Survey Regarding the Potential of a New Video Game Grader in the Market

[Gloves | 11,844]

28 minutes ago, Code Monkey said:

I was joking too, language is probably one of the things I'm most critical of myself so I rarely make mistakes. When I got my diagnosis for Asperger's, one of the notes from the psychologist was that she had never met anyone with such proper sentence structure.

I was playing Immortals Fenyx Rising last night and made it to a point where the game told me, "This Myth Challenge is required to progress further up the mountain." I debated with myself if I was going to let the developers know they incorrectly used further instead of farther. I don't know how that got through testing.

Further and farther are interchangeable enough that it doesn't matter. There are usage guides on the internet, but they are not infallible by any stretch; the beauty of language, especially that of English, is that it is ever-evolving. 

As for how these things get by testing, that's an easy answer - the terminology used in your example is an acceptable one. How ACTUAL mistakes make it through, however, is that they're too busy making a game to worry about necessarily always being perfect in every tiny detail. Copy mistakes are easy to make, often go through many revisions, pass many hands, and each step of the way is a human prone to error. 

[Code Monkey | 2,014]

1 minute ago, Gloves said:

Further and farther are interchangeable enough that it doesn't matter. There are usage guides on the internet, but they are not infallible by any stretch; the beauty of language, especially that of English, is that it is ever-evolving. 

One is qualitative while the other is quantitative. They're not interchangeable.

[Gloves | 11,844]

7 minutes ago, Code Monkey said:

One is qualitative while the other is quantitative. They're not interchangeable.

According to you. 

[Gloves | 11,844]

I have come home at last! This is my real country! I belong here. This is the land I have been looking for all my life, though I never knew it till now . . . Come further up, come further in!

 

The above is a generally accepted usage of the word "further", and aligns well with your example. 

So the writing in that game at least in that regard mirrors the quality of CS Lewis. 

[OptOut | 8,892]

Lol, @VideoGameGradersLLC has finally proved his worth, and so we've immediately turned on each other!

[VideoGameGradersLLC | 82]

4 minutes ago, OptOut said:

Lol, @VideoGameGradersLLC has finally proved his worth, and so we've immediately turned on each other!

It’s a good thing I didn’t show a sealed game. 

[Dr. Morbis | 2,092]

My only issue is that you seem to be putting small scuffs/marks on the same level as actual creases in the box.  The Pac-Man box is in deplorable condition, and yet the game rates ony a few points behind SMB 2 et al.  Same problem with Top Gun: the creases on the side of the box should call for a major decrease, not the same little minus -1 or -2 that a tiny scuff you can barely see would call for.  Thanks for sharing this, but I feel that your system of grading is going to sandwich all games of all levels of condition into a narrow middle-road from like 60-90.

If you're using a 100 point scale, what would a 15 CIB look like?  What about a 98?  Your Top Gun and 10 Yard Fight should absolutely not have the same score.  Look at those two boxes!!!  I mean, Top Gun's manual is nicer, so there's that, but come on!  I guess my constructive criticism is that not all faults are created equal, and that especially rings true for collectors, so you need to be especially cognizant of that...

Edited March 14, 2021 by Dr. Morbis

[VideoGameGradersLLC | 82]

7 hours ago, Dr. Morbis said:

My only issue is that you seem to be putting small scuffs/marks on the same level as actual creases in the box

That has been the biggest moving part in the scorecard, we have had scratches, wrinkles and creases as 3 separate categories at one point and every other combo. I agree they shouldn’t be together as creases are more detrimental to overall condition. Probably need to have creases as a category and wrinkles/scratches as another. Besides the big manual difference one thing that makes the Top Gun box and 10-Yard Fight box closer in grade is corners, especially on the back, minor wear on four corners brought down 10YF but TG is strong there. Need to tweak handling  corners I think, too much sportscard background influence probably. 
Appreciate the feedback. 

[VideoGameGradersLLC | 82]

16 hours ago, MrWunderful said:

@VideoGameGradersLLC I like everything I see so far. 

Thanks
 

I was pretty skeptical at first, but seeing some proof makes me feel much more like you are serious about it. 

Tried to tell you

But I get it  Seeing is believing  

Im curious to see what (if any) design you have that would show proof of tamper. I understand if its proprietary or secret right now and you dont want to share, though. 
 

Label (our or new never used before lable) will have a unique ID number for each game that can be verified online and include pregrade photos to help confirm so the very worst any tampering would have to be the same game. But that’s going to be very hard to do. Label will have a hologram with our name and or logo on it, along with one or two additional measures that we will only reveal to registered members upon request as an added security level. The case itself will need to broken to be opened, will have digitally printed logo/name on the case itself which would take great effort to reproduce and we are looking at a small holographic external sticker at a seem of the case that would leave residue behind if removed. 
Long answer when YES probably would have sufficed. 
 

I would probably be open to trying your service. 
 

Glad to hear it  Thanks Again

 

[VideoGameGradersLLC | 82]

7 hours ago, Dr. Morbis said:

I feel that your system of grading is going to sandwich all games of all levels of condition into a narrow middle-road from like 60-90.

Likely true but I feel like that’s where most games will live with any grader, any system because it’s where games are...sportscards too. It’s why over 90 is so valuable, it’s really hard to get graded in that range as it should be. The 10-Yard Fight and Mach Rider boxes look really good at a glance, it’s not until they examined under bright light with a magnifying glass that some imperfections are shown. In our testing I have been concerned about so many in that range, actually even a tighter one but then looking at POP reports of sportscards it’s not unusual, people will tend to only send high quality for grading and rarely send in crap cards unless they are the elite prewar card era even still the curves tend to be similar with that mid to upper mid are the majority of grades. 
 

[AdamW | 713]

So from my "not so much about quality but very persnickety about what items are" perspective:

* Noting print codes is appreciated, thanks. Please always do this.

* Please note box print codes too. Usually for Nintendo games the box print code is on the box tabs. I don't actually know for sure that NES games have these (I don't really collect NES games), but even if they don't, please do it for games that do! Please also note any other codes printed on the tabs (there is often a date code there, which is very useful information that again is lost if a game is slabbed without it being noted). Here's an example of the print code (DMG-APSE USA) and date code (990729, 29th July 1999) on a Pokemon Yellow box (this is the white-ESRB print, DMG-APSE USA is the print code for that print, the other prints all have different print codes):

* Please note all packins in the same level of detail as the other items. Packins have print codes and variants and differ in condition just like manuals. Just yesterday I had to pay more for a Pokémon yellow player's guide offer than I would have had to pay for a *cart only copy of the damn game*, these things matter. And there are two variants of that packin and I know which print of the game should have which one. Here's an example of a packin from Gold/Silver showing it has a print code, and this copy is revision -1 (it also exists with no revision code, i.e. original version):

Thanks for posting the examples!

* edit: sorry one more thing: please check manuals for a date code and note it if present. GB/GBC/GBA game manuals sometimes have a date code in the inside back cover, for e.g. Here's an example of the date code from the manual for that Pokemon Yellow (in this case the manual and box date code are the same, but this is not always the case, though if the dates are *too* far apart I might start to suspect that manual didn't come in that box):

Edited March 14, 2021 by AdamW
added photo examples

[AdamW | 713]

4 hours ago, VideoGameGradersLLC said:

Likely true but I feel like that’s where most games will live with any grader, any system because it’s where games are...sportscards too. It’s why over 90 is so valuable, it’s really hard to get graded in that range as it should be. The 10-Yard Fight and Mach Rider boxes look really good at a glance, it’s not until they examined under bright light with a magnifying glass that some imperfections are shown. In our testing I have been concerned about so many in that range, actually even a tighter one but then looking at POP reports of sportscards it’s not unusual, people will tend to only send high quality for grading and rarely send in crap cards unless they are the elite prewar card era even still the curves tend to be similar with that mid to upper mid are the majority of grades. 
 

This I agree with, FWIW. I'm grading every boxed Pokemon listing I see on eBay currently and I figure to grade it a 1 (out of 10) it'd have to be actually on fire in the listing photos. If the fire's been put out it's a 2. The lowest I've actually graded something so far is a 2.5, I think. I wouldn't expect a grading company to think "1 out of 100 is the worst copy we've ever graded", it's more "the worst copy that could possibly exist and still be actually identifiable as a copy of the thing". You wouldn't expect to ever actually grade that, because why would anyone bother? It makes sense to me to rarely see something graded below a 6 (out of 10) or so, as the thing would have to be intrinsically fantastically valuable to be worth grading if it's less than 6 condition.

[AdamW | 713]

BTW, here's an example of why I think this stuff is important (and will possibly become more so):

https://www.ebay.ca/itm/100-Authentic-pokemon-red-blue-yellow-Complete-100-CIB-ready-to-Wata-7-0-/164721054231?nordt=true&rt=nc&orig_cvip=true

That seller specifically advertised these copies for CIB grading, and got $2k for them. That's a *lot* of scratch. But the contents are IMO entirely wrong, for Red and Blue. I don't believe those manuals and packins would have come in those boxes. Those boxes should have come with manuals U/DMG-APAE-USA (Red) or U/DMG-APEE-USA (Blue), the game-specific "Free Player's Guide Offer inside" flyer U/DMG-APAE-USA (not the generic HUNGRY? Nintendo Power flyer - that came in some copies of later prints, but never these early print boxes), and consumer info U/DMG-USA-6 or U/DMG-USA-7 (not one with an H/ prefix).

In a world where this kinda stuff is happening, at best a grading company should catch that and refuse to grade it. At worst a grading company needs to note every item in sufficient detail that a knowledgeable buyer can spot that something is wrong and refuse to buy.

Edited March 14, 2021 by AdamW
grammar fix, personal opinion

[JVOSS | 1,762]

47 minutes ago, AdamW said:

So from my "not so much about quality but very persnickety about what items are" perspective:

* Noting print codes is appreciated, thanks. Please always do this.

* Please note box print codes too. This is *very important* if you're slabbing the box as noone can check it after you've done that. Usually for Nintendo games the box print code is on the box tabs. I don't actually know for sure that NES games have these (I don't really collect NES games), but even if they don't, please do it for games that do! Please also note any other codes printed on the tabs (there is often a date code there, which is very useful information that again is lost if a game is slabbed without it being noted).

* Please note all packins in the same level of detail as the other items. Packins have print codes and variants and differ in condition just like manuals. Just yesterday I had to pay more for a Pokémon yellow player's guide offer than I would have had to pay for a *cart only copy of the damn game*, these things matter. And there are two variants of that packin and I know which print of the game should have which one.

Thanks for posting the examples!

* edit: sorry one more thing: please check manuals for a date code and note it if present. GB/GBC/GBA game manuals sometimes have a date code in the inside back cover, for e.g.

@VideoGameGradersLLC using @AdamWabove example would you have an "expert grader" for each box/system.  and if so what would be the turn around time be.

(first run would take years due to building lists of contents, as there is no 100% accepted list of game to box to instruction list around)

[VideoGameGradersLLC | 82]

I like what AdamW suggests especially when talking about what can no longer be seen once in a case. And we’ve always planned on including as much of this info as possible on the label in limited space. 
And to JVOSS point as a business everything we do must factor the impact on staying efficient. 
We also view our role as identifying what IS there not as much what isn’t there. Yes “matching” box, cart, manual is at the core and we’ve discussed handling IMP, MMP, etc. we understand there is much more to consider. But as is evident throughout the internet determining every insert with every game is nearly impossible. Certainly Zelda maps and letters from Mike Tyson are more important than the Nintendo Power subscription card but if we tell you everything inside then you as the collector/buyer of a VGG graded game have that knowledge and can decide what’s important to you or that impacts the price you are willing to pay. 
All that said.......Pokémon. Ugh Pokémon. 
Pokémon games are their own beast with an entirely new set of craziness of codes and misprints and variations. 

[AdamW | 713]

Yup, that's a fair point. I'm pretty sure at this point, for instance, that the "loadout" sometimes changed without the box print changing. Sorry my examples are all Pokémon, but that's what I know . For e.g. the no-ESRB copies of Yellow most often come with a black-ESRB cart (DMG-APSE-USA-1) and manual U/DMG-APSE-USA-2, but I've also seen *enough* copies with white-ESRB cart DMG-APSE-USA and manual U/DMG-APSE-USA-1 to think that was a "real" loadout. I don't think you can always expect the same box to have the same contents. So even if you have a legit record of the contents of a sealed copy of a given box, that's not necessarily the whole story. And of course, there's the possibility of simple human or robot error - something just getting left out, or the wrong thing being put in, at the factory.

So maybe something of a hybrid approach is the best. In any case I think it's best to note all these things in as much detail as possible. And I do think if something smells *really* off - I won't go into details as it's boring, but there are combos I have a lot of trouble believing could ever really have happened - it would be sensible to just refuse to grade the item as CIB at all. But otherwise, maybe some sort of "confidence assessment" or just a straight up written note as to how likely the grader believes it is that the item is authentically "complete" might be interesting. That would allow for leeway for awkward cases, and even for future improvements in knowledge. As long as we know in as much detail as possible what's actually in the sealed container.

I do like WATA's "matrix" thing. Where there isn't enough room on the tag to note everything, have a relatively secure database with the full info in it. I just wish they'd note box print codes and date codes...

Edited March 14, 2021 by AdamW

[fcgamer | 4,754]

Here's an idea,being serious here, and I don't usually give out the good ones for free. It'd be unique to your company and solve a lot of the problems that grading CIBs gets, which imo is a lot of problems, since this format is totally different from sports cards making a 1:1 process like apples to oranges.

Grade each item separately, slab each item separately, forget the silly idea that a mint cart + trashed box = average grade tops.  On another note, technically lack of shrink wrap could also be considered a damage too.

[VideoGameGradersLLC | 82]

8 minutes ago, fcgamer said:

Grade each item separately, slab each item separately

We have talked about that. Including a single slab that holds all 3 in 1 case so you can see all parts together. Case dev is very expensive and time consuming which makes it tough but I do like that idea and think 1 slab showing all 3 would be cool. 

[AdamW | 713]

I like that idea too, though it could get tricky/big for games with posters and maps and stuff But it would be a USP for sure! And it'd mean a bit less of the contents would be 'entombed' and never seen again...

Edited March 15, 2021 by AdamW

[YOURTURN | 1,257]

@VideoGameGradersLLC? CAS has done this once. Here best example in regards to what you are talking about. With a bonus on how much it costs without any modifications. It makes for a nice option, and worth looking into if you can do the same at a more competitive price point. 

[jonebone | 1,307]

The biggest problem which I'm not sure if anyone has mentioned, is the lack of experience.  You don't even know what a Mint game is until you've seen some really nice ones in hand.

I've always used the 0-10 scale with .5 increments in my personal collection tracker.  Stuff I had in 2008 / 2009 that I graded as 9.5 or 10s is probably more like a 8.5 at best on my scale a decade later.  Your perspective changes a lot when you've held hundreds of games compared to thousands or tens of thousands of games.  

And last but not least, I perused the rubric a bit but you're trying to be too black and white when grading is all about the gray area.  It's like grading a boxing fight, 2 guys could go two separate ways and the 3rd guy goes one way and that's the decision.  It's not about just number of punches landed, there's something to assessing the object as a whole and having experts weigh in.

Stuff like creases are simple but sunfading, box tears, missing flaps, punched hangtabs, mildew / mold, box retouching, etc. all are in the gray area. 

For example, let's take your rubric and say I have a perfect game, but that someone cut off the inside flaps or some silly reason.  That's severe damage, and any CIB collector knows that.  It looks like it'd be 115 out of 120 on your scale, but I'd have a hard time justifying anything above an 90-100 out of 120, and that would be if everything else was gem mint.  Not only does that show the problem with having such a trivial black and white scale (only 3 points for bottom?! You know how many times a bottom tear shows up? More than you think.), but it also shows the subjectivity of some types of abnormal wear.

Anyways, experience is the most paramount thing, way more than a case, price, turnaround speed, etc.  If you have any chance of pulling it off you better get some experienced people on board or you're wasting your time. 

[OptOut | 8,892]

The time for you posers to put your money where your mouth is! I, for one, have ALWAYS had the deepest conviction in my support of my good friend @VideoGameGradersLLC. I gave him a rough time, and he bounced back every time for more punishment. He even graded a games.

That is why I am PROUD to officially be the very FIRST contributor to his INDIGOOOOG! 

May the record state I always believed in you VGGLLC, and you EARNED that 7 dollars!

I, for one, AM ready for a new option in video game grading, and anyone else in this thread who knows what's up will help me and the awesome team at VGGLLC to make it a reality. Thank you. 

Edited March 15, 2021 by OptOut
Doxxd myself.

[fcgamer | 4,754]

29 minutes ago, VideoGameGradersLLC said:

We have talked about that. Including a single slab that holds all 3 in 1 case so you can see all parts together. Case dev is very expensive and time consuming which makes it tough but I do like that idea and think 1 slab showing all 3 would be cool. 

But why even bother with putting them all in one case? Separate cases, which then can be sold individually or together.

I mean, let's be very very honest here, so many of these games have been Frankensteined together, so it seems very very pointless to me to entomb pieces together, for eternity, when they just as likely as not did not even come together initially.

[VideoGameGradersLLC | 82]

It appears @OptOut’s account has been hacked! Please contact support. 
Seriously, thank you. If I can win you over maybe there is a chance! 
Now who wants to 1up and go $8?

 

[VideoGameGradersLLC | 82]

1 minute ago, fcgamer said:

But why even bother with putting them all in one case? Separate cases, which then can be sold individually or together.

I hear ya. Certainly offering many options can be another USP for us.