Most Turbo collectors and resellers don't knpw what all the games are or what they came with. They also tend to be selective about what counts as "complete". So when it comes to people selling Turbo stuff, you tend to get a mixture of ignorance and deception.
Absolutely.
To build on B_T's idea of "mixture ignorance and deception"...
An average person, casually looking at TG-16 sales/auctions, certainly gets the impression that jewel cases were included with all (or nearly all) standard releases.
Even if a buyer was aware that *some* TG-16 HuCARDs lacked the jewel case, I would not fault him for getting fooled by a nicely made label on a salvaged jewel case. Hopefully, upon actually inspecting the item, a buyer could determine that it was a repro.
PAY IT FORWARD
Ignorant buyers, in turn, can become ignorant sellers. That really creates an ugly situation, because the sellers have no reason to suspect that they are being deceptive when they sell their "genuine" items.
TRENDS
The whole "reproduction" trend has exploded in the last few years, so we see many more homemade jewel cases + labels. COMBINE THIS with the fact that most of the current buyers have little-to-no direct experience buying these games retail BITD...(the same is probably true for the sellers, too, now that I think about it).
I can tell you that 15-20 years ago, very few people were putting any TG-16 repros on eBay. And they were usually very amateurish.
I suspect that in the next few years we will reach the "tipping" point"....where 50% or more of most "collections" contain components (label, case, manual, game, etc.) that are reproductions. That trend will only increase.
I SHOULD HAVE KNOWN BETTER
A seller might put Soldier Blade in a Keith Courage jewel case...since the photos don't show the spine of the jewel case, an idiot might buy it thinking Soldier Blade came with a case. THIS WAS ME. I just impulsively wanted the NA version and looked at the photos in the auction... I forgot that Soldier Blade was a late release. The seller noted his auction included a generic jewel box, but I skimmed past that part of the description. So...I should have known better. However, that doesn't mean that I put 100% of responsibility on buyers.
IGNORANCE VS. DECEPTION
I think most people (buyers, sellers) are ignorant about TG-16. That's fine, because only a sad, sad person (myself included) is well-versed in all this arcana.
However, there MOST CERTAINLY are shady opportunists who feign ignorance...I have seen intentionally misleading/deceptive sellers. Every community has its wolves/parasites that prey and systematically exploit ignorance.
