HES --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Founded in 1984, HES (Home Entertainment Suppliers) is an Australian company that produced and sold games for the NES from Sachen, AVE, AGCI, Tengen, and Color Dreams. In total, HES released 26 NES games, including 5 multicarts. They made their own cartridges and labels, although the game software (and sometimes entire PCB chipset) were not changed at all from their original publishers. HES stands out among the unlicensed publishers mostly because of their assortment of different cartridge styles.
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Whether you were using an actual NES console, or one of the many available NES or Famicom clone systems, HES had a cartridge that would work for you. They defeated the NES lockout chip by having the player attach a licensed NES game to their cartridge via a built-in port on the "piggyback" cartridge design, or a special adapter with a ribbon cable connection on the "dongle" cartridge design. Either way, this effectively added a working lockout chip to their unlicensed game. Ingenious and annoying at the same time, these games are frustrating to collect because they don't fit into boxes, cases, or on shelves with the rest of your collection. HES also produced games in a more normal looking flat cartridge design. The result of all of this is that most HES titles have multiple cartridge variants.
Sidewinder
HES Flat Cartridge
Sidewinder
HES Piggyback Cartridge
HES Piggyback Cartridge
Top View
Sidewinder
HES Dongle Cartridge
There is also a sub-variant of the HES flat cartridge design. Earlier releases (Type 1) have a flat top edge with tiny ridges to act as a grab-tab for loading and unloading the game into the console. Later releases (Type 2) have the same ridges, but also a raised lip at very top to make it easier to get the games in and out.
Pac-Man
HES Flat Cart Type 1
Chiller
HES Flat Cart Type 2
In addition to cartridge variants, some HES titles can be found with a full-color label, a black & white label, or an upside-down label. The black & white labels seem to exist on games that were released later on, presumably to cut costs. Another interesting fact is that none of the HES carts have back labels.
Penguin & Seal Arctic Adventure
Color Label, Upside-Down Color Label, and Black & White Label
Chiller
Duck Maze
F-15 City War
Death Race
Funblaster Pak
Impossible Mission 2
*all known flat cart copies have an upside-down label
Jackpot
Little Red Hood
Magexa Soccer
(Ultimate League Soccer)
Maxi 15 Pack Version 1
Green Label
Pyramid & Double Strike
Maxi 15 Pack Version 2
Red Label
Death Race & Black Jack
Mindblower Pak
Othello
Pac-Man
Penguin & Seal Arctic Adventure
Pipemania
Pyramid
AVE label
Pyramid
black & white label
R.B.I. Baseball
Raid 2020
Real Player's Pack
(Caltron 6-In-1)
Sidewinder
Silent Assault
Super Sprint
Toobin'
Total Funpak
Twin Eagle
Vindicators
One of the more obscure oddities in the HES catalog is the Magexa 2-Pack. This somewhat flimsy cardboard box contained two HES games - Super Sprint and Magexa Soccer, both flat carts type 2. Super Sprint is the same cart that HES sold in its regular cardboard packaging, but Magexa Soccer (pictured above) is something unique. The game's ROM is actually Ultimate League Soccer by AVE, but it's built into a HES cartridge on a HES PCB. The cart has black label that simply calls the game Soccer, and says that it is distributed by a company called Magexa from Napoli (Italy). The Magexa Soccer cart can also be found in its own box, which calls it International Ultimate League Soccer. It is believed that this version was sold only in Italy, and the Magexa 2-Pack was sold only in Australia. Very little is known about either of these versions.
Magexa 2-Pack
International Ultimate League Soccer
The chart below lists all of the known HES cartridge variants for each title.
Most HES games were sold in a large plastic clamshell case, similar to what VHS tapes were sold in at the time. The games' manuals were printed on the back of the case insert, which slid out of a plastic sleeve on the front. Later releases were sold in a standard-sized cardboard NES box.
Total Funpak
plastic clamshell case
Super Sprint
cardboard box
Most likely due to its proximity to the East and deep connections to the West, Australia, more than any other country, had a wide variety of PAL and NTSC NES games, Famicom games, and unlicensed and bootleg games in both formats. HES realized this and came out with two products to help gamers get the most out of their NES consoles - The Unidaptor and Unidaptor MKII. The original Unidaptor was way ahead of its time. It's a bulky device that consists of a HES NES cartridge attached to a ribbon cable that connects to a large metal box with 3 cartridge slots on top. The first slot is for a licensed NES game that matches the regional lockout info of the console. The second slot is for any 72-pin cart, licensed or unlicensed, from any region. The third slot is for any 60-pin Famicom style cart, licensed or unlicensed, from any region. The console takes the lockout chip security and regional data from the first cart, and the actual game software from the other cartridge passes through, allowing you to play anything on your NES. It does not require a battery or external power source, and stays connected to the NES console, reducing wear and tear on the 72-pin connector inside. The Unidaptor MKII was a smaller, less expensive version that looks exactly like a HES Piggyback cart, but with two cartridge slots on the end, one for the local licensed game, and the other for the second 72-pin game. The MKII does not support 60-pin carts.
HES Unidaptor
HES Unidaptor MKII
HES Unidaptor
installed with games