Cost of games going up

[Justinjcox20]

I only just started scratching the surface of NEC related consoles. Although I find it to be very fun, the price tag that goes along with these games are just crazy sometimes. And they are so few and far between. I'd love to play games like rondo of blood, gekisha boy, coryoon, gates of thunder, (sorry if I misspelled any of those) and magical chase. But I simply don't make the money to play these games. What is causing this inflation, me and my friends discuss this all the time, and we usually come to the conclusion of the trend in retro video games, and the inflation of the market due to resellers and dumb buyers are causing this trend. I want to know what people think. I can't be alone

[BlueBMW]

due to resellers and dumb buyers are causing this

The Pokemon gotta catch em all syndrome where new people "discover" the Turbo Grafx 16 and proceed to try and get a full collection over the course of a few months.  Then a month later get bored and move on to another poor system and dump all their stuff to the next insta-collector.

Game collecting as a hobby is dead to me.  Now its just about playing.  Pick up an everdrive for the hucard games and watch for repro's of the CD games to save some coin.

[Black Tiger]

The problem is too many people casually try new libraries without doing much research beyond the big website/youtube personality recommendations for the same cliched handful of games. Most of the best games are inexpensive, but people keep targeting the same titles. Many Turbo games are overpriced because of the perceived rarity by collectards, but the PCE versions are usually still cheap or at least a fraction of the price.

The other big problem is that most <16-bit game buyers don't understand the difference between asking prices, sold prices and unsold prices. We get too many threads like this every month and people constantly declaring "how can [game] be $200!?!" When it's actually selling regularly on eBay for $30 - $50. This actually leads people to pay $100 for a <$50 game, mistakenly believing that they scored a great deal as it's currently "going for" $200 - $500.

[Necromancer]

What BMW and BT said.

I also blame the goverrats.

[SignOfZeta]

Well, the TG-16 was a niche console even in its day, the world is now much more populated and the supply of consoles less however many got chucked in the bin.

And now you're buying it too.

How could the price stop going up? We're all part of the problem.

[ginoscope]

due to resellers and dumb buyers are causing this

The Pokemon gotta catch em all syndrome where new people "discover" the Turbo Grafx 16 and proceed to try and get a full collection over the course of a few months.  Then a month later get bored and move on to another poor system and dump all their stuff to the next insta-collector.

Game collecting as a hobby is dead to me.  Now its just about playing.  Pick up an everdrive for the hucard games and watch for repro's of the CD games to save some coin.

That is what I did I used to have a big collection back in the day before I sold it.  I got myself an everdrive and it is great if all you want to do is play the games.  I still buy games but am more patient and not so eager to over pay.

[Otaking]

The cost of PC Engine games in the west has not gone up in the last few years, if anything the vast majority of prices have dropped a bit. The prices have gone up on a very small handful of games, but there are tons and tons of games that can still be bought cheaply.
My point is if you got into buying PC Engine games five years ago for the most part, price wise you'd be in the same boat as someone getting into it today.

I've said this before on similar threads, here's the last one.

I agree it appears the price of PC Engine games has gone up in Japan itself, but the price in the west for Japanese PC Engine games for the most part has either stayed static or gone down over the last few years.
A very small percentage of games have had a price increase in the west, games such as Tatsujin, Magical Chase, Dracula X, Liquid Kids and Ninja Spirit. But these games are in the massive minority, the vast majority have not gone up.
The common cheap PC Engine games have gotten even cheaper with all those auctions for 100 game lots with free shipping that have been on eBay for the last few years. They have completely over saturated the availability of the cheap common games.

Regards in Japan itself, I think a few years a back a load of gaijin all had the bright business ideas to move to Japan to buy games from Yahoo.jp and Akiba and then resell them on a western eBay shop. I get the impression that most of these entrepreneurs were French. This does appear to have effected the PC Engine prices in Japan, but not the west.

[SamIAm]

I think the fact that the yen has depreciated 50% in the last few years, along with the emergence of yahoo auction proxy bidders, has had an enormous influence on the entire situation. Things are more affordable in a sense, while at the same time they're becoming scarcer and ultimately being priced higher.

[crazydean]

Hai guyse, anyone want to sell me magicoal chaste for $50?

How could the price stop going up? We're all part of the problem.

Thank you, Zeta. Finally someone who admits they are part of the problem. It seems like all I've seen lately is, "I hate all these collectors driving up prices of games I'm trying to collect. I just want to play the games, but I need original disc/hucard, case, and manual. It's not the same if you just play the game on an everdrive."

[Justinjcox20]

Yeah, I can definitely say that getting into it myself doesn't help the situation. I usually always check sold listings to see what it is going for. I for one do like to collect, but I will not go totally crazy on something. I have been looking into the ever drive idea, seems like a good option. I have not been on this forum in a long time. I guess that is why I wanted to know what others think. It's pricey to buy for this console. That's why I only have a few games. I guess I will just need to wait until I can get in on an ever drive purchase so I can play alot of the other games. I still like having my own copies. But I can be patient and find it for the right price. I'm pretty green to NEC, so I welcome insight on it.

[julencin2000]

Don't forget Facebook or Twitter, making visible our once somewhat obscure hobby.

Yes, there were forums before FB/TW, but you know it's not the same.

[PunkicCyborg]

I'd love to play games like rondo of blood, gekisha boy, coryoon, gates of thunder, (sorry if I misspelled any of those) and magical chase.

None of these games have ever really been cheap and of the ones you mention probably only GoT has ever even dipped below original retail price. So complaining about how expensive they are you need to consider that these are all excellent titles and are 25 year old games now in a booming retro game market. More duos have left Japan in the last couple years than ever before and everyone seems to want that game room with wall to wall stacked shelves. It's just the way it is and get an everdrive/cdr/emulation if you want to just play the games

[BigusSchmuck]

It's not just Turbo games, its almost every retro gaming system in the 16-bit era. Games like Metroid, Mario, Contra, Sonic, etc that sold millions have gone up in price considerably in the past 5 years or so. I recently went to PRGE and saw plenty of copies of Metroid but the asking price was $20. Keith Courage I saw as high as $25 just because it was "complete." Yeah, an everdrive really is your best bet if you want to play the games on the original hardware. I'm glad I got one.

[Trenton_net]

Personally, and this is just my opinion, I think people realized that in Japan the PC-Engine was a rather popular console. That means games would be cheap and easy to find in large numbers, so if you wanted to collect for something go for that. It also helps that PC-Engine games are small and easy to import as opposed to Genesis or Super Famicom games that require big shipping boxes for even a modest amount of games (CIB).

I sat on the collecting sidelines for a fair bit, but then I saw the writing on the wall and I made my move. I was able to focus on most of the major titles before prices started in the upward trend. Now I really only have mostly commons to get and the occasional rare title that I didn't manage to pick up. But considering those are few and far between for me, it's not as painful as starting from scratch at today's prices.

Edit: To agree with what has been said, I should prefix that I'm talking about price increases in regards to more sought after titles. For most common titles, the price change is flat, which is why there was no rush to get them in my case.

[Otaking]

this is not a dig to the OP or anyone else, but what's the deal with peeps these day and PC Engine prices?
I'll put it in caps just to hit it home, ok here goes
THE GENERAL PRICE OF PC ENGINE GAMES HAS NOT GONE UP
Am I missing something? peeps 5 years ago weren't complaing about prices when they were mostly the same as today.

Yes the the price of TurboGrafx games have risen massively, yes the recent price inflation in SNES and SFC games is just ridiculous, but this is just not happening with PC Engine.

If you base your opinion on the whole PCE library around monitoring the price of a couple of games like Dracula X or Magical Chase you would have a completely warped perception on the price of PCE games.
I could sit here and list the hundreds of games that haven't changed in atleast 5 years, games like Sapphire, Spriggan, Star Parodia, PC Denjin etc... etc.. etc.. are all the same, and rarez like all the Special Caravan HuCards I would say have dropped a little in the past 5 years