Multicart

In video game parlance, a multicart is a cartridge that contains more than one game. Typically, the separate games are available individually for purchase (such as Sega Smash Pack) or were previously available individually (such as Final Fantasy: Dawn of Souls). For this reason, collections, anthologies, and compilations are considered multicarts. The desirability of the multicart to consumers is that it provides better value, greater convenience, and (in the case of portable games) more portability than the separate games would provide. The advantage to developers is that it allows two or more smaller games to be sold together for the price of one larger game, and provides an opportunity to repackage and sell older games one more time, often with little or no changes.

Multicarts are distinct from minigame series such as Mario Party, Game & Watch Gallery, or WarioWare. These games are made up of several minigames specifically created for the overall game experience. In contrast to this, the NES multicart Super Mario Bros./Duck Hunt contains two full-version games, each of which were available for purchase individually.

Although most commonly associated with NES and SNES, multicarts, both authorized and unauthorized, have appeared for many cartridge-based systems, including the Atari 2600, Intellivision, Odyssey 2, Master System, Sega Genesis and Game Boy. As storage capacity on cartridges continues to grow and become less expensive, the popularity of multicarts has seen a resurgence on the only remaining cartridge-based systems, those of Nintendo’s Game Boy Advance and DS. Since launch, these systems have seen an increase in the number of “2-in-1” and “3-in-1” games, with some re-releasing popular titles previously seen on the same platform such as Konami's Castlevania.

Pirate multicarts
"120 in 1" cartridge

Among pirate Famicom games, multicarts often advertise an inflated number of games on their labels, calling them "x-in-1" (x can be any number greater than 1, such as "76-in-1," "200-in-1," "1200-in-1," and even "9999999-in-1"), but in reality usually[1] only have anywhere from five to one hundred truly unique games. The list is padded by different variations of these games, hacked to start at different levels or to start a player with different power-ups. The games are usually first-generation Famicom titles, several of which were never officially released in America, and in typical pirate fashion have either had their names deliberately misspelled, their copyright notices/logos removed, or both.

Other popular video game systems also have their own share of unique pirate multicarts. Unlike the Famicom, the Nintendo Game Boy multicarts have a variety of different, innovative multicart designs. Standard-sized Game Boy multicarts have either a game selection menu like the NES multicarts, or require quick toggling of the Game Boy power switch to select through games. Most of them incorporate an external soft reset button (not available on any original cart), so you can reset the game without powering off the system. To overcome the storage limitations of a standard-sized pirate cart, huge pirate carts were created. These unusually large and thick carts, more than two times the height and depth of a standard Game Boy cartridge, were able to store many of the larger new games, such as Donkey Kong Land easily. One drawback of these carts is they lack any battery backup, but some newer carts come with battery backup, so saving games on these carts is impossible if the battery backup is not included. Most of these carts were produced in China, Taiwan and Hong Kong.

More recently there have been Game Boy Advance multicarts with several GBA games and several or even hundreds of NES ROMs. These carts are known to include some bootlegs, hacks or variations of games, advertising them as different games and giving them incorrect box arts on the main boxart.

Unlicensed multicarts

These multicarts were published with the consent of the owners of copyright in the games themselves, but without the console maker's consent:

  • Action 52, from Active Enterprises. This ambitious project attempted to put 52 unique games into a single cartridge, but shoddy programming and heavy code reuse between games, combined with a hefty $200 (USD) retail price, resulted in this game often being considered one of the worst multicarts.[2][3][4]
  • Caltron 6-in-1 - Rare vintage NES multicart, later re-released as the Myriad 6 in 1
  • Maxivision 15-in-1, which contained fifteen games from unlicensed NES manufacturers such as Color Dreams and American Video Entertainment.
  • The North American versions of the Quattro series by Codemasters, published by Camerica
  • Wisdom Tree compilations:
    • Bible Adventures - This three-in-one Game Boy cartridge featured Noah's Ark, Baby Moses, and David and Goliath.
    • King James Bible - This included the King James Version Bible in e-book format, plus Bible Word Match and Bible Shepherd.
    • King of Kings: The Early Years - This three-in-one NES cartridge featured The Wise Men, Flight to Egypt and Jesus and the Temple.
    • NIV Bible & the 20 Lost Levels of Joshua - This included the New International Version Bible in e-book format, plus Bible Word Match, Bible Shepherd and Joshua: The Lost Levels. The latter is a port of Joshua & the Battle of Jericho for the Game Boy, featuring 20 levels not available in the NES version.
    • Sunday Funday - The last NES game released commercially in the United States for several years, this three-in-one cartridge featured the title game (a graphics hack of Color Dreams's old Menace Beach), Fish Fall (a previously-unreleased puzzle game), and a karaoke program featuring a Christian pop song, "The Ride," by 4Him.

Official multicarts

Atari 2600
  • 32 in 1: Only released in Europe (PAL systems) contains Atari's early hits such as Blackjack, Boxing and Combat
  • 2005 Minigame Multicart: Published by AtariAge well after the end of the 2600s lifespan, this collection includes seven entries of the 2005 MiniGame Competition

Due to the relative ease of duplicating Atari 2600 cartridges, a large number of pirate multicarts were developed for the system. Most of these were released outside the US and EU (most commonly Brazil).

Nintendo Entertainment System

Sega Master System

Sega-released Master System multicarts were labeled "The Combo Cartridge" on the box, as opposed to the "Mega Cartridge" and "Two-Mega Cartridge" labels placed on single-game cart boxes.

Sega Mega Drive/Genesis

Game Boy

Sega Game Gear

Super Nintendo Entertainment System

Nintendo 64
  • Namco Museum 64: Contains Pac-Man, Ms. Pac-Man, Pole Position, Galaga, Galaxian, and Dig Dug
  • Midway's Greatest Arcade Hits: Contains Defender, Sinistar, Robotron: 2084, Joust, Spy Hunter, and Tapper

Game Boy Advance

Nintendo DS

References
  1. "This cartridge claims to have 400 games on it. If you’ve done much research in multicarts, you’ll know that most cartridges that say they have a huge number of games usually have just a few games repeated over and over again. Well, let’s turn it on and see what we have. Well, let’s turn it on and see if it lives up to it’s promise: ... Well, that’s the 400 games, as promised. That’s pretty uncommon with multicarts promising large numbers of games." - FamicloneBlog
  2. Action 52 at MobyGames; most, if not all of the user reviews are critical of the games.
  3. Active Enterprises article on Atari HQ; the site states that the company had "far more wild dreams than actual talent", leading to their sudden demise in 1993.
  4. "...all small companies with big mouths usually go out of business. They tend to promise far, far more than they can actually deliver and end up choking themselves." - Atari HQ on Active enterprises
  5. https://segaretro.org/Mega_6_Vol._3
  6. https://www.giantbomb.com/sega-top-ten/3030-58069/
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