New Old Stock - Atari 2600 River Raid

[obnoxious | 107]

I've been looking for Atari 2600 cartridges, the ones I most played in my childhood and ran into this offer. The seller has an old game store stock with lots of original 2600 game boxes and offered me a 6pack never-before-openend River Raid box for $260.

I'm not into sealed/graded market but I think this is a good opportunity. It's $43 for each game, which is sold for about $200 each in the same condition. I mean, the plastic seal seems to be in perfect condition and the boxes have no creases or dents at all. He also has a Magnavox Odyssey in the box, in absolutely mint condition and told me a guy offered to buy all his 10 6pack sealed boxes of Space Invaders.

From the pictures I get it's a 90+ VGA or 9.8 A++ Wata. This would be a nice way to raise my available funds for other playable cartridges (maybe I'll keep a sealed one for myself, who knows?)

What you think, is it a good opportunity to take?
 

[RH | 4,903]

Probably a good investment to flip. There's often at least a little money in buying big or high dollar lots and busting them up.

If you get them graded, I 100% recommend going with VGA. I won't dig up all the recent issues/PR problems they've had this past month, but all things considered, their turn around times have been abysmal. For the sake of speed, I recommend going with VGA if you hope to get them back in the next 365 days.

[obnoxious | 107]

2 minutes ago, RH said:

Probably a good investment to flip. There's often at least a little money in buying big or high dollar lots and busting them up.

If you get them graded, I 100% recommend going with VGA. I won't dig up all the recent issues/PR problems they've had this past month, but all things considered, their turn around times have been abysmal. For the sake of speed, I recommend going with VGA if you hope to get them back in the next 365 days.

Just to be clear: I'm not one of those who think he'll get 5 figures from a game box. I know their graded value will range from $180 to $300 tops. It seemed like a good opportunity to have a sealed graded box, another one that I can unbox it myself and give a nice sniff out of that "80's smell" and sell the others to fund the hobby. I know that some cartridges get some mold and stains even in a perfectly sealed box. I think I made my homework research on this matter.

So, I'm considering VGA because:

1) I think VGA's grading is much more logical
I've been researching Wata and VGA grading systems and I agree with this Reserved Investments video about how Wata's grading 9.8 may mean anything between VGA's 80 to 95. I don't think I'll get a Wata 10 A++ (well, who does?, it feels like a gamble) out of these boxes.

2) Wata scandals
Wata *may* totally lose credibility due to the last couple of years scandals related to HA. Although VGA cases aren't as elaborated as theirs, this may harm future value.

I don't really care about turn around time, my priority is to spend as little money as possible.

[obnoxious | 107]

Is the VGA's site offline for you also? Been 3 days I can't open it.

[AdamW | 713]

I dunno. You're paying a little over 40 a game then you've got grading, shipping, selling and holding costs to consider. Seems like a lot of work for not that much profit. But I guess it comes down to how you value the time, that's a personal call...

[G-type | 2,480]

those are some nice looking River Raid boxes

[captmorgandrinker | 1,649]

Is that from the Venezuela guy?   They might not all be that nice looking when they get to you (nor sealed if customs opens them)

[obnoxious | 107]

28 minutes ago, captmorgandrinker said:

Is that from the Venezuela guy?   They might not all be that nice looking when they get to you (nor sealed if customs opens them)

Yes, he agreed to send me pictures of the boxes being sent to me. I'll try talking to VGA about him sending it directly to them for grading. That would reduce the chance of them being open, instead of being sent to me and then to VGA.

Have you got anything from him or knows someone who did?

By the way: have you seen the Odyssey he's selling? Amazing stuff.

[captmorgandrinker | 1,649]

Just now, obnoxious said:

Yes, he agreed to send me pictures of the boxes being sent to me. I'll try talking to VGA about him sending it directly to them for grading. That would reduce the chance of them being open, instead of being sent to me and then to VGA.

Have you got anything from him or knows someone who did?

By the way: have you seen the Odyssey he's selling? Amazing stuff.

Yes, I snagged a 6 pack of Ikari Warriors.  Customs opened the outer box it looks like (had the DHL reseal tape on it) but left the game boxes alone.

One looks to have gotten squished in shipping and the other 5 looks relatively okay, just your typical Atari random bowing.

[GPX | 1,369]

@OP, I’d suggest to try sending one off for grading to see if the effort and resell price is worth your time. You will have gained some insight on the challenges of getting a game graded, and also have an itch scratched.

[obnoxious | 107]

3 minutes ago, captmorgandrinker said:

Yes, I snagged a 6 pack of Ikari Warriors.  Customs opened the outer box it looks like (had the DHL reseal tape on it) but left the game boxes alone.

One looks to have gotten squished in shipping and the other 5 looks relatively okay, just your typical Atari random bowing.

Sorry about the question but are you in the USA?
I'm in Brazil so I'd have to send it to the US and take my chances on having it opened by the customs anyway. Luck is part of the game

Did he put the factory box inside another box, with protective padding?
 

 

6 minutes ago, GPX said:

@OP, I’d suggest to try sending one off for grading to see if the effort and resell price is worth your time. You will have gained some insight on the challenges of getting a game graded, and also have an itch scratched.

Thanks for the tip but sending one and then sending others would be more expensive than just sending them all at once, due to customs charges, shipping costs and my money being worth roughly 0,20:1 dollar.

Then I'll get the least well graded and just crack it open, for my own amusement

 

[GPX | 1,369]

16 minutes ago, obnoxious said:

Sorry about the question but are you in the USA?
I'm in Brazil so I'd have to send it to the US and take my chances on having it opened by the customs anyway. Luck is part of the game

Did he put the factory box inside another box, with protective padding?
 

 

Thanks for the tip but sending one and then sending others would be more expensive than just sending them all at once, due to customs charges, shipping costs and my money being worth roughly 0,20:1 dollar.

Then I'll get the least well graded and just crack it open, for my own amusement

 

That’s entirely up to you. This is what grading is really all about though - making tough decisions. My advice is to do what you would like to do, and be sensible with the amount of money you spend and the time and effort you have to go through. It’s a constant balancing act.

[obnoxious | 107]

1 minute ago, GPX said:

That’s entirely up to you. This is what grading is really all about though - making tough decisions. My advice is to do what you would like to do, and be sensible with the amount of money you spend and the time and effort you have to go through. It’s a constant balancing act.

Thanks for the insights, I'll keep them in mind. Put that the money I'm investing in this is exclusively for collecting, it won't affect me if I just lose it all, which won't happen. The worst is ending up with less than I invested and a relatively good graded copy for me to keep. I'm ok with that for being the first time in the grading games game.

 

[Code Monkey | 2,006]

The most recent sales on Heritage Auctions for a sealed shipping pack of 6 River Raid were $264 and $192.

[obnoxious | 107]

29 minutes ago, Code Monkey said:

The most recent sales on Heritage Auctions for a sealed shipping pack of 6 River Raid were $264 and $192.

I saw them while researching. These two boxes were in questionable condition, they look like being exposed to moisture.

There were others in very good shape, one of those was sold for $720 the day before the $192 one. Even a $900 sold in Nov/20.

[captmorgandrinker | 1,649]

5 hours ago, obnoxious said:

Sorry about the question but are you in the USA?
I'm in Brazil so I'd have to send it to the US and take my chances on having it opened by the customs anyway. Luck is part of the game

Did he put the factory box inside another box, with protective padding?

Yes, I am in the USA.

No, just the one box with minimal padding.   Although I bid on a 6 pack of games, not necessarily a sealed 6 pack carton, so I did get what I paid for.  

I'm still happy with what I got, just wanted to point out that the condition they show up to the USA in might not make VGAing them worth it.