The Nintendo 64 Disk Drive, aka N64 DD, was never released in North America but did see a very limited release in Japan.  The limited release in Japan was not because Nintendo didn’t make enough- apparently they made 100,000 units available but only sold 15,000 of them over a 14 month period.  Along with the unit there were only 10 titles made available.  Now, a development kit for the Nintendo 64 Disk Drive has popped up on Ebay, along with a disk of unknown contents (of course).

I have to say, for the price this seller has certainly not given much in the confidence of his item.  For the low price of $2,999.99 you can get a development N64 Disk Drive with one disk.  Hmmm, is it really worth it though?  This auction flat out states that you will not be receiving the required “startup developmental cartridge”.  I mean, that is a key piece of finding out what is on that disk but you are not going to get it.  This is usually the case- these “once in a lifetime” auctions are usually missing some key component but that is not reflected in the price they are asking for what they have.  Remember, buyer beware.

What are the titles that were released?  Um, nothing all that great from what I can see.  Sure, there were a couple of Mario Paint style games- one being a polygon based deal.  There is an expansion for F-Zero X so I guess if you are an F-Zero X nut a Nintendo 64 Disk Drive could be cool.

Keep in mind, I do not know if you can play commercial games on the development disk drive.  Nor do I know if the Japanese games are compatible with the North American developmental disk drive either.  Again, buyer beware.

Source: Ebay

Carl Williams

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