Regarding the lost FE6 trial maps

[Historia-KQ]

Hello. Person who was responsible for writing the FE6 promo trial maps article on LMW here.

Just now, I saw a comment on Filbertian's Youtube video about the maps (here) written by taketokinoko who claimed to have participated in the Ranking Contest where the "Defeat Bandits" cartridge could be obtained. This person claims that they still have the cartridge, though judging from what the translation says, it apparently doesn't work anymore, and so are all other cartridges that have the rest of the trial maps.

Here's the full comment translated in DeepL, which includes the data of the "Defeat Bandits" map according to them.:

I participated in the ranking that took place on the official Sword of the Seal website.
At that time, I sent a GBA cartridge to Nintendo and received a trial map for "Defeat the Bandits".
I still have that cartridge.

However, 20 years later, I can't load the "Banditry" map, probably because the battery in the cartridge ran out.
Probably all of the existing cartridges that received the trial map are in the same state.
So, I cannot speak about the exact data.

If I were to speak from my memory at the time, it would look something like this (this is just an image in my memory):

• Map size was about 24 wide and 20 high.
• Your units are initially placed on the left side of the map.
• The area of "high mountains" is spread out in a diamond shape in the center of the map. The length of the diagonal of the rhombus is about 16 (width) and 14 (height).
• In the center of the "high mountain" area, there are 3 squares of "flat land" and "fortress", where there are wise men with "Thunder Storm" and "Reserve".
• Berserkers and dragon masters are scattered throughout the map.
• Infantry classes such as snipers, heroes, and wisemen are placed along the path.
• Enemy castles are on the right side of the map. Castles are control points.

It is worth noting that this is the only map where enemy units use "reserve".
The "reserve" does not appear during the main part of the Sword of the Seal, and is only possessed by Brunya, who is added in the trial map.
Since the enemy mobs are equipped with such a rare item, it left quite an impression on me at the time.

So, if anything of what taketokinoko said is true regarding the fate of these cartridges, then maybe the promo trial maps are gone forever, though I still have hope that working cartridges are out there. At least we know what the "Defeat Bandits" map is all about, based on what they remembered. Please lmk if there's any inaccuracies about what is translated. Again, I used Google Translate to figure out what they said about the lost FE6 trial maps.

Edited September 29, 2022 by Historia-KQ
Updated for better accuracy

[Mars of Aritia]

Interesting.

It sounds a bit like chapter 15, only the castle is on the right. Despite the name, it seems like it's a seize chapter (制圧 means seize i think, don't know Japanese), with the gimmick being you have to go around the mountain (sounds like it's mostly peak tiles (高い山) so you can't cross it) while avoiding bolting and fortify sages in the middle.

Would be great if he could try to dump the rom or the save file, perhaps it can be salvaged from there.

(and fyi, I recommend using deepl for japanese machine translations, generally much more accurate.)

[VincentASM]

Nice discovery!

Mm, it didn't really sink in that Binding Blade is 20 years ago. It would've been much easier if we tried to locate the carts earlier, but at this point, I'm not holding out much hope.

Only way I can think of seeing those maps if somebody leaks them (extremely, extremely low) or there's a Binding Blade remake that brings them back (not impossible, since New Mystery brought back the BSFE episodes, but I doubt it).

Or somebody already dumped the ROMs/saves way back.

[Historia-KQ]

11 hours ago, Mars of Aritia said:

Interesting.

It sounds a bit like chapter 15, only the castle is on the right. Despite the name, it seems like it's a seize chapter (制圧 means seize i think, don't know Japanese), with the gimmick being you have to go around the mountain (sounds like it's mostly peak tiles (高い山) so you can't cross it) while avoiding bolting and fortify sages in the middle.

Would be great if he could try to dump the rom or the save file, perhaps it can be salvaged from there.

(and fyi, I recommend using deepl for japanese machine translations, generally much more accurate.)

Ah I see. Judging by that, the map itself sounds pretty challenging.

Also, I've updated the OP by replacing the Google one with the new translation using DeepL as you suggested.

9 hours ago, VincentASM said:

Nice discovery!

Mm, it didn't really sink in that Binding Blade is 20 years ago. It would've been much easier if we tried to locate the carts earlier, but at this point, I'm not holding out much hope.

Only way I can think of seeing those maps if somebody leaks them (extremely, extremely low) or there's a Binding Blade remake that brings them back (not impossible, since New Mystery brought back the BSFE episodes, but I doubt it).

Or somebody already dumped the ROMs/saves way back.

Yeah, it doesn't help that from my knowledge, only few cartridges have these trial maps, and most of them have broken down in the following 20 years. If more people became aware of the trial maps back in the day, they would've been preserved easily.

Anyways, so far, taketokinoko is the first of those people who have a cartridge for one of the lost maps (and sadly theirs had broken down), so if anyone managed to get in contact with them, please just let me know. I hope we find more people who still owns the cartridges that have these trial maps installed, and maybe we could find more info regarding the other three.

[Historia-KQ]

I've updated the LMW page to add the new information about "Defeat Bandits".