INTV Mail Order Games

[Coldheat]

I did a quick search on the forums here but did not find the answer. Does anyone know if there is a list of the mail-order only INTV games that were release around 1988?

[Fushek]

Here's the 88 and 89 releases:

 

Super Pro Decathlon (88)

Pole Position (88)

Mountain Madness Skiing (88)

Body Slam Super Pro Wrestling (88)

Stadium Mud Buggies (89)

Spiker Super Pro Volleyball (89)

 

I'm not certain, but thought that Spiker was the only one that was mail order only but Stadium Mud Buggies may have been. As far as I know, all others were available in stores.

[+intvsteve]

Spiker was in stores. Saw it in TRU in 1990.

[Coldheat]

Thanks. Maybe they were just limited avialablity in stores. Just trying to figure if this is why the cost of CIB copies are high.

[Fushek]

Thanks. Maybe they were just limited avialablity in stores. Just trying to figure if this is why the cost of CIB copies are high.

 

Smaller production runs and I think that only very limited stores carried any. According to the IntellivisionLives website:

 

1988 Stores stop carrying Intellivision console and games. Sales are strictly through mail order.

 

Here's a couple of nice links for historical information about the company. I find the game histories fascinating.

 

Short company history: http://intellivisionlives.com/history.php

Interesting game development history: http://intellivisionlives.com/credits.php

 

Enjoy!

[+JasonlikesINTV]

Thanks. Maybe they were just limited avialablity in stores. Just trying to figure if this is why the cost of CIB copies are high.

Current prices are high because they are decent games that came out around the end of the Intellivision's lifetime. They are fun and rare. The rareness is partially due to the fact that many were mail order only, but also because most people were done with Intellivision by then. NES was in full swing by the mid eighties. Spiker and Stadium Mud Buggies are the last two released and I believe Spiker only sold around 5,000 total copies. I'm guessing that maybe a hundred are floating around in collections. It's hard to say.

[+intvsteve]

Yeah, the Intellivision Lives site has lots of good info, but I'm pretty positive about TRU in 1990. I had returned to the U.S. after being out of the country for a year, and was catching up w/ a dear friend who worked at TRU and we walked down the gaming aisle. Up to 1988 I'd gotten stuff via mail order, but then dropped out of gaming of any kind pretty much for the following two years and was astonished upon my return to see Intellivision in the stores. I suppose it *could* have been in 1988, and my memory's playing tricks on me. I was poking fun at all the exclamation marks on the boxes for Body Slam, and distinctly remember there being lots of Super Pro titles, but Spiker really stands out.

 

Then again, memory's a funny thing, and maybe in the years since, my regret at not getting those games back at the insanely high price of ~20.00 is fiddling with it.

[Coldheat]

Thank you for the links and information. This all makes complete sense.

[+JasonlikesINTV]

Relevant:

 

http://atariage.com/forums/topic/198861-cmarts-intv-triton-catalog-collection/?fromsearch=1

[pimpmaul69]

My thoughts are the possibility that tru placed a large mail order for the last games as that is where everyone i have heard of buying them got them at.

[freewheel]

Thanks. Maybe they were just limited avialablity in stores. Just trying to figure if this is why the cost of CIB copies are high.

 

As already mentioned, production numbers. We're talking 5-20,000 copies per game (very rough approximations) for a lot of these. And people back in those days didn't tend to keep packaging - the earlier gatefold boxes were unusual, as they were just such a nice presentation. So you still see a lot of non-collectors who held onto the gatefolds. But top/bottom flap? Most people threw them out.

 

When you consider that a lot of the more common carts sold well over a MILLION copies... well, you do the math Start buying games at random, and once you have several hundred Astrosmashes (and multiply this by many, many other common games), you might stumble upon a Spiker.

Edited January 22, 2015 by freeweed

[+cvga]

I bought a Super Pro System from TRU for $80 in 1990. This was back when you had to take a ticket to the window. They didn't even know what it was and tried to talk me into buying the 'Sega' instead. They also had several INTV games for $19.99 each including Spiker and Stadium Mud Buggies. What did I buy? Super Pro Football of course. What an idiot in retrospect.

 

At least years later I bought someone's collection that included a boxed Spiker before the prices went crazy.

[wolfy62]

I bought a Super Pro System from TRU for $80 in 1990. This was back when you had to take a ticket to the window. They didn't even know what it was and tried to talk me into buying the 'Sega' instead. They also had several INTV games for $19.99 each including Spiker and Stadium Mud Buggies. What did I buy? Super Pro Football of course. What an idiot in retrospect.

 

At least years later I bought someone's collection that included a boxed Spiker before the prices went crazy.

That is a funny story!

 

Heck I would have bought Football then too if I were to choose.

 

I used to go to a swap meet in Santa Clarita Ca. once a month and an Asian lady and her kids would have a bunch of tables with every new game for any system out there.

 

I saw all the super pro games and I mean all of them. I would stop and look at the artwork and maybe buy a NES game or Sega but just look at the Intellivision games amazed they still made them. I was thinking......really? who still buys those. Now I do!

 

1988-1992 range when I was still dating my Wife!

[wolfy62]

She put bright orange stickers on them when she lowered the prices.....anyone have something like that?