MrFulci, I never understood the whole Magical Chase thing either. I remember when the game sold for $350 like you mentioned, and thought that was absurd. Before I came to this board a couple years back, I never even knew it was such a phenomenon. I bought a complete JP copy for $40 about 7 years ago and have always thought it was mediocore at best. Never got the hype behind this one, it's a competent shooter, but nothing special. At least Sapphire did some nice things technically.
I've been thinking about it, and I think the biggest difference between now and a decade ago as far as vintage games goes is that there are no more "secrets". With the interent and Wii, and Ebay, everyone knows about all the "good" games. So bargaining hunting is obsolete. Back when Gamestop was booming for used games, all being cart-only, I found so many incredible deals on complete games on the interent. They're used to be so many sites where I could go and get games, even sealed games at retail value, now Ebay has the monopoly on the market. And ever since publications have started to "rate" these games in terms of rarity, price gouging has gone insane.
$350 or so, for a complete in box Magical Chase, though I thought at the time expensive, it never struck me as, "Crazy". That wasn't a set price though, as with all auctions, prices fluctuated. I recall around that time another selling for $600 or so on ebay, though, I think that one was sealed.
I also got rid of some stuff, sometime during 2001, or 2002. Long story to it. Now, I miss some of that stuff. It was mostly the NES stuff that is gone, though, at least that isn't so difficult to get back. Still, I recall some of what I had, and the stories behind getting it all. What I wish I had, were an inventory of what my NES stash consisted of. I still have my system and about a dozen games for it though. At least the carts are cheap, so when I decide I need to have Abadox again, it's not like I have to spend much $.
My Sega CD collection suffered a bit of a similar fate.
Atari 2600, I got rid of a lot of my extra parts, years ago. I wish I had kept 20% of what I sold, but, oh well! I still have what I cared about most.
Those years, about a decade ago, a lot of stuff went. I had a decent collection of board games, nothing remains of that.
Same goes for some books and magazines. Gone.
The Turbo Grafx stuff didn't disappear during that time, though. That's good.
You refer to things being more, "Secret" a decade ago. Not really, from my experience. About a decade ago (2004 or 2005), the information was still out there. I recall selling a rare game in an Atari 2600 game lot (I didn't know it was rare), and all of these people kept trying to make a side deal for $15, $20, I think the most some guy offered me was $40. Some people even message me telling me to ignore the messages I am likely receiving about this game, etc... I would have figured it out anyway.
Back then, it didn't seem much different than now.
What I notice, is it depends on how out in the public certain things are. An example I can think of, is I was browsing books, and saw that walking dead comics are being placed in paperback compendiums. So, I went to look for how much the early comic books sold for, I was curious, since it has a TV show and such. It was a lot of $. I am pretty sure before the TV series, it was sold for much less $!
That's why I think, with the Wii pushing the TG-16 out there, for many people to see, it seemed to pick-up from there, with prices and everything. Also during that time, TZD liquidated. Turbo Grafx, it always struck me a bit as an ignored system.
I never stopped in GameStop, though I did hear back then they used to carry a lot of used "old" games.
What killed bargain hunting, was ebay. I recall the deals I got on Atari 2600 stuff in the 90's. Before ebay, and even for a little while after ebay debuted. Lots of stuff, for cheap. At yard sales, if I didn't see an Atari 2600 system, I'd sometimes ask, and sometimes hear, "Oh, that old stuff? I didn't think anyone would still buy that stuff. We have one in the basement, hold on"...
Anyway, The Turbo Grafx, it just seems more popular now than it was 10 years ago. It's a bit odd.
Considering prices for some TG-16 stuff now, the best thing to do, is if you think you're going to want to play something later, hold onto it. It's something I am keeping in mind, also!
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Topic: WTB: Neutopia I & II (TG16) (Read 493 times)
