Retro game prices on Ebay

[DigitalKarma]

Is it me or has anyone noticed that auction price values on retro video games for any system has gone up in the last 3 yrs?

Snatcher fetched anywhere from $100 to 150 three years ago. Now it is $200-250.

A lot of SNES completely boxed games havegone up $50.

Super Metroid used to be around $50. Now averages around $90-100

Wonder why that is. Your thoughts

[o.pwuaioc]

Just search here for ebay and prices and you'll find tons of threads. And no, you're not the only one, hundreds of people on various forums, this one included, have made the exact same observation.

[YoshiM]

It's supply and demand, simple. More people are getting into collecting thanks to their own nostalgia bolstered by seeing some of these rare titles at the ever increasing number of classic game shows around the world or YouTube videos.

[Gatucaman]

Oh boy, the Supply and Demand Trap.

Wrong!, is because of the Speculator Epidemia we have now, and resellers, scalpers and even scammers who make counterfeit repros of games like Eartbound.

[PizzaKat]

I got Super Metroid for 20 on BIN I think in 2009. I thought that was steep. TMNT Turtles in Time for 15 or 17 BIN. Won an auction for Atari Jaguar with 13 games a few good ones for 65 in 2008 I think. Im floored to see how everything went up so much. Im glad I started hoarding years ago. I blame it a lot on those guys with game chasing videos showing the value worth and what they paid for.

[o.pwuaioc]

Oh boy, the Supply and Demand Trap.

Wrong!, is because of the Speculator Epidemia we have now, and resellers, scalpers and even scammers who make counterfeit repros of games like Eartbound.

That's part of supply and demand. The supply is limited and the demand from resellers is great.

[YoshiM]

Oh boy, the Supply and Demand Trap.

Wrong!, is because of the Speculator Epidemia we have now, and resellers, scalpers and even scammers who make counterfeit repros of games like Eartbound.



Now if we're talking about the "Buy It Now" or high startig bid type sales I'd agree but for those actual auctions that get the big bucks, that's the bidders that did that. If someone wants it bad enough, they'll pay. All back to supply and demand.

[DigitalKarma]

Seems like there are more of those type of sellers than the actual auctions themselves.. jacking up the going price about 40%. I think it was quite the opposite a few years back. Hmmm.

[The Adventurer]

Demand creates scarcity and leads to rising prices over time?

THE HELL YOU SAY?!

[Dashopepper]

At least everyone can benefit fro Ebay by selling there stuff on there. A "mom and pop" video game store was at a video game convention with over priced garbage, asked if they would take a trade for my NES Contra and $5 for Space station silicon valley n64. He said he only gives $5 for contra so sssv would only cost me $20 instead of the $25 it was marked. Fucking people.

[Tanooki]

You're another in a long line of people who have caught on to the abuses going on in the old game market, and in particular with Nintendo stuff, though TG16 wasn't spared either yet so far.

There's nothing singular to blame on it. The trendy shit over the last five years to bring 8/16bit graphics up as an art form has made things a curiosity to the younger and a reminder to the kids of that time. You have those in their 30s/40s now who grew up with the stuff wanting to chase a memory or treat it like comic and card collecting of decades earlier. We have this shitty economy that's not being helped by the scumbag in chiefs policies which turns people even more who are unemployed, underemployed or just underpaid to alternate sources of income to pad the books. Economy or not, the popularity got there enough it pulled the dregs and shitheads of society out in droves who want to pray on the uninformed, impatient and stupid people to rip them off blind playing off desires and memories. As mentioned, you have the popularity of Youtube with all these assholes bragging about their cheap finds videos talking up the hundreds in value for pennies to the dollar, or the poorly acted attention whores like Pat the NES Punk, AVGN and the Mike Mattei flushing out games into the public eye driving demand. And all around that, it's simple economy of supply (which isn't being increased) and demand (which due to all that shit above and more) getting higher, so we all suffer for it.

It happened before if you were a kid in the 80s/90s having comics and baseball cards wrecked. Same stuff with stores opening up all over, people raising prices inching it into the more well offs pockets to the detriment of the child who that stuff was targeted to, and it imploded. The stuff always in time will implode to a point and re-correct itself where the real rarities have value, and the rest get set down back on the bench of reality. But that's another topic, when/if the bubble or whatever you want to call it may or may not pop and how.

All I know is this bullshit drove me largely away from old games and selling off shit I don't want to use anymore, yet due to the awful prices I do keep some stuff had it been still worth $20 I'd ditch. If it wasn't for my recent discovery of the unique games in style and substance on the Famicom I would be a lot less happy about it than I am now. If you know my ebay account or read on NA you'll know I've been parting with a good bit of stuff in the last few years.


Karma you're also right about the 40% (or whatever) bump and a few years ago compared to now how sellers acted. Sure there were always rare games and their prices were justified like Little Samson(Lickle) was an easy $100 even going back 5+ years beyond what the video game price chart website shows, but notice I think it was maybe 3 years back now the game shot up more than double the price in months, under a years time, and if you track it back to ebay you can see this pissing contest of people with the gotta have it mentality and greedy resellers feeding those idiot beasts and it never fell back again after that. All it takes is some tipping point to trigger it and a game can go nuts in a matter of a week. Another one you can look up would be Zombie Nation on NES too which went crazy from cheapo obscurity.

[DigitalKarma]

Well said tanooki. That explains it. Its a combination of all those things. I've been out of the game collecting loop for several years now so when I finally got back on it, I had to shake my head at some of the prices. I'm sure the bubble will burst at some point.

I don't think I could ever find a great deal like I did when I got sealed copies of Cosmic Fantasy 2 and Exile for TG-16 at $5 a piece..especially not in today's overinflated market.

Anyway since I'm a new member I can't post in the marketplace forum yet. If anyone is interested I have an eBay auction for Grand Theft Auto IV Special Edition - Everything excluding the game. Starting bid @ $.99, and ends in less than 9 hrs. Only for the true collectors and those wanting to upgrade their existing standalone copies. USA buyer's only

http://m.ebay.com/itm/261458614999

or if the link doesn't work..

Look up item #: 261458614999

Sorry..shameless advertisement. just wanted to get it out there to as many interested collectors as possible. :)

[Gentlegamer]

Tanooki generally has it right. Interest in retro gaming increased just as the peer group started entering their 30s, similar to comics and baseball cards, and attracted the same resellers. This has been further exacerbated by ebay changing its listing policies to too heavily favor BIN. You should notice that there are very few actual auctions for retro stuff anymore, everything is BIN high price. There are pages and pages of the same stuff BIN for the same price because ebay doesn't charge for unsold BIN listings anymore, so there's no incentive to actually get the item to sell for a lower price. Sellers just keep it up hoping someone is impatient. Of course, even when there is an auction, they don't start at 99 cents anymore, usually at just under a BIN price, and then you have to worry about shill bidding. It's a big mess. The only real hope is a crash, which can be expected with any collectible community.

I bought Metroid with manual and box (the box had been cut up and pasted in a rental box since the owner's father ran a rental business in the 90s) for $45, auction one year ago. This was after it had already gone up about 100% from a about 6 months prior, when it was around $20-30. I guess it went up another 100% in a year's time. None of these prices are sustainable.

Another game: Golden Axe Warrior for Sega Master System. I bought it BIN for $20 in 2006. I didn't get around to playing it until I actually bought a SMS this past October (I just had a Power Base Converter until then). I posted about it at videogamecritic.com, and many replies remarked about how it was so rare and expensive... I checked, it was around $150! This is madness!

[o.pwuaioc]

Another game: Golden Axe Warrior for Sega Master Syste. I bought it BIN for $20 in 2006. I didn't get around to playing it until I actually bought a SMS (I just had a Power Base Converter). I posted about it at videogamecritic.com, and many replies remarked about how it was so rare and expensive... I checked, it was around $150! This is madness!

Holy shit, it was just $50 two years ago!

[Tanooki]

Wow Golden Axe for that much? I sold it off for around $40-50 a year ago now. It was flat for a very long time, guess the SMS in select rarer cases is starting to get screwed too, but most Sega systems have a few that do that but a great majority are ignored playing back to Sega's treatment of their base and running them off. :)

I have no idea why I forgot to throw ebay under the bus in that thread of mine. They're largely the problem because if they were still pay to post the prices would be more accurate and lower because people would have to scratch and fight to get something. I'll admit I post a higher value, no incentive anymore not to whereas before that I started stuff at a dollar to five bucks just under the increase in price tier. I'm just slightly less filthy because I look what people pay at open auction and BIN, then start the stuff under what like condition sells and a BIN sadly too high after the greedy jerks made the 10% margin into 30% between start/bin.

Late last year I did a search confined to the US market, NES only, no other variables and I found the totals to be 85% BIN only items, the other 15% started at a level and did or didn't have a bin because that's how their filter breaks it up at the top of the listing of auctions per page. As it is I fall into the 15%. What I find mind blowing is that even with my score and account age, almost nothing of what I put up sells the first or even second go around. Lately getting rid of stuff due to this bs 'market' I've had 20+ items up for a few months now and I'll be lucky if 1-3 items sell while ebay store stoolies and the big feeder trolls like playeva and dkoldies who have a 30% mark up over reality sell in shittier condition. I can squarely blame moron mentality on paying more.

[DigitalKarma]

this is my first time selling on ebay and wanted to test the waters. wonder if it was a mistake setting the starting price at .99 cents and set the shipping cost at half price for buyers.. I like those 99 cent auctions where the bidders dictate price instead of the buyer setting the starting price almost as high as BIN price, there's no fun in that.

I know it's GTAIV.. big deal, and the set isn't complete..just missing only the game but the set is in great shape. if the auction ends at $2.75, i'll be paying the rest of shipping cost out of my pocket and not even make a $0.01 profit on it. I don't expect to get back much from it maybe $7 at the most but at $2 that is kind of insulting..probably better off not selling it lol

someone will be getting a good deal from it and who knows might even resell it next week for BIN price of $50 and make more profit than me.

i noticed there were similar auctions in the last two months, their starting price was $19.99 and ended up selling for $25-35 and buyer had to pay higher shipping cost so they probably spent $50 altogether. and one other BIN auction that sold the exact same set for $41.. i guess my auction was a little too generous and cheap.

good will and karma will only get you so far, and the price gouging sellers will continue to prosper.

[TanruNomad]

The ironic thing is the guys who try to sell their stuff for outrageous buy-it-nows often end up selling for less than those who start their auctions at $0.99 because more people watch and bid on smaller starting auctions. It's science!

As to the growing cost of retro games, it's mostly due to the increased awareness of these games and the culture due to the popularity of youtube game reviewers, some of whom rant about these prices themselves even though they indirectly contributed to them (I'm guilty of this myself).

[WCP]

The ironic thing is the guys who try to sell their stuff for outrageous buy-it-nows often end up selling for less than those who start their auctions at $0.99 because more people watch and bid on smaller starting auctions. It's science!



As a seller, it's so damn risky though to just put something out there at 99 cents and hope the bidding goes your way. I don't sell on Ebay anymore because of this. You have to have outrageously priced BINS to try to cover all the fees. That's all you see on Ebay now. BINS. That's why prices are so much higher. Ebay / Paypal started charging too many fees, and sellers are too afraid to end up losing money, so everybody has to overprice stuff.

It's a vicious cycle.

Also, Ebay is so anti-seller, and pro buyer, it's ridiculous. Sellers have to account for scamsters that take advantage of Ebay's guarantee policy.

[Gameguy]

Another game: Golden Axe Warrior for Sega Master System. I bought it BIN for $20 in 2006. I didn't get around to playing it until I actually bought a SMS this past October (I just had a Power Base Converter until then). I posted about it at videogamecritic.com, and many replies remarked about how it was so rare and expensive... I checked, it was around $150! This is madness!

Holy shit, it was just $50 two years ago!

Wow Golden Axe for that much? I sold it off for around $40-50 a year ago now. It was flat for a very long time, guess the SMS in select rarer cases is starting to get screwed too, but most Sega systems have a few that do that but a great majority are ignored playing back to Sega's treatment of their base and running them off. :)
There is something else affecting the value of SMS games, sort of. It used to be that nobody cared about the system except for serious collectors, only US games were selling for real value for completionists who needed US copies for a complete collection, European copies or Canadian copies of most games were near worthless or worth around $5 complete. Now most people buying SMS games don't seem to notice a difference or care about having Euro copies, they're selling for a decent amount as well. Now that Euro copies aren't dirt cheap, nothing is holding back prices on US copies, everything is rising in price.

It's basically down to demand like everything else, it's just that with SMS games it really used to matter which versions of the games you had. Euro games were more common in Canada and those were always dirt cheap, now they're selling like US copies. People aren't noticing a difference between them anymore. It probably helps that there's no difference with the names of the console(unlike the Genesis and Mega Drive), the carts all look physically the same, and they're all just as compatible with either region as a whole.

I'm not exactly sure why people are looking more favourably towards the SMS now, the games were cheap because few people cared about the system. It used to feel like a crappy loser next to the NES. Now it's feeling more "nostalgic" than it used to. Even for me, and I used to hate it except for a select few games. It's sort of like how people are warming up to the Gamecube when it was the third place loser when it was current.

[Gentlegamer]

Are there different versions of Golden Axe Warrior? When I added it to my collection at RFgeneration, someone messaged me about buying it, asking if it had the UPC sticker on back. It doesn't, and I noticed it doesn't have any SEGA of America copyright on it, just SEGA Enterprises LTD.

[Manhattan Sports Club]

Are there different versions of Golden Axe Warrior? When I added it to my collection at RFgeneration, someone messaged me about buying it, asking if it had the UPC sticker on back. It doesn't, and I noticed it doesn't have any SEGA of America copyright on it, just SEGA Enterprises LTD.

For the most part, the majority of Genesis and Master System stuff is still cheap, as SEGA has become historically viewed as "second-rate", though I already prefer Genesis over SNES in the long run and am as much of a Master System fan as an NES fan.

[bigbacon]

Are there different versions of Golden Axe Warrior? When I added it to my collection at RFgeneration, someone messaged me about buying it, asking if it had the UPC sticker on back. It doesn't, and I noticed it doesn't have any SEGA of America copyright on it, just SEGA Enterprises LTD.

there were like 4 or 5 SMS games that were taken from the eurozone and brought over to usa for sale where they put a UPC sticker on the case over the label are sticker

there is debate about these all time but the game having it ups the price, sometimes quite a bit.

There was golden axe warrior, Spider man, strider, sonic 1, and I forget what else. (may have only been those 4)

Sonic is the biggie if it has the UPC.

other than that sticker, there is no difference between the USA release and the Euro release of these games. they even have the horizontal manuals.


As for prices.....

Anything Nintendo is astronomical, for the most part. Sega stuff, while going up, is still very cheap in my eyes.

Most US SMS games can be found complete for less than 10 or 15 bucks, hell, out of my complete USA SMS game collection there is only one game I paid more than 75 bucks for. Try that on any other system.

[Tanooki]

Bacon it's just those and you're right. Sonic is the nastiest. Funny story I bought Sonic 1 from the UK, ended up of all things getting the US UPC version for like $10. When I got that around 2 years back the two most recent ebay paid sales, one from within the US in fantastic shape was barely shy of $1K, and one as nice but going to the US from the UK was a little over $500. ALL FOR THE STICKER. The others don't come near (GAW, Spiderman and Strider) but there is a premium.

I sold mine when I got rid of the SMS and I worked a deal with a guy through hours of chitchat over ebay internal mail as I had it OBO. My sticker was missing like 15% of it and it had (dead) mold and water damage. I still got $300 for it and other than the jacked sticker mine was very nice too, so even hosed up it was worth a lot.

Also you're a little off, not everything Nintendo is bad. Most of the N64 stuff is lower priced still, few of them are in that original $50 retail and higher club for loose carts. The DSI mini set (has like 4 games only for it) is stupid cheap even sealed, and if you ignore Jack Bros almost all the Virtual Boy US releases are cheap too. What is bad is the popular stuff -- NES, SNES, and even the Gamecube where a good bit is rising in value sadly. Everytime some fools get into wanting to monetizing something the cancer spreads.

[SparTonberry]

DSi set is probably cheap because it's only four games (3 NA, 1 EU) and I don't think any of them are highly desirable games either.

[calgon]

I'll echo what everyone has already said. Case in point: I remember feeling I paid too much for my copy Dragon warrior 3 for NES at 15 dollars in the early aughts. Can remember late nights on irc with members of the NES scene complaining that Little Samson was getting outrageously overvalued at upwards of $40 in price. Game regularly goes for $500 now on ebay.

[YoshiM]

Not to totally thread jack but how does Gamegavel compare? I briefly browsed and saw a lot of BIN's and a bunch of auctions that haven't been even bid on. Do sellers do pretty well on there?

[bb_hood]

Most of the N64 stuff is lower priced still, few of them are in that original $50 retail and higher club for loose carts.

Well, in terms of rarity N64 games have been overpriced for a long time. Game like Mario64, Mario Kart 64, Donkey Kong64, and Zelda ocarnia are some of the most common games on the planet. There are very few N64 games that are actually rare and hard to find, especially compared to nintendo nes which has tons of rares.



Can remember late nights on irc with members of the NES scene complaining that Little Samson was getting outrageously overvalued at upwards of $40 in price. Game regularly goes for $500 now on ebay.

Well, Little Samson at 40$, that would have been a long time ago. While it is not the rarest of nes games, it is hard to find. Mainly because of word of mouth, everybody wants a copy. For many people ebay is the only place to really snatch up a copy. The same goes for alot of the rarer games, people trying to complete collections are forced to pay ebay prices.
I think ALOT of it is speculation also, I think people buy carts like samson, flintstones 2 and other pricey rares because they think they will become astronomically valuable in the future, but that is very unlikely. People see the price jump and think it will continue but most likely it wont. Not many people are willing to pay even close to 500$ for samson despite what completed listings show.

[PizzaKat]

Sellers fees are miniscule. They don't gouge like Ebay. Seeing their site from awhile it was no difference in price from Ebay. Looking now the same bullshit again.

[Gameguy]

Are there different versions of Golden Axe Warrior? When I added it to my collection at RFgeneration, someone messaged me about buying it, asking if it had the UPC sticker on back. It doesn't, and I noticed it doesn't have any SEGA of America copyright on it, just SEGA Enterprises LTD.

there were like 4 or 5 SMS games that were taken from the eurozone and brought over to usa for sale where they put a UPC sticker on the case over the label are sticker

there is debate about these all time but the game having it ups the price, sometimes quite a bit.

There was golden axe warrior, Spider man, strider, sonic 1, and I forget what else. (may have only been those 4)

Sonic is the biggie if it has the UPC.

other than that sticker, there is no difference between the USA release and the Euro release of these games. they even have the horizontal manuals.
This is the difference. The only difference is the sticker on the back with Golden Axe Warrior, other games can have a difference with the box art and manual but not this one. The European version is more common than the US, but now both are really valuable. Most people just want to play it as it's one of the best games on the system.

There are Canadian releases that have a sticker, just like US versions do. I haven't heard of anyone specifically collecting these versions yet. I took a picture of one I have. For the longest time even with the rarity guide here, there's no separate section for Canadian releases. There's just a note on the European games that they've also been sold in Canada. I kind of wonder why it's not the same with those US releases with just a sticker, it's the same thing with Canadian games.


http://i60.tinypic.com/2h2lh5u.png

[Gamevet]

As mentioned, you have the popularity of Youtube with all these assholes bragging about their cheap finds videos talking up the hundreds in value for pennies to the dollar, or the poorly acted attention whores like Pat the NES Punk, AVGN and the Mike Mattei flushing out games into the public eye driving demand. And all around that, it's simple economy of supply (which isn't being increased) and demand (which due to all that shit above and more) getting higher, so we all suffer for it.

It happened before if you were a kid in the 80s/90s having comics and baseball cards wrecked. Same stuff with stores opening up all over, people raising prices inching it into the more well offs pockets to the detriment of the child who that stuff was targeted to, and it imploded. The stuff always in time will implode to a point and re-correct itself where the real rarities have value, and the rest get set down back on the bench of reality. But that's another topic, when/if the bubble or whatever you want to call it may or may not pop and how.



It started with stuff like Classic Game Room and The Angry Video game nerd. Now you have Metal Jesus, Game Chasers, Gamestar81, Game Sack, Retro Ware etc.... You watch one of those and Youtube will start linking you to other users showing the same kind of stuff about retro gaming and collecting. 3 or 4 years ago, nobody cared about the 7800 or the Jaguar, but after Classic Game Room started giving positive reviews for those systems the prices started going up for a Jag and even the pitiful 7800 gained a little more value.


-----------------------------------------------

I don't buy retro games from Ebay. There are other online stores and sites that will give you a better price.

Just last week I found a minty copy of Sword of Berserk for the DC ($14 shipped) by doing a google search for people selling it. I believe that game sells for around $20-$25 on evilbay.

[Melf]

I'm not exactly sure why people are looking more favourably towards the SMS now, the games were cheap because few people cared about the system. It used to feel like a crappy loser next to the NES. Now it's feeling more "nostalgic" than it used to. Even for me, and I used to hate it except for a select few games. It's sort of like how people are warming up to the Gamecube when it was the third place loser when it was current.

I think it's because people are finally discovering what a wonderful little system it is. Back in the 8-bit era, most people missed out because of Nintendo's bullying of retailers and publishers. When you corner 90% of the market with a monopoly, it's hard for other machines to get an audience.

The GameCube wasn't the same situation because Nintendo's hold on the market was long gone by then. I guess most people didn't have room for a third machine, and now that it's cheap, they're finding out that the GC was a great console.

[Gameguy]

I think it's because people are finally discovering what a wonderful little system it is. Back in the 8-bit era, most people missed out because of Nintendo's bullying of retailers and publishers. When you corner 90% of the market with a monopoly, it's hard for other machines to get an audience.
I can't fully blame Nintendo for Sega's failure. It wasn't Nintendo's fault that Sega decided to make most games use the most boring cover art possible, and use no cartridge art at all by using plain text labels(with plenty of spelling mistakes). Just going by the marketing of the system for store shelves, it looked stupid and boring. I originally thought Sega's original controllers were horrible because the cables were stuck out the right side of them, but since the Famicom had the cables the same way I won't blame Sega for that stupid decision, though it was still stupid to just copy Nintendo. Putting the pause button on the console instead of the controller was also a dumb move. North America did miss out on a bunch of good games, but we would have got most of them if the system sold better here.


The GameCube wasn't the same situation because Nintendo's hold on the market was long gone by then. I guess most people didn't have room for a third machine, and now that it's cheap, they're finding out that the GC was a great console.
At the time having a system that was capable of playing DVDs was a big deal, Nintendo's system couldn't do that back then. The PS2 also had backwards compatibility with PS1 games which made it the best system to get at the time, that and the games had a more adult appeal compared to the kiddie image of the Gamecube. Now it doesn't matter if systems can play DVDs, players are pretty cheap. Playing PS1 games isn't that big a deal anymore either, people can use a PS3 to play them now. A few reasons why the Gamecube is more popular these days. Just a feeling of mine anyway.

[SparTonberry]

Also, GameCube was seen as a "kiddie" system when it was released. It was seen as a console mostly for first-party games, like the Wii U probably will be in the future.
Making purple the primary console color probably didn't help.

Master System HAD marketing? :P
(maybe I'm just not old enough to remember it, but I hear especially after Tonka took over, there was pretty much no commercials in the US, so I never even heard of the console until emulators came around in the late '90s. Knew the NES quite well, though.)

[bigbacon]

i would love to talk to the marketing directory of sega/tonka at the time of the SMS....i really want to know why....

sucks that the US got shafted with it as in europe there were tons of great games we never got.

[Einzelherz]

One thing I have noticed lately is a lot of auctions being bought with 2 seconds left by accounts with hundreds if not thousands in feedback score. I assume that these are standard ebay sniper-resellers using bots, but I don't recall that being a problem in old video games a couple years back.

[Gatucaman]

One thing I have noticed lately is a lot of auctions being bought with 2 seconds left by accounts with hundreds if not thousands in feedback score. I assume that these are standard ebay sniper-resellers using bots, but I don't recall that being a problem in old video games a couple years back.

Is this all true?, and if this happens with Japanese games as well with legit japanese sellers, (not those damn US sellers living in japan using the same trend tricks "RARE VINTAGE WHY THE FUCK WOULD I WANT TO START MY AUCTION AT 0.01 CENTS LIKE LEGIT AUCTIONS INSTEAD I WILL MAKE A BIN PRICE WITH ONLY A 10USD DIFFERENT FOR THE STARTUP PRICE THAT MIGHT GET EVEN HIGHER!"), then i may as well just try to get X3, Hoshi no Kirby 3 and Jikkyou Oshaberi Parodius, and be done)

[ProjectCamaro]

One thing I have noticed lately is a lot of auctions being bought with 2 seconds left by accounts with hundreds if not thousands in feedback score. I assume that these are standard ebay sniper-resellers using bots, but I don't recall that being a problem in old video games a couple years back.

When I bid on auctions I normally wait until there is 3 seconds or less. If you bid early all you're doing is driving up the price and giving yourself more competition. I've gotten some really good deals doing that in the past.

[Tanooki]

Bot snipers have been around for more than a few years now, it's not just something fairly recent. The problem is all the reseller trash and predators getting into the racket especially in the last 3 years which is making it look like a recent thing. The volume of douchebags is just a lot higher trying to fight for stuff to flip.

[Gatucaman]

Bot snipers have been around for more than a few years now, it's not just something fairly recent. The problem is all the reseller trash and predators getting into the racket especially in the last 3 years which is making it look like a recent thing. The volume of douchebags is just a lot higher trying to fight for stuff to flip.

Isnt shillbidding supposed to be illegal, you know those douches who flip the price of to win an auction just to screw over someone who wanted under a certain price, and then these jerks dont even buy the product, couldnt they get into legal trouble?.

[YoshiM]

Isnt shillbidding supposed to be illegal, you know those douches who flip the price of to win an auction just to screw over someone who wanted under a certain price, and then these jerks dont even buy the product, couldnt they get into legal trouble?.

Illegal- not sure. Against eBay's rules? Possibly. Can one prove it that a bidder is working for the seller? Probably not.

[Tanooki]

ebay illegal yes, but they don't do much to stop it. From the complaining I've seen about it in the NintendoAge rant thread for ebay among others that slide by unless someone does some footwork and discovers through the blocked name a bunch of bids that coincide with what you're bidding on there's not much that can be done and they don't care since they get a cut on everything including the shipping which is garbage. Shill bidding works in their favor now since they block bidder IDs, as in the past when they weren't you could see someone doing it, report it, and they'd get booted.

[Rickstilwell1]

I wouldn't say Atari 2600 is dirt cheap or out of the interest of collectors. Lately I've noticed you're lucky to find a tested working system of any model system under $50 (because of shipping). In 2009 you could easily find a $10 2600 Jr. with a game. Even untested or non working systems are around $20-30. Large lots I used to see for $40-50 are $100-200.

Just the other year I had trouble selling complete in box games with a system.

I think maybe these prices have gone up because of increased shipping costs though.

[o.pwuaioc]

I think maybe these prices have gone up because of increased shipping costs though.

That's primarily it. I can sell my current light sixer on the cheap side, but shipping is going to be ugly regardless.

[calgon]

I was joking with a friend the other day about how the e-bay experience has changed so much within the past ten or so years. For example, It was a regular occurrence finding great deals by searching for "ninetendo" and "seag". Starting to get nostalgic for the methods in which I used to hunt for retro games. Good Lord....:puppydogeyes:

[Arkanoid_Katamari]

Bacon it's just those and you're right. Sonic is the nastiest. Funny story I bought Sonic 1 from the UK, ended up of all things getting the US UPC version for like $10. When I got that around 2 years back the two most recent ebay paid sales, one from within the US in fantastic shape was barely shy of $1K, and one as nice but going to the US from the UK was a little over $500. ALL FOR THE STICKER. The others don't come near (GAW, Spiderman and Strider) but there is a premium.

I sold mine when I got rid of the SMS and I worked a deal with a guy through hours of chitchat over ebay internal mail as I had it OBO. My sticker was missing like 15% of it and it had (dead) mold and water damage. I still got $300 for it and other than the jacked sticker mine was very nice too, so even hosed up it was worth a lot.

Also you're a little off, not everything Nintendo is bad. Most of the N64 stuff is lower priced still, few of them are in that original $50 retail and higher club for loose carts. The DSI mini set (has like 4 games only for it) is stupid cheap even sealed, and if you ignore Jack Bros almost all the Virtual Boy US releases are cheap too. What is bad is the popular stuff -- NES, SNES, and even the Gamecube where a good bit is rising in value sadly. Everytime some fools get into wanting to monetizing something the cancer spreads.

I don't think NES is that bad, right now. Sure, theres enough games on the system that are ridiculous now, but u can still collect the bottom 3 or 400 games on the system without spending that much money. Most still sell for less than $20, and a lot of the real "essentials" like Mario, Mega Man, Metriod, Zelda, Contra, etc. are still selling for around this price, like the N64. I buy 90% of my games at flea markets and stores cuz then u can actually deal with people, and most retro game stores have somewhat fair prices. Somewhat. SNES and Gamecube seem to be getting out of hand right now, where any game thats had even the smallest attention is selling for around $30-$50. Ridiculous.

[Arkanoid_Katamari]

Ultimately, I don't think game collecting is thaaat expensive a hobby, if u know where to shop, most of ur games can be picked up for less than $10, so who can really complain with that? It's only a small fraction of games that have made those monetary leaps on Ebay.

[DigitalKarma]

wow $300 for a copy of Daytona usa for the Sega Saturn when it only cost less than $3..lmao :roll:

Is someone actually stupid enough to buy it?

http://www.ebay.com/sch/Video-Games-Consoles-/1249/m.html?item=181321590142&hash=item2a379be57e&pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&_ssn=arpimachinesales&_sac=1

[Tanooki]

I don't think NES is that bad, right now. Sure, theres enough games on the system that are ridiculous now, but u can still collect the bottom 3 or 400 games on the system without spending that much money. Most still sell for less than $20, and a lot of the real "essentials" like Mario, Mega Man, Metriod, Zelda, Contra, etc. are still selling for around this price, like the N64. I buy 90% of my games at flea markets and stores cuz then u can actually deal with people, and most retro game stores have somewhat fair prices. Somewhat. SNES and Gamecube seem to be getting out of hand right now, where any game thats had even the smallest attention is selling for around $30-$50. Ridiculous.

I get what you're saying, but when you consider the bottom 3-400 of them are range from so completely awful to just downright mediocre(if that) it's just pissing money into the wind unless you're some pokemon gotta catch em all system collector. :) The gamecube is hardly out of hand, though there are a few annoying games, little is over the original retail value, but I totally agree the SNES has become just downright disgusting in how the stuff is priced, even a good bit of the junk is on an up swing which is amazing.

I've quit actively buying NES and SNES games, same with the N64 and Cube too. I've got more or less anything I'd want thankfully barely beating out the curve in trying to restore my desired games of my old collection that went to bad times. The last physical game I'd grab back is Aerofighters and the price loses me somewhere between infuriating and nauseating. :D I'll grab a game I want if I can find it cheap, but I don't go in with any hope or expectation anymore as it's better to get a random happy albeit rare surprise. I've converted over to buying Famicom games. Most of them are super cheap since most Americans don't care or don't want to deal with Japanese menus and converters, and a few gems that are spendy you can get famiclones for a 1/3 or less of the price of a real cart which I've done in a few cases.



It's a bit of a stretch to say that depending where you shop game buying hasn't become a problem. Prices are regional if you take the internet out of the equation of just you clicking ebay/amazon and being done with it. Some areas are flush with games, others are not. Some are loaded with predatory reseller scum who swoop up everything and use sleazy tactics and others have few to none. And then places that have stores many or few, some still price by the local market within reason not to be pillaged for online, and others will ask over ebay because it's a local sucker trap. Since I started buying back stuff I've split my time between CA and KY and CA has more reseller trash, but the flea markets are consistent weekly in getting a least and item or two where I lived, but in KY here fleas have more or less nothing and are only parts of the year due to weather and the local shops which used to be cheap and plenty are not getting dusty with no turn over due to dickery on pricing that only keeps them afloat moving the Marios Zeldas and other big name stuff thats easy turn over.

[SparTonberry]

wow $300 for a copy of Daytona usa for the Sega Saturn when it only cost less than $3..lmao :roll:

Is someone actually stupid enough to buy it?

http://www.ebay.com/sch/Video-Games-Consoles-/1249/m.html?item=181321590142&hash=item2a379be57e&pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&_ssn=arpimachinesales&_sac=1

I was about to say it's probably the rare variant. But nope, the person is just a moron. Star Fox loose for $520 (hey, he's a generous guy who knocked $130 off his normal price) :P

[xelement5x]

I was about to say it's probably the rare variant. But nope, the person is just a moron. Star Fox loose for $520 (hey, he's a generous guy who knocked $130 off his normal price) :P

Heh, I was thinking the same thing. I'd spend $300 on a Daytona Netlink in a heartbeat at this point.

[Rickstilwell1]

This is part of the reason I mainly only collect games I've actually completed before or really really liked when they didn't have definite endings. Shaving off thousands of games from my want list makes spending the money I have to to get what I want later on down the road a bit less scary. I want games I collect to mean something to me, not just take up some space. Generally if I beat something once, I will want to play it again. There's never been a time where that hasn't been true.

I'm starting to miss some of the systems I had for a long time but sold and I enjoyed plenty of arcade type games on pre-NES systems to make me want to buy them again too. I just got an Atari 2600 again, and I'm missing a lot of common games I could probably find for $2 or $3 each somewhere.

Looking at my completion list from last year and this year so far, I think it's going to take a lot of time and money to even get caught up with my current want list. I mean that's up to 132 games and I don't have all that many yet and only few are CIB yet. I collect a loose copy and a CIB copy.

There are some games though that just cost way too much loose (Bucky O 'Hare for NES is a good example) where I might just want to buy the more expensive CIB copy and just call it a day on that title. I'm sure it'll be a nightmare when I finally get around to playing through Dragon Warrior III and Dragon Warrior IV. Of course if I play my cards right I'll have enough money saved by then to not flinch at its probably insane price.

[Gatucaman]

I Myself will try to do a little experiment............mainly to see if the shillbidding issue on NES games is true or not

[Gatucaman]

Well, what i did is that i founded a Shatterhand in bad condition that was going at 3 USD but i tought it wasnt the real price, i suspected it would been something higher, but i keep pushing the bid us more button (i bid 5 USD at first), and i have it at 8.59 USD.

http://i.imgur.com/Jrh0XNR.jpg

But then LITERALLY at the last 5 seconds bam!

http://i.imgur.com/oy81ZR6.jpg

Now i am not sure how bad it gets for most people and heck, not even sure if this is even shillbidding, since it was only 5 USD difference, but i wanted to share it with you guys, i mean the cart itself didnt even had the top label (and the description claimed it was "Just a little Rough") and..........truth be told, this was just a test to see if it's really difficult to get american NES games from US sellers there, because of the shillbidders and the hipsters, i already own the game in MUCH BETTER CONDITION, and i bought it for dirt cheap in 2011 at a flea market, i planned to gave it as a gift to a friend, but send him a better label that i could scan myself.

[xelement5x]

Gatucaman, there are a lot of people who don't bid on items until the last 5 seconds. Many don't even manually bid, they use bid sniping services which will automatically place your max bid with however many seconds you want left. I use them all the time on low profile stuff so I don't tip my hand early. It's kind of a waste on heavily watched items though in my opinion.

[Daria]

My mom uses a sniping bot.

Let that sink in, the woman's like 63. Lets just assume everyone's using them now.

[bb_hood]

Now i am not sure how bad it gets for most people and heck, not even sure if this is even shillbidding, since it was only 5 USD difference, but i wanted to share it with you guys, i mean the cart itself didnt even had the top label (and the description claimed it was "Just a little Rough") and..........truth be told, this was just a test to see if it's really difficult to get american NES games from US sellers there, because of the shillbidders and the hipsters, i already own the game in MUCH BETTER CONDITION, and i bought it for dirt cheap in 2011 at a flea market, i planned to gave it as a gift to a friend, but send him a better label that i could scan myself.

That shatterhand is pretty beat but it sold for less than all the other complete copies on ebay, it seems that shatterhand now goes for 20-30$. Considering its a really good game its not outrageous that someone would pay about 16 bucks for a beat copy to play. It was a sleeper game for a long time and im not surprised it jumped in value.


I was recently outbid by someone with a sniper bot. I was so pissed. I had the 'one click bid' window open and everything. I got outbid at the last microsecond.

[PizzaKat]

Im one of those people who bid in the last 5 seconds. Its a waste to do it beforehand with lot of time left in the auction.

[Tanooki]

I bid by hand in the last 3-5 seconds and queue it up in one window, then have an alt-tab away another to watch the counter and have another bid in case I change my mind to throw a little more on it. I refuse to use asinine sniper tools. There's too many people who drop a bid with 3-5 to go so I try and get as close to 3 seconds as possible given any delay lag on it going in usually amounts to 1-3sec.

[chriswy27]

Now that I have a real job I have been buying all the older games I wanted as a kid. Probably many others doing the same.

[Tanooki]

Sure people of the era, then you have the younger exposed kids/adults and then the hipsters who follow the fads to look cool. The problem is on the whole a lot of them are impatient and stupid, want it now, don't bother to research or go for a good price and it causes the ebay pissing match of always trying to get $5 more than the next guy and then we're where we are now.

[Gentlegamer]

Just browsing some things today, and shaking my head at all the BIN listings showing a "sale price" of a dollar or two off.

I hope ebay comes to its senses and reinstates listing fees for unsold auctions.

[Gatucaman]

Just browsing some things today, and shaking my head at all the BIN listings showing a "sale price" of a dollar or two off.

I hope ebay comes to its senses and reinstates listing fees for unsold auctions.

Hooray save whooping 2 bucks on a price that's still bloated anyways, or here's a btter one

http://www.ebay.com/itm/WHOMP-EM-NES-NINTENDO-GAME-/350786260225?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item51ac7d8d01

YAY, save Whooping 60 CENTS!..........................Muertos de Hambre, might as welll flip you the bird and slap you in the face.

And Here am i also thinking that sniping tools were illegal too, people have sink that low?

[jperryss]

I bid by hand in the last 3-5 seconds and queue it up in one window, then have an alt-tab away another to watch the counter and have another bid in case I change my mind to throw a little more on it. I refuse to use asinine sniper tools. There's too many people who drop a bid with 3-5 to go so I try and get as close to 3 seconds as possible given any delay lag on it going in usually amounts to 1-3sec.

The only thing that a sniping tool does is let you schedule your bids in advance for the optimum time (the last 5 seconds before an auction ends). Sniping tools have become so prevalent that doing it manually is an inconvenience and potentially a disadvantage, as the sniping server likely has a better connection than you do, as well as (in some cases) redundancy and/or mirroring across multiple servers in multiple locations to snipe in parallel.

On the other hand, putting your bid in with days left accomplishes nothing other than possibly driving the price higher.

Do you use an "asinine DVR" to watch your favorite shows when it's convenient for you, instead of being forced to watch them when they air? Sniping tools really aren't much different.


And Here am i also thinking that sniping tools were illegal too, people have sink that low?

Why should it be illegal? If anyone should care, it's eBay themselves since lower auction prices means lower final value fees they get from sellers. And if they cared, they could fix the problem very easily by having the auction extend by 60 seconds if a bid is put in during the last 30 seconds.

[Zthun]

You know, unless your a hardcore collector that is just trying to fill up shelf space, flash carts solve this problem. You don't need to worry about the condition, you don't need to worry about the battery since the save is on the cart, and you don't have to worry about price fluctuations.

It's a good investment. $120-$150 or so for a cart that you can put anything you want on is a good deal considering the prices of today's classic games.

[Gatucaman]

Well, the thing is, i am closer to own 100 NES Games (plus 7 Famicom games) and my main goal was to get a collection of 150 games of all the good ones, and that's it, considering that i have been able to get for dirt cheap titles like Princess Tomato, Shatterhand and Fricking KickMaster (a game i neever tought i would find, let alone for 4 USD) tha gave me hope, plus with famicom games, i already covered certain titles that are bloated expensive in their US releases.

[Daria]

Threads like these just make me glad that 99% of my retro collecting goal is behind me.

[Rickstilwell1]

Threads like these just make me glad that 99% of my retro collecting goal is behind me.

Sucks for me I sold the stuff before it spiked and now I have to start over during a price hike. Yikes!

[Gatucaman]

I Just love it when assholes on Ebay sell NES game lots and claimed that their games are rare and mostly consist of COMMON AS DIRT GAMES like Super Mario 3, Lolos 1 & 2, Robo Warrior for Fuck sake!

You know what could possibly, maybe, help to solve this problem, or at the very least, do some difference, if we (along with the people from /vr/ from 4chan, made an image guide to "educate" people about the Ebay Bullshit and to not be hipsters, and share it to local gamers so they let the people in stores per example EDUCATE themselves and stop scalping and extoritioning the little guys.

[Rickstilwell1]

I Just love it when assholes on Ebay sell NES game lots and claimed that their games are rare and mostly consist of COMMON AS DIRT GAMES like Super Mario 3, Lolos 1 & 2, Robo Warrior for Fuck sake!

You know what could possibly, maybe, help to solve this problem, or at the very least, do some difference, if we (along with the people from /vr/ from 4chan, made an image guide to "educate" people about the Ebay Bullshit and to not be hipsters, and share it to local gamers so they let the people in stores per example EDUCATE themselves and stop scalping and extoritioning the little guys.

The hard part about hipsters is that they like being not cool. So people telling them they're not cool doesn't help. Nor does going the other direction. They are an odd breed. They kind of remind me of the unswayable Bronies. lol unless MLP is just a fad that will pass.

[bb_hood]

I Just love it when assholes on Ebay sell NES game lots and claimed that their games are rare and mostly consist of COMMON AS DIRT GAMES like Super Mario 3, Lolos 1 & 2, Robo Warrior for Fuck sake!

You know what could possibly, maybe, help to solve this problem, or at the very least, do some difference, if we (along with the people from /vr/ from 4chan, made an image guide to "educate" people about the Ebay Bullshit and to not be hipsters, and share it to local gamers so they let the people in stores per example EDUCATE themselves and stop scalping and extoritioning the little guys.

People have been claiming everything on ebay as 'rare' for forever now so no point in getting excited or upset over it. If people want to pay more for common games its up to them. I dont think it spoils it for the rest of us because these are common games that can be found cheaper with patience. If you have to have that copy of Mario 3 RIGHT NOW then sure hit the buy it now button.

Rarity and price guides have been around forever so no need for more guides for stupid ebay buyers. If someone can get online to ebay they can just as easily find a nes rarity guide online.

[Rickstilwell1]

What bothers me though is that people here on the forums who are supposed to be more respectable collectors and sellers use ebay as an excuse to raise prices here too. If I ask somebody in the WTB section to sell me a CIB The Legend of Zelda on NES for $25-30, they are probably just not going to answer me unfortunately because they know they can get more money for selling it on ebay, thus making the problem worse by not joining the ebay boycott. Or often times when I do get a seller offering a game for a good price on a forum, they don't take good pics and say the item looks great. And when it shows up it has like water damage on the manual, heavy creasing on the boxes, writing or rental stickers on the carts or cds. Nintendoage people are so shady sometimes. One time I even got a bootleg Donkey Kong Country 3 for SNES by somebody who "didn't know the difference." Caught them red handed when I opened the cart to install a battery because it had none in it to begin with. He never replied back.

Now I'm not saying everybody does this and I'm sure some people here would still give good deals, but it just worries me because I've seen it happen. Sometimes even good sellers turn bad. I thank all those members who have sold me something on this forum before or bought from me because on Digitpress I have had all good experiences so far.

[o.pwuaioc]

What bothers me though is that people here on the forums who are supposed to be more respectable collectors and sellers use ebay as an excuse to raise prices here too. If I ask somebody in the WTB section to sell me a CIB The Legend of Zelda on NES for $25-30, they are probably just not going to answer me unfortunately because they know they can get more money for selling it on ebay, thus making the problem worse by not joining the ebay boycott. Or often times when I do get a seller offering a game for a good price on a forum, they don't take good pics and say the item looks great. And when it shows up it has like water damage on the manual, heavy creasing on the boxes, writing or rental stickers on the carts or cds. Nintendoage people are so shady sometimes. One time I even got a bootleg Donkey Kong Country 3 for SNES by somebody who "didn't know the difference." Caught them red handed when I opened the cart to install a battery because it had none in it to begin with. He never replied back.

Now I'm not saying everybody does this and I'm sure some people here would still give good deals, but it just worries me because I've seen it happen. Sometimes even good sellers turn bad. I thank all those members who have sold me something on this forum before or bought from me because on Digitpress I have had all good experiences so far.
My good to bad ratio on ebay is far, far worse than forums. There have been a couple of bad apples, but I've only had one really terrible experience. I guess I'm lucky.

I do use ebay, somewhat, to price things, but unlike ebay, I continually drop prices until they're at a price someone wants to pay for, and I rarely turn down people asking for deals. I know I can't be alone in this, but sadly, too few people are willing to make a deal.

And then we have to worry about flippers on top of it all. :/

[Tanooki]

Rick while I agree with your sentiment I've seen this play out in the predator pool of the sellers board on Nintendoage to then have people bitch about others even some calling them out by name in open threads where people ignore the ebay price rape trends and give nice deals, sometimes like 3+years ago kind of nice to then have the buyer instantly post the stuff on ebay. Usually the buyer will be all appreciative that they were looking for an item for awhile or one of those lines, and the stuff just smack goes right up on ebay for those mid to higher end BIN prices and rake in a nice little extra on it.

That reason alone is why I set mine very carefully over there and on ebay too. I look at the current trending prices, remove the top 10-20% and bottom 10-20% for flukes, and then I see the average and come in lower by a dollar or a few dollars or more depending on the price so it's attractive and bought (and then on NA I'll take that and remove the ebay fees and will go even lower depending on the deal by 20%.) Someone gets a solid deal but not solid enough to flip it off my efforts.

Joining the ebay boycott isn't the answer. It's either somehow getting them to put back the posting fees and also allowing 1min auction extensions for sniper garbage that will curb a good bit of it. Snipers will lose out as the practice ends, and people posting shit for more than it actually sells for would stop unless they like to lose their ass on showing off goodies no one can buy. After they went to that newer model of free posting BIN's have shot up to 85% of the auctions for NES games on ebay, leaving 15% for true auction or auction w/BIN postings (I do that.)


By the way who screwed you over at NA, you do know they have a feedback model there, a hall of shame, and the site admins tend to go after people for stealing.

[Gentlegamer]

I'd rather everyone snipe with their max bid in the last seconds than slowly drive the price of the auction up over several days.

[Rickstilwell1]

Rick while I agree with your sentiment I've seen this play out in the predator pool of the sellers board on Nintendoage to then have people bitch about others even some calling them out by name in open threads where people ignore the ebay price rape trends and give nice deals, sometimes like 3+years ago kind of nice to then have the buyer instantly post the stuff on ebay. Usually the buyer will be all appreciative that they were looking for an item for awhile or one of those lines, and the stuff just smack goes right up on ebay for those mid to higher end BIN prices and rake in a nice little extra on it.

That reason alone is why I set mine very carefully over there and on ebay too. I look at the current trending prices, remove the top 10-20% and bottom 10-20% for flukes, and then I see the average and come in lower by a dollar or a few dollars or more depending on the price so it's attractive and bought (and then on NA I'll take that and remove the ebay fees and will go even lower depending on the deal by 20%.) Someone gets a solid deal but not solid enough to flip it off my efforts.

Joining the ebay boycott isn't the answer. It's either somehow getting them to put back the posting fees and also allowing 1min auction extensions for sniper garbage that will curb a good bit of it. Snipers will lose out as the practice ends, and people posting shit for more than it actually sells for would stop unless they like to lose their ass on showing off goodies no one can buy. After they went to that newer model of free posting BIN's have shot up to 85% of the auctions for NES games on ebay, leaving 15% for true auction or auction w/BIN postings (I do that.)


By the way who screwed you over at NA, you do know they have a feedback model there, a hall of shame, and the site admins tend to go after people for stealing.

Wavingflags2. His last message was "i had no idea it was a pirate copy. its pretty crazy because i was under the impression pirating games is pricey. i see most homebrews selling for $20-30 and donkey kong country 3 seems like a reasonably cheap game.


regardless if you want to send me back the donkey kong country 3/super mario world 1. i'll pay the return shipping, and send you my other copies. also as far as donkey kong country 1. If you want to send that back I can swap it out with another one. ill take better photos of everything. "

So I messaged him to show me the pictures of the replacement items they offered and they never replied back with the promised pictures. With Super Mario World I was going for the label variant and this seller had both but sent me 2 of the same. DKC1 had a rental sticker and something engraved in the plastic on the back. DKC3 was a pirate. I never posted feedback as I thought maybe they went on vacation or lost internet or something. But now it's been since August so maybe I should mention them on there now.

Edit: He hasn't even been on Nintendoage since last October. Maybe something happened to him.