You raise some interesting points, but plenty of other hobbies have grading as well and not everyone or even most collectors in any hobby seek out the highest graded copies in existence. Personally, I don't buy graded games but I do collect sealed and my goal is always to find a nice copy which in VGA terms would be roughly 85+ or so. I have a large collection and my collecting goals are complete sets, not just a few nice examples of specific games. I know plenty of coin and comic collectors who set a grading floor and have zero interest in spending more to obtain a slightly more perfect example. Ultimately, everyone sets their own collecting goals and not every collector or even sealed collector out there is looking for a shelf full of 90 or better NES games. In fact, I think there is only a tiny handful of collectors who even care much about grading. Heck, the vast majority of collectors don't even collect sealed and I would suspect that this won't change in the future, especially if as you argue values continue to rise.

To provide accurate population reports, the grading service has to have graded a significant portion of tha available supply of an item. Most sealed sales on Ebay and elsewhere are still not graded and likely will never be. If that changes at some point, a population number may be of interest, but grading has not exactly been embraced by most collectors and not even the majority of sealed collectors.

If you're talking about sealed copies of rare NES games going for $10K+, I disagree with you that we aren't at the peak. There just aren't enough collectors now or ever with that kind of income or cash to sustain that type of pricing on what are modern mass produced items that can't be preserved in the long term. If your argument is that there are some sealed games that are "undervalued" right now that will continue to rise, I will agree with that. I don't, however, agree that video games are a sound investment long term as unlike comics or coins or other established collectibles, there is just too much unknown supply right now, too many other ways of having the same experience and frankly too much volatility in the industry in general to conclude that the next generation will care at all about the NES or the SNES or any other platform that they never owned. Ten years ago Atari collectors would have shared your view of limitless growth in value, but many of them learned the hard way that prices don't increase forever and the next generation of collectors always goes for what they remember from their childhood, not a vague sense of history and nostalgia for something they never experienced.

Quote Originally Posted by jonebone View Post
But that's the thing, no matter how many "thousands of sealed ones" are out there, there are surely not thousands of MINT sealed ones. If every Zelda collector just wants a copy of Zelda, regardless of the seal (oval vs. white), regardless of condition (tears / creases / etc.), and regardless of release (Player's Choice vs. Original), then yes, supply would satisfy everyone.

But it doesn't work that way. Everyone wants first print, and as Mint as they can find. No matter how many copies are in circulation, there will always be a highest known grade.

You speak of other hobbies, and population reports are standard in cards at least (only other hobby I know). For example, a listing might say PSA 10 Cal Ripken Topps Traded Rookie, Pop 5. This is verifiable via the PSA database, and VGA plans to have one at some point. In this case, you know that you are bidding on the highest possible grade, and there are 4 others in existence. Of course there are many other ungraded copies out there, but getting high grades in any hobby is no easy task.

Even with all of the VGA resellers, which you mention being at an all-time high, you still don't see a bunch of new NES VGA 90 titles popping up, especially on the fan-favorites. It's the high grades that will always be in demand as long as video games are collectible.

But yes, you could theorize that we all may move on in our 50's / 60's / late age as we retire and have other more important things to do. Who knows if there will be a new generation of buyers at that point.

But none of that matters today. All I know is that we are nowhere near the top on the insanely Mint and popular fan favorites. If you're only in it as an investment, you'll still have many years to determine when you want to get out.