Regional lockout- how many regions are there?

[jpx72]

I was wondering about how many different regions recognizable by NES are there?
For example in Europe, are there differences between the Italian, German and Scandinavian lockout chips?
Thanks!

[tepples]

There are two NES regions in Europe: PAL A and PAL B. I think Great Britain, Ireland, Australia, New Zealand, and Italy make up one region, and the rest of Europe is another. So Germany and Scandinavia are the same region.

[jpx72]

Thanks a lot, so an Italian NES won't play German cartridges. Hmm till this day I thought that Europe was one region as a whole...

[Bregalad]

It will if you cut pin 4.
Yeah to me it is completely silly that UK and Italy didn't get the same CIC as the remaining of Europe... Especially considering otherwise the games (ROMs, packaging, etc...) are exactly identical. I get the NTSC/PAL differences, so I do get the Japan/America/Europe differencies. But differencies within europe, other than translations for different languages, is silly.
And only a couple of NES games were translated into something other than english (Shadowgate comes to mind).

For all other Nintendo and non Nintendo consoles released later, Europe has always been considered a single region though.

PS : What about Ireland ? Did they get PAL-A or PAL-B games ? It would have made some sense if they had PAL-A like the UK, but then again I don't think Nintendo made any sense at all in the first place.

[tepples]

Yeah to me it is completely silly that UK and Italy didn't get the same CIC as the remaining of Europe

The UK/Italy/Australia version (PAL A, CIC 3197) was distributed by Mattel, and the other version (PAL B, CIC 3195) was distributed by another company. Different distributors of the NES wanted their shares of the licensing revenue for games sold in their regions.

But differencies within europe, other than translations for different languages, is silly.

Except for country-specific censorship rules, such as "No Swastikas" restrictions in different parts of Europe.

[jpx72]

Swastikas

So the Nazis are responsible that Nintendo set Europe apart!

[qbradq]

Nazis and Mattel, yes