Rare Super Mario Bros. game sells for a record $660,000

[0078265317]

https://www.cnn.com/2021/04/03/business/super-mario-bros-auction-record-trnd/index.html

 

I know we discussed this before.  But that was only 115k.  This is a new record. 

[XtraSmiley]

More evidence that the rich are pulling away from normal people at a rate that is morally corrupt. They don't even know what to do with all their wealth so they are spending on stupid shit.

[jhd]

 

Wow! That is about four times the average price of a condo where I plan to move/retire. US$660,000 would buy several nice, large houses there -- or even a small apartment building.

 

My hard upper-limit for a single video game is about Cdn$100 (for some rare RPGs); I simply cannot conceive of spending $10,000 for one game, much less $600,000! 

 

 

[youxia]

Move along, nothing to see here. Just the speculectors (Wata, Heritage) at it again.

[0078265317]

On 4/4/2021 at 3:20 AM, youxia said:

Move along, nothing to see here. Just the speculectors (Wata, Heritage) at it again.

Yes, but still interesting that somebody forked over 660 thousand for it. 

[0078265317]

Also

 

It wasn't the only video game that brought in big money at the auction. A 1987 Mega Man cartridge sold for $144,000 and a buyer paid $102,000 for a copy of Mike Tyson's Punch-Out!! made the same year.

 

So looks like a market for some rarer titles. 

[youxia]

7 minutes ago, 0078265317 said:

Yes, but still interesting that somebody forked over 660 thousand for it. 

Yeah, allegedly. An "anonymous buyer". And last time, wasn't it a consortium made up of the guys from these companies, who bought that other game?

 

 

[Tanooki]

The titles are hardly rare, maybe the condition is fairly so, but given their corruption and refusing to show actual population reports to back up the actual values and sales trends, it's just puffing up morons and finding the dumbest one of the lot to pay a (if not so spendy) laughably ignorant sum on this stuff to create those pop reports to help back up this stupidity.  WATA/Heritage at it again, shared members on staff, going to grease that palm for as many cuts and fee charges as possible off tools they love to use.

[Blazing Lazers]

There have been legit 6-figure deals made for various videogame rarities among collectors, but I'm a bit skeptical that this was anything other than money laundering or speculators selling to each other or some sort of financial chicanery. Sure, videogames are now as established as baseball cards and comic books as collectibles, but this is a case where price is nowhere near equivalent to rarity or even actual monetary value. At best, this might be an example of the "greater fool" theory in action.

Edited April 7, 2021 by Blazing Lazers

[toiletunes]

I'm putting mine on Ebay, it should get more since it has Duck Hunt. No box or Manuel but OOP RARE L@@K

[Atari_Bill]

22 minutes ago, Blazing Lazers said:

There have been legit 6-figure deals made for various videogame rarities among collectors, but I'm a bit skeptical that this was anything other than money laundering or speculators selling to each other or some sort of financial chicanery. Sure, videogames are now as established as baseball cards and comic books as collectibles, but this is a case where price is nowhere near equivalent to rarity or even actual monetary value. At best, this might be an example of the "greater fool" theory in action.

Chicanery, great word!   ?

[Tanooki]

Blazing - Exactly why I said what I did.  Where's the pop report to support this?  I can get a couple tools battling it out, but even 2 overly competitive deep pocketed dimwits would likely see the last one sell for let's make this up at 150K... and this hits a half mil higher?  I call bullshit.  It doesn't add up.  There had to be something more here than the simple face value it was just worth it to the winner.  There's no valuation to back it up, no priors, nothing.  It wasn't a case that it was the only Mario to pop up in a decade in such shape, so go for it, like some rare car in a barn find situation.  I mean sure, maybe it was the dumbest fool won it, but we can hope not as it sets a bad precedent that WATA will be salivating at to repeat so they can get the grading, then auction cut since they're partners with workers on the boards of both, so they can just rake it in, and then again.  Perhaps time to get a government entity involved, maybe something illegal is up the SEC would like a peek at.

[Blazing Lazers]

Yep, this whole situation just doesn't pass the smell test. I can't even be sure that there really even was such a sale at all. $150K for a verifiably new SMB from the very first 1985 run? Yes, I can believe that. This sort of price for this particular copy? No way. There's more going on here. 

[NeonSpaceBeagle]

 this bubble is gonna pop HARD very VERY soon...

 

[NeonSpaceBeagle]

The whole thing is really slimey.  It's basically rich collectors just purchasing off each other.  Very few hands, VERY FEW people actually care about this stuff.  Major grift.