Older systems never really go out of style. Though new technology may make them obsolete, they will forever hold a place in your heart for being absolutely rad. If you're wise you've maintained that old SNES or Gameboy, still bringing it out from time to time and rocking the hell out of Tetris. But what of us who lacked that foresight? Are we to be forever punished for our folly?

As it turns out, lots of companies make bootleg Nintendo systems and have been since the days of the Famicom. Though what they've done is all sorts of illegal, these people are heroes for bringing the joy of Double Dragon and Bubble Bobble to those who wouldn't have had access to the actual system. But every hero needs a villain, and the world of copyright infringement is no different. Though some of these shady knock-offs are a actually quite good, there are a fair share that are simply lazy or flat out dangerous. As a service to you, our humble reader, we present the five worst Nintendo knock-offs, now with at least one explosion.

5) Power Player Super Joy III

For the folks who want to have 76,000 NES games in their hands, but only after uttering the world's most ridiculous title, comes the Power Player Super Joy III. Manufactured in China and modeled after the N64 controller, this bad-boy plugs directly into your television. A second player can join the copyright infringing fun by hooking up a Sega Genesis-looking controller and for some games a light gun is also included. Some models even have a slot for Japanese Famicom cartridges, if several thousand video games isn't enough to fill the void in your entertainment life. If you're still hesitant to the shell out the $70 asking price, check out the box:

Pictured: Awesome.

The Super Joy is so incredibly amazing that three Jedi are fighting to the death just to get a shot at using the zapper gun. In fact, this thing is so extreme that it can some how be "The Original" and a "New Addition" at the same time. The Super Joy III is sold in Brazil, Europe, Asia and, until recently, North America. As it turns out, the FBI looks down on piracy because they lack a sense of fun, so they've become pretty strict about keeping this out of American stores. Though it isn't very likely that this will be staring back at you window shopping in the mall, it's still a common find a flea markets, a.k.a. The Black Market for Crap, and is pretty much guaranteed to go cheap.

The Catch: Of those 76,000 games, 1,000 of them are Popeye.

Though you might think that a company that's willing to infringe on several copyrights between its very product and said product's packaging is trust worthy enough to advertise itself honestly, the Super Joy doesn't have 76,000 games so much as it has 76. Granted, those games are duplicated 1,000 times each, so it's almost a truthful statement in the same sense that the FDR almost walked. When the Power Player Super Joy 3.5 ("Now With More Joy!") was released, they pulled the claim of having over 76,000 games and kept with the original 76. Most of these games, like Super Mario Bros., were common in their day, and only a few overall are rare, so you really have to consider if the promised super joy is going to be worth an FBI raid on your basement.

4) The Game Axe

In 1995 the folks in the Taiwainese company Legend Technologies had a dream: to play Famicom games anywhere. Sure, there was the Game Boy, but the Famicom ports were limited and the display was laughable. There was potential in a portable Famicom and Nintendo passed on it. Legend Technologies decided the only thing to do was to take the law into their own hands and break it by creating the Game Axe.

Needless to say, Taiwanese video game designers have yet to see an actual axe.

The near 4 inch screen displays perfect colors and the mono speaker is pretty clear on all volume settings. Though they weren't originally intended to be sold outside of Asia, a Game Axe can be purchased via mail order for about $200, which is reasonable when you consider that you could buy two Nintendos, carry them around and make awesome laser sounds for about the same amount.

The Catch: In the early days of portable video game consoles powering the unit was a problem, and the Axe was no exception. For six AA batteries you get around 2 to 2 1/2 hours of game play and, unless you're the Energizer Bunny, the cumulative cost of batteries will soon out-weigh the costs of getting this thing through customs. Fortunately, there's the option of using an AC adapter (though not included because that would make sense), saving you countless dollars on batteries and thoroughly defeating the portability concept.

There's also the matter of playing actual Nintendo cartridges. You're no doubt aware that a Famicom cart is much smaller than a NES cart. In order to play an NES cart you'll need to use the included adapter. The added weight requires you to balance the NES cart while playing it, effectively turning you're game of Duck Hunt into a game of Jenga. If the cart or the adapter are touched, moved, jarred or shouted at in the slightest the game will freeze and effectively end. So yeah, maybe portability isn't such a great option.

3) Game Theory Admiral

We're not entirely sure what theory they're presenting here.

The Game Theory Admiral brings together a love of NES games with the convenience of portability. Unlike Nintendo's own Gameboy, the GTA plays actual Famicom cartridges. Also, it's apparently an admiral, so it's got that going for it, too. The Chinese based publisher Mystery sells the Admiral online for about $58. The system is modeled after the Game Boy Advance, sans the left and right trigger buttons, and is a vast improvement over the Game Axe of old. The system makes use of an adapter to play Famicom games. Through the use of composite cables, you can even play the Admiral on a television, acting as a home system and carry-around. The battery life, color, and sound are all improved from the Game Axe, making it the illegal Nintendo handheld to own. It didn't earn all those medals for nothing, you know.

The Catch: The Famicom adapter will only allow you to play Famicom games, so Nintendo carts in other regions are useless. Some people claim that using an old Game Axe adapter in your Famicom adapter leads to success, but at that point your cartridge is towering some nine inches over the system itself, so you should probably stop importing Chinese electronics and just buy a damn NES.

As for multiplayer, no such thing is possible. The system has a controller port for a second player, but you would need a non-existent converter for any Nintendo controller to fit. There's also a plug-in for an AC adapter, which, of course, the Admiral doesn't come with. Some reviewers claim that the system actually blew up while using a simple Radio Shack AC Adapter, so you should probably avoid this thing all together if you live anywhere near electricity or, at the very least, a Radio Shack.

2) TriStar 64

Wish you could play older Nintendo games on your current system? The Wii answers the call by playing GameCube games as well as having a back catalog of older games on the Virtual Console. But let's assume you don't have a Wii - either you hate fun or you're allergic to awesome. What are you to do?

The folks from Hong Kong's Future Laboratories (apparently based in the future) developed the TriStar 64, an unauthorized add-on to your Nintendo 64.

Greetings from the future.

This piece of hardware slides into the cartridge slot of the N64 and rests on top of the system. The three slots on top of the Tristar can play N64, Super Nintendo/Famicom and Famicom games (an adapter is needed for standard NES games). You can even play Game Boy games with a Super Game Boy cart, effectively letting you play every Nintendo system from the NES to the N64 (except the Virtual Boy, not that you'll want to play it anyway).

The Catch: To say that the Tristar is a little bulky is to say the Nile is damp.

It's just about the size of the N64 itself. It's so big, in fact, that it requires its own power supply via an AC adapter. You'll also need to run the N64's AV cables through the Tristar and then plug the Tristar's own AV cables into the television. Once you've managed to hook everything up, you should have a crude electric jungle canopy. Oh, and that thing about playing all the games from the NES onward? Turns out that's not true. Many games with save features like Super Mario RPG or The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past (see: games you'd still want to play) don't actually run on the Tristar. Hopefully you enjoy playing Popeye.

1) The Chitendo Wii

In some countries console piracy is widely acceptable because of costs. The original hardware is considered too expensive for the average consumer and thus a cheaper version is much more profitable. Enter the Vii, China's answer to the Wii. Clocking in at around $180, the Vii is cheaper than the Wii and, unlike other items on this list, the Vii isn't a simple redesign to play NES games. The company behind the Vii, KenSingTon, has managed to spread the Vii throughout Europe, where it's advertised in shops as an alternative to the Wii. The Vii has become so popular that it's even being sold in Japan for about $80, substantially cheaper than the retail price of the system it was based off of. What could possibly be wrong with this?

The Catch: Well for starters, the fucking thing is hollow.

On the upside, this is an excellent place to hide Easter eggs.

For $180 you'd expect you're hardware of questionable legality to at least be well built. Whatever makes this thing work is all right there. It is incredibly lightweight and it looks as though a short fall would result in the insides coming apart like so many Legos. On top of that, the motion controls, while functional, barely work. Though a few of the included games work well with their simple motions others require a great amount of aggression and violence to register.

To put the icing on this shitty cake, it doesn't actually play Wii games. Insteadm it comes with a tiny cartridge of twelve 16-bit games. So in short, you paid for a Super Nintendo that you can flail at while you play. The twelve in one "Sport Vii" cart has some simple Wii Sports clones played by a diseased rabbit and his rodent friend. The highlight, however, is definitely Fry Egg, a game where you make an omelet to an upbeat midi soundtrack. Your score is based on how delicious the end product is.

We're not entirely sure how this qualifies as a sport, but judging by how many cracks it takes to successfully break the egg, this is obviously a test of gentle strength not at all unlike the caber toss.

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