I've seen this with Sega games as well. Interesting people are diving into this more and more, as 3 days ago Retro Gamer Boy made a video about Sega Genesis/Megadrive scam/manipulation as well. Link for ones that are interested. kzfaq.info/get/bejne/l65oeNOHyJmun40.html

Once this whole WATA thing is over.. does that mean prices will go back down?

If you look at comments below, "The Skidders" is the user that received the original message on eBay if you'd like to contact them

I collect pokemon cards I don't sell on but the prices have gone up and up also i picked up a playstation game recently I won't be able to play it atm but i got it for a collectors piece

Yeah these type's of things make me sick, Market Manipulators and Scalpers and the like, honestly everything has a price on it and there's things where paying say $20.00 is fine for a product, there's the opposite where you pay the same price and it isn't worth that price tag, seriously I really hope things change cause I don't want to overpay for things, especially nowadays with the whole PS5 situation...

👌

LMFAO I'm literally dying over here! 🤣

More likely the pork roll (it’s not Taylor ham) market.

Yeah why are prices for ps3 games going up when the consoles not that old as in 30yrs

Sounds a bit like complaining when Bitcoin reached a $100.

It’s been going on for years and it’s sad. Fuck em all

@@opaljk4835 I take the same stance now and again lol.

Prices in the video game vinyl scene are insane.

@@Deadly.Awesome I've heard that but haven't looked into it much. Seems like a prime target got scalpers though; the cross section of two booming collectors markets.

I sold close to $10k in valuable vinyl last year due to the insane prices. Replaced all but a couple with reissues already for about $20 each. Lol.

literally millions were made and you have emulations on top of that

Another sign that the market has gone to shit is when collectors discussions revolve around "investing", "reselling", and "value of my collection"

Just found out about this joystick thanks to this post...WOW. It even has 4 and 8 way modes, WTF?! Looks damn amazing (except for the color ...lol)

@@KeithPhillips They came in tan with black buttons to match the Commodore 64 and Atari 400 & 800 , but they also made them in black with red buttons . The ones you want to find have screws on the bottom (no screws means it's glued together and not serviceable) . They also made them with both one and two fire buttons . The black color is more desirable , as is the two fire button . And you can still buy replacement switches to rebuild them . They use 5 or 6 (depending on the number of fire buttons) Uxcell brand square momentary switches that measure roughly 14mm x 14mm x 24mm .

On a Kaiser bun

@@chiefchimp2789 mama if you please! hope youll be getting to see them this year.

@@hfield07 Sadly, no. Lucky enough to see them a total of 6 times, going all the way back to the chocolate and cheese tour (they still had a drum machine on stage)

and on top of it, wizards got rid of the MSRP not too long ago so before an individual gets the chance.... the stores are already dynamic with prices of new sealed product according to demand and supply... a couple of years ago boxes were around 100 bucks. a couple of sets ago they were north of 250 the first week, north of 350 the second week... and then the set after that was a bomb so they sat on unbought product.

You want the bubble to pop? Tell “collectors” and resellers to stop. Sadly, that won’t happen.

Agreed. I have a massive collection. My favorite part of my collection is I have almost every single fighter on Dreamcast that I bought over time for extremely fair & affordable prices. Just recently that set of games has skyrocketed to ridiculous prices. But it bothers me as a collector & lover of fighting games because I collect them to play them & now I play them with my kids. So now a younger kid getting into games will have a much harder time trying to play old school fighters such as SFIII or project justice because they won't be able to spend hundreds on an old school game & there are so many titles that aren't available for download. Collecting should be about the fun & love of the hobby, not for accumulating wealth.

I agree I got sealed games but couldn’t care less of their value

They are worthless but you want to buy them? I think you proved your own counterpoint.

If you are confident the bubble will pop, you should sell everything now, and then you can buy it all back cheap in a few years

Discogs try to rise the price with some nasty practices.

Here's an example of what I'm talking about. They manipulated the market on Atari Spider-man sealed games. I have been doing this long enough to know that these were available in case packs and there were sellers listing them for years at $50 mint sealed. They had hundreds of copies in BINs. As more copies sold over the years the price went up to around $80 at the time the resellers started buying them up to make a profit. In a matter of weeks the entire supply dried up. There were literally hundreds if not thousands of sealed Spider-man games in NOS. Some of these guys I assume bought hundreds of them and are socking them away and doing their best to put them out slowly. When they first released them on HA and started pumping the market it worked and the games went fire. But it didn't take long for the market to adjust (with no video exposing it). The supply was never ending and multiple WATA copies started hitting ebay and other auctions. The prices dropped like a bad habit. Prices at this point are about 10% of what they started at initially. This happened because these games were common and that initial pump couldn't take hold because it was BS from the beginning. The problem with the rare sealed NES titles and the like is that some of these games are actually rare. So I think these types of tactics only work when someone promotes something that is truly uncommon. Otherwise the supply can't be contained.

Market manipulators have a substantial advantage over regular consumers with little to no risk at all. They buy low, buy all that they can, and then hype up the market and rasie the prices as much as they can and then sell. The worst that can happen is that they sell the same what they bought it for. But with the control and money a lot of these manipulators have, losing their "investment" is not even that big of a blow to their pocket.

Doesn't matter - it still exists, and the "risk" is minor for those manipulating.

I offer $50 bucks, after the WATA scam worth nothing.

It’s tempting

@John Smith Interestingly enough I even inquired with heritage auction. They only valued it at 12,000. I’m just not in the good old boys club I guess lol

@@Tactical_Therapist Being in the good old boys club might have gotten it rated 9.8 A++ , and then you could get the big bucks.

@@BainesMkII exactly. 100%. Grading cellophane wrap. Pure science, no doubt

It is, climate.

for me it was Gamestop or CEX when they used to have used PS1-2 games for like under $2 and went to this Trader Mart where they got a bunch of common old NES games for under $5 but when those bigger ticket items on ebay I would buy them automatically when they are put in lots for bidding. I sometimes do the BIN but I usually do bids and BIN if its the last resort for my collection. I collect all kinds of games from Atari to PS5 now.

A lot of it revolves around consumer psychology. If people are tricked into thinking something is rare or valuable they jump on in with the herd because of fomo or it boosts their ego thinking they own something valuable. If the prices continue to rise it justifies their irrational behavior in their own mind. This is what's happening in the cryptocurrency market as well. Alt coins that literally have no value in the real world whatsoever are skyrocketing in price.

I've had similar thoughts recently. The infusion of stimulus and unemployment cash is a perfect storm for inflation in video game and collectible markets. The rapid rise in prices is attracting a lot of rats looking for profit before the ship sinks. I don't blame people for flipping games for profit but the markets clearly seems to be behaving like stock charts and wealthy investors are bleeding gullible collectors dry.

"companies set MSRP fairly close to market price " -- that doesn't mean anything. A retailer's MSRP is the market price. **Scalping** is not natural market forces at work. "You give away an item for cheap" -- new gaming consoles are cheap??

Its crazy that game was actually made

That's how people sell everything nowadays, sellers market, and there are suckers everywhere.

I am glad to see people in this thread/comments section are wise to this crap that is going on in the video game and collectible markets

Yep can't even get a series X or S and what's worse consoles wont be in the stores till 2023 are you fucking kidding me god I hate scalpers.

I'm glad I picked up the Hang On/Astro Warrior combo cartridge before all this stuff happened. Unfortunately, I am still missing most of the last releases. I can't spend $200-$300 on Strider when I bought Buster Douglas for a lot less.

It’s jerkoffs like this guy on eBay which makes the buy it now option appear negative but it’s far out weighed by the positives it brings, because not everyone lists buy it now only, most people usually offer a combination of the options. Also sometimes you don’t want to wait through an auction at the chance it will be cheaper, iv seen eBay auctions go for the same or higher than a buy it now listing. And auctions can be manipulated too, iv bid on an item that no one else was interested in and I was gona get a great deal until the last day when a newly created eBay account starts bidding the item up, to what I assume the seller wanted for it. So I contacted eBay and they agreed these were shill bids. So I’d hate to see eBay go back to auctions only. I think the make an offer option is the best because if your not dealing with a scumbag you can usually get a good deal.

I remember early 2000 were you could buy 500 nes games for around 500$ on ebay. The good old days...

@@PatrickThomasBrady Oh yeah I've been through my share of schill-bidding. I started at Goodwill and the earliest incarnations of ebay... Most of the things I get interested in now are super common and still get listed in the $15 - $25 range. Ridiculous.

@@madjoe8622 Oh most of what I own was collected in the early 2000s. I made a big push around 2007-2009 and actually scored some really nice lots. Wish I would have put more into NES, SMS, GEN, SNES, TG16 before 2010 or so... Stories like this might destroy the business end of vintage games.

I completely agree. The stock market itself is unbelievably overvalued. The Fed keeping interest rates at near zero for over a decade is flushing the economy with speculative investment and easy credit. The infusion of stimulus and unemployment money over the past few years is feeding into frivolous consumerism. It's a ripe market for opportunists looking for suckers to scam. The retro market was dipping before Covid hit and it refueled the video game hype. It won't last.

@@mjcook3922 In the meantime, you can get "Felix The Cat" or "Bonk" NES games as "72 Pins" on ebay for less than $20. ;) PS I used to have a giant NES collection and sold it between moves circa 2009 because back then you could buy or sell them for almost nothing. Now that collection would be thousands of dollars. Live and learn. I kept the SNES, Genesis & Atari stuff because it took up less space. Thank GOD!

I don't really buy that argument because you could apply that logic to any collectible. You can buy a digital copy of Amazing Fantasy #15 (the first appearance of Spider-Man) for a few bucks or just download it for free. Obviously the art as you put it is the content of the comic, not the paper it was printed on. I don't think that takes away from the physical object though and the fact that collectors want to have a piece of their childhood. I collect sealed and CIB video games and I have collected for many years. I remember getting Mike Tyson's punch out and my original Gameboy for Christmas and unwrapping them. I remember the boxes and opening the seals. I remember picking out the games at Toys R us and bringing the tag to the security gates to pick up my new copy. I remember my Gram letting me pick out a game at Hills dept store and not being able to decide. The first time I held a factory sealed copy of those games in my hand it was a rush of nostalgia and it brought back a lot of great memories. Not just about the game but my family and my childhood. Yes, the games themselves are the main event, but for me owning a factory sealed copy has nothing to do with status. I don't think its fair that because a lot of you guys don't feel this way you are completely closed off to the idea that there are real, legitimate reasons (beyond investment) to collect this stuff. Even if you throw nostalgia and childhood memories out of the window - what about preservation? You don't think its important to preserve the history of not only the games themselves but also the packaging, manuals and marketing behind them. I do.

@@jasonscalling8714 I mean, I would apply that logic to Amazing Fantasy 15 and any other collectible as well. Amazing Fantasy 15 should be worth more than a videogame but it also shouldn't be worth the price of a house. You could get an Action Comics #1 for like $25,000 in the mid 1980's. Even if you adjust that for inflation, it's nowhere near what the top comic collectibles sell for today. I see value of collectibles. How rare it is, the cultural and artistic significance, etc. But what people are paying today are way over inflated prices.

@@juannunez5767 agreed its why the crashes hurt so badly and will continue to happen in most markets its as if everyone forgot about what happened with beanie babies caveat i dont think games comics and cards are = beanie babies //but the boom bust cycle is real but people get rose colored glasses on thinking gravity doesnt exist

@@vendora1 But you can't possibly appreciate games very much if you honestly think its fair to compare them to friggin beanie babies. Everything about that market was fabricated. Games aren't like that.

@@jasonscalling8714 jim and kahn literally manipulated the market just like beanie babies they took a small market and tried to make it a thing keep being delusional

I think hee got a sunburn over the weekend.

@@tahustvedt I was thinking maybe the same thing but then I saw his arms and hands look normal color..

What do you mean by scalping? Obviously wrong in a lot of cases.

@@DanielRivera-on5qh Scalping is when you buy something (usually new) and sell it immediately back at higher price.

@@madjoe8622 I know what it is. I don't think this person does. Scalping is usually associated with snagging the supplies from the suppliers and selling it yourself for more and holding back the supplies that people could have gotten

@@DanielRivera-on5qh In my discussions with these types of people that defend frivolous activity, scalping, or market manipulation they seem to not fully understand what it is or their definitions are inaccurate or incorrect and they have a flawed view of a free market. Or the second type is the sociopaths defending criminal activity and justifying bad behavior because they lack any guilt or social responsibility towards other people and truly don't comprehend or care how their actions affect an entire market.