Heritage Auctions Thread

[Gulag Joe | 582]

1 minute ago, Aatos said:

I thought your reasoning for the high price was that there was only 1 were only 2 though. That's 600% increase though. 

Anyway as you seem to be in the know (even though not too many people seem convinced here yet), I'm still looking for an explanation why Mario 64 specifically - what makes that the most valuable game in history by a long stretch? Again I know any other collectibles market poorly but it seems equal to someone paying $10M for Superman #164 from 1963 in pristine condition and arguing they just really really wanted the one of few really mint copies. 

You are reading numbers that are unverifiable in regard to the assumption of there being 10 vga 90+ out there. The only thing we know for sure is that there are only 2 graded 9.8a++ and that came directly from the auctioneer. Until people start posting source links for all these other alleged grades, it's all fake news.

[Aatos | 35]

18 minutes ago, Gulag Joe said:

You are reading numbers that are unverifiable in regard to the assumption of there being 10 vga 90+ out there. The only thing we know for sure is that there are only 2 graded 9.8a++ and that came directly from the auctioneer. Until people start posting source links for all these other alleged grades, it's all fake news.

Uhh.. I thought you just acknowledged the 12? Either way I've been here (well, over there) for 10 years too and based on what I know of the people here I too trust Jonebone's assessment over yours, sorry (it makes more sense intuitively as well, considering e.g. the sales numbers and overall Mario's popularity at the time of release of this vs. something like SMB1 etc.).

But anyway again you dodged my actual question here - why would Super Mario 64 in particular be any kind of sensible purchase for 1.56M ? Or is your final answer to just hang with the "it's just so incredibly rare which legit makes it worth 1.56 million dollars" ?

Edited July 12, 2021 by Aatos

[Californication | 1,477]

I feel like for $1.6 M someone should be able to make a couplw of these.

[Gulag Joe | 582]

2 minutes ago, Aatos said:

Uhh.. I thought you just acknowledged the 12? Either way I've been here (well, over there) for 10 years too and based on what I know of the people here I too trust Jonebone's assessment over yours, sorry (it makes more sense intuitively as well, considering e.g. the sales numbers and overall Mario's popularity at the time of release of this vs. something like SMB1 etc.).

But anyway again you dodged my actual question here - why would Super Mario 64 be any kind of sensible purchase for 1.56M ? Or is your final answer to just hang with the "it's just so incredibly rare which legit makes it worth 1.56 million dollars" ?

I'm not acknowledging anything without any supporting evidence to the contrary. People can say whatever they want. I asked for access to the VGA data as that's one of the main reasons I follow this thread. So if there are indeed 10 90+ copies out there, I'd like to know the source of that data and then search that data for the populations of other games. I have been unsuccessful getting pop data from VGA over several requests.

You're not supposed to believe everything you read on the internet as truth. That can go exactly the same for myself as well. You don't have to believe me. But everything I've said can be backed up with price charting and HA search history.

[Aatos | 35]

9 minutes ago, Gulag Joe said:

 "it's just so incredibly rare which legit makes it worth 1.56 million dollars"

Okay then.

[WalterWhiteJr. | 1,162]

Lol people actually believe these sales are real? I hope indictments come down for market manipulation and fraud. 
 

https://kotaku.com/sealed-mario-64s-record-breaking-1-5m-sale-has-retro-e-1847274681

[AdamW | 713]

2 hours ago, Gulag Joe said:

Yea and it turned out to be a 1/2? Dang I was wayyyy off! Lololololol

I haven't actually seen them claim the 2 number since the auction. Printed stories are now saying "less than 5", which could be more than 2.

[ApebitMusic | 130]

I really don't get the argument that this high end sealed collecting isn't game collecting. I think that's such a generalization, and at the end of the day it comes down to each individual and their motives. Are some of the people dishing out this money not big game collectors and only doing it for investment? Sure, but I believe only a very small portion have zero interest in games! As a video game collector, in theory, I want the best possible copy of any given game. That just happens to be sealed, high grade games, same as I would chase a high grade '52 Mickey Mantle or Action 1 in sports cards and comics, respectively. 

A lot of this "THAT ISN'T GAME COLLECTING" comes off as sour grapes to me, personally. 

[AdamW | 713]

18 minutes ago, Gulag Joe said:

I'm not acknowledging anything without any supporting evidence to the contrary. People can say whatever they want. I asked for access to the VGA data as that's one of the main reasons I follow this thread. So if there are indeed 10 90+ copies out there, I'd like to know the source of that data and then search that data for the populations of other games. I have been unsuccessful getting pop data from VGA over several requests.

You're not supposed to believe everything you read on the internet as truth. That can go exactly the same for myself as well. You don't have to believe me. But everything I've said can be backed up with price charting and HA search history.

The numbers are from old population data when VGA was still actually providing it. They haven't done for years, but some people around here and facebook still have copies of the last data before they stopped.

[Gulag Joe | 582]

3 minutes ago, Aatos said:

Okay then.

The game was sold. It doesn't matter if you or myself or anyone can't figure out why. Why would anyone pay millions of dollars for NFTs? Why would anyone pay thousands for a "sculpture" of air? Why would anyone pay thousands of dollars for a nes world class track meet ripoff game? People with disposable income spend it in disposable ways.

[Gulag Joe | 582]

1 minute ago, AdamW said:

The numbers are from old population data when VGA was still actually providing it. They haven't done for years, but some people around here and facebook still have copies of the last data before they stopped.

VGA has never provided pop data. I submitted games to them right when they first started accepting them. I'd love to see this alleged data though,it would be very helpful as VGA specifically told me that they don't provide that data on multiple occasions.

[GPX | 1,369]

10 minutes ago, Gulag Joe said:

The game was sold. It doesn't matter if you or myself or anyone can't figure out why. Why would anyone pay millions of dollars for NFTs? Why would anyone pay thousands for a "sculpture" of air? Why would anyone pay thousands of dollars for a nes world class track meet ripoff game? People with disposable income spend it in disposable ways.

This here lies the misconception. Yes, people can legit pay for millions of dollars that nobody else wants. No, not all record breaking sales are legit transactions. 

Have you ever seen Ebay bids go for crazy amounts? Then it later gets relisted? This is just one type of shonkiness that exists in the current era of games trading. So by extrapolation, HA sales, with this crazy end prices, they are not immune to some form of shonkiness going on. If anything, there is a high level of shonkiness going, just no one has proof of it (yet).

Edited July 12, 2021 by GPX

[GPX | 1,369]

3 minutes ago, Gulag Joe said:

VGA has never provided pop data. I submitted games to them right when they first started accepting them. I'd love to see this alleged data though,it would be very helpful as VGA specifically told me that they don't provide that data on multiple occasions.

Are you making things up as you’re going along? Because I’ve graded stuff from VGA in the past and I’ve been given pop data for nearly a hundred items, when asking. Not sure in the recent 2 years, but they would allow up to 3 items per day for pop data in the prior years. 

[Brickman | 3,986]

I can’t really take any WATA grades or HA auctions seriously when they get known kick backs in the guise of “insurance premium costs”. HA seem overly secretive as well. This sale could very easily have been their advertising budget for the half and the two “bidders” are just passing these games back and forth. Find it a bit suspicious that Deniz personally graded this one himself, wouldn’t trust that snake.

Hope one day WATA and HA are done for market manipulation.

[tidaldreams | 654]

1 hour ago, MrWunderful said:

1 of 1

1 of 2

1 of 12

 

Cmon big Joe, real Trolls dont waffle that hard

 

Unrelated, is there anyway that we can verify that that $1.5 million figure was actually paid for?

I believe unpaid items are marked as "unsold" or something like that and are not searchable in past sales. But there are very few of those. Either way, they give you quite a while to pay for your items, for a purchase this large you might even be able to negotiate payment terms, etc.

[Gulag Joe | 582]

1 minute ago, GPX said:

Are you making things up as you’re going along? Because I’ve graded stuff from VGA in the past and I’ve been given pop data for nearly a hundred items, when asking. Not sure in the recent 2 years, but they would allow up to 3 items per day for pop data in the prior years. 

I asked once in 2014 for data on 3 games, again in 2015, and again in 2016 and was denied each and every time. "We do not have data available" was the response each time.

[Aatos | 35]

28 minutes ago, Gulag Joe said:

The game was sold. It doesn't matter if you or myself or anyone can't figure out why. Why would anyone pay millions of dollars for NFTs? Why would anyone pay thousands for a "sculpture" of air? Why would anyone pay thousands of dollars for a nes world class track meet ripoff game? People with disposable income spend it in disposable ways.

Sure it matters - I mean not in cosmic sense of course, but it's interesting distinction to me and many others if

a) The game was actually sold at all - again I don't know for 100% this exchange actually happened, nor do I know if I should trust what I see on the website. I don't actively doubt them, but again the more senseless this particular purchase right now is, the more sus the whole thing becomes

b) What kind of logic went into buying the game. I mean what you suggest (they just had disposable income) is just one possible explanation. Or was it a huge gamble banking on finding the bigger fool to buy this game, was there some rich bitcoin mofo who really loved this game in particular and decided to get this no matter what, was this part of the big push to lure coin/comic collectors to "invest" into big video game names now while the market is still relatively young (which we know certain parties have been pushing for few years now), or what?

It's really interesting and relevant because looking at the facts - the title, the sales price and arguably the rarity, it doesn't make too much sense. 

Also, I think we all can agree people buying NFTs are just megarich out of touch idiots or people who try to make a profit out of it? So if the buyer of this is someone similar to those people, that would be actually pretty interesting and relevant too because that kind of person could not be further away from someone who you see here, who collects games and even sealed games out of the passion for the art. 

And one more point, since you mentioned Stadium Events in particular - that's probably the worst counter-example you could pick specifically because the way its price and valuation has developed in the collecting community is really kind of polar opposite to this. SE's price has developed super organically in my opinion, over the past 15 years, because the concept of full set collecting has developed and deep understanding and appreciation for it along the way, whereas this SM64 seemingly increased in price literally like 100-fold overnight. 

Edited July 12, 2021 by Aatos

[Gulag Joe | 582]

14 minutes ago, GPX said:

Are you making things up as you’re going along? Because I’ve graded stuff from VGA in the past and I’ve been given pop data for nearly a hundred items, when asking. Not sure in the recent 2 years, but they would allow up to 3 items per day for pop data in the prior years. 

I've posted in this group a few times in the past, but have a longshot request- if you have pop data for sealed Resident Evil (long box- ps1), Mortal Kombat 1(sega genesis), or tecmo super bowl, I'd be very thankful to know what those numbers are and what grades are out there. 

[Gulag Joe | 582]

6 minutes ago, Aatos said:

Sure it matters - I mean not in cosmic sense of course, but it's interesting distinction to me and many others if

a) The game was actually sold at all - again I don't know for 100% this exchange actually happened, nor do I know if I should trust what I see on the website. I don't actively doubt them, but again the more senseless this particular purchase right now is, the more sus the whole thing becomes

b) What kind of logic went into buying the game. I mean what you suggest (they just had disposable income) is just one possible explanation. Or was it a huge gamble banking on finding the bigger fool to buy this game, was there some rich bitcoin mofo who really loved this game in particular and decided to get this no matter what, was this part of the big push to lure coin/comic collectors to "invest" into big video game names now while the market is still relatively young (which we know certain parties have been pushing for few years now), or what?

It's really interesting and relevant because looking at the facts - the title, the sales price and arguably the rarity, it doesn't make too much sense. 

Also, I think we all can agree people buying NFTs are just megarich out of touch idiots or people who try to make a profit out of it? So if the buyer of this is someone similar to those people, that would be actually pretty interesting and relevant too because that kind of person could not be further away from someone who you see here, who collects games and even sealed games out of the passion for the art. 

And one more point, since you mentioned Stadium Events in particular - that's probably the worst counter-example you could pick specifically because the way its price and valuation has developed in the collecting community is really kind of polar opposite to this. SE's price has developed super organically in my opinion, over the past 15 years, because the concept of full set collecting has developed and deep understanding and appreciation for it along the way, whereas this SM64 seemingly increased in price literally like 100-fold overnight. 

If it helps at all, I've used HA for selling games and the sales were indeed legit.

[WalterWhiteJr. | 1,162]

10 minutes ago, Gulag Joe said:

If it helps at all, I've used HA for selling games and the sales were indeed legit.

I’ve used HA for sales and sales were cancelled because shill accounts just bid up and didn’t pay for my item. 

[Gulag Joe | 582]

10 minutes ago, WalterWhiteJr. said:

I’ve used HA for sales and sales were cancelled because shill accounts just bid up and didn’t pay for my item. 

Yikes. How did HA resolve the problem?

[WalterWhiteJr. | 1,162]

Just now, Gulag Joe said:

Yikes. How did HA resolve the problem?

They relisted it and it sold in the next cycle for like less than half of that initial amount.

[GPX | 1,369]

28 minutes ago, Gulag Joe said:

I asked once in 2014 for data on 3 games, again in 2015, and again in 2016 and was denied each and every time. "We do not have data available" was the response each time.

Maybe you weren’t a VGA member at the time? Or maybe they didn’t have any on record back then for those items? It’s kind of a moot point at this stage, because you already have half a dozen members on here who can verify VGA does give out pop data (in limited samples per day). 

19 minutes ago, Gulag Joe said:

I've posted in this group a few times in the past, but have a longshot request- if you have pop data for sealed Resident Evil (long box- ps1), Mortal Kombat 1(sega genesis), or tecmo super bowl, I'd be very thankful to know what those numbers are and what grades are out there. 

Again, you’re clutching at straws here. Me obtaining data for the games you're requiring doesn’t prove my point to the contrary.

Even though I’m mostly a Pal collector, I have enough awareness that there’s bound to be at least 2-3 dozens that are in that sort of condition for a sealed Mario 64. Using some data provided by jonebone/Atwood among a few others along the way.

[Gulag Joe | 582]

6 minutes ago, GPX said:

Maybe you weren’t a VGA member at the time? Or maybe they didn’t have any on record back then for those items? It’s kind of a moot point at this stage, because you already have half a dozen members on here who can verify VGA does give out pop data (in limited samples per day). 

Again, you’re clutching at straws here. Me obtaining data for the games you're requiring doesn’t prove my point to the contrary.

Even though I’m mostly a Pal collector, I have enough awareness that there’s bound to be at least 2-3 dozens that are in that sort of condition for a sealed Mario 64. Using some data provided by jonebone/Atwood among a few others along the way.

I was just asking incase you had that data. I was not trying to prove a point or prove you wrong for that matter. I'd genuinely like to know, that's all.

I've seen the Atwood census. Only a few of his games were the big cuts were seeing now, however, alot of his stuff wasn't in the best of shape.

Edited July 12, 2021 by Gulag Joe

[GPX | 1,369]

4 minutes ago, WalterWhiteJr. said:

They relisted it and it sold in the next cycle for like less than half of that initial amount.

Thanks for letting us know!