A very common question I’ve had over the last year or two – especially within the last few months – is, “I’ve found this version of EarthBound called ‘EarthBound Uncut’ on eBay. Is it an official release? What’s the deal?”
It’s true – EarthBound Uncut cartridges have suddenly sprung up everywhere and in a bunch of different forms! Here’s a look at a few:
As you can probably guess, these aren’t official cartridges – they’re bootleg reproduction cartridges. It’s common for repro cart makers to take others’ ROM hacks and put them onto cartridges, which is what’s happened here.
As far as I can tell, EarthBound Uncut is based on this old EarthBound ROM hack that a fan made based on my EarthBound localization comparison. I’m not even sure my comparison was complete back then, so I don’t even know how “complete” this uncut patch is. There are LOTS of hacks that are meant to uncensor EarthBound, though, so I might be wrong. If anyone has more info, let me know.
Anyway, for those who are curious or who might ask in the future, hopefully this info will help!