Game Collectors Pose With Their Greatest Treasures - Wired

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  SEATTLE – Game collectors brought Their treasures to the Retro Game Roadshow panel at Penny Arcade Expo to show them off in front of an appreciative audience and learn what They Might Be worth.

  Collecting expert Frank Cifaldi, Mike Mika and Steve Lin joined me for another exciting panel full of amazing collectibles, with a twist this time: Audience members could come on stage and play a Price Is Right – style mini-game. The audience member who guessed the closest price to the one we concurred on won a prize.

  Here are some of the collectors who came to the show withtheir treasures. (You can watch parts 1 and 2 of the archived live stream of the show on Twitch.)

  Above:

  Nicholas Beaudrot of Seattle, Washington holds two accessories for the Nintendo Famicom system: The Disk System floppy disk add-on and the Nintendo Family BASIC keyboard.

  “I picked up both of These at One of those junk toy stores in West Tokyo When I was visiting last October,” said Beaudrot During the Retro Game Roadshow panel.

  The panel appraised both of These accessories together, alongwith (not pictured) Their original boxes and the hard-to-find AC adapter for the Disk System, at $ 200.

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  Marcus Lindblom of Kirkland, Washington holds a copy of Motherwell 2 . While this cult classic Japanese role-playing game is not worth that much – around $ 45 in this condition – this copy is special. Lindblom was the translator and writer of the English language version of the game, called Earthbound , and this was the copy of the game given to Lindblom by Nintendo while he worked on it.

  Considering how much Earthbound items have sold for, the panel said thatthis copy of the game could fetch at least $ 1,000, especially if Lindblom were to include a letter Verifying the historical uniqueness of this Particular copywriting.

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  Andrew Egerton of Hattiesburg, Mississippi holds a copy of Megaman 9 That is signed by Keiji Inafune, the creator of Megaman. The panel appraised it at $ 500.

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  Nate Greene, of Indianapolis, Indiana holds a sealed, mint condition Super Nintendo cleaning kit. Although some Super Nintendo memorabilia has’ve become quite valuable, the Cleaning Kit is not in. That category – Although it is in pristine condition, the panel Evaluated it as being worth only about $ 15.

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  Adam Friedlander of Poughkeepsie, New York brought a Twin Famicom game console, made by Sharp. It combined Nintendo’s Famicom system, released in the United States as the Nintendo Entertainment System, with the optional magnetic floppy disk drive add-on that was only sold in Japan. Unfortunately, like so many Disk Systems, the cheap rubber belt That spun the disk had fallen apart inside this console. So the Famicom Disks will not play without a repair job, Although the standard game cartridges will work.

  As it stands, the Twin Famicom was appraised by the panel at $ 110. (We might have overshot this one a bit.)

• 

  Brian Silva of Boston, Massachusetts holds Shantae , a game for the Game Boy Color. One of the final games released for the portable game system, it has more fans today than it did When it was released, and mint complete copies like this can be worth around $ 750.

• 

  Cyrus Burris brought his copy of Tenchi Sozo all the way from Westport, Connecticut. The sequel to the Super Nintendo role-playing game Illusion of Gaia , it is known as Terranigma outside Japan. While the English-language version released in the United Kingdom and Australia can fetch up to $ 300 in the box, the Japanese version here is much more common: the panel appraised it at $ 35.

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• SEATTLE – Game collectors brought Their treasures to the Retro Game Roadshow panel at Penny Arcade Expo to show them off in front of an appreciative audience and learn what They Might Be worth.

  Collecting expert Frank Cifaldi, Mike Mika and Steve Lin joined me for another exciting panel full of amazing collectibles, with a twist this time: Audience members could come on stage and play a Price Is Right – style mini-game. The audience member who guessed the closest price to the one we concurred on won a prize.

  Here are some of the collectors who came to the show withtheir treasures. (You can watch parts 1 and 2 of the archived live stream of the show on Twitch.)

  Above:

  Nicholas Beaudrot of Seattle, Washington holds two accessories for the Nintendo Famicom system: The Disk System floppy disk add-on and the Nintendo Family BASIC keyboard.

  “I picked up both of These at One of those junk toy stores in West Tokyo When I was visiting last October,” said Beaudrot During the Retro Game Roadshow panel.

  The panel appraised both of These accessories together, alongwith (not pictured) Their original boxes and the hard-to-find AC adapter for the Disk System, at $ 200.

• Marcus Lindblom of Kirkland, Washington holds a copy of Motherwell 2 . While this cult classic Japanese role-playing game is not worth that much – around $ 45 in this condition – this copy is special. Lindblom was the translator and writer of the English language version of the game, called Earthbound , and this was the copy of the game given to Lindblom by Nintendo while he worked on it.

  Considering how much Earthbound items have sold for, the panel said thatthis copy of the game could fetch at least $ 1,000, especially if Lindblom were to include a letter Verifying the historical uniqueness of this Particular copywriting.

• Andrew Egerton of Hattiesburg, Mississippi holds a copy of Megaman 9 That is signed by Keiji Inafune, the creator of Megaman. The panel appraised it at $ 500.

• Nate Greene, of Indianapolis, Indiana holds a sealed, mint condition Super Nintendo cleaning kit. Although some Super Nintendo memorabilia has’ve become quite valuable, the Cleaning Kit is not in. That category – Although it is in pristine condition, the panel Evaluated it as being worth only about $ 15.

• Adam Friedlander of Poughkeepsie, New York brought a Twin Famicom game console, made by Sharp. It combined Nintendo’s Famicom system, released in the United States as the Nintendo Entertainment System, with the optional magnetic floppy disk drive add-on that was only sold in Japan. Unfortunately, like so many Disk Systems, the cheap rubber belt That spun the disk had fallen apart inside this console. So the Famicom Disks will not play without a repair job, Although the standard game cartridges will work.

  As it stands, the Twin Famicom was appraised by the panel at $ 110. (We might have overshot this one a bit.)

• Brian Silva of Boston, Massachusetts holds Shantae , a game for the Game Boy Color. One of the final games released for the portable game system, it has more fans today than it did When it was released, and mint complete copies like this can be worth around $ 750.

• Cyrus Burris brought his copy of Tenchi Sozo all the way from Westport, Connecticut. The sequel to the Super Nintendo role-playing game Illusion of Gaia , it is known as Terranigma outside Japan. While the English-language version released in the United Kingdom and Australia can fetch up to $ 300 in the box, the Japanese version here is much more common: the panel appraised it at $ 35.

All photos: David Ryder / WIRED

Chris Kohler is the founder and editor of Game | Life and the author of “Power-Up: How Japanese Video Games Gave the World an Extra Life.”

Read more by Chris Kohler

Follow @ kobunheat and @ Game Life on Twitter.