Recent NES black box sales

[Buyatari]

I don't know about that. My five year old nephew plays video games now, but everything he has ever played has been on an iPad and has never come on physical media. He also could care less about Mario since most of his TV watching involves stuff on various Disney channels and who knows if he will ever get a 3DS or WiiU. With mobile devices rapidly becoming equal in capabilities to dedicated portables, I suspect within one more generation Nintendo and other companies will simply be in the software business if they even exist at all. I also think the next generation of gamers is going to be far less into collecting physical "stuff" the same way current consumers have significantly cut back on buying new release DVDs and PC gamers have largely adopted digital downloading for new game purchases. I mean how many people collect CDs or records today? It's a lot less than five or ten years ago and considering most people are music fans of one sort or another, it would seem like the population of music collectors would be growing, but as a vinyl collector myself, I can tell you for certain that's not the case at all.

Sealed games are something that won't continue to appreciate long term simply because they decay over time. Have you ever seen old records or even toys with shrink wrap older than a few decades? They have a yellow or brown tinge and the paper and colors start to discolor. It's just not a permanent thing no matter how carefully you try to protect it. I myself am guilty of being a sealed collector, but I would never pay a premium for sealed stuff simply because I know it can't last over the long haul. People spending thousands for graded games are in for a sad reality 20 years from now when their plastic cases are filled with brown and sticky wrap and boxes that have begun to cave in. There's a reason libraries and museums which house software collections insist on removing the wrap. Plastic is very volatile because ultimately it's a petroleum product and it reacts with paper, glue, dyes, metal, etc...all of which are used in the printing and manufacturing processes for cartridge and disc based video games.

It doesn't matter what type of gaming he does. I would guess he plays more games than he reads comic books or flips baseball cards etc. It won't matter if consoles go by the way side. I feel that anyone interested in videogame history will be interested in the originals.

Speaking of losing out to digital media here is an article on a famous collectable Beatles record. I've linked the article below but here is the part I think you may find the most interesting.

So exactly how much are these butcher cover albums worth?: The 2007 (6th) edition of Price Guide For The Beatles American Records by Perry Cox and Frank Daniels gives us the following figures:

1) First state mono in near mint condition: $4000
2) First state mono promotional copy in near mint condition (w/Promotional Copy – Not For Sale stamp): $5000
3) First state stereo copy in near mint condition: $12,000
4) Second state (paste-over) mono copy in near mint condition: $800
5) Second state (paste-over) stereo copy in near mint condition: $1500
6) Third state (peeled) mono copy in near mint condition: $800
7) Third state (peeled) stereo copy in near mint condition: $1500

Of course, these figures are just guidelines, and to be honest, seem to me to be quite low in comparison with some recent sales I have seen. In the case of first and second state copies, if the albums are still sealed (i.e. unopened) in their original shrink wrap they can bring several times the price listed above.

http://www.thebeatlesrarity.com/2011...butcher-cover/


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Here is a related article on a stash of 24 sealed butcher albums that were discovered. I am not a record collector but it seems that with this particular issue having it still sealed is a good thing not a bad thing.

Over the years there have been many great finds for Beatles record collectors, but probably the most significant was the discovery ten years ago of what ended up to be twenty-four original sealed first state Butcher cover albums.

It's hard to believe that it's been 8 years since the above information was written. It may be even harder to believe that during this time the value of premium butcher covers has more than tripled. The market value of the 24 Livingston butcher covers is now approaching an astonishing one million dollars!! Record prices of $85,000 for a stereo copy and $44,000 were set a couple of years ago. It looks like the sky is going to be the limit...

http://www.rarebeatles.com/album2/discog/livleter.htm