i believe the story (supposedly) is that the original blend of the famous nic 3000's were the Oliva line series X cigars that they never released due to trademark problems with Fuente. They sold their stock to famous smokeshop who sold the cigars under the famous nic 3000 label in bundles. After selling the initial stock quickly, they commissioned a factory to replicate the blend in the cigars, so it's similar but this 2nd batch was not exactly the same. I've heard they were still good though. The current cigars available are from the 3rd batch, those are the only ones I've tried, but i think they're still really tasty. I also heard they get even better with some age.