Wata graded ROM hacks

[fcgamer | 4,723]

12 hours ago, RH said:

Believe me, I have no love for Wata. At all.

But I agree with @Code Monkey. I think this is a case where Wata grades what’s sent in and they remain agnostic about the contents, it legitimacy as being official and what not.  I’m fine with this because where do you draw the line.

In my opinion, grading something like this allows for the additional grading of homebrews and such.  Unless you’re 100% against grading, I doubt any of us disagree with homebrew grading.  By allowing for homebrews, ROM hacks and repros, they are putting the onus on potential buyers to verify that they are getting what they want.

I agree this was a dumb move on the person who submitted it and it’s obvious these are ugly fakes.  Still, if you want to get into high-dollar collecting, you need to learn to verify what you are getting whether it’s encased in acrylic or not.

The guys at Wata are idiots for labelling these games as the fan term "reproductions". It reminds me of the guy doing research on unauthorised game consoles who tries to lump the modern China-made shit in with the stuff from the 80s and 90s. It's like saying Italians and Americans share the same culture.

I can't wait until the day that Wata grades an Aliexpress game and labels it as a "bootleg", and then grades a 1994 Kart Fighter from Hummer Team and labels it as a "bootleg" as well, as if they are the same thing and are equal in terms of what exactly they are (they aren't, though basically no one aside from @Ankos and me are into this sort of stuff here, there's tons of collectors and gamers outside of VGS who know what I'm talking about). 

Eventually this house of cards will collapse, and such moves as this will lead to the collapse, as it starts to become apparent that they have no idea about anything.

[Ankos | 435]

26 minutes ago, fcgamer said:

The guys at Wata are idiots for labelling these games as the fan term "reproductions".

That is the sort of thing sellers on eBay started doing because eBay started giving them trouble for including the word bootleg in their listing

[final fight cd | 186]

8 hours ago, Sumez said:

Please stop sending money to this bogus company

If you want your game kept in good condition, buy box protectors. If you want to know what condition it's in, look at it.

I always found it odd that people pay money to have somebody else tell you what condition your game is in.  And then if the grade doesn’t match his/her expected condition, he/she gets upset. Like, this one dude’s opinion is the end-all-be-all?  If the same person graded the game 10 times, there undoubtedly would be variation from day to day/week to week.  I would rather trust my own thoughts and opinions than some random person I never met before. 
 

We live in an age of materialism and social media, where everybody feels the need to show off and compare themselves to others. Makes me wonder if in an alternative universe where social media, like FB/IG, didn’t exist would grading be as big as it is now. 

Edited November 4, 2022 by final fight cd

[guitarzombie | 924]

Do any other SERIOUS grading companies, grade anything that ISN'T authentic?!  Sports cards/memorabilia? Comics??

 

From WATA not caring and grading anything, to people buying a NEW bootleg for $60, grading it for X, then selling it for thousands are all saying "WE THINK THE PEOPLE WHO BUY THESE ARE RICH/GREEDY AND STUPID".  Wata is complicit in helping to damage the community.  Kudos to them.

[darkchylde28 | 1,546]

44 minutes ago, final fight cd said:

I always found it odd that people pay money to have somebody else tell you what condition your game is in.  And then if the grade doesn’t match his/her expected condition, he/she gets upset. Like, this one dude’s opinion is the end-all-be-all?  If the same person graded the game 10 times, there undoubtedly would be variation from day to day/week to week.  I would rather trust my own thoughts and opinions than some random person I never met before.

Well, the original theory behind it was that you'd have an objective third party determine the exact condition the object was in at the time it was presented for grading, then lock it away in some sort of sealed container in order to ensure that that grade stayed true.  In this way, collectors would be able to skip past all the bickering and finger pointing when trading, buying, selling, etc. such collectibles among themselves.  It seems like grading didn't really become the end goal in order to hike/hype up the value of something versus being a good, impartial tool to serve the community until folks like Jim Halperin got involved (beginning with coins in the 80s, where he ran afoul of the FTC for giving inflated values to coins that his company had graded, resulting in big fines).

Nowadays, yeah, the whole grading industry has far more to do with "investment" schemes than actually providing any sort of valuable service to the communities that built and maintain the popularity of the various objects that pass through their hands.  Not all grading companies are solely focused on that part of their market, but enough are so as to put a bad taste in a lot of folks' mouth and give every company in that industry a bit of a black eye just by association.

[final fight cd | 186]

3 hours ago, darkchylde28 said:

Well, the original theory behind it was that you'd have an objective third party determine the exact condition the object was in at the time it was presented for grading, then lock it away in some sort of sealed container in order to ensure that that grade stayed true.  In this way, collectors would be able to skip past all the bickering and finger pointing when trading, buying, selling, etc. such collectibles among themselves.  It seems like grading didn't really become the end goal in order to hike/hype up the value of something versus being a good, impartial tool to serve the community until folks like Jim Halperin got involved (beginning with coins in the 80s, where he ran afoul of the FTC for giving inflated values to coins that his company had graded, resulting in big fines).

Nowadays, yeah, the whole grading industry has far more to do with "investment" schemes than actually providing any sort of valuable service to the communities that built and maintain the popularity of the various objects that pass through their hands.  Not all grading companies are solely focused on that part of their market, but enough are so as to put a bad taste in a lot of folks' mouth and give every company in that industry a bit of a black eye just by association.

i was more referring to people who pay to have their games graded with the intentions of keeping them.  

[MrWunderful | 2,927]

Sealed collecting has become so watered down and commercialized, That the majority of Newer collectors automatically assume that anything that has been graded is immediately worth more money and better than “raw”.

 

It’s become so terrible that it’s trickled down into everything that’s not sealed as well. 
 

Put it in a case , remove its usefulness and it automagically becomes more valuable. 

[inasuma | 1,203]

On 11/3/2022 at 4:11 PM, CodysGameRoom said:

What’s funny about this is pat could have messaged wata and asked if they still grade rom hacks and reproductions.

good news: they don’t! They stopped a bit before Collectors Universe bought them out apparently. Confirmed by watas own head of authentication this year in GetTheGregGames’ discord.

people already pointed this out to Pat and he still hasn’t corrected the title. Even Seth A. pointed it out.

side note: I agree wata really should have never bothered grading unofficial games (whatever that is defined as). Rom hacks are obviously unofficial and IP infringement. Home brews I think are stair game if someone wanted to grade those (no opinion otherwise).

Edited November 5, 2022 by inasuma

[MrWunderful | 2,927]

They probably want to mention that on their FAQ, as i couldnt find anything about not grading reproductions. 
 

https://www.watagames.com/faq

 

they say if it will fit, they will grade it. They actually mention a whole bunch of real games they WONT grade lol

[CodysGameRoom | 2,008]

8 hours ago, inasuma said:

What’s funny about this is pat could have messaged wata and asked if they still grade rom hacks and reproductions.

CU Podcast isn't a newspaper, they don't have to "print a retraction". Most likely they are saving to mention on the next podcast which would make the most sense. 

I guess if only Pat had known to check.... Greg's Games discord, or whatever, lol, then maybe he would have known.

Or ya know, WATA could have put something on their website, anything at all, clearing the air on it. 

[darkchylde28 | 1,546]

41 minutes ago, CodysGameRoom said:

CU Podcast isn't a newspaper, they don't have to "print a retraction". Most likely they are saving to mention on the next podcast which would make the most sense. 

I guess if only Pat had known to check.... Greg's Games discord, or whatever, lol, then maybe he would have known.

Or ya know, WATA could have put something on their website, anything at all, clearing the air on it. 

They just don't fact check like they used to.  Tsk, tsk.

[inasuma | 1,203]

1 hour ago, CodysGameRoom said:

CU Podcast isn't a newspaper, they don't have to "print a retraction". Most likely they are saving to mention on the next podcast which would make the most sense. 

I guess if only Pat had known to check.... Greg's Games discord, or whatever, lol, then maybe he would have known.

Or ya know, WATA could have put something on their website, anything at all, clearing the air on it. 

I never claimed pat is running a newspaper or that he’s a journalist or that he should have known to check Greg’s discord.

im just saying someone with Pats audience, you’d think they’d have due diligence in getting their facts right, it’s pretty basic stuff.

like don’t get me wrong: pat has every right to rip in wata for grading ROM hacks. But I expect better of community mouthpieces.

[Link | 2,709]

I guess Pat likes to shit talk as much as anyone  

9 hours ago, MrWunderful said:

they say if it will fit, they will grade it. They actually mention a whole bunch of real games they WONT grade lol

It's almost like they're too lazy to bother with making oddball size cases, and there's no point because they're too busy making money hand over fist bliwing up the market and sitting on peoples' games for 6-12 months+ rather than offering an actual comprehensive service. 

[darkchylde28 | 1,546]

9 minutes ago, Link said:

It's almost like they're too lazy to bother with making oddball size cases, and there's no point because they're too busy making money hand over fist bliwing up the market and sitting on peoples' games for 6-12 months+ rather than offering an actual comprehensive service. 

I really hate to come to WATA's defense, but seeing as their cases seem to be designed to fit each type of box/cart really closely to prevent a lot of movement, I can understand them not wanting to invest tens of thousands of dollars, if not more, into a relative handful of cases that are specifically sized for individual games and nothing else.  I agree with your general assessment of their true motivations 100%, but in the case (ha ha) of creating a bunch of different cases that can each really only be used for one specific game, I have to say that I'm on their side, as it's highly unlikely that they'd end up recouping their investment in whatever minimal order size for those cases would be versus however many of each would trickle in for grading over the years.

[MrWunderful | 2,927]

Tool and die / material costs are probably waayyy higher than it would be worth it for a super limited amount of specific cases. How many sealed carmen sandiegos are floating around? Even if there are 1000 waiting to grade, they would probably only break even if that. 

[Nintendopower4ever | 88]

2 hours ago, MrWunderful said:

Tool and die / material costs are probably waayyy higher than it would be worth it for a super limited amount of specific cases. How many sealed carmen sandiegos are floating around? Even if there are 1000 waiting to grade, they would probably only break even if that. 

I have both of them for sealed SNES and they are actually two different sizes! lol

[OptOut | 8,883]

I am very glad to hear that WATA no longer grade repros.

It's mindboggling that they ever did so in the first place, mind you, but this is a very positive development, IMO.

[Nintendopower4ever | 88]

I just noticed that Kenneth still has absolutely no idea what he's doing with grading the Made in Mexico -LTN region Super Nintendo games after we discussed it in great detail on here over 2 years ago that they are NOT USA version and are NOT -USA Code and he tried to argue with me about them grading them as USA versions. I can still see they are grading them wrong as May 2022 from the date on the back of the case lol

https://www.ebay.com/itm/284861148045
 

 

[CodysGameRoom | 2,008]

5 hours ago, Nintendopower4ever said:

I can still see they are grading them wrong as May 2022 from the date on the back of the case lol

Umm idk if saw their website but they are the experts so how dare you question their infinite wisdom???

[inasuma | 1,203]

10 hours ago, Nintendopower4ever said:

I just noticed that Kenneth still has absolutely no idea what he's doing with grading the Made in Mexico -LTN region Super Nintendo games after we discussed it in great detail on here over 2 years ago that they are NOT USA version and are NOT -USA Code and he tried to argue with me about them grading them as USA versions. I can still see they are grading them wrong as May 2022 from the date on the back of the case lol

https://www.ebay.com/itm/284861148045
 

 

kenneth doesn't grade at wata these days. stopped at the end of april i believe. so it's more likely the current staff are going off whatever knowledgebase existed after he left.

also, this was painful to read lol

Edited November 7, 2022 by inasuma

[Nintendopower4ever | 88]

26 minutes ago, inasuma said:

kenneth doesn't grade at wata these days. stopped at the end of april i believe. so it's more likely the current staff are going off whatever knowledgebase existed after he left.

also, this was painful to read lol

What was painful to read?

Even if he did stop grading, he still had 2 years to fix the error of grading Latin games as USA games with the wrong region code after we discussed it and never corrected the issue. I know he was always an NES guy so I tried to help them because I actually do know SNES pretty well lol

Edited November 7, 2022 by Nintendopower4ever

[Nintendopower4ever | 88]

49 minutes ago, inasuma said:

kenneth doesn't grade at wata these days. stopped at the end of april i believe. so it's more likely the current staff are going off whatever knowledgebase existed after he left.

also, this was painful to read lol

Also, if you have any idea what I'm talking about you would see the problem with WATA grading Latin versions of games like Mega Man 7 and Captain Commando where both versions were made in Mexico and the Latin version is much more common sealed and I've seen a few listed into the 5 figures. Heritage auctions literally claimed there was only one production run and there are no variants with one of the misgraded Latin versions they auctioned! Who at WATA wrote that description last year??? lol

"Mega Man 7 - Wata 8.0 B Sealed, SNES Capcom 1995 USA. There's pretty much only one production run for this game as far as variants are concerned! All copies were produced in Mexico. Produced by Tokuro Fujiwara. Released as a sequel to Mega Man 6, but was released after Meg Man X. Cover art by Greg Winters. Video game for Super Nintendo Entertainment System."

https://comics.ha.com/itm/video-games/mega-man-7-wata-80-b-sealed-snes-capcom-1995-usa/a/7261-29100.s?ic4=GalleryView-ShortDescription-071515

Edited November 7, 2022 by Nintendopower4ever

[Tyree_Cooper | 753]

"pretty much" already sets the tone, i.e. "we don't know but the interweb says so somewhere, so it super raer"

[CodysGameRoom | 2,008]

Man, the way you guys talk it's like these guys aren't experts at all...

[darkchylde28 | 1,546]

2 hours ago, CodysGameRoom said:

Man, the way you guys talk it's like these guys aren't experts at all...

Hey now!  Everybody knows that all snake oil salesmen are experts!