Gisteren deed RoyRetroKing (awesome dude, zie zijn Twitter en YouTube Kanaal) een tweet over de NES (Nintendo Entertainment System) ROM van Happily Ever After, een game die 25 jaar geleden gecanceld werd omdat de Disney film waar deze titel op gebaseerd zou worden niet door ging. Maar deze ROM (lees Prototype en dus buggy) is nu online gezet en te spelen via een Everdrive Flashcard op de originele hardware of via een emulator naar keuze op je PC, gemodde console of Raspberry Pi etc etc. De link naar de ROM kan je helemaal op de bodem van dit zeer informatieve artikel vinden, waar van je hier onder een stukje kunt lezen.

A press release sent out by 1st National Film in October stated that this Nintendo game was scheduled for January 1991. The film, meanwhile, only made it to French movie screens in 1990, due to 1st National Film's failure to procure enough money for advertising and prints, according to the Associated Press. An application to join the NASDAQ was being prepared by the distributor, while the summer of 1991 was the new slated release date for the movie. (Ironically, Disney beat Filmation to the punch by introducing the first animated motion picture sequel in its company's history in November 1990, The Rescuers Down Under.)

After January rolled around uneventfully, GamePro published a single screenshot of Snow White's 8-bit video game in action in March 1991 with the bemused aside, "What? An NES title with a female protagonist?"Game Player's wrote in the same month that the gaming adventure was "forthcoming" to coincide with the still unexhibited feature film.

In July, 1st National Film began trading on the NASDAQ (link). A company press release from the following month claimed that when the Nintendo game was demoed at Chicago's Consumer Electronics Show in June, over $3 million in advance wholesale orders were placed by retailers during the four-day gathering.

Sean McGee is no stranger to this website. I was already in his debt when he helped solve a decade-old mystery behind the Super Mario Bros. 2 sample cartridges that were purportedly used in-house by Nintendo of America. He found one hidden in a system at a yard sale, and did what no other collector before him would do: shared the data for history's sake, making my heart grow several sizes that day.

I could hardly believe the continuation of his good luck when he notified me in mid-July 2015 of his latest find.

"Have you ever heard of the Happily Ever After NES game? I've run into a copy of that."

Having followed Nintendo prototype matters for far too long, I have become accustomed to the condescension, the bravado, the bullshit that go hand in hand. Sean resembles none of that. He's refreshingly down-to-earth and tells me bewildering, unprovoked things like "And of course a ROM dump will follow." There isn't a quote more deserving to be immortalized in knitted cursive on a decorative pillow.