ThePhleo's 2023 Complete Rarity Guide Collection [NES, Super Nintendo, Nintendo 64, Gamecube, Game Boy, Virtual Boy, Game Boy Color]

[ThePhleo | 2,184]

Now for your casual enjoyment, I present ThePhleo's 2023 Complete Rarity Guide Collection.

Nintendo Consoles
	[Wii Coming 2024]	[Wii U Coming 2024]
Nintendo Handhelds
		[GBA Coming Late November]
[DS Coming 2024]	[3DS Coming 2024]	[Switch Coming 2026]
Nintendo Misc.
[Game & Watch Coming Late November]

Each list includes its own unique rarity scale based off of the median available item of each library, an R5 for N64 isn't the same as an R5 for Game Boy, and so on.

I do plan on adding a universal rarity scale once I have more libraries added. Planned libraries are going to be added in the following order.

October 2023

1. NES
2. Super NES
3. Nintendo 64
4. Game Boy
5. Game Boy Color

Update 1 - Nintendo (November 2023)

1. Game Boy Advance
2. Gamecube
3. Game & Watch
4. Virtual Boy
5. Pokemon Mini

Update 2 - Sega (December 2023)

1. Sega Master System
2. Genesis (with CD & 32x)
3. Saturn
4. Dreamcast
5. Game Gear

Update 3 - PlayStation 1 (January 2024)

1. PlayStation

Update 4 - Atari (February 2024)

1. Atari 2600 (With most Third Party publishers)
2. Atari 5200
3. Atari 7800
4. Atari Jaguar (with CD)

Update 5 - Other '70s and Early '80s (March 2024)

1. ColecoVision
2. Intellivision
3. Odyssey
4. Odyssey 2
5. Fairchild Channel F
6. Bally Astrocade
7. Vectrex
8. MicroVision

 

I do plan on normalizing the titles of the games soon, for now their Wikipedia titles are what I'm using. Data will eventually be used for another project I'm working on.

I'd also like to include PS2, PSP, and Xbox into the mix, but their libraries seem too large for too small a payout.

Let me know how I can improve the list, and if you see any glaring errors.

Thanks!

 

- ThePhleo

Edited November 21, 2023 by ThePhleo

[DefaultGen | 5,405]

I'm enjoying the first article for the first issue of the VGS E-Zine. When is the full issue going to be out.

[CT | 91]

I'm sure you have thought of this, but do you believe creating a rarity list like this focuses on the interests of Ebay sellers?

Meaning, sellers are more motivated to sell Little Samson (especially individually and not in a lot) versus a low demand, "bad game" like Hatris. 

On your list, Hatris is listed as more rare than Little Samson, but perhaps Ebay sellers just don't sell Hatris as much or would rather put Hatris into a lot or system bundle to get rid of it. There is less of demand to buy Hatris.

So it seems you would be tracking how popular a game is selling on Ebay, with the number of copies available not necessarily correlating to actual rarity.

I didn't want to stir up controversy, I've always respected your lists and this question popped up in my head.

 

[ThePhleo | 2,184]

16 minutes ago, CT said:

I'm sure you have thought of this, but do you believe creating a rarity list like this focuses on the interests of Ebay sellers?

Meaning, sellers are more motivated to sell Little Samson (especially individually and not in a lot) versus a low demand, "bad game" like Hatris. 

On your list, Hatris is listed as more rare than Little Samson, but perhaps Ebay sellers just don't sell Hatris as much or would rather put Hatris into a lot or system bundle to get rid of it. There is less of demand to buy Hatris.

So it seems you would be tracking how popular a game is selling on Ebay, with the number of copies available not necessarily correlating to actual rarity.

I didn't want to stir up controversy, I've always respected your lists and this question popped up in my head.

 

You’re absolutely right that it’s a popular item to sell.

The word “rarity” isn’t the right word to begin with, but it’s the one we all (incorrectly) use.

Rarity is an absolute number determined on the date of the final production of an item. A better word would be Scarcity.

Scarcity is a moving target. What’s an “R5” today might be a R3 tomorrow, but ultimately in 100 years time everything might be a R10.

My lists above are just a snapshot in time, if you are in the market for Little Samson in October 2023, then it’s slightly more common/easier to find than Hatris…yeah that’s irrefutable…but it might switch spots next month.

So, in a couple months when I update the charts, we’ll have some more data to add, and instead of a “90 day” moving market, we’ll have a “180 day” moving market. The goal is to try to get a years worth of data.

[ThePhleo | 2,184]

29 minutes ago, DefaultGen said:

I'm enjoying the first article for the first issue of the VGS E-Zine. When is the full issue going to be out.

What’s an E-Zine? That some sort of prescription drug or something?

[Nintegageo | 582]

Very cool. Did not know Tecmo Soccer was such a rare game.

[RegularGuyGamer | 2,013]

[CT | 91]

7 hours ago, ThePhleo said:

My lists above are just a snapshot in time, if you are in the market for Little Samson in October 2023, then it’s slightly more common/easier to find than Hatris…yeah that’s irrefutable…but it might switch spots next month.

So, in a couple months when I update the charts, we’ll have some more data to add, and instead of a “90 day” moving market, we’ll have a “180 day” moving market. The goal is to try to get a years worth of data.

Thank you for your comments! I really respect your lists and dedication to the hobby. Thank you for clarifying and I'm looking forward to seeing more. Great work!

[DarkTone | 984]

Cool. When will you add the PAL games? 

Why is everyone laughing? 

[nrslam | 476]

And here I thought I had all the N64 games. Silly Brazilian release!

 

[LeatherRebel5150 | 1,056]

30 minutes ago, nrslam said:

And here I thought I had all the N64 games. Silly Brazilian release!

 

That needs to be explained to me. Ive seen people lump that i with the US set for some reason.  Even this spreadsheet says USA on the top and has this game listed 

Edited October 24, 2023 by LeatherRebel5150

[ThePhleo | 2,184]

6 hours ago, CT said:

Thank you for your comments! I really respect your lists and dedication to the hobby. Thank you for clarifying and I'm looking forward to seeing more. Great work!

Thanks! I love this kinda stuff so it’s kinda fun for me really.
 

6 hours ago, DarkTone said:

Cool. When will you add the PAL games? 

Why is everyone laughing? 

If you check the notes tab on the NES list, they’re coming eventually, along with the test carts and other stuff.

Gonna be way harder though since I’ll have to go on UK eBay, Italy eBay, Germany, etc etc.

36 minutes ago, nrslam said:

And here I thought I had all the N64 games. Silly Brazilian release!

 

Sorry, yeah I count that one! Explanation below.

6 minutes ago, LeatherRebel5150 said:

That needs to be explained to me. Ive seen people lump that i with the US set for some reason.  Even this spreadsheet says USA on the top and has this game listed 

You’re right it doesn’t belong in the USA list, but it’s special enough to warrant adding as it’s own unique category.

Its technically a licensed NTSC release and I accidently lumped it in with the 296 USA releases.

Ill fix it when I get to a PC

[DarkTone | 984]

6 hours ago, ThePhleo said:

Thanks! I love this kinda stuff so it’s kinda fun for me really.
 

If you check the notes tab on the NES list, they’re coming eventually, along with the test carts and other stuff.

Gonna be way harder though since I’ll have to go on UK eBay, Italy eBay, Germany, etc etc.

Sorry, yeah I count that one! Explanation below.

You’re right it doesn’t belong in the USA list, but it’s special enough to warrant adding as it’s own unique category.

Its technically a licensed NTSC release and I accidently lumped it in with the 296 USA releases.

Ill fix it when I get to a PC

Thats cool. It was 100% a joke. 

[ThePhleo | 2,184]

On 10/24/2023 at 4:14 PM, DarkTone said:

Thats cool. It was 100% a joke. 

Im sorry sir; this is serious business.

Now excuse me while I look up sales data on Color A Dinosaur, and Singer Izek Sewing Machines.

[Floating Platforms | 716]

This is pretty cool, and seems pretty accurate to what I've been seeing too so far, but I think there are potentially a couple cartridges to consider on the Game Boy/Game Boy Color side.  There are a few titles that were released both as gray GB carts and black GBC carts.  Frogger, Super Breakout, and Wario Land II immediately come to mind.  The gray cart GB versions of each are significantly tougher to find in the wild and most of the ebay listings will be the black ones - Wario Land II has more gray available than those other 2 I mentioned, but it's still a sub-segment.

[LutherDestroysTheGond | 690]

Pretty neat.  For Gameboy titles, it's hard to sift out the non -USA versions of game though without manually scrubbing through pics of games in each active/sold listing.  For example, 3/4 active copies of Jimmy Connor's Tennis are from other regions.  Finding a -USA copy is very difficult and usually more expensive than the other regions.   Other region copies also get lumped in when determing the scarcity/price.  As a result, it appears more common and actually cheaper on the end result here than it usually is for a -USA copy of this game at least.  There may be other examples but that was one that stood out to me as I had been hunting it recently 

Edited October 27, 2023 by LutherDestroysTheGond

[the_wizard_666 | 1,325]

Just a couple things I noticed on a cursory glance of the NES list:

Racermate 2 should probably be a 10 based on numbers alone.

It could probably be fair that Stadium Events is no higher than a 9.  It's more common than people think, especially when several pop up every year for sale.  The other R10s are far rarer than SE.

Not sure if the R9 Impossible Mission II is supposed to be the AVE or SEI release, but neither should be that high.  AVE would be an R6 tops.  Neither SEI variant should be more than an R7, maybe R8 on a good day.

Bubble Bath Babes is far more common than the other two Panesians, and should probably be downgraded to R8.

Caltron was once considered super rare, but a few found skids tanked it.  R7 at best.

Little Samson seems low at 7.  I'd put it at 8 for sure.  Given how scarce it was before the price skyrocketed, I'd say it's probably scarcer than F2, though that's debatable.

For the most part, the list looks good, but those were just a few that felt a bit off.  Not terribly so in most cases, but definitely off.  Still, I commend you on the sheer magnitude of the project and how it turned out.  There's always gonna be nitpicking done with rarity lists, but you did a pretty good job overall!

[DarkTone | 984]

4 hours ago, the_wizard_666 said:

Just a couple things I noticed on a cursory glance of the NES list:

Racermate 2 should probably be a 10 based on numbers alone.

It could probably be fair that Stadium Events is no higher than a 9.  It's more common than people think, especially when several pop up every year for sale.  The other R10s are far rarer than SE.

Not sure if the R9 Impossible Mission II is supposed to be the AVE or SEI release, but neither should be that high.  AVE would be an R6 tops.  Neither SEI variant should be more than an R7, maybe R8 on a good day.

Bubble Bath Babes is far more common than the other two Panesians, and should probably be downgraded to R8.

Caltron was once considered super rare, but a few found skids tanked it.  R7 at best.

Little Samson seems low at 7.  I'd put it at 8 for sure.  Given how scarce it was before the price skyrocketed, I'd say it's probably scarcer than F2, though that's debatable.

For the most part, the list looks good, but those were just a few that felt a bit off.  Not terribly so in most cases, but definitely off.  Still, I commend you on the sheer magnitude of the project and how it turned out.  There's always gonna be nitpicking done with rarity lists, but you did a pretty good job overall!

I would have guessed BBB had the same amount made as the other 2. Or maybe its like Starfox over DKC competition cart, more made but harder to find? 

[the_wizard_666 | 1,325]

9 hours ago, DarkTone said:

I would have guessed BBB had the same amount made as the other 2. Or maybe its like Starfox over DKC competition cart, more made but harder to find? 

I have seen significantly more BBB carts over the years than the others.  Hot Slots appears to be the rarest of the three, but not by enough to warrant a change in rank.  I presume it's simply that BBB came out earlier and thus more copies were made.  It's still one of the rarest NES carts that wasn't published by Sachen, but it's more a high R8 than an R9.

Actually, there are two other R9s that should be downgraded too.  Challenge of the Dragon and Ultimate League Soccer are also more like high R7 to low R8.  

[Code Monkey | 2,010]

2 hours ago, the_wizard_666 said:

I have seen significantly more BBB carts over the years than the others.  Hot Slots appears to be the rarest of the three, but not by enough to warrant a change in rank.  I presume it's simply that BBB came out earlier and thus more copies were made.  It's still one of the rarest NES carts that wasn't published by Sachen, but it's more a high R8 than an R9.

Actually, there are two other R9s that should be downgraded too.  Challenge of the Dragon and Ultimate League Soccer are also more like high R7 to low R8.  

I see Hot Slots way more than the other two, in fact it's the only one of the three I own and it's complete. It's the only one I've ever seen for sale locally but it's possible that was a fluke.

I would disagree with Ultimate League Soccer but maybe that's also a fluke for me. I accidentally bought a second complete one because I didn't realise I already owned it, now I have two.

[DarkTone | 984]

Interesting. So, why are unlicensed games on the list? 

[Jaden | 151]

Because people care about collecting them, for whatever reason.

[the_wizard_666 | 1,325]

3 hours ago, Code Monkey said:

I see Hot Slots way more than the other two, in fact it's the only one of the three I own and it's complete. It's the only one I've ever seen for sale locally but it's possible that was a fluke.

I would disagree with Ultimate League Soccer but maybe that's also a fluke for me. I accidentally bought a second complete one because I didn't realise I already owned it, now I have two.

After watching for two decades, I can confidently say BBB is way more common.  There are droughts of course, but over the long haul, BBB turns up way more frequently.

3 hours ago, DarkTone said:

Interesting. So, why are unlicensed games on the list? 

Because they're awesome, and weren't ever counted separately until the last 10 years or so.  Before the Braveheart spikes on NA, there was no such thing as a licensed only set.  Once he started spending stupid money to get everything all at once, and hoarded variants like a madman, unlicensed became too scarce and expensive for most people.  Once people decided not to care about unlicensed, new collectors thought that was normal and kept it going, thinking it was a quality thing, but objectively it was straight scarcity.

[Ankos | 439]

3 hours ago, DarkTone said:

Interesting. So, why are unlicensed games on the list? 

A more interesting question to me would be: "What makes an unlicensed game count?" It's sort of an abstract anything goes category. I don't think it is a question that needs answering though, since most systems have a generally accepted "canon" for unlicensed stuff, and relatively few people search for stuff outside of that

(If you're someone who hunt for really niche stuff you kinda have to come up with your own personal list)

[ThePhleo | 2,184]

On 10/27/2023 at 2:41 PM, LutherDestroysTheGond said:

Pretty neat.  For Gameboy titles, it's hard to sift out the non -USA versions of game though without manually scrubbing through pics of games in each active/sold listing.  For example, 3/4 active copies of Jimmy Connor's Tennis are from other regions.  Finding a -USA copy is very difficult and usually more expensive than the other regions.   Other region copies also get lumped in when determing the scarcity/price.  As a result, it appears more common and actually cheaper on the end result here than it usually is for a -USA copy of this game at least.  There may be other examples but that was one that stood out to me as I had been hunting it recently 

Can you take a look at the provided eBay link in the list and see if any european copieis are showing up? The way I filtered out foreign carts is by searching only in the USA and excluding all foreign ebay listings. I also used search filters like -pal -jp -japan etc.

I'm not sure what to look for when looking at Game Boy and I want the data to be as accurate as possible.

 

On 10/27/2023 at 11:10 PM, the_wizard_666 said:

Just a couple things I noticed on a cursory glance of the NES list:

Racermate 2 should probably be a 10 based on numbers alone.

It could probably be fair that Stadium Events is no higher than a 9.  It's more common than people think, especially when several pop up every year for sale.  The other R10s are far rarer than SE.

Not sure if the R9 Impossible Mission II is supposed to be the AVE or SEI release, but neither should be that high.  AVE would be an R6 tops.  Neither SEI variant should be more than an R7, maybe R8 on a good day.

Bubble Bath Babes is far more common than the other two Panesians, and should probably be downgraded to R8.

Caltron was once considered super rare, but a few found skids tanked it.  R7 at best.

Little Samson seems low at 7.  I'd put it at 8 for sure.  Given how scarce it was before the price skyrocketed, I'd say it's probably scarcer than F2, though that's debatable.

For the most part, the list looks good, but those were just a few that felt a bit off.  Not terribly so in most cases, but definitely off.  Still, I commend you on the sheer magnitude of the project and how it turned out.  There's always gonna be nitpicking done with rarity lists, but you did a pretty good job overall!

10 on my list is "made up"

Anything past 7 is subject to major shifts just based on regular droughts and gluts of copies appearing in a 90 day period.

Impossible Mission is really a mission impossible to filter out the SEI/AVE variant. The SEI variant is significantly more common though, so what I did in that item was add a "-ave" to the search, which gives me the rough number for the SEI copies, and then searched for listings that specify the AVE variant to get the AVE "pop"....it's not perfect, but it's just one title, and I had to get SOME metric for it.

In regards to Caltron, doesn't matter if there's skids worth if they're not listed. They aren't available to you and therefor not on the market. This is a market scarcity list, not a true "rarity" list (a feat that's literally impossible)

But yeah, I agree that there's only so much you can do with a rarity guide. I tried to put my feelings aside but I still had to make up the "R10" ranking to satisfy my need to justify stuff like Stadium Events and Myriad and NWC existing.

 

16 hours ago, Code Monkey said:

I see Hot Slots way more than the other two, in fact it's the only one of the three I own and it's complete. It's the only one I've ever seen for sale locally but it's possible that was a fluke.

I would disagree with Ultimate League Soccer but maybe that's also a fluke for me. I accidentally bought a second complete one because I didn't realise I already owned it, now I have two.

I disagree with a lot of the items in the list too, but the numbers don't lie. If something is regularly available then, is it really that rare? Plus, all the things we all disagree with are at the really FAR end of the hobby. Who really cares what an R8 or R9 is if only a couple dozen of us even care that it exists to begin with, no?

 

16 hours ago, DarkTone said:

Interesting. So, why are unlicensed games on the list? 

You can click the "Licensed Only" tab to filter them out. I personally don't collect Unlicensed much, but I know other people do so I included them.

 

12 hours ago, Ankos said:

A more interesting question to me would be: "What makes an unlicensed game count?" It's sort of an abstract anything goes category. I don't think it is a question that needs answering though, since most systems have a generally accepted "canon" for unlicensed stuff, and relatively few people search for stuff outside of that

(If you're someone who hunt for really niche stuff you kinda have to come up with your own personal list)

The things that make the "Unlicensed" list is literally Mike Etler.

Some dude in the '90s in the Jersey Shore area owned a game store, and whatever games popped up in his store were added to his public NES rarity guide. Simple as that.

Since he never got in Sachen games, they never made his list and therefor all 67 of their releases "don't count" but somehow Cheetahmen II and Dizzy the Adventurer do, despite never being officially released.