Heritage Auctions Thread

[OptOut | 8,889]

1 minute ago, RETRO said:

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?

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.

My comment wasn't a slight against YOUR personal engagement with the hobby, it was directed at the current influx from outside influences.

Apologies if you took that as a comment against your own participation, which I am unaware of.

[Seth | 172]

I edited my comment with a postscript as you were posting your follow-up, as I realized that despite quoting me verbatim and then using the word "you" throughout, you might have been speaking of others. But the point stands that when we confront these investors pretending to be collectors we need to be certain they understand much more about (say) the NES than Contra and SMB3.

[GPX | 1,370]

2 hours ago, darkchylde28 said:

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.

I disagree, it’s not a pene measuring contest. It’s more a pene hyping contest. Who can hype the most that lasts the longest.

[OptOut | 8,889]

2 minutes ago, RETRO said:

I edited my comment with a postscript as you were posting your follow-up, as I realized that despite quoting me verbatim and then using the word "you" throughout, you might have been speaking of others. But the point stands that when we confront these investors pretending to be collectors we need to be certain they understand much more about (say) the NES than Contra and SMB3.

Thanks, yeah I actually agreed entirely with your previous comment, but used the "great hobby" phrase as kind of a jumping off point for my own critique. 

Fact is, some people won't accept the video game hobby as a "quote-unquote" great hobby WITHOUT hundred thousand/million dollar sales, but my point is the hobby was great all along, regardless of what people PAY for any of this old shit.

I LOVE Mario 64, which I've owned a copy of since childhood, since the day it came out, and to me it's worth INFINITELY more than any monetary value you could put on. 

Sure, I would sell my beat up, loose, childhood copy of the game for a million dollars if you offered me, or a hundred grand, or maybe even a fuggin hundo alone... I mean, I could always buy another one, right?

But the memories? And the impact on me as a gamer? You could never buy that, not even close.

That's what I meant, it wasn't actually about any individual at all, it's about the feeling. 

[GPX | 1,370]

8 minutes ago, RETRO said:

I edited my comment with a postscript as you were posting your follow-up, as I realized that despite quoting me verbatim and then using the word "you" throughout, you might have been speaking of others. But the point stands that when we confront these investors pretending to be collectors we need to be certain they understand much more about (say) the NES than Contra and SMB3.

Just to share your sentiments, a lot of us members here who have joined earlier on are regular passionate gamers. We know more about the games than the knowledge obtained from our university degree, most probably. 

A lot of the high ceiling prices on HA are likely from people who either have:

- good knowledge about games and the market, and price pumpin like no tomorrow

or

- have the bare minimum understanding about games and what prices they were going for just 2 years ago.

The passionate collectors right now are likely going after the 4-5 figure items and observing all the shenanigans going at each other with the 6-7 figures. This is my educated hunch.

[OptOut | 8,889]

2 minutes ago, GPX said:

Just to share your sentiments, a lot of us members here who have joined earlier on are regular passionate gamers. We know more about the games than the knowledge obtained from our university degree, most probably. 

A lot of the high ceiling prices on HA are likely from people who either have:

- good knowledge about games and the market, and price pumpin like no tomorrow

or

- have the bare minimum understanding about games and what prices they were going for just 2 years ago.

The passionate collectors right now are likely going after the 4-5 figure items and observing all the shenanigans going at each other with the 6-7 figures. This is my educated hunch.

This is where you are wrong dude, it's LOWER for the actual educated collectors, like us. 

Most of the people who know hat they are doing are in the 3 figure and low-mid 4 figure range.

The peeps cranking out high 5 figure, 6 figure and fuggin 7 figure spends really have no idea what they're doing.

[darkchylde28 | 1,546]

20 minutes ago, RETRO said:

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.

Just to make a counterpoint, you don't have to like all of the obscure, often disliked games that you reference (and appear to wear as some badge of honor for having suffered through) to be a "real" retro gamer.  You just have to have actual personal/emotional investment in the games and the hobby, not just a basic desire to flip whatever you can, higher and higher generally, even if your favorites come down to the classics that everybody likes.

I didn't have a lot of money growing up and played all sorts of off-the-beaten-path games.  Not because I liked them, or because it made me more "real" than my friends who also liked the NES, but because they were cheap, and as most of us remember, once you got a game there was usually no way to flip that immediately into another, so if you wanted to play something different than what you'd already had to that point, you had to buckle down and suffer through what you'd picked up.  Some of them I liked, some of them I despised, but hey, I, too, loved Mega Man, Contra, Zelda, etc. (Mario games are just ok to me, call that what you will).

Opty has already made his response post further on in the thread from this post, but please be aware that citing "expert" statistics about what games are "great" and what games "aren't" honestly sounds more like someone pretending to like the games and truly enjoy the hobby than someone who loses track of time and speaks endlessly when their memories of playing some of the most popular and common games of the era come up.  Please don't take this as a slight or that I mean that you somehow aren't serious about the hobby, just trying to show you that your presentation can (and to me, does, on the surface) ring just as hollow as someone espousing undying love for the same games that just about everybody who remembers the system does.

[Seth | 172]

GPX, I suspect you're right. I collect Intellivision, Atari, and (primarily) NES, and I decided a while ago to be a "three-figure" collector—I wanted to prove to myself, if only to myself, that it's still possible to get amazing NES games in very good grades without ever paying even $1,000. So far I can tell you... it's going well. This really *doesn't* have to be the four- or five- or six- or seven-figure hobby it's become, it just takes some careful research and not obsessing over 9.8/A++ grades. That said, I do own games that could have been in Friday's Heritage signature auction pretty easily, that I purchased in the last year and were under $1,000. It's doable, and for me it feels like an act of resistance, I guess.

I know the folks here are in most instances very serious gamers. Sometimes, like OptOut, I guess I find myself just wanting to fume about the others—the speculators, investors, flippers, and even the 10% collectors—out loud.

[GPX | 1,370]

10 minutes ago, OptOut said:

This is where you are wrong dude, it's LOWER for the actual educated collectors, like us. 

Most of the people who know hat they are doing are in the 3 figure and low-mid 4 figure range.

The peeps cranking out high 5 figure, 6 figure and fuggin 7 figure spends really have no idea what they're doing.

Nah mate, a CIB N64 Pal Starcraft has been going for $2000 a few years ago. Sealed games already have been going for high 4 figures back then, being rarer than CIBs. 5 figures is a natural progression of the incoming speculative interest of the market.

Edited October 30, 2021 by GPX

[Seth | 172]

Darkchylde28, I agree with you 100%. Anyone can and should like whatever games they like and for whatever reason. I am obsessed, for instance, with the idea that Mappy-Land is nearly as good as Super Mario Bros.—which I really believe it is, if you play it enough to see how deep and complex it is—but I don't expect anyone else to feel that way. I guess I just hate that the speculators, investors, flippers, and 10% collectors have convinced so many people that the only games on the NES worth talking about are like the ten most well-known titles. The NES—and its game library—is one of the greatest artistic achievements of my lifetime, and it's being turned into a Mario-Zelda-Mega Man-Ninja-Gaiden-Tyson meme. It makes me so angry.

[Seth | 172]

PS: I hear you about the statistics. The statistics were offered as part of a separate conversation that you're conflating with this one, though I take responsibility for that. I was saying that if you're going to speak of NES games as a market, yes, you'd want to actually do research into which games gamers admire en masse because gamers will ultimately be the market for sealed-and-graded NES games, unlike now where it's overseas multimillionaires and billionaires and domestic flippers (so my point was that you'd want to crunch data on scarcity, general consensus, and market availability).

That is a SEPARATE issue from how each one of us enjoys gaming. Anyone can enjoy gaming howsoever they like.

I really hope the distinction I'm making is clear here, because I most certainly did not say that a real gamer follows what "experts" say. That's absolute nonsense.

Edited October 30, 2021 by RETRO

[Seth | 172]

OptOut, I am so happy to hear you talk about 3-figure collecting. That's what I do and I feel like folks never talk about it. I agree that—and again, this is SEPARATE from the "games we enjoy playing" conversation—anyone who really knows the console they collect for is most likely a three-figure or very-low-four-figure collector because they have done the quantitative and qualitative research to collect in that way.

[OptOut | 8,889]

Just now, GPX said:

Nah mate, a CIB N64 Pal Starcraft has been going for $2000 a few years ago. Sealed games already has been going for 4 figures back then, being rarer than CIBs. 5 figures is a natural progression of the incoming speculative interest of the market.

Dude, PAL StarCraft is STILL in the mid 4 figures range, right now. An average copy of US Samson of Dinosaur Peak still is in the same range.

Japanese games like 64DD golf and Doshin the giant expansion pack, actually RARE games are LOW 4 figures too.

The "sealed/graded" premium, focussing on condition and print based scarcity is an aberration. The entire rest of the retro-game collecting world lives in the low 4 figures still, MAX, just like it always has.

Only things you could consider in the same ballpark as the current sealed hype shit is sealed SE or NWC, or I dunno, NEO GEO or something, but they have always been there...

 

I know you are a sealed collector, so that might not ring true with you, but if you don't collect sealed, although prices HAVE gone up, we're still a 4 figure hobby, overall, and I mean that's at the HIGHER end... I've been spending like crazy for YEARS at this point and the most I've spent on a single game is still only 365 USD...

[GPX | 1,370]

8 minutes ago, RETRO said:

GPX, I suspect you're right. I collect Intellivision, Atari, and (primarily) NES, and I decided a while ago to be a "three-figure" collector—I wanted to prove to myself, if only to myself, that it's still possible to get amazing NES games in very good grades without ever paying even $1,000. So far I can tell you... it's going well. This really *doesn't* have to be the four- or five- or six- or seven-figure hobby it's become, it just takes some careful research and not obsessing over 9.8/A++ grades. That said, I do own games that could have been in Friday's Heritage signature auction pretty easily, that I purchased in the last year and were under $1,000. It's doable, and for me it feels like an act of resistance, I guess.

I know the folks here are in most instances very serious gamers. Sometimes, like OptOut, I guess I find myself just wanting to fume about the others—the speculators, investors, flippers, and even the 10% collectors—out loud.

Just to reiterate, sealed games (highly sought after ones) have already been going for mid-to-high 4 figures way before WATA even existed. The 5 figure range isn’t at all surprising to a long term sealed collector like me. Though, I’m agreeing with you and OptOut that the long term sealed collectors ain’t likely paying over a million bucks for a sealed Mario 64, no matter what the condition.

[Seth | 172]

OptOut, the only thing I'd add to that is that one can be a sealed-and-graded three-figure collector as well as "three-figure raw" collector and develop quite a collection. It's hard, but it's fun because it's doable with enough work.

[Seth | 172]

GPX, this is where I disagree a bit. I have mostly near-mint NES games, mostly games that are rare or beloved or both, and I've never spent $1,000 on a game or bought it raw and gotten it graded myself. And I'm even talking about purchases in 2021, well post-market boom. So this idea that you couldn't develop an insane collection buying VGA games pre-WATA for three figures is just... well, dude, it's wrong. You want to talk about Metal Storm or Little Samson or Dinosaur Peak? Sure, they were always way up there sealed and graded. But if you go one or two levels of scarcity down you're in the high three figures. Still. Even now. As I said, you just have to work a little harder. I don't see many of the newest collectors (I mean like a Mizkif-type "collector") or any of the flippers, even, being willing to work that hard. They decided long ago that they were smart if they spent four rather than five figures, and candidly that does seem like laziness to a three-figure collector.

Edited October 30, 2021 by RETRO

[GPX | 1,370]

5 minutes ago, OptOut said:

Dude, PAL StarCraft is STILL in the mid 4 figures range, right now. An average copy of US Samson of Dinosaur Peak still is in the same range.

Japanese games like 64DD golf and Doshin the giant expansion pack, actually RARE games are LOW 4 figures too.

The "sealed/graded" premium, focussing on condition and print based scarcity is an aberration. The entire rest of the retro-game collecting world lives in the low 4 figures still, MAX, just like it always has.

Only things you could consider in the same ballpark as the current sealed hype shit is sealed SE or NWC, or I dunno, NEO GEO or something, but they have always been there...

 

I know you are a sealed collector, so that might not ring true with you, but if you don't collect sealed, although prices HAVE gone up, we're still a 4 figure hobby, overall, and I mean that's at the HIGHER end... I've been spending like crazy for YEARS at this point and the most I've spent on a single game is still only 365 USD...

I agree that the hobby is still lurking around the 3-4 figures for the most part. Not gonna argue about that. The main thing I want to emphasise is that sealed games (sought after ones) whether Pal or NTSC, have been going for mid-to-high 4 figures way before WATA/HA started shaking hands with each other. 

[Seth | 172]

4 minutes ago, GPX said:

I agree that the hobby is still lurking around the 3-4 figures for the most part. Not gonna argue about that. The main thing I want to emphasise is that sealed games (sought after ones) whether Pal or NTSC, have been going for mid-to-high 4 figures way before WATA/HA started shaking hands with each other. 

GPX, do you mean a very few games or many of them? If you just mean a few, couldn't you really say there have been very low five-figure games since pre-WATA? Not many, but there were a few.

Edited October 30, 2021 by RETRO

[OptOut | 8,889]

4 minutes ago, RETRO said:

OptOut, the only thing I'd add to that is that one can be a sealed-and-graded three-figure collector as well as "three-figure raw" collector and develop quite a collection. It's hard, but it's fun because it's doable with enough work.

I mean, I personally own over a hundred sealed games... And I probably spent BARELY more than a thousand USD to do that... It's easy when no one cares about Japanese stuff, I guess! 

But I don't expect that to even cross the minds of most people paying eight hundred thousand dollars for a copy of Mario 64, or four hundred thousand dollars for a copy of Sonic the Hedgehog...

I doubt they'd even know what a Dreamcast or a 64DD was!

[GPX | 1,370]

7 minutes ago, RETRO said:

GPX, do you mean a few games or most of them?

I’m talking about the high end items (rare condition or rare sealed). But most of the sealed games were at least mid 3-figures to low 4-figures pre-WATA. 

Edit: I should add I’m talking about retro games (80s-90s), and pre-WATA being the market rates around 3 years ago. Also, I’m more likely to be biased with Pal games as I focus more on them.

Edited October 30, 2021 by GPX

[Seth | 172]

5 minutes ago, OptOut said:

I mean, I personally own over a hundred sealed games... And I probably spent BARELY more than a thousand USD to do that... It's easy when no one cares about Japanese stuff, I guess! 

But I don't expect that to even cross the minds of most people paying eight hundred thousand dollars for a copy of Mario 64, or four hundred thousand dollars for a copy of Sonic the Hedgehog...

I doubt they'd even know what a Dreamcast or a 64DD was!

Yeah, I think my favorite part of all this is that those folks don't realize us three-figure collectors are just waiting for the pop reports to come out—which will sink certain popular retro games—and then we'll buy and own those games, too. And it's at that point that all those collectors (who paid insane amounts for SMB3 and so on) will want the actually rare and beloved games that were/are available for three figures now. It's all so silly. That said, as I don't sell games, I just collect, any and all of these market "gains" will stay purely theoretical for me.

Edited October 30, 2021 by RETRO

[OptOut | 8,889]

1 minute ago, GPX said:

I’m talking about the high end items (rare condition or rare sealed). But most of the sealed games were at least high 3-figures to low 4-figures pre-WATA.

I one HUNDRED percent respect the sealed collector, in it for the love of the games and the love of the condition of those games. MAXIMUM kudos to you and those others like you bro.

However, it MUST be said that the Retro game collecting culture, which has coalesced over the last twenty years at least, has thrived and flourished from people just playing and loving the damn games, buying loose carts, dog-eared manuals, scruffy-looking boxes, and beat-up consoles to play em all on.

That will always be the true core of the hobby for me, as much as I admire the look of a CRISP factory fresh sealed and graded box, honest to god.

[Seth | 172]

12 minutes ago, GPX said:

I’m talking about the high end items (rare condition or rare sealed). But most of the sealed games were at least high 3-figures to low 4-figures pre-WATA.

Yeah, then we don't agree on this one (as to you saying "low 4-figures"). It's 2021—two years after the boom and four years after WATA was founded—and for NES you can still, with any patience or effort, get rare and beloved games in sealed, graded, near-mint condition for three figures. Burai Fighter, Bases Loaded, Blaster Master, Low G Man, Cobra Triangle, Vice: Project Doom, The Guardian Legend, Smash TV, Dragon Spirit, Cabal, Formula One: Built to Win, Klax, Adventures of Lolo, Battle of Olympus, Nightshade, Willow, RoboWarrior, Guerilla War.

Not to mention beloved but not rare games like Kirby's Adventure, StarTropics, Wario's Woods, and Golgo 13.

This is why I keep saying that focusing attention only on games that make every Top 25 list for a given console—and those lists are usually devised not to find the best or most interesting games, but the most decent games people already know—is such a travesty.

Edited October 30, 2021 by RETRO

[GPX | 1,370]

4 minutes ago, OptOut said:

I one HUNDRED percent respect the sealed collector, in it for the love of the games and the love of the condition of those games. MAXIMUM kudos to you and those others like you bro.

However, it MUST be said that the Retro game collecting culture, which has coalesced over the last twenty years at least, has thrived and flourished from people just playing and loving the damn games, buying loose carts, dog-eared manuals, scruffy-looking boxes, and beat-up consoles to play em all on.

That will always be the true core of the hobby for me, as much as I admire the look of a CRISP factory fresh sealed and graded box, honest to god.

I know exactly what you are saying because I used to be that exact collector you described. Then insanity kicked in, and I wanted to set myself a bigger challenge to get the games I like in sealed/pristine condition. I do it for the love of games and collecting as a dual hobby. I still regard myself as a collector even though I part invest/sell, because I don’t mind how the market fluctuates. If it goes down, I buy more, if it goes up I buy less.

[GPX | 1,370]

6 minutes ago, RETRO said:

Yeah, then we don't agree on this one. It's 2021—two years after the boom and four years after WATA was founded—and for NES you can still, with any patience or effort, get rare and beloved games in sealed, graded, near-mint condition for three figures. Burai Fighter, Bases Loaded, Blaster Master, Low G Man, Cobra Triangle, Vice: Project Doom, The Guardian Legend, Smash TV, Dragon Spirit, Cabal, Formula One: Built to Win, Klax, Adventures of Lolo, Battle of Olympus, Nightshade, Willow, RoboWarrior, Guerilla War.

Not to mention beloved but not rare games like Kirby's Adventure, StarTropics, Wario's Woods, and Golgo 13.

This is why I keep saying that focusing attention only on games that make every Top 25 list for a given console—and those lists are usually devised not to find the best or most interesting games, but the most decent games people already know—is such a travesty.

I think you’re being too correlational with how a game plays and what price the game deserves. How good of a game has no real bearing on the overall price it garners. The end price of a collectible has to do with how sought after it is, with a sprinkle of hype, and how much money people are willing to throw at it. 

Also, I’m not saying all sealed games should be 4-figures or more henceforth. No, siree! The market should still have its share of bargain items, not all will be zillions of titillions worth by 2025.