Heritage Auctions Thread

[AnimalHouse | 117]

14 minutes ago, ExplodedHamster said:

Well, Minecraft just sold for 27k lol. 

Kudos to anyone who owns Minecraft 9.8. Sadly, I never got into Minecraft and therefore never invested in it. Its one of those times where I could have bought it from the store and just put it aside like I do with many games now. I wish I had. 

[Gloves | 11,788]

9 minutes ago, Caliboy24 said:

Yeah prices went up too fast too soon, rather than organically going up little by little. I think alot of these record prices paid is due to FOMO or some rich folks just wanting the best of the best only. Waiting for prices to stabilize to see where the market is heading next. 

But still, the video game market is still up a million percent from a few years ago even after this pullback . Future still looking good.

If the future looking good to you is "prices going up". 

That ain't me, man. I wanna see this shit PLUMMET. I don't even care about the roughly 50k worth of games I'm sitting on. Drop my collection value to 10k tomorrow and my only thought will be "nice, I can buy more games". 

[AnimalHouse | 117]

17 minutes ago, Caliboy24 said:

or some rich folks just wanting the best of the best only.

Or some rich folks wanting to avoid paying the IRS a lot of money by dumping there money into graded games. Then trade them off the books later sort of speak lol.

Edited October 29, 2021 by AnimalHouse
grammar

[DoctorEncore | 3,691]

4 minutes ago, AnimalHouse said:

Kudos to anyone who owns Minecraft 9.8. Sadly, I never got into Minecraft and therefore never invested in it. Its one of those times where I could have bought it from the store and just put it aside like I do with many games now. I wish I had. 

I wouldn't worry too much. I bet the next one goes for 10k and the one after that for 2k. Wata probably has like 50 copies sitting in their office right now.

[WarMech | 82]

2 hours ago, tidaldreams said:

First and hopefully only pick up 

So you won that? Thanks for helping me figure out a rough value on mine if it gets that grade back. I was seriously using that auction to determine if I wanted to put mine up in a future one.

[tidaldreams | 654]

3 minutes ago, WarMech said:

So you won that? Thanks for helping me figure out a rough value on mine if it gets that grade back. I was seriously using that auction to determine if I wanted to put mine up in a future one.

So did i do good or overpaid  lol

[WarMech | 82]

8 minutes ago, tidaldreams said:

So did i do good or overpaid  lol

Presently I have no idea, that was literally their first copy to ever be auctioned, though I recall they are also sitting on a 9.6 right now too. I was watching that and the Mario Strikers that went for  almost $2900, and I'm still watching the open auctions for Dragon Warrior VII and Mega Man & Bass (both of which are not doing all that well) to gauge if I want to sell mine there or not, or try and sell them raw.

I hope you did good, and I hope mine can get close to that if I pull the trigger. You bought it for the equivalent value of a trip to Tokyo for my wife and I to visit her grandma, If mine went for that, I would be happy, but that's just me.

That being said, if I knew you wanted one, I probably would have sold you my raw ungraded one for less than that.

Edited October 29, 2021 by WarMech

[tidaldreams | 654]

14 minutes ago, WarMech said:

Presently I have no idea, that was literally their first copy to ever be auctioned, though I recall they are also sitting on a 9.6 right now too. I was watching that and the Mario Strikers that went for  almost $2900, and I'm still watching the open auctions for Dragon Warrior VII and Mega Man & Bass (both of which are not doing all that well) to gauge if I want to sell mine there or not, or try and sell them raw.

I hope you did good, and I hope mine can get close to that if I pull the trigger. You bought it for the equivalent value of a trip to Tokyo for my wife and I to visit her grandma, If mine went for that, I would be happy, but that's just me.

That being said, if I knew you wanted one, I probably would have sold you my raw ungraded one for less than that.

Yeah, after submitting a ton of games to WATA i realized that 9.8 A++ is a PITA to get so sometimes I just bite the bullet 

There are raw ones that sold on the 'bay for over $2k that won't even come close to that grade 

[Caliboy24 | 47]

3 hours ago, Gloves said:

If the future looking good to you is "prices going up". 

That ain't me, man. I wanna see this shit PLUMMET. I don't even care about the roughly 50k worth of games I'm sitting on. Drop my collection value to 10k tomorrow and my only thought will be "nice, I can buy more games". 

I hear ya.  Yeah I don't mind dropping as well as I'd like to add more key games into my collection 

[Caliboy24 | 47]

3 hours ago, AnimalHouse said:

Or some rich folks wanting to avoid paying the IRS a lot of money by dumping there money into graded games. Then trade them off the books later sort of speak lol.

That is true too lol.  Every collectible has just skyrocketed, even the funny/weird ones which I really don't know how they can be so valuable (NFT's and digital blockchain sports cards)

[OptOut | 8,889]

Sonic the Hedgehog, RN:

[jonebone | 1,307]

My take: Extremely soft across the board.  Good for collectors but I assume cosigners are quite disappointed after the July bar was set.

I thought the summer auction was just too loaded but the market didn't care and absorbed it all quickly with ease. This is another long and loaded one, right after Goldin and right after CL.  It appears that the market can only absorb so much and people are getting more selective.

But HA is not only doing their quarterly Signatures, they've expanded their lineup to be more frequent (almost bi-monthly), but splitting them out between showcase auctions (such as NES thru N64 or "Modern" = Xbox/PS2 forward) and Signatures inbetween.  I like that approach more, more frequent but smaller auctions.  This is just too much all at once, especially with more copy cat auction houses coming on and having their auctions.

My personal picks

Most surprising: Tomb Raider 9.4 A+ PS1 $102K, really expected a cooldown on that title like Marios / Zeldas / RPGs / Etc.
Honorable Mentions: 9.8 A++ NBA Jam Genesis $31.2K, 9.8 A++ DKC Made in Japan $52.8K

Biggest letdown from Expectations: RE1 Longbox 9.6 A+ $264K (Expected $500k+ easy)

Good "deals":
Metal Storm NES 9.6 A $3,960
Mario World SNES 9.4 A $144K

If you remember my comments on the last auction, I said that $1.56M Mario 64 9.8 A++ over $360k Super Mario World 9.4 A+ was an absolute travesty.  Mario World in 9.4 or higher box sealed is going to be rarer than 9.6 or higher Mario 64s.  And as suspected, the Mario 64 9.6 A++ barely holds $100k and Mario World 9.4 A still holds $140k.  The Mario World has a much more stable floor indeed.

[Gulag Joe | 582]

It may be wise to avoid consigning anything else until there are population reports available.

[ExplodedHamster | 404]

I think the best deal, by far, was the Zelda on Gameboy at around 45k. That is rare and maybe the best known copy. 

[Dumars2001 | 164]

2 hours ago, jonebone said:

My take: Extremely soft across the board.  Good for collectors but I assume cosigners are quite disappointed after the July bar was set.

I thought the summer auction was just too loaded but the market didn't care and absorbed it all quickly with ease. This is another long and loaded one, right after Goldin and right after CL.  It appears that the market can only absorb so much and people are getting more selective.

But HA is not only doing their quarterly Signatures, they've expanded their lineup to be more frequent (almost bi-monthly), but splitting them out between showcase auctions (such as NES thru N64 or "Modern" = Xbox/PS2 forward) and Signatures inbetween.  I like that approach more, more frequent but smaller auctions.  This is just too much all at once, especially with more copy cat auction houses coming on and having their auctions.

My personal picks

Most surprising: Tomb Raider 9.4 A+ PS1 $102K, really expected a cooldown on that title like Marios / Zeldas / RPGs / Etc.
Honorable Mentions: 9.8 A++ NBA Jam Genesis $31.2K, 9.8 A++ DKC Made in Japan $52.8K

Biggest letdown from Expectations: RE1 Longbox 9.6 A+ $264K (Expected $500k+ easy)

Good "deals":
Metal Storm NES 9.6 A $3,960
Mario World SNES 9.4 A $144K

If you remember my comments on the last auction, I said that $1.56M Mario 64 9.8 A++ over $360k Super Mario World 9.4 A+ was an absolute travesty.  Mario World in 9.4 or higher box sealed is going to be rarer than 9.6 or higher Mario 64s.  And as suspected, the Mario 64 9.6 A++ barely holds $100k and Mario World 9.4 A still holds $140k.  The Mario World has a much more stable floor indeed.

As always, you nailed it with your assessment and thoughts!

Overall, I still think that the sealed market is pretty healthy and that people/collectors (myself included) kept thinking records were going to be broken with each passing auction and kind of "got used to/expected" prices to continue to shoot higher and higher. That being said, there were still numerous 5 and 6 figure sales (unheard of just a couple of years ago), so the sky definitely isn't falling, but it appears that the Mario 64 is going to be the new Atari 2600 Spiderman, but on a much larger financial scale.

I think the biggest winners (very happy cosigners) were:

Nes Super Mario Bros 2 first print 9.8 A+ seal selling for $324,000

Nes Mike Tyson's Punchout later print 9.8 A++ selling for $312,000

Biggest loser of the night, is obviously the Mario 64 9.6 A++ selling for $102,000 (I bet the cosigner of that game was in shock with the final amount)

 

I also couldn't believe the $80,000 dollar difference between these two Zelda 2's over a 0.2 in the grade?!

Zelda II: The Adventure of Link - Wata 9.8 A+ Sealed [Rev-A, Round SOQ, Early Production], NES Nintendo 1988 USA.... 

Auction 7263 | Lot: 28091 | Oct 29, 2021 

Sold For:  $102,000.00

Zelda II: The Adventure of Link - Wata 9.6 A+ Sealed [Rev-A, Round SOQ, Early Production], NES Nintendo 1988 USA.... 

Auction 7263 | Lot: 28092 | Oct 29, 2021 

Sold For:  $22,800.00

[jonebone | 1,307]

53 minutes ago, ExplodedHamster said:

I think the best deal, by far, was the Zelda on Gameboy at around 45k. That is rare and maybe the best known copy. 

I think that's a good grab, it was just hard for me label it as best deal when the 9.6 A+ was about 10k last year. I do agree I expected more there and that game is an easy set it and forget it type of game where it would go for more in a year or two if buyer wants to get out of it.

[jonebone | 1,307]

22 minutes ago, Dumars2001 said:

 

I also couldn't believe the $80,000 dollar difference between these two Zelda 2's over a 0.2 in the grade?!

Zelda II: The Adventure of Link - Wata 9.8 A+ Sealed [Rev-A, Round SOQ, Early Production], NES Nintendo 1988 USA.... 

Auction 7263 | Lot: 28091 | Oct 29, 2021 

Sold For:  $102,000.00

Zelda II: The Adventure of Link - Wata 9.6 A+ Sealed [Rev-A, Round SOQ, Early Production], NES Nintendo 1988 USA.... 

Auction 7263 | Lot: 28092 | Oct 29, 2021 

Sold For:  $22,800.00

It's interesting to see where 9.6 to 9.8 multipler will be on case games. For non case games you can't be as picky, but mint purists know they can hold out for 9.8 on case games.

If this 5x multipler is to be believed, then you'd still think 9.8 A++ Mario 64 would be 500k by that line of thinking. I'm not sure what the fair number is but time will tell.

[Seth | 168]

Jonebone nailed it. I think everything he says here is correct. The community is still too small to absorb this many large, highish-end auctions in such a short while (along with the perpetual low-level hum of activity on eBay, Mercari, and the double-digit number of indie video game dealers listed at RETRO). I think the size and pace of auctions is likely to continue, however, especially with Hake's starting to sell video games, Heritage increasing its pace of video game auctions as Jonebone said, CGC coming online, and the possibility (however remote) that we will start seeing a few more items at market that were graded by P1, UKG, IGS, CAS, VGG, or RGS because resellers are fed up with the WATA and VGA wait-times and generally poor customer service. Not to mention that pop reports—which benefit buyers much more than sellers, whatever sellers say—will, when they come, adjust various game prices in a way that offers a chance of actually expanding the hobby to more than just those who can afford to pay four or five figures.

Edited October 30, 2021 by RETRO

[OptOut | 8,889]

You know, it would PROBABLY help if people actually interested in retro video games were inclined to bid on any of these graded games... You know?

Like, imagine this... IMAGINE if there was someone motivated by anything other than financial gain who felt compelled to bid on some of these items? Someone who felt a genuine connection to these games, and loved them for the objects they are, and the experiences they represent, rather than as a vehicle for storing and enhancing wealth?

You know I'm STARTING to think, it's ALMOST as though, you can't build a market for retro video games off of the greed of comic book and sports card collectors... funny that, right?

Maybe, these people don't really have the nuanced understanding of the items they are bidding on necessary to make informed and rational value judgements? Maybe Mario 64 ISN'T worth a million dollars, in ANY condition whatsoever?

Huh?

Wow, who would have guessed.

Sports dudes, comic bros, go home, you're embarrassing yourselves.

[darkchylde28 | 1,546]

5 minutes ago, OptOut said:

You know, it would PROBABLY help if people actually interested in retro video games were inclined to bid on any of these graded games... You know?

Like, imagine this... IMAGINE if there was someone motivated by anything other than financial gain who felt compelled to bid on some of these items? Someone who felt a genuine connection to these games, and loved them for the objects they are, and the experiences they represent, rather than as a vehicle for storing and enhancing wealth?

You know I'm STARTING to think, it's ALMOST as though, you can't build a market for retro video games off of the greed of comic book and sports card collectors... funny that, right?

Maybe, these people don't really have the nuanced understanding of the items they are bidding on necessary to make informed and rational value judgements? Maybe Mario 64 ISN'T worth a million dollars, in ANY condition whatsoever?

Huh?

Wow, who would have guessed.

Sports dudes, comic bros, go home, you're embarrassing yourselves.

I've been thinking of it as a penis measuring contest limited only by the absurdity of the checkbook involved.  But hey, potato, potahto, lol.

[Seth | 168]

I can't speak for others but I am a collector only—I don't sell games and I don't buy them as investments. And I'll only buy games I've played and loved. My collection is not massive but it is also not small. I play retro games regularly; this week I've been replaying Mappy-Land (NES), which I think is a criminally underrated retro game title for 1,000 reasons I could enumerate, and last week it was Low G Man (NES), and next week it will be something else. I don't know how many collectors like me are in this market, but I agree the number is low. And no, I'm not counting those who sell 90% of what they buy and keep 10%. Absolutely those are collectors, and they may have loved gaming in an intimate way at some point in their lives, but you can't build a hobby on people who participate in it with only 10% of their activities and who spend 95% of their time talking about video games talking about (a) selling them, or (b) investing in them with an eye toward selling to non-gamer millionaires at home and abroad.

Right now the sealed and graded collecting market is hollow; it's essentially a shell. There's a high-end market for a very, very small selection of titles that are either bought by resellers to be sold to millionaires or bought by millionaires via proxies or procurers on the front end. Sometimes the resellers sell to one another because one reseller thinks they can sell an item for more than the other reseller can.

Items at auction usually get under 10 bids; it's remarkable if an item gets more than 10. Meanwhile, the actually rare games for any system are ignored because most of those in the market don't know (or if they know don't care) which games they are; and all of the underrated games for a system are ignored because neither the millionaires nor their proxies have ever heard of them. Metal Storm is the #5 Underrated game in the entire NES library, according to 100+ industry experts (all passionate gamers), but as Jonebone just pointed out it was basically ignored in the Heritage auction yesterday.

Every once in a while you'll get a reseller like David Robbins who buys a more obscure NES game like Renegade (actually overrated and widely disliked; it's the #31 worst game on the console, per 50+ experts) for $1,500 in sub-investment grade and then puts it on eBay for $22,000, but this has nothing to do with understanding the NES, underrated retro games, or titles that actually should be going for reasonable three-figure prices (the market value of a near-mint Renegade for the NES, based on its #187 Scarcity and #155 Underrated rankings at RETRO—as with its worst-games standing, taken from data offered by 150+ experts and industry outlets and two dozen public markets—is approximately $500). The point in these instances is to hype the game sufficiently in the eyes of overseas buyers so that someone in Saudi Arabia or China or Japan will break down and stupidly buy this conspicuously bad NES game for $8,000.

Meanwhile, you can get an infinitely better game (Dragon Spirit: The New Legend) at auction for about $400 in near-mint grade, or Low G Man for $350, or Kings of the Beach for $300. All much better games than Renegade—more scarce, more respected.

So the market is hollow because it has no 50%-of-the-time-plus collectors in it who have an emotional attachment to the majority of the activities they're participating in in the hobby. The way to fix this would be for folks who claim to want to advance the hobby to purchase rare and underrated games for each console and deliberately sell them for three figures at narrow margins in order to bring real collectors and gamers of modest means into the hobby. Once you get people into the hobby and make it broad rather than narrow and deep rather than shallow, interest will ultimately be there domestically for mid- and even high-end items rather than having to run overseas or to other resellers. That well will dry up soon.

This could be a great hobby if it wasn't largely the province of rapacious robber barons.

S.

Edited October 30, 2021 by RETRO

[WalterWhiteJr. | 1,162]

4 hours ago, Dumars2001 said:

As always, you nailed it with your assessment and thoughts!

Overall, I still think that the sealed market is pretty healthy and that people/collectors (myself included) kept thinking records were going to be broken with each passing auction and kind of "got used to/expected" prices to continue to shoot higher and higher. That being said, there were still numerous 5 and 6 figure sales (unheard of just a couple of years ago), so the sky definitely isn't falling, but it appears that the Mario 64 is going to be the new Atari 2600 Spiderman, but on a much larger financial scale.

I think the biggest winners (very happy cosigners) were:

Nes Super Mario Bros 2 first print 9.8 A+ seal selling for $324,000

Nes Mike Tyson's Punchout later print 9.8 A++ selling for $312,000

Biggest loser of the night, is obviously the Mario 64 9.6 A++ selling for $102,000 (I bet the cosigner of that game was in shock with the final amount)

 

I also couldn't believe the $80,000 dollar difference between these two Zelda 2's over a 0.2 in the grade?!

Zelda II: The Adventure of Link - Wata 9.8 A+ Sealed [Rev-A, Round SOQ, Early Production], NES Nintendo 1988 USA.... 

Auction 7263 | Lot: 28091 | Oct 29, 2021 

Sold For:  $102,000.00

Zelda II: The Adventure of Link - Wata 9.6 A+ Sealed [Rev-A, Round SOQ, Early Production], NES Nintendo 1988 USA.... 

Auction 7263 | Lot: 28092 | Oct 29, 2021 

Sold For:  $22,800.00

There is NOTHING healthy about the sealed market and how it got to this point. 

[WalterWhiteJr. | 1,162]

31 minutes ago, RETRO said:

I can't speak for others but I am a collector only—I don't sell games and I don't buy them as investments. And I'll only buy games I've played and loved. My collection is not massive but it is also not small. I play retro games regularly; this week I've been replaying Mappy-Land (NES), which I think is a criminally underrated retro game title for 1,000 reasons I could enumerate, and last week it was Low G Man (NES), and next week it will be something else. I don't know how many collectors like me are in this market, but I agree the number is low. And no, I'm not counting those who sell 90% of what they buy and keep 10%. Absolutely those are collectors, and they may have loved gaming in an intimate way at some point in their lives, but you can't build a hobby on people who participate in it with only 10% of their activities and who spend 95% of their time talking about video games talking about (a) selling them, or (b) investing in them with an eye toward selling to non-gamer millionaires at home and abroad.

Right now the sealed and graded collecting market is hollow; it's essentially a shell. There's a high-end market for a very, very small selection of titles that are either bought by resellers to be sold to millionaires or bought by millionaires via proxies or procurers on the front end. Sometimes the resellers sell to one another because one reseller thinks they can sell an item for more than the other reseller can.

Items at auction usually get under 10 bids; it's remarkable if an item gets more than 10. Meanwhile, the actually rare games for any system are ignored because most of those in the market don't know (or if they know don't care) which games they are; and all of the underrated games for a system are ignored because neither the millionaires nor their proxies have ever heard of them. Metal Storm is the #5 Underrated game in the entire NES library, according to 100+ industry experts (all passionate gamers), but as Jonebone just pointed out it was basically ignored in the Heritage auction yesterday.

Every once in a while you'll get a reseller like David Robbins who buys a more obscure NES game like Renegade (actually overrated and widely disliked; it's the #31 worst game on the console, per 50+ experts) for $1,500 in sub-investment grade and then puts it on eBay for $22,000, but this has nothing to do with understanding the NES, underrated retro games, or titles that actually should be going for reasonable three-figure prices (the market value of a near-mint Renegade for the NES, based on its #187 Scarcity and #155 Underrated rankings at RETRO—as with its worst-games standing, taken from data offered by 150+ experts and industry outlets and two dozen public markets—is approximately $500). The point in these instances is to hype the game sufficiently in the eyes of overseas buyers so that someone in Saudi Arabia or China or Japan will break down and stupidly buy this conspicuously bad NES game for $8,000.

Meanwhile, you can get an infinitely better game (Dragon Spirit: The New Legend) at auction for about $400 in near-mint grade, or Low G Man for $350, or Kings of the Beach for $300. All much better games than Renegade—more scarce, more respected.

So the market is hollow because it has no 50%-of-the-time-plus collectors in it who have an emotional attachment to the majority of the activities they're participating in in the hobby. The way to fix this would be for folks who claim to want to advance the hobby to purchase rare and underrated games for each console and deliberately sell them for three figures at narrow margins in order to bring real collectors and gamers of modest means into the hobby. Once you get people into the hobby and make it broad rather than narrow and deep rather than shallow, interest will ultimately be there domestically for mid- and even high-end items rather than having to run overseas or to other resellers. That well will dry up soon.

This could be a great hobby if it wasn't largely the province of rapacious robber barons.

S.

Ah. David Robbins reference. The good old backdooring/shill bidding legend himself! He has done wonders to advance the hobby lol. 
 

Agree that @jonebone hit the nail on the head with his recap assessment  

“rapacious robber barons.”  Love this phrase by the way. May I borrow?

Edited October 30, 2021 by WalterWhiteJr.

[OptOut | 8,889]

54 minutes ago, RETRO said:

This could be a great hobby 

It already was... It already IS!

The people who are passionate about retro gaming have been here for ten, twenty, thirty years already.

If you love Super Mario 64, you know EVERY nook and cranny of that game, you can get 120 stars with your eyes closed...

If you love Contra, you have the Konami code memorised by heart, it's 30 years of muscle memory...

If you love Super Mario Bros 3 you collect every warp whistle in a play-through, but you don't use them...

If you've ever blown in a cart, or boiled a pin connector, or checked EVERY single copy of a disc in the store before finally buying the one you were happy taking home, you are and have already been part of a GREAT fucking hobby!!!

This is, and remains, OUR hobby.

Burn your fingers, take a haircut, loose your ass.

I was here before, I'll be here when you're gone.

[Seth | 168]

When a self-described hardcore retro gamer brags about their familiarity with Contra and Super Mario Bros. 3 it sounds a little to me like Mark Zuckerberg trying to convince the world he's a person with real feelings because he likes smoking brisket and ribs.

Talk to me about Young Indiana Jones Chronicles. Or Over Horizon. Or Zombie Nation. Totally Rad and Arkista's Ring. Crisis Force, Recca, and Moon Crystal. The Legend of Prince Valiant, Ring King, Boulder Dash, Nightshade, Shadow of the Ninja, Mighty Final Fight. The Lone Ranger and Cowboy Kid. Tell me about the first time you beat Mappy-Land or Dragon Spirit, tell me if your favorite NES pet is the dog from Conquest of the Crystal Palace or David Crane's Blob. Tell me you beat Fester's Quest without a Game Genie or Battle of Olympus because you accidentally fell into the right pit without a Walkthrough. I want to hear about Eliminator Boat Duel, your favorite piece in Archon, and which genre-switcher you prefer: WURM or Golgo 13. Does Baseball Stars II rank ahead of Dusty Diamond's All-Star Softball on your mental ranking of all NES baseball games? Are you a Lunar Pool man, or Side Pocket? R.C. Pro Am I or II? Tecmo World Wrestling or Pro Wrestling? The Black Bass or The Blue Marlin? I want you to explain which Mega Man echo, The Krion Conquest or Whomp 'Em, you prefer. Justify The Legend of Zelda getting the press Crystalis never did, or Life Force rather than Gun-Nac, Zanac, Image Fight, Gun.Smoke, Burai Fighter, or S.C.A.T. Who in their right mind prefers Ikari Warriors to Guerilla War, or Ninja Gaiden to Vice: Project Doom, or (for that matter) the original Super Mario Bros. to Felix the Cat, Bucky O'Hare, Little Samson, or Clash at Demonhead?

You gotta be kidding me with this Konami Code nonsense. And Super Mario Bros. has been ranked the #1 NES game for 30 years. That's like saying George Washington is your favorite U.S. president. You could literally be an alien wearing human skin to try to "pass" for all I know. 

Voight-Kampff test failed.

S.

PS: In the event the "you" you used throughout wasn't me but overseas millionaires, (a) the "hobby" I was referring to was collecting sealed and graded games (not collecting games generally, which is indeed a very old hobby), and (b) gamers need to have gamer-type conversations, not be dragged into rehashing old discourse about two of the best-known NES games. There are still lost classics that need their day—I mentioned many above.

Edited October 30, 2021 by RETRO