Well, because of the new research into Emerald, I decided to buy myself a new copy, so I could keep the data on my old copy and get some fresh legends and other stuff. Unfortunately, the copy I recieved turned out to be a fake. This is the second time I've recieved a fake Pokemon cart, the first being a Ruby cart which lasted for about a couple of weeks then stopped working altogether.
The copy I bought was advertised as a new copy, so I was expecting it to be factory sealed - you know, with the plastic wrapping around it and everything. However, the box itself came flat, they were too eager to get my money to even fold the box properly. The box itself was faded, and whatever they used to print it obviously needed a new ink cartridge. The same could be said of the manual that came with it - the ink in there was badly printed and in some cases the various layers were offset by a noticeable amount.
And as for the game cartridge, well you could tell straight off there was something wrong with it, when comparing it to a genuine Emerald cart. The electronics on the back are totally different for a start, there were letters printed on the circuit board itself of the fake copy, which dont appear on the genuine article, and even the label was printed badly - my old Emerald cart had a better looking label than this one.
The game itself appears to play fine, for the 15 minutes I tried it out, at least. However the kiss of death is after you start up the game, it gives a message that reads 'The game can be played.' This is always a bad sign, and look out for it whenever you purchase a copy second hand or otherwise. Even my genuine copy of Emerald, which is around 3 years old now, doesnt give that message, so a genuine copy should not have that problem.
So, what to do?
Well, the first thing I did was to call Nintendo Customer Services. After a few minutes of waiting I got through to someone, explained the situation, gave the purchase details and the seller's ebay account to them, and a little bit of banter about how common these fakes were, and obviously for Nintendo collating more information to them will be a useful step towards stopping fake distribution.
The next thing I did was to send a message to the seller, informing him that he sold me a fake copy, that Nintendo were aware of it, and that I expect a full refund. Hopefully that should be a painless transition, but now that Nintendo have his ebay account (its a business account, no less), it will stop at least a few fakes getting sold out there.
I think another thing we need to do is for anyone who attempts to buy on ebay is to collate a blacklist of ebay sellers that sell fake carts. The more information we have on these guys should at least start to put off people trying to sell these fakes, and maybe put pressure on ebay to start taking this seriously.
On a related note, I've noticed ebay bids were people are also advertising copies of Emerald with all 386 Pokemon shiny, or asking people to send in their copies to add the shinies, for outrageous amounts of money. I'm sure this practise should also go hand in hand with selling fake copies as something we should stamp out.
Blacklist:
Seller: http://myworld.ebay.co.uk/charcoal_boy/
Item Purchased: Pokemon Emerald -
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&ssPageName=STRK:MEWNX:IT&item=270373919617
The copy I bought was advertised as a new copy, so I was expecting it to be factory sealed - you know, with the plastic wrapping around it and everything. However, the box itself came flat, they were too eager to get my money to even fold the box properly. The box itself was faded, and whatever they used to print it obviously needed a new ink cartridge. The same could be said of the manual that came with it - the ink in there was badly printed and in some cases the various layers were offset by a noticeable amount.
And as for the game cartridge, well you could tell straight off there was something wrong with it, when comparing it to a genuine Emerald cart. The electronics on the back are totally different for a start, there were letters printed on the circuit board itself of the fake copy, which dont appear on the genuine article, and even the label was printed badly - my old Emerald cart had a better looking label than this one.
The game itself appears to play fine, for the 15 minutes I tried it out, at least. However the kiss of death is after you start up the game, it gives a message that reads 'The game can be played.' This is always a bad sign, and look out for it whenever you purchase a copy second hand or otherwise. Even my genuine copy of Emerald, which is around 3 years old now, doesnt give that message, so a genuine copy should not have that problem.
So, what to do?
Well, the first thing I did was to call Nintendo Customer Services. After a few minutes of waiting I got through to someone, explained the situation, gave the purchase details and the seller's ebay account to them, and a little bit of banter about how common these fakes were, and obviously for Nintendo collating more information to them will be a useful step towards stopping fake distribution.
The next thing I did was to send a message to the seller, informing him that he sold me a fake copy, that Nintendo were aware of it, and that I expect a full refund. Hopefully that should be a painless transition, but now that Nintendo have his ebay account (its a business account, no less), it will stop at least a few fakes getting sold out there.
I think another thing we need to do is for anyone who attempts to buy on ebay is to collate a blacklist of ebay sellers that sell fake carts. The more information we have on these guys should at least start to put off people trying to sell these fakes, and maybe put pressure on ebay to start taking this seriously.
On a related note, I've noticed ebay bids were people are also advertising copies of Emerald with all 386 Pokemon shiny, or asking people to send in their copies to add the shinies, for outrageous amounts of money. I'm sure this practise should also go hand in hand with selling fake copies as something we should stamp out.
Blacklist:
Seller: http://myworld.ebay.co.uk/charcoal_boy/
Item Purchased: Pokemon Emerald -
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&ssPageName=STRK:MEWNX:IT&item=270373919617
