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byuu, creator of the cycle-accurate SNES emulator higan and behind a preservation project for SNES games, has killed the project after a loss of 100 PAL games during shipping. While he still plans to dump the Japanese games that he bought, the hopes of getting a complete PAL set are gone.

On January 5th, a package containing 100 PAL games were sent to me to dump. The United States Postal Service has either stolen or lost this package. Most likely the former.

Do not tell me to wait longer. I don't want to fucking hear it. The package is gone and nobody can help. I don't want to ride on some platitude that "HERP DERP MAYBE ONE DAY THEY'LL SHOW UP!" They won't. There is no point in false hope, that's cruel to both me and the donor, and it will just delay reimbursement.

The next step is to try and obtain the insurance claim, and then I'm going to start making payments each paycheck to try and reimburse the sender until he is able to repuchase all 100 games locally. Or if he prefers, he can just keep the money that's equivalent to the value of the cartridges. I won't be purchasing the carts to be delievered to me, because I don't want to risk shipping them back.

I also want to be clear, the donor never asked for reimbursement upon loss. It was my decision and it's going to happen, because I can't live with myself if it doesn't.

Regardless, this much is certain: the SNES preservation project is officially and permanently dead.

This is a great loss to the emulation scene and its attempt at preserving the original systems accurately. Some people are suggesting byuu to set up a Patreon/GoFundMe and he seems okay with the idea if he can fully pay back for what was lost this time.

Source
byuu's overview


EDIT: Feb 23

It appears that the games have been recovered! The $10,000 collection of rare Super Nintendo games are no longer missing. According to the USPS, the games were actually lost, due to the label ripping off, rather than the rumors of package theft that had been floating around. Byuu, the person behind the project now says the SNES Preservation Project is no longer dead. In the linked blog post below, Byuu writes that had the media not covered this incident, these games would have sat in a facility for months, before ultimately winding up in an auction. There was a clear address on the box, even after the label had been damaged. He says while the project will continue on in the years to come, but he will never trust the postal service with larger shipments due to this issue.

My package was sitting in Atlanta, GA for well over a month with my address clearly visible right on the box. Had this case not been escalated to the media, it likely would have gone up for auction in a bin with other electronics sometime in March. As absolutely thrilled as I am to have these games finally delivered, I do still believe the entire experience reflects poorly on the capabilities of the USPS. I hope that they will improve, but ... I'm guessing that's not likely.

If you donated to his Patreon to help recover the cost of the lost games, Byuu is offering a full refund.

SOURCE

 

[Haloman800]

The post office lost my gps I sent to my wife so she knew how to get home from a trip.
It did have a $50 insurance claim that I filed the paperwork for, then low and behold they lost the paperwork a month later and ironically the tracking number was taken off their site. Moral of the story is... Never trust a government entity. Use ups or fedex.

USPS lost $300 Disney World tickets I sold on eBay. When I called customer service, they were completely useless & I had to eat the loss.

USPS is a joke. Thats all there is to say.
From pricing to actual handling of items.
A joke.

Fun fact. USPS makes it illegal for companies like UPS or FedEx to charge less than them for mailing certain items. That's right, they are forcing you to pay more for their competition so you will go to them instead.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Private_Express_Statutes

 

[Sonic Angel Knight]

Well, only if a nipponi-san guy would downloaded the game at the limited time that it was on broadcast, and then his/her BS-X Cartridge would be obtained by a preserver (dumper). That's how Cifaldi and Callis dumped a handful of other titles in Kirby no Omochabako series, and the only one remained undumped of them is "Kirby's Ball Rally". I have the same prob you have, since I have SMB3 BSX ROM, but only the third week the other weeks are not available over the web, maybe they are not dumped also, Tamori no Picross dated 4.23 is also undumped (Check out picross.wikia.com/wiki/Tamori_no_Picross)

I dunno how the stuff is dumpped, all i know is that there was a special smb3 game i haven't played and i wanted to try it. So i tried running the rom in the emulator, all i get is a title screen with the box art that shows up in super mario all-stars, then nothing happens. I dunno how to continue. It was more confusing thaan when i had to figue out how to actually play legend of zelda FDS game. I didn't know that i had to switch sides at the title screen, usually in FDS games it tells you when to switch sides, but that specific games doesn't, it just plays the title screen demo in endless loop until you change to side B.

I don't know where to get instructions on how to play the BSX SMB3 game, all i know is some require to wait and even holding turbo fast forward for minutes did nothing.

 

[gamesquest1]

well I guess with enough attention ups might get off their butts and go check the "lost mail" room and find it, I had a scan through the reddit posts but between the jokes etc I couldn't see any mention of if he had sent them a picture of what the parcel would have looked like originally and with the brown paper removed (I. e if it was in a say, repurposed shoe box or something for example) those kinds of thing would help the staff find the unlabeled packaged, although he would probably have to jump through some hoops to prove the item was his etc, but it's better than leaving it to get buried in the pile of damaged/lost items never to be seen again

let's just hope some scum bag hasn't ran off with them, although I assume they will have decent cctv coverage in their sorting centre, or at least they should have

 

[fatsquirrel]

USPS lost $300 Disney World tickets I sold on eBay. When I called customer service, they were completely useless & I had to eat the loss.


Fun fact. USPS makes it illegal for companies like UPS or FedEx to charge less than them for mailing certain items. That's right, they are forcing you to pay more for their competition so you will go to them instead.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Private_Express_Statutes

I paid 35$ for shipping of a knife from USA to my location via USPS. It took more than 3 (!!!!!!) weeks for item to arrive., when it did, the box was so mauled that I could see the inside of it and the items packaging was squished.
Its like tigers handle their packages.
Next time I paid 45$ for UPS and the same (category) item was in my mailbox in a bit more than 48 hours, package was nice and clean, no dents whatsoever.
I'm not even gonna complain about tracking via USPS. Its like this
1. PACKAGE OUR COURIER PICKED UP YOUR PACKAGE- 2. WE DONT KNOW WHERE THE FUCK IT IS NOW BETTER PRAY ITS COMING - 3. DELIVERED

Anyway I ordered 3 times so far via usps because it was the cheapest (or the only) possible option, but good lord, never again.

 

[ww97]

I dunno how the stuff is dumpped, all i know is that there was a special smb3 game i haven't played and i wanted to try it. So i tried running the rom in the emulator, all i get is a title screen with the box art that shows up in super mario all-stars, then nothing happens. I dunno how to continue. It was more confusing thaan when i had to figue out how to actually play legend of zelda FDS game. I didn't know that i had to switch sides at the title screen, usually in FDS games it tells you when to switch sides, but that specific games doesn't, it just plays the title screen demo in endless loop until you change to side B.

I don't know where to get instructions on how to play the BSX SMB3 game, all i know is some require to wait and even holding turbo fast forward for minutes did nothing.

ZSNES does not work here. Use SNESGT and hold L-shift until the 8 minutes pass.
BTW, I tried it, but Mario's sprite is a bit glitched...

 

[Sheimi]

I never had any trouble with USPS in my area. Order from JP, Pal, US games, dresses, etc via USPS. Different for everyone then.

 

[Tom Bombadildo]

Every shipping service is shit somewhere, it just depends on your area more than the service as a whole. I've never had any problems with USPS or UPS, but Fedex is easily the worst shipping carrier I've come across (losing packages, extremely long sort times, box damage etc). DHL is also extremely ass, somehow a package being shipped from Texas with DHL went in a giant circle, going from Texas to Arkansas to Indiana...then straight back to Texas again. I live in MI.

 

[Saiyan Lusitano]

...So buy them all again maybe..? And locally this time?

Buy again and locally? If these games are rare and expensive then it'd cost him much more to buy each one separately. This is the type of collection that can take months or years just to get a game at a decent price.

It's looking more like this was a theft and not a mis-delivery of the items.

It was definitely theft as this type of thing doesn't just get.. lost.

USPS lost $300 Disney World tickets I sold on eBay. When I called customer service, they were completely useless & I had to eat the loss.

An employee most likely kept them and resold.

I paid 35$ for shipping of a knife from USA to my location via USPS.

What kind of a knife is it?

 

[fatsquirrel]

What kind of a knife is it?

Tactical, why?
Don't worry I'm a hunter.

 

[Jayro]

I hate how my package ships 95% to me, then gets handed off to the local USPS post office for delivery. Like, I paid for FedEx to knock at my door for delivery, not for you incompetent fuckbags to leave it on my doorstep without knocking, thanks...

 

[fatsquirrel]

I hate how my package ships 95% to me, then gets handed off to the local USPS post office for delivery. Like, I paid for FedEx to knock at my door for delivery, not for you incompetent fuckbags to leave it on my doorstep without knocking, thanks...

A local d delivery service guy once left my packet which had over 500$ worth items inside it at a nearby supermarket and then called me to pick it up. Also that market is 1 mile away from my residence....need I say I went full rage on their customer service?

 

[Saiyan Lusitano]

Tactical, why?
Don't worry I'm a hunter.

Cool. But I mean, what does it look like?

 

[fatsquirrel]

Cool. But I mean, what does it look like?

That particular order was a Chris Reeves Sebenza 21 Large model with carbon fiber handle

edit: wrong model picture

 

[Daggot]

Seeing how people are sharing USPS fail stories I'll share one. I once imported an in-box copy of Megaman Legends for the N64 from Japan. The mailman left it in the rain instead of placing it my mailbox literally half a foot away. Since JP N64 boxes are cardboard if the Japanese guy who mailed it hadn't wrapped it in a shit ton of plastic it would've been ruined.

 

[tbb043]

I highly doubt anything was stolen. Who would even know what was in it to steal it? No, far more likely lost or even destroyed. Maybe half a cart and the mailing label will show up in a few months in a plastic bag with a "whoops we messed up, but we deliver millions of pieces of mail each year so yeah fuck you if you think we're gonna take responsibility for your shit getting wrecked" message printed on it.

I told a lot of people in my community, don't use US Postal Services if you don't want to get your stuff stolen.

Problem is, he wasn't even using the post office, his actual shipper (DHL, I believe) stupidly took it most of the way then put it in the mail for the last leg of the journey. UPS and Fedex do this sometimes as well, and short of very expensive personal couriers, that's pretty much it for shipping.

Anyway, i just mean that there is some awful stuff going on with USPS, and then how do they stay in business?

They're part of the government bureaucracy, that means they don't need results to stay in business and also makes the employees all but impossible to fire no matter how corrupt or incompetent.Part of the swamp that needs draining,

 

[gamesquest1]

the dreaded postal service in the UK is "my hermes", one time they decided a "safe place" to leave a parcel was directly in front of the drain pipe while it was raining, luckily I had only popped the shop and missed them by 5 mins, but if I would have been out all day that would have been completely drowned

unfortunately a lot international delivery companies use them as their uk partner (as they are the bottom of the barrel cheap option) so whenever I'm expecting something from abroad I have to be extra vigilante, they have also handed me a parcel that upon looking at the parcel it was supposed to be delivered to a completely different city and it took them over 2 weeks to come pick it back up to get it to the proper address, when I phoned at first to tell them their mistake their suggestion was that I go post it at the post office

 

[Saiyan Lusitano]

the dreaded postal service in the UK is "my hermes", one time they decided a "safe place" to leave a parcel was directly in front of the drain pipe while it was raining, luckily I had only popped the shop and missed them by 5 mins, but if I would have been out all day that would have been completely drowned

unfortunately a lot international delivery companies use them as their uk partner (as they are the bottom of the barrel cheap option) so whenever I'm expecting something from abroad I have to be extra vigilante, they have also handed me a parcel that upon looking at the parcel it was supposed to be delivered to a completely different city and it took them over 2 weeks to come pick it back up to get it to the proper address, when I phoned at first to tell them their mistake their suggestion was that I go post it at the post office

To be on the safe side it's better to use Royal Mail over Hermes, unless shipping is cheaper via Hermes but then one has to consider how valuable that item is to be sent via Hermes. I've read "Left it on the porch" and that's very worrisome because that could mean anything and it could be stolen by a by-passer.

 

[gamesquest1]

To be on the safe side it's better to use Royal Mail over Hermes, unless shipping is cheaper via Hermes but then one has to consider how valuable that item is to be sent via Hermes. I've read "Left it on the porch" and that's very worrisome because that could mean anything and it could be stolen by a by-passer.

yeah I never recommend my hermes to anyone, whilst nothing has ever been lost, its clear their drivers resent their jobs and seemingly have a monthly competition going for the most ridiculous poor delivery method of the month/year

 

[KingAsix]

I saw his reasons but I didn't think that was valid enough not to go and get them himself. To trust such a large and expensive package to USPS was foolish.

 

[depaul]

Sorry for the loss but... why does he need to dump the cartridges again? Don't we have full SNES Romsets floating around the net?