inasuma

i slept through the auction. nailed it.

just back from heritage

I don’t even know what to pick. Too many. I did thoroughly enjoy many of my modern pickups from certifiedlink

This guy games

Yeah I mean to be clear I didn’t really do any sort of competitive analysis. lol just went with what worked

ooooh shit i might take you up on that. i'm glad scheduled functions are a thing. i guess i know what i'll be doing next

actually that's not far off from what i did. i used a netlify function via next pages api. i try to avoid aws generally just because i've used it so few times and i'm not confident with it. haha

I've also recently updated my tracking website. Now folks can subscribe to a newsletter (for new blog posts mainly). https://www.afew.games/ All that's needed is an email. I have it set up so I send out newsletters manually for now, but eventually it would be nice to send out biweekly emails *if* I've written anything new since the last newsletter. I can't really be bothered to do that at the moment but at least mailchimp's marketing API was super easy to implement with next js. lol

old price tags are awesome as long as they don't cover a significant part of the box.

In all fairness cassettes are friggin cool. edit: this is not an endorsement of graded cassettes. i have no interest in or desire for that.

Is that the two piece box or flip top lid box? Looks insanely cool; congrats on your grades.

Have you seen cgcs label tho? Not much better. The big ass holographic sticker on the front doesn’t help either lol

Actually I’m pretty sure the guy paid a designer that’s what I remember anyway

there's at least one 95+ out there still. probably owned by rarebucky. i'm curious what that would sell for. haha

yes lol

You wouldn’t believe it but I debated including P1G, then when I realized I had exactly one P1G game, my senses came back.

Actually, looks like I might have been wrong. For comics, CGC uses a plastic called SAN (Styrene-Acrylonitrile). Apparently just another form of acrylic. I have both a comic holder and now their game holder, and tbh they feel the same. Very tough material though, and fooled me into thinking it might be polycarb! Source: https://thecollectorsresource.com/blog/getting-to-know-your-cgc-comic-book-cases/

for better or worse - this is pretty true. at least in theory. i don't trust anyone's condition estimate unless i really know that person has dead-on estimates. which is like... one person, ever. haha

i dont think polycarb cracks super easily so probably not lol actually now that i think about it maybe it isn't polycarb and i made that up. wata's new holder is definitely polycarb tho.

I echo many of others' thoughts. I tend to grade the games I want preserved for as long as possible and in my personal collection. Rare, sentimental, or unique games. For CIB specifically, I've honestly never tried, but lately I've realized I'll probably never play them physically (because I have ROMs and flash carts for that), so preserving them is likely the path I'll take via grading.

Now that I have at least one holder from each of the big graders, thought it would be cool to bring them all together (with pics) for discussion and opinions. I hope this is beneficial to some of you who are either grading or considering grading. Which holder do you prefer? Lately I'm coming around to CGC because of how thoughtful the inner blister is. It's also crystal clear and protects those sweet, sweet, corners. Okay, here's the round up: VGA Material(s): Acrylic Bonding: Acrylic cement Inner blister: No Tamper-Evident: No Size: Form-fit (any console/game) Scale: CGA Grading Scale Label VGA's holder is pretty straightforward. It's a few pieces of acrylic held together using cement, and smaller acrylic pieces acting as guard rails to position the game. The depth inside the holder is about the same depth as the game, with some arbitrary extra space so the game isn't crushed. One thing I've noticed is sometimes the rails are slightly too far from the game, causing it to shift around. While unlikely to damage the game in any meaningful way, it's still worth noting. There's also very small grooves on each front corner. I'm guessing these are there to make it easier to pry open the top or bottom for re-slabbing. --- Wata Material(s): Acrylic (outer holder) & Plastic (inner blister) Bonding: Acrylic cement & interlocking pins Inner blister: Yes Tamper-Evident: Yes Size: Standard width/depth w/ variable height Scale: Wata Grading Scale Label Wata's case has two main features: tamper-evident design and a secondary, inner blister to keep the game in position. The bottom piece is held in using acrylic cement, while the top piece (with the label inside) is held on via six interlocking pins. It's physically not possible to remove the top piece without destroying the pins, or so it seems. There are three pins around each side of the top piece (front, back, side). The inner blister is two pieces. There are no corner bubbles, and the blister positions the game against the front surface of the holder. Note: the width and depth of the holder is always the same. This was clearly meant as a manufacturing benefit, and as a result, DVD games take up about 3x their depth when accounting for the depth of the holder plus overhang of the top lid. --- CGC Material(s): Polycarbonate (outer holder) & Plastic (inner blister) Bonding: Ultrasonic weld (no cement/agent) Inner blister: Yes Tamper-Evident: Yes Size: Semi-bulky Scale: CGC Video Games Grading Scale Label CGC's holder has a number of interesting features, and matches a few details with card/comic holders. Like Wata, CGC has an inner blister. Instead of using pins or cement to bond the pieces of the outer holder, it's sealed using ultrasonic welding. There's five additional small clips to help keep the holder pieces together: one on the bottom, two on the left side, and two on the right side. For horizontal games, I think there's two on bottom and one on either side. One clip is always welded. (Below, top pic shows the welded clip, next two show the smaller, unwelded clips, although its hard to see even in person so apologies) --- Again, hope this is helpful. Very curious about y'alls opinions!

It’ll be great to compare all the cases. It’s like a micro history lesson on grading haha At this point I feel like there are enough pros and cons to each that, for me, it’s going to be about which preserves the game better. Cgcs label, while distracting as all hell, could be overlooked considering how nicely the game presents and corners given ample space lol

The cases are polycarbonate IIRC, same as player1

you're low key motivating me to submit my CIBs. i've told myself for years i wouldn't grade them because "what if i want to play them" but who am i kidding, that's why i got a flash cart lol