I posted the followed at nintendoage with pics of what the graded games will look like.

http://www.nintendoage.com/forum/mes...&enterthread=y


Kraid Killer

Posts: 2022
Joined: 11/27/2006

I wanted to take a few minutes to update you guys on some of the discussion we
had in the past regarding VGA - the Video Game Authority that will begin
grading games shortly. I've had several good discussions with Tom Derby, who
is one of the senior people at AFA and now VGA, and as a result of those
discussions I've agreed to help them out from time to time in a consulting
role. Most of you guys know me as a sealed game collector and as you can
imagine, the last thing I want is graded reseals out in the marketplace.

Towards that end I've provided Tom with the spreadsheet I put together for
purposes of the ezine, so that VGA knows what seals to expect for what games,
and have provided him with some other ideas and will continue to do so. In
addition, they have done a lot of research on their own and based on my
discussions with Tom it seems pretty clear to me that once they get up and
running it will be harder than ever before for resealers to fool the market.
I'm sure that mistakes will happen, no person and no organization is perfect.
That being said, I have every confidence that this being handled as well as
possible. As an added bonus, there are already some things being put in place
here, at the beginning, that will have long term research benefits down the
road in terms of the information available with respect to titles and variants.

A very limited amount of grading has already begun, and more details will be
posted when time permits on the AFA/VGA website (www.toygrader.com). I attach
some preliminary pictures of what the graded cases will look like. Please
note that these are not professional pictures; better pictures will be taken
shortly. But they serve to illustrate what you can expect the graded games to
look like.

As you can see from the pictures, there are two case stytles available. The
first (see castlevania) has the grade and other information on the side. The
other style (see dodgeball) has the grade and other information up top, similar
to a graded comic book or sports card. Games will be graded on a 100 point
system similar to action figures. I would assume both based on my experience
with graded collectibles and based on the pictures attached that grades of 100
will virtually never be achieved. As you can see in the pictures below, even
an 85 (the dodgeball) is an extremely sharp example. This degree of condition
analysis will allow collectors of all grades to get the grades they want, and
more importantly to know what grades they are buying when purchasing on ebay
and/or other sites.

I expect that such graded examples will shortly begin hitting ebay, so keep an
eye out. It will make for interesting viewing as our hobby continues to
evolve. In closing I'd like to thank Tom for including me in the process and
for allowing us, in that manner, to have input into what all of this will look
like.

If you have any comments I welcome them here or by pm. I will share additional
info as it becomes available.

Dan