console are good enough to deliver the retro dose players want…
A warning Nintendo ignored
"Pirates are underserved customers." That phrase stormed the Web in January 2009 and belongs to Jason Holtman, who was part of Valve's executive team. That was one of the keys behind Steam's success. The exact combination of convenience, deals, and fewer geographic restrictions lifted the service to its current position of privilege. Unfortunately, several companies out there never managed to register the message, and keep making decisions that are very hard to understand.
One of the most striking examples is Nintendo. The Japanese giant hit the bullseye with the Switch, but the cancellation of the NES Classic left us stunned. 2.3 million consoles in five months is not a bad performance, and given the distribution problems it faced, we all expected a broader presence on store shelves. With the NES Classic headed for the guillotine and a huge number of frustrated fans, exactly what we had imagined happened: The attack of the clones.
A closer look at the bootlegs
The first images were published by user "Lupin the Third" on the forums of the portal NeoGAF (link below). In this model, the box design imitates the European version very well, and only by examining its contents can we confirm that it is a bootleg, with low-quality logos sitting slightly crooked on the shell. Once turned on, the "Welcome" throws any trace of originality out the window, but its selection menu is a fairly decent reproduction, as long as we ignore the differences in fonts, spacing, and alignment.
After a quick pass through AliExpress (the listing has already been removed), the NES Classic "alternatives" are already advancing on eBay, with legends like "500 in 1" and "Entertainment System". In short, don't be surprised if in the coming weeks your local market gets flooded with NES Classic consoles at very friendly prices. To tell the truth, their presence is bad news for resellers, since it will be harder to justify the hundreds of dollars they ask under the "original hardware" label if the clones' emulation is up to the task.
NeoGAF
