Nintendo Game Boxes?

[JP]

OK...I know this is a strange one!

I've wondered about this before but I've finally decided that I need to know the answer now.

Looking at my UK DS games, each one has a coloured triangle at the bottom right of the spine. Most of them are green triangles but occasionally I've seen purple and I think, blue too.

They don't seem to have any relevance to age ratings, genre, publisher or anything else either.

They are also on the Wii & Gamecube games and I think they were on older games too. I've not noticed them on games from other regions, only here.

Does anybody have any idea what the hell they are for?

[Emir]

I thought they were for genre.... possibly. My memory is pretty bad though.

[tom-nook]

Not 100% certain but I think 1st party titles are always green and (at least some) 3rd party games have a purple triangle.

I seem to remember that Australian gamecube games had the same sort of thing going on...but I think possibly with different colours though.

Edit: quick search on Google & there seems to be loads of theories kicking about but no definitive answer.....country the game is intended for/ age rating/ genre/ publisher etc.

[Mayhem]

The colour dictates which countries in Europe the game is supposed to be sold in, based on the instruction manual language(s) available (sometimes it's a multimanual, sometimes a one language job for each specific country) and the programming in-game.

Not sure if there's anywhere which explains what colour means which region(s) though...

[JP]

It doesn't tie into the language theory though as I have different games with exactly the same languages and different colours and also games with different languages and the same colours.

That was one of my many ideas which I tested lol.

They just don't seem to correspond to anything that I can work out.

[egparadigm]

I wondered the same thing a few years ago. I was a prolific gamecube collector and I noticed the same pattern.

The answer is: region. The green is for western Europe and purple is Germany. Or something like that. I was told by Mim who worked for NGC.

[JP]

You mean region they are sold in or assembled in?

Maybe we should start a list and work it out lol...

[egparadigm]

I just had a look at my games and some say they are assembled in Germany, some say Europe - regardless of the colour of stripe.

Out of 29 European games, 3 are purple (the rest green). They are: Beyond Good and Evil (Ubi), Ikaruga (Infogrames) and PoP:SoT (Ubi).

[JP]

The majority do seem to be green.

Out of about 20 - 25 games I have 2 purple which are Nanostray (DS) and Ikaruga like you.

What the hell have I started here? lol

Maybe it's some huge multi platform party game that Nintendo have been gradually selling us for years without us knowing?

[MattyD]

AFAIK the colour tells the German people in the Nintendo distribution centre which manuals to pack in the box. I know it's something to do with which languages a title has. All of my PAL games are green I think, except for Beyond Good and Evil, if that helps.

[Mayhem]

It doesn't tie into the language theory though as I have different games with exactly the same languages and different colours and also games with different languages and the same colours.(

I shouldn't have really used "based" as other people have also followed up, but the flash DOES indicate which countries the release is for and determines the manual going in there. I have some PAL Cube games, and all the green flash have multimanuals, and the pink have single language for starters... although the INLAY to the games in the pink cases are still multilanguage.

[JP]

So as they are packing them they will different colours depending on where they will be sold and different booklets are put inside?

If it's a purple one then how does that show them which language booklet to use?

[Swallow]

Heh, PAL boxes.