Anyone know wtf this SNES screen is? What causes it? How to get rid of it?

[advancedpillow]

I sat down after 12 hours of work to play a repro cart. I never EVER got this screen before, in 20+ years of playing my snes.



I reset the console, loaded it up again, and my save files were wiped. Completely deleted! Does my snes suddenly think im playing pirated games? It's an ntsc console. This is just bizarre. I recently finished a 10 hour quest on a different repro cart. No problems. I tried to load that one up tonight and it gave me that message.

Is my snes dying or something? I'm genuinely freaked out about this. Is this this some weird lockout thing? I should mention, none of these repros that are causing this screen are new. I've had and played these for at least a year now. I'm just totally stunned.

[Quietus]

I doubt that it's your SNES.  As I recall, these messages are displayed on a per-game basis.  Does it happen with every single one?  Just one cart?  Have you tried an original game to see if you get it?

[snarfblam]

I've seen this before 'round the webs. My recollection is a bit fuzzy, but I believe that this is programmed into the games and not into the SNES. This video shows a different looking screen for Donkey Kong.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HyxRSK6g_yU#

I imagine that it's triggered by something along the lines of a bad checksum or detectable differences in unlicensed cart hardware.  You know, the sorts of things you might see in repro carts. Bumping the cart could also cause glitchiness that might cause this, possibly indirectly by corrupting save files. By the way, how is a repro cart different from a pirate cart?

[advancedpillow]

Well that explains why my save files were wiped.