Chaos Control

...as an update, this is now offered for sale here on VGS.

Hello, my fellow collectors! I've been collecting for various systems since 1998, and have been on various online communities over the years. Nowadays, I'm primarily on AtariAge, but I wanted to offer a one of a kind rare bundle for sale here in case anyone here would welcome it in their collection. What it is is the very last version of the Action Max, which swapped out the pack-in game of 99% of systems for the late-release Blue Thunder. Blue Thunder is the rarest Action Max title, and besides its status as a late-release it is also a very old bit of collector lore that the other reason it is so rare is that most of the copies were held back to be sold with these bundles. The only actual difference between this bundle and any other Action Max is the front sticker indicating the update of the pack-in game, and of course the copy of Blue Thunder itself. Now the system box itself, while intact and clean, has a few dings and moderate tearing in a few spots. It is by no measure mint. No collector would bother with it if it weren't the only known example of this bundle. Besides the unique box sticker, the copy of Blue Thunder is still SEALED! UNOPENED! DEAD MINT! It even still has the hang tab in back. While the box is cool and one of a kind, you're really buying this for the sealed Blue Thunder. While I'm not the person to do it, somebody could easily get it graded and put it up for auction for a lot more. The rest of the contents are all present, and in good shape. It honestly seems as though they were never used. Now as to price, it is $650 shipped in the US. I'm not willing to ship overseas or to Canada. Shipping will be via fully insured USPS Priority Mail, and the box will be well packed. This will get to you safely. Payment will be via PayPal. I have a longstanding Feedback thread here: https://atariage.com/forums/topic/202668-blazing-lazers/ ...rest assured that I'm legit. You have a rare chance at something not just rare but also one of a kind. Thanks for your interest!

Future PS4 collectors will argue that only titles sold in physical stores should count, given how many online shops sold intentionally scarce games. That's before one gets into the Poop Slinger situation... It wouldn't be a huge surprise if some speculators intentionally make and "release" a few physical titles while holding back most of the production run. It wouldn't really take much money or effort, given how low Sony set the minimum print runs for physical discs. Some griefers might even do it intentionally to make sure nobody can ever get a full set of physical titles.

There's a homebrew Action Max DVD compilation of all the original games, along with a homebrew DVD game or two. They work great! At least the Action Max doesn't need to be emulated!

Some systems cannot be considered emulated, as they have hardware that no emulator can fully replicate. Sure, you might be able to play the ROMs, but for something like the Vectrex you need the original vector monitor of the system itself to get the full experience. Other early systems are the same way- can any emulator really replicate the unique Astrocade or Channel F controllers (short of a USB solution), or the those of the Odyssey or Studio II? Other systems like the Telstar Arcade have no emulator at all given how basic they are. How would somebody even go about dumping one of those triangular cartridges, anyway? Newer systems than those, such as CDi, don't have perfect emulation, and what does exist only works with some titles. If one really wants to experience the obscure titles, they have to get the actual discs, and given how many there are and how rare they are the only hope for most are disc images or a large wallet. All the early systems above? One might think that systems with small libraries would be easy to collect for, but generally they have the same percentage of near-impossible rarities as most other systems. Collecting for them is in a way even worse than newer systems, given the passage of time. The really rare titles only show up once or twice a year on eBay, if that.

Even though I ship everything in a box with good padding, I still always pay for full insurance. Stories like these are exactly why.

If you bought the Nintendo demo discs cheap years ago and as part of lots, then you're probably fine. I feel a bit bad for a lot of collectors who aren't hesitating to pay big bucks for fakes on eBay, but only a bit. They really should know better. As for dedicated US lists, I do have some in the works, to include breaking them down by type, an updated longbox guide, and lists with a clear image of each title.

Funny that you mention the jewel-case re-releases of the longbox titles, as I'm actively hunting some, and the preservation community is also working to better document them as many have turned out to have disc ring code variants. There's a few that I've only seen once or twice. Some others don't even make sense, such as why Philips bothered to re-release National Parks Tour in jewel-case format, and a good chunk of the longboxes don't seem to have been given any jewel-case re-release. It gets even worse when the slipcovers are factored in, as not every CDi US jewel-case title was given a slipcover. Most were, but not all, and of course many slipcovers have been lost over time. For the longboxes, you're absolutely right in your above observations. When I was putting together the full longbox list, CDi Music Book was one of the discoveries. Flowers is rare but comes up on eBay several times a year. At one point I had 5 copies! Baby Animal Tales took me a while, as well. Non-game titles, like Kathy Smith Trainer, Cosmopolitan Interactive Tonetics, and Baby Songs were also very difficult to find, particularly complete with slipcover. The US versions of the Music titles are almost all very scarce. Just try to find complete US versions of say, Dave Grusin Gershwin Connection, Peter Gabriel All About US, and the Three Tenors.

I had to piece a lot of it together from eBay sold listings, pictures of collector collections online, various catalogs and brochures from back in the day, and from the ICDIA lists here: http://www.icdia.co.uk/archive/index.html along with the databases at World of CDi: https://www.theworldofcdi.com/ and the mostly complete checklists here: https://cdii.blogspot.com/p/cd-i-masterlists-catalogue.html?m=1 Even with all of that, there's still some uncertainty and unknowns even among us collectors and preservationists. As for the various demo discs, the vast majority of the ones for the Nintendo titles are fake, fake, fake. The following is a guide to identifying them: https://preserve-cdi.blogspot.com/2020/11/demonstration-discs-spotting-real-and.html?m=1 ... there are also various clear demonstration discs that, as with the white-label ones, were used for internal testing, demonstration, and retail purposes. Many unreleased titles have been preserved only because of the demos that are really the full version sans retail packaging. Only copies of the Zelda and Mario discs are likely to be fake. Any other CDi white label disc is probably real. Their rarity does seem to match the rarity of the retail version, from what I've noticed. A demo copy of, say, ACT College Search 92, is as proportionally rare as the retail version.

It is indeed one of the very rarest US releases. CDi was on the way out when ESRB ratings came out, but the last releases on CDi in the US did receive them. Replay is one. In order to buy it somebody had to have had one of the Philips catalogs that offered it, or found one of the few independent dealers that stocked CDi. It being a late release US exclusive is also why all the UK and European CDi collectors, who are the majority of the CDi community, didn't know about it for a long time. As for valuing it, well, it's almost always popped up in lots or as a cheap BIN. ReDump sold an incomplete (no slipcover) copy earlier this year at open auction for the first time in many years. It ended at just over $400.

One minor clue is how the copy of the Blue Thunder tape that was included happens to be fully sealed with a retail style hangtab. As far as anyone knows, did the original pack-in title come sealed?

For many years I had heard that one of the reasons that Blue Thunder was rare is because a lot of the copies got held aside to be included in an updated Action Max bundle, but poor system sales scuttled those plans. I didn't think it was true, but a few years ago I actually managed to obtain one of those later Blue Thunder bundles. It includes a sealed Blue Thunder instead of the original pack-in game, but the only other difference is a sticker on the front of the box. What I'd like to ask about is if any collectors here happen to know anything more about this bundle, or have seen other examples. Surely it can't be the only one out there. And to note, yes, it is for sale, but this post is put up mostly out of curiosity about the story behind this odd bundle.

So there is another copy. Neato! Of course, there's probably a warehouse with boxes of them and other titles somewhere. I can only wonder what happened to all of the unsold stock from Philips... Out of curiosity, what are your thoughts on the rarity of some of the other longbox titles, such as ACT College Search 92, CDi Music Book, Sailing, Flowers of Robert Mapplethorpe, etc? When I was putting together the full set those were particularly hard to come by.

Just to note, the following ended auction: https://www.ebay.com/itm/Philips-Cd-i-Four-Interactive-Guides-Plus-games-Sampler-Rock-Food-Flowers/154395982577#vi__app-cvip-panel ...is one of the sorts of items that just never comes up on Ebay and didn't even have photographs online until a year or so ago. Only the most dedicated CDi collectors had even heard of it. That auction was likely the first ever open auction of a complete copy, ever, in spite of it being a 30-year old title. There's actually about 6 copies known of that US version, but only two, that one and my own, are still sealed. Obtaining it involved all the methods mentioned in this thread just to verify that it did indeed exist was sold publicly, as well as negotiating a detailed trade with a collector from back in the day and a tidy sum of money (though not as much as the $447 the new copy just sold for).

Well, the listing just ended. Almost $450 is a fairly good price for the seller, especially considering the Tuesday afternoon ending time. Now some of the price could be interest in that Sampler title, to be fair. Still, only a few other CDi titles have ever sold for more at open auction (minty copies of Zelda Adventure, Link Faces of Evil, etc- the usual pricey suspects). If anyone here won the lot let us know what's in the Sampler!

So you're who outsniped me on that US Flashback with the slipcover! I hope it was really worth $305! But yeah, US Flashback is not common, as for some reason most copies lost the slipcover over time. Same for US Chaos Control. Still, it's vastly more common than Anne Willan. You won't see that one by itself for a long time again. What's the one other game that you're missing?

It's lofty, and absolutely true. I tell you that as a collector (since '98) who has hundreds of CDis and full sets for several uncommon platforms. Anne Willan PFoF is just beyond rare in its US version, and this is the first ever open auction of a copy. There weren't even any clear pictures of it online until I put some up about a year ago.

The name was actually a Sonic Adventure reference, lol. Chaos Control was the last US game to reach retail, though. The only ones after it were catalog exclusives like Bradley Fighting Vehicle, though Europe got games for nuch longer.

To answer the OP, yes, I've had this happen. Husband and wife, both were Ebay sellers. Wife bought an item from me, then didn't even open it for 45 days after delivery, was unsatisfied, an instantly negged me instead of reaching out to me first. I would have happily given a refund or exchanged the item. Blew my perfect Feedback rating that had stood for over a Decade. Hubby in turn blocked me, as I found out when I unknowingly went to bid on a listing of his. I noticed the city he was in happened to be the same one as the other Ebayer, and as it was a very obscure one it didn't strike me as a coincidence, and indeed it wasn't.

Something extraordinary, something astounding, just came up on Ebay: https://www.ebay.com/itm/Philips-Cd-i-Four-Interactive-Guides-Plus-games-Sampler-Rock-Food-Flowers/154395982577?pageci=9f40ca9e-641f-4e59-987c-8e7e65150e0f ...while the sampler does feature two unreleased games, the grail in the lot is that sealed copy of Anne Willan Presents the Food of France. For those that aren't aware, it is the single rarest US Philips CDi longbox title, and one of the rarest titles ever released for any videogame system. Only 6 or 7 copies are known of the US version, and only one of them (owned by me- the listing is not mine) is still sealed. This is one of very, very few US console releases for any system that has NEVER come up for an open auction- not in 30 years. What few copies are known were found in lots or came from former Philips employees. If this had been on a Nintendo system it would sell for tens of thousands, such is its rarity! And aside from alerting interested CDi collectors, I wanted to ask if the community can think of any other titles released for US systems that have yet to show up at open auction. Besides one or two other CDi titles, I can't think of any. Does anyone here know of some?

Wow, thank you all for your insights and advice. I hadn't realized that delayed Feedback or even no Feedback at all is so commonplace nowadays. My own Ebaying is mostly buying, and I always try to leave Feedback as soon as possible after taking delivery if my purchases and checking them out. There's an obligation to confirm that I'm happy with the purchase (or not, in extremely rare instances) and reassure the seller that I'm a legit buyer and that they won't be scammed. As a seller, I have encountered enough flaky and just plain bad buyers that on the few occasions I do sell I like getting timely Feedback because it is a good reassurance that my buyers really are happy with their purchase and won't later try to abuse the returns process to commit online shoplifting against me or pull some similar scam. Now, I can understand if a buyer doesn't have time to leave Feedback on many small sum purchases, but on a large lot of valuable games that went for over a thousand dollars? Yes, that's the sort of high-end deal that the buyer really should take a few moments to verify that they're happy (or not) with what they spent that much money on, or at the very least to confirm that the package arrived intact. Surely that isn't at all unreasonable, given the money and games involved?

I recently sold the following Gamecube lot: https://www.ebay.com/itm/Lot-of-rare-Gamecube-games-GoGo-Hypergrind-Paper-Ribbit-Slider-Angler-Spells/224096280156?pageci=1f172d93-354d-4bca-91d0-8ded520d56b1 ...it went quickly. I realized how high the price spikes had gotten, and that I'd never play those games again. I'd had them lying around for over a Decade. I could free up some shelf space and put the money to good use. I've been collecting since the 90s, but rarely sell on Ebay due to a hostile selling environment and bad buyers. Now, when I did decide to sell, the buyer only responded with a few short words to my messages and has failed to leave Feedback at all, even well after the lot was safely delivered. I packed it well, and have full pictures of the entire process, along with full insurance. My question to the community is this: should I worried about this buyer, and for valuable lots like this one am I wrong to expect responsive communication and timely Feedback?

https://atariage.com/forums/topic/294006-ftfo-blue-thunder-action-max-nuon-n-gage-jag-cdi-coleco-entex-neo-geo-misc/?do=findComment&comment=4447431 There's a very obscure late-release Action Max version that had Blue Thunder as the pack-in. One of the reasons that Blue Thunder is so rare is that a lot of the copies were set aside for these bundles, only for the system to be discontinued due to poor sales. To my knowledge, mine is the only known complete one, and yes, that included copy of Blue Thunder is still sealed. https://atariage.com/forums/topic/294006-ftfo-blue-thunder-action-max-nuon-n-gage-jag-cdi-coleco-entex-neo-geo-misc/?do=findComment&comment=4447431

If you like shmups, system exclusives, anime, hidden gems, and Square Enix, then you'll love Project Sylpheed. The controls are fully customizable after the tutorial, there's a lot of replay value, all the Achievements are offline and fairly easy to obtain, the DLC is currently free, it's a graphics showcase, and will likely never see a re-release on a newer system. Once you get past the first few missions and start building up your fighter the game really picks up, and you can keep all your unlocks into additional playthroughs. Operation Darkness is another 360 exclusive that is also a future grail, and is already getting tough to find.

My pleasure. I'm also going for the full US 360 set, but just the regular retail releases. I doubt anybody will ever be able to even put together a full list of every single retail special edition, collectors edition, variant, etc, and certainly not be able to obtain them all. There's just way too many. But at least they'll all be fully functional offline, for the most part. If you're ever looking to find which games are the true rarities, one way is to browse through TrueAchievements and see just how many people have gotten the commonest Achievement for any particular title. When only a few dozen to a few hundred have unlocked even the easy cheevs, you know that you're looking at a rare game. As for particular lists, cross referencing the Wikipedia lists with True Achievements lists (which will show what's actually been played and thus had a release) should yield solid data. Once you have that, just check the list against Ebay availability. The really rare ones even now only have a few copies at any one time, and some of those are incomplete, foreign versions, "custom cases", etc.