"The Dreamer Collection"

[madmozz | 2]

1 hour ago, tbone3969 said:

I bet it goes for 100k

If it goes for a 100K I am not going to have it in my collection lol, I was hoping maybe 20k lol

 

[tidaldreams | 654]

6 hours ago, tbone3969 said:

I bet it goes for 100k

100k for RE longbox? nah, it's going over 1M.

[jonebone | 1,307]

9 hours ago, tidaldreams said:

100k for RE longbox? nah, it's going over 1M.

*Should, if the Mario 64 is setting the bar.

At minimum, there is no doubt in my mind that's a $500k game today.

[madmozz | 2]

3 hours ago, jonebone said:

*Should, if the Mario 64 is setting the bar.

At minimum, there is no doubt in my mind that's a $500k game today.

Really? I just looked and it's at 52k already I figure it will top out at 100k at most, but what do I know? My initial thoughts of 20-25k was blown out of the water, I was just hoping everyone was so into MARIO & N64 that the PS1 games might still slip through, I mean it's rare no doubt ( which imho Mario is not) but I didn't think the interest or big money was onto PS1 just yet, seems I was wayyyyyyy off as this game might break a few records...damn!

[CodysGameRoom | 2,008]

I'd prefer the Saturn version.

[jonebone | 1,307]

42 minutes ago, madmozz said:

Really? I just looked and it's at 52k already I figure it will top out at 100k at most, but what do I know? My initial thoughts of 20-25k was blown out of the water, I was just hoping everyone was so into MARIO & N64 that the PS1 games might still slip through, I mean it's rare no doubt ( which imho Mario is not) but I didn't think the interest or big money was onto PS1 just yet, seems I was wayyyyyyy off as this game might break a few records...damn!

Yes you're way off.  There's not a snowball's chance in hell it goes under $300k.

[fcgamer | 4,723]

Boys, this is a hell of a lot rarer than that long box sealed, or a Mario 64 sealed, etc.

Wata and Heritage have done their best, attempting to pump prices and alter the definition of rare. It's all laughable to me, a bunch of investors and rich blokes buying a bunch of shit that they don't know anything about.

I've said for years that rare does not equate to valuable and vice versa, even still I see the word rare being tossed around in this thread even.

I can't wait to see this bubble burst, the whole lot's a bunch of idiots, and finally, the dreamer collection, wtf sort of pedigree is that? I think I'll get my games graded and have them be listed as the "Suck my ballz" collection, lol.

[madmozz | 2]

1 hour ago, jonebone said:

Yes you're way off.  There's not a snowball's chance in hell it goes under $300k.

You really think that high? I am kind of new to this& those numbers just seem surreal when an opened one is $200, are they really that kind of rare? I am just trying to educate myself.

[madmozz | 2]

2 minutes ago, fcgamer said:

Boys, this is a hell of a lot rarer than that long box sealed, or a Mario 64 sealed, etc.

Wata and Heritage have done their best, attempting to pump prices and alter the definition of rare. It's all laughable to me, a bunch of investors and rich blokes buying a bunch of shit that they don't know anything about.

I've said for years that rare does not equate to valuable and vice versa, even still I see the word rare being tossed around in this thread even.

I can't wait to see this bubble burst, the whole lot's a bunch of idiots, and finally, the dreamer collection, wtf sort of pedigree is that? I think I'll get my games graded and have them be listed as the "Suck my ballz" collection, lol.

Wow cool rare game! but why would anyone want to see a bubble burst? I have seen that happen in the 1990s with comics and let me tell you its not good for any collectors low or high end. I mean it seems like your really pissed off because games are selling  for a lot of money to people that don't play them? Or maybe WATA isn't the most reputable company & is out to make money...really. Well welcome to the club of baseball cards, comics and even VHS all of which are being bought by people who don't care to read or watch them with a lot of money ( I don't know anyone who has 3 million for a Spiderman comic) . I am a comic guy and I clearly remember everyone saying CGC was a joke, it won't won't last, " they are comics why seal them up" and basically what your saying suck my balls I hope it burns because "those people are buying into my hobby". But let me tell you anyone hoping WATA is going away or thinks CGC ( which is now going to grade games), VGA,PSA on IGS hasn't had a huge impact on price's & will continue to do so isn't really isn't plugged into where these markets are at and where they are going. You may not like the future of the hobby but that train has left the station.

 

[fcgamer | 4,723]

Nah, bubble burst only concerns the graded / sealed market, of which many (most?) aren't a part. So a bubble burst will not affect me in any way, aside from potentially lower prices, and the cockroaches leaving the hobby. 

Natural growth is one thing, but this is not organic growth.

[tidaldreams | 654]

3 hours ago, madmozz said:

Really? I just looked and it's at 52k already I figure it will top out at 100k at most, but what do I know? My initial thoughts of 20-25k was blown out of the water, I was just hoping everyone was so into MARIO & N64 that the PS1 games might still slip through, I mean it's rare no doubt ( which imho Mario is not) but I didn't think the interest or big money was onto PS1 just yet, seems I was wayyyyyyy off as this game might break a few records...damn!

Unlike SM64, this game is actually rare sealed... hell the jewel case version is a grail on it's own, much less the longbox.

[madmozz | 2]

5 minutes ago, tidaldreams said:

Unlike SM64, this game is actually rare sealed... hell the jewel case version is a grail on it's own, much less the longbox.

I know it's rare just being new to gaming its hard to wrap my head around some of the numbers being brought up with this game, I mean 300k in South Jersey is damn nice house lol  On a side note I looked up past auctioned your correct there seems to be a hell of a lot of Mario games and there were no past sales of this game & only one of the Twisted Metal  which might be one of the best looking boxes of all time imho.

 

Edited October 7, 2021 by madmozz

[tidaldreams | 654]

1 minute ago, madmozz said:

I know it's rare just being new to gaming its hard to wrap my head around some of the numbers being brought up with this game, I mean 300k in South Jersey is damn nice house lol 

The 1.5M that the Mario went for would be a nice house anywhere in the country (except California) 

[madmozz | 2]

AR

2 minutes ago, tidaldreams said:

The 1.5M that the Mario went for would be a nice house anywhere in the country (except California) 

I guess if you use the Mario as a gauge it makes sense this game is going to go much higher then I thought, I just didn't think PS1 had the same kind of interest.

[jonebone | 1,307]

17 hours ago, madmozz said:

You really think that high? I am kind of new to this& those numbers just seem surreal when an opened one is $200, are they really that kind of rare? I am just trying to educate myself.

Did you see the horrible jewel case sell for $14.6k on eBay?  Rusted staple, multiple cracks, probably a 6.5 to 7 A / A+ at best.  That is a game that no one should have wanted due to condition, believe it was being sold $40K OBO on social media before he had to let it go to auction.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/194390468611

So yes, a game that no one should have wanted went for $15k.  The first print in Mint shape, well listed on an auction house in front of tons of people with 6 and 7 figures of spending?  In a condition that everyone would want?  You'll see where it winds up.

[madmozz | 2]

2 hours ago, jonebone said:

Did you see the horrible jewel case sell for $14.6k on eBay?  Rusted staple, multiple cracks, probably a 6.5 to 7 A / A+ at best.  That is a game that no one should have wanted due to condition, believe it was being sold $40K OBO on social media before he had to let it go to auction.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/194390468611

So yes, a game that no one should have wanted went for $15k.  The first print in Mint shape, well listed on an auction house in front of tons of people with 6 and 7 figures of spending?  In a condition that everyone would want?  You'll see where it winds up.

Thanks for link WOW that looks awful and it went for 14k, I guess this one is going to go high.

 

[madmozz | 2]

Hey can I also ask being a comic guy it's pretty easy to find date in terms of what say a 8.5 would be in relationship to say a 9.8 % wise is there any kind of standard at this point? For example and in general is a 8.5 worth 40% of a 9.8 any help would be great.

[Gulag Joe | 582]

It looks like 2.75 million copies of Resident Evil 1996 sold, but I was unable to find data that shows a breakdown of how many of those were long boxes vs how many were jewel cases. Does anybody have an idea of what the total number of units sold of RE long boxes is?

[tidaldreams | 654]

7 hours ago, jonebone said:

Did you see the horrible jewel case sell for $14.6k on eBay?  Rusted staple, multiple cracks, probably a 6.5 to 7 A / A+ at best.  That is a game that no one should have wanted due to condition, believe it was being sold $40K OBO on social media before he had to let it go to auction.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/194390468611

So yes, a game that no one should have wanted went for $15k.  The first print in Mint shape, well listed on an auction house in front of tons of people with 6 and 7 figures of spending?  In a condition that everyone would want?  You'll see where it winds up.

Yeah, same person had a Klonoa that only went for $3k that was in much nicer shape. I was actually going to bid on it but decided not to bother, kinda regretting it now...

[AdamW | 713]

5 hours ago, madmozz said:

Hey can I also ask being a comic guy it's pretty easy to find date in terms of what say a 8.5 would be in relationship to say a 9.8 % wise is there any kind of standard at this point? For example and in general is a 8.5 worth 40% of a 9.8 any help would be great.

It's much harder with games, for a few reasons which all boil down to the same reason: lots of uncertainty. Notably:

1. Seven figure prices for games are entirely new within the last few months. Six figure prices are new for all but, like, two games. Even five figure prices are new for the vast majority of games that are currently selling in that range. There's no established pricing history here. Nobody's an expert on these numbers. Rich people are picking prices out of hats.

2. We don't have population reports for games. Even if we did, they would come with substantial uncertainty attached, because grading is nowhere near as pervasive for games as it is for comics or cards. You can't assume that more or less all high quality copies of a game will have been graded by now. So even if you had pop reports from both major graders for a game, you couldn't be really sure how many more high quality copies might still be out there. But we don't even have that, so it's hard to price an 8.5 against a 9.8 or whatever for any game, because we don't really have any solid idea how many of each are out there.

3. Our knowledge of a lot of important information about games isn't really complete, and a lot of buyers don't even seem to be operating on the best information that's available. Games frequently have complex production histories that the market clearly cares about - check the price of "Red text" Pokemon Blue vs. a "black ESRB" copy, or "Left Bros." SMB3, or sticker sealed or hangtab SMB vs. an oval seal copy, or "realistic violence" FFVII vs. "misprint" vs. the other prints - but we definitely do not know a lot of it for a lot of games. It's been pretty well researched for the games I mentioned and some others, but at the same time, people are throwing large sums of money at games for which the print history hasn't really been established very well.

You really can't operate in the game market as if it were a market that, uh...makes sense and is full of informed participants who agree on the fundamentals, because it kinda isn't. It is a more immature market than that. A lot of stuff is up in the air.

[AdamW | 713]

Having said all that - an 8.5 is almost always going to be worth a lot less than a 9.8. That's a very big difference. 8.5 is not that great of a grade for games in reasonable supply, which includes the most 'buzzy' games at present like your Marios and Pokemons and Final Fantasys; I'd guess a lot of people wouldn't be totally happy with anything under a 9.2. An 8.5 is usually going to have at least one fairly visible imperfection. (As @SethA points out, for games which are genuinely rare, you'd have to adjust your condition expectations downwards).

Keeping the overall uncertainty in mind, and with an exception for games that are genuinely rare in any kind of decent condition, on the whole I'd expect an 8.5 to typically be worth substantially less than 40% of a 9.8. Maybe more like 10-30%.

[edited to cover seth's point about less common games]

Edited October 9, 2021 by AdamW

[Seth | 166]

On 10/8/2021 at 1:39 PM, AdamW said:

Having said all that - an 8.5 is almost always going to be worth a lot less than a 9.8. That's a very big difference. 8.5 is not a good grade for a game; I think most collectors aren't really gonna be happy with anything under a 9.2. Keeping the overall uncertainty in mind, and with an exception for games that are genuinely rare in any kind of decent condition, on the whole I'd expect an 8.5 to typically be worth substantially less than 40% of a 9.8. Maybe more like 10-30%.

Hi Adam,

I think you'd agree that this is a gross oversimplification. While high-end investors and re-sellers won't generally be happy with under a 9.2 if they're collecting (for what reason I can't for the life of me figure out, but that's another matter) ubiquitous hard-shell modern video game titles that post-date the grading craze (and therefore may still exist in warehouses and private caches in volume) rather than actually rare and valuable cardboard titles, where there's actually a condition premium, even in that submarket an exceedingly rare game—such as there are any—in 8.5 box condition would still be valued.

Those of us who collect cardboard are (a) dealing with older and more fragile games, where there's a condition premium and grades are generally lower so an 8.5 might be considered just fine, (b) dealing with game libraries that have some legitimately rare games that almost never come on the market, in which case an 8.5 is terrific, and—the most obvious—(c) may be actual collectors (non-investors/non-resellers), in which case the visual appearance of the box is what matters most, and an 8.5 will display very well while still being a high enough grade that if one were to try to re-sell it many, many years from now (considering the rarity and generation of the item) it would probably perform admirably at market. Heck, an 8.5 copy of 1942 (NES) just sold for over $4,000, and that actually *isn't* one of the "rare" sealed-and-graded NES games (though it's also not "common"). A better analogy is Sword Master or Journey to Silius, which just came up at Heritage and would have gone for $1,000+ easily whether they were 8.5 or 9.0 or 9.6. You just don't see those games in sealed and graded condition, at any WATA grade.

But then there's a whole separate dynamic that these conversations miss, because they're largely participated in by resellers and investors who've lost all sense of perspective. *Some people don't have millions of dollars*. For Jonebone to say that "no one" would want a 7.0/A game is to say that everyone who is in this conversation or *should* be in this conversation is made of money and/or is a reseller/investor. I can easily see a collector who can "only" afford to collect their favorite games in 7.0/A condition, as even those games will generally go (at least in the NES era) for $300 to $700 per (sealed), which already makes collecting at volume nearly impossible for most people.

As game-collecting becomes more popular, there are going to be more middle-class folks coming into the conversation—and that's a very good thing. And more non-speculators—also a good thing. I think a lot of people would be turned off by these conversations that don't take into account game generation, title rarity, or collector budget. The simple fact is that there *is* no "most collectors" and shouldn't be. Everyone collects differently.

While there's an argument to be made that VGA is the better grading service for collectors because (a) the games are approximately 50% to 70% as expensive like-to-like, (b) the grading QC is better, (c) the cases have fewer bubbles and scuffs and internal contaminants, and (d) everything under a 95 or above a 70 is officially in the "near mint" range (EX+/NM to NM/M), whereas anything under a WATA 9.0 is *outside* the near mint range (and whereas almost the only items you'll ever find from VGA on the market are under 95 and over 70, WATA has flooded the market with sub-9.0 items and 9.0-and-over items that are in garbage condition and didn't deserve that grade)... that's a different conversation.

Seth

[GPX | 1,369]

2 hours ago, SethA said:

Hi Adam,

I think you'd agree that this is a gross oversimplification. While high-end investors and re-sellers won't generally be happy with under a 9.2 if they're collecting (for what reason I can't for the life of me figure out, but that's another matter) ubiquitous hard-shell modern video game titles that post-date the grading craze (and therefore may still exist in warehouses and private caches in volume) rather than actually rare and valuable cardboard titles, where there's actually a condition premium, even in that submarket an exceedingly rare game—such as there are any—in 8.5 box condition would still be valued.

Those of us who collect cardboard are (a) dealing with older and more fragile games, where there's a condition premium and grades are generally lower so an 8.5 might be considered just fine, (b) dealing with game libraries that have some legitimately rare games that almost never come on the market, in which case an 8.5 is terrific, and—the most obvious—(c) may be actual collectors (non-investors/non-resellers), in which case the visual appearance of the box is what matters most, and an 8.5 will display very well while still being a high enough grade that if one were to try to re-sell it many, many years from now (considering the rarity and generation of the item) it would probably perform admirably at market. Heck, an 8.5 copy of 1942 (NES) just sold for over $4,000, and that actually *isn't* one of the "rare" sealed-and-graded NES games (though it's also not "common"). A better analogy is Sword Master or Journey to Silius, which just came up at Heritage and would have gone for $1,000+ easily whether they were 8.5 or 9.0 or 9.6. You just don't see those games in sealed and graded condition, at any WATA grade.

But then there's a whole separate dynamic that these conversations miss, because they're largely participated in by resellers and investors who've lost all sense of perspective. *Some people don't have millions of dollars*. For Jonebone to say that "no one" would want a 7.0/A game is to say that everyone who is in this conversation or *should* be in this conversation is made of money and/or is a reseller/investor. I can easily see a collector who can "only" afford to collect their favorite games in 7.0/A condition, as even those games will generally go (at least in the NES era) for $300 to $700 per (sealed), which already makes collecting at volume nearly impossible for most people.

As game-collecting becomes more popular, there are going to be more middle-class folks coming into the conversation—and that's a very good thing. And more non-speculators—also a good thing. I think a lot of people would be turned off by these conversations that don't take into account game generation, title rarity, or collector budget. The simple fact is that there *is* no "most collectors" and shouldn't be. Everyone collects differently.

While there's an argument to be made that VGA is the better grading service for collectors because (a) the games are approximately 50% to 70% as expensive like-to-like, (b) the grading QC is better, (c) the cases have fewer bubbles and scuffs and internal contaminants, and (d) everything under a 95 or above a 70 is officially in the "near mint" range (EX+/NM to NM/M), whereas anything under a WATA 9.0 is *outside* the near mint range (and whereas almost the only items you'll ever find from VGA on the market are under 95 and over 70, WATA has flooded the market with sub-9.0 items and 9.0-and-over items that are in garbage condition and didn't deserve that grade)... that's a different conversation.

Seth

Great first post! 

I just want to add that there is no simple formula for prices for any incremental changes in the grades. It is an absolute false logic. 

Some games might only be at the highest grade of 8.5 or VGA 80, and that I can imagine, might become as pricey as anything we see of the future. Conversely, not all 9.8A++ are worth a million bucks. 

[AdamW | 713]

4 hours ago, SethA said:

Hi Adam,

I think you'd agree that this is a gross oversimplification. While high-end investors and re-sellers won't generally be happy with under a 9.2 if they're collecting (for what reason I can't for the life of me figure out, but that's another matter) ubiquitous hard-shell modern video game titles that post-date the grading craze (and therefore may still exist in warehouses and private caches in volume) rather than actually rare and valuable cardboard titles, where there's actually a condition premium, even in that submarket an exceedingly rare game—such as there are any—in 8.5 box condition would still be valued.

 

"with an exception for games that are genuinely rare in any kind of decent condition"

It was indeed a gross simplification, for someone who's new to the market. I didn't want to snow them under in detail.

Edited October 9, 2021 by AdamW

[AdamW | 713]

2 hours ago, GPX said:

Great first post! 

I just want to add that there is no simple formula for prices for any incremental changes in the grades. It is an absolute false logic. 

Some games might only be at the highest grade of 8.5 or VGA 80, and that I can imagine, might become as pricey as anything we see of the future. Conversely, not all 9.8A++ are worth a million bucks. 

Still, if a game is rare enough that an 8.5 of it is worth a ton of money, if a 9.8 of it surfaced, you can bet it'd be worth an even larger ton of money...