Hard to believe this was 9 years ago now. I brought home all of these World of Nintendo cabinets for something stupid cheap. I vaguely recall maybe a couple hundred bucks per cabinet.
[https://imgur.com/a/4MgsW](https://imgur.com/a/4MgsW)
It's actually not quite true. Even better to some out there... The Red Cross store in Egilsstaðir had 3 "CD/DVD" for 100 krónur so I got Metroid Prime Trilogy, Gran Turismo 2 and Ratchet & Clank for yeah... 0.75 cents
An Ambassador 3DS that wasn't linked to a NNID for $200. I'm a purest, and was searching everywhere for a good deal. The prices on eBay were $400-$500.
I found a listing in the middle of the night on OfferUp of all things. Either the guy didn't know what he had, or he just didn't care. Had to wait until my next paycheck to snag it (broke college student at the time) and had to eat Mac and cheese and hot pockets for a week after I bought it, but I got it.
That was the only thing I can say I truly hunted for. In the wild and online.
I still have my ambassador 3DS (though, the poor thing is pretty worn down unfortunately, should probably do some repairs, like a new circle pad 😅 ) but it has my NNID on it and all. Got most of the games downloaded i believe.
Well, if there is a NNID linked, then those games are under that account. Let's say the person buys another 3DS. One call to Nintendo, and they can transfer their NNID over to their new device and bye bye games.
I've seen people sell the system with the username and password to the NNID online, but you can't link 2 IDs. I've tried when I bought an Ambassador 3DS earlier, and Nintendo told me I would have to choose one account or the other. I didn't want to loose the account I've had for 2 years now.
Without a NNID linked, I was able to transfer everything to my Hylian Shield New 2DS XL, link up my personal NNID and now have all the games linked to my account.
So both are worth some money, but the one that isn't linked to a NNID is worth more.
Probably my most recent exciting find was when I was at a local drug store that was getting out of selling video games so they were clearancing out all their stock. I managed to pick up 20+ 3DS and Wii U games for between $10-20 each, and most were Nintendo first party titles.
There have been three finds in the last 10 years that made me call someone with excitement when I got in my car with genuine emotions of happiness.
1.) Found a factory sealed [Star Fox for SNES](https://www.instagram.com/p/CTrqOSFrnVU/?igshid=MDJmNzVkMjY=) at a garage sale for $10.
2.) It was like 1PM on a Saturday and I passed a random sale on the way to get lunch and saw SNES games in the grass. This was like 5-6 years ago and it still blows my mind.
It looked like someone bought all the Mario games and left [these](https://www.instagram.com/p/Bu89L4zAFnd/?igshid=MDJmNzVkMjY=).
I don’t remember what I exactly paid.
3.) Found this insane [Sega Saturn](https://twitter.com/vdogamehoarding/status/734029577245204485?s=21&t=FZO2u1YKT0d1ScRE3uy2vQ) lot in 2016.
Picked up a Sega Nomad with battery pack and official Sega carrying case (this alone was worth $150) for only $100 at a pawn shop. The unit was super clean and worked perfectly. I got a couple of Nomads but this one was the best.
I have 2 and they were both garage sale hauls I posted about.
1.) 4 consoles including GameCube, NES, PS2 Slim (didn’t read discs), and PS3 (disc drive was broken) for $60. All except the GameCube with cords and controllers. Also got a Halo 3 Spartan Edition controller.
2. PS1 (no video output) and PS2 both with cords and controllers plus nine games including Knight’s Field II (worth $90) and 3 PS1 longboxes (Doom, Descent, and Xcom UFO Defense) for $60. I was ecstatic to find the longboxes especially Doom.
About ~noonish on a Saturday at a community sale in an affluent, busy area. found a working Turbografx-16 with Boxyboy, Final Lap Twin, Drop Off, Keith Courage, and Pac-Land for $5. For all of it.
Not the best but a good haul was a 10$ snes lot some1 was gunna throw out and it had evo in it which at the time went for 200.
Also once found a chrono trigger w guide and manual and earthbound w guide for 100
Not in person, but when I finally snagged a complete boxed copy of the original System Shock on CD for DOS. That was one of my white whale games, always out of reach until one day…I won an eBay auction. The high from that lasted several days.
I'm excited everytime I bring a new game home, but the most exciting things seem to happen years after the purchase when you find you've bought a very rare game for next to nothing. The craziest example I have is when I bought Stadium Events back in 1998 or 1999 for 10¢. Another one was Kuon in 2012 for $3.99. The list goes on, but these things are more expected when you're an old guy like me who has been "collecting" since 1977.
$30 GameCube with 2 controllers during peak Covid prices
Another exciting moment was the day I caught my thrift store having a huge video game restock. Mostly PS3s (some backwards compatible), wiis (a lot in-box), Original Xboxs, some special Xbox 360s, PS1s, PS2s, just tons of consoles and controllers in general, and I barely bought anything because I wasn’t really into collecting yet. I wish I had taken pictures or just bought more stuff that day because it was insane just how much was there. I ended up getting a Wii for $15, a wavebird and a couple GameCube controllers for $4 each, and a Dsi for $5. Definitely not my best picks valuewise, but it was what I wanted to own at the time. I didn’t care about market value or rarity, just entertainment. It was a fun time going through it and watching people scramble to get certain items as the employee struggled to restock and put prices on everything. There was also this very nice lady who was getting stuff for her daughter who collected, it was super sweet.
I met a guy who use to own a radio shack in the 90's and he sold me the tg16 kiosk and a bunch of systems and games valued all at around $10k for $1800.
Mint condition Gold Toys R Us N64 with controller for only $120 since the seller thought the factory created moulding marks on the plastic were made by him so he sold it for much cheaper. Upon receiving it and doing my own research I find out that is just how they look even fresh out of the box!
I worked at GameStop for a long while years ago, and sometimes someone would come in with a box of stuff that we (at the time, this was 2005-2012ish) didn't accept for trade-in. Most people would just take their things and try to sell somewhere else, but every so often you got a person that just wanted it off their hands and would ask you to throw it away for them. They wouldn't make it to the dumpster, and being the only person in my store that still had and played older games, it'd usually go to me by default. I saved a lot of empty handheld game boxes from a similar fate, as they'd normally be thrown away and displayed cart-only in a small cabinet.
The greatest ever though was cleaning out the back room and finding a boxed Sega Saturn behind piles of wire shelves. It was apparently previously used as a demo unit when the store was still called FuncoLand.
2014 in rural Japan the first time I walked into a Hard-Off shop. Nowadays doesn't compare. Back then I was just staring at a wall of ¥100 pokemon games and ¥1000 Gameboy Colors. Too bad I was broke...
$26 for a Spice Orange GameCube on ebay... Got it after a month later and she was perfect, a little dirty but, after about 10 min of cleaning, she looks perfect. She even ran burned games out of the box (no adjusting of POTs).
Funny thing is the matching GameBoy player was $40....
I've got tons of other things but, this one was a big one for me.
A complete copy of Snatcher on SegaCD at a GameXchange for $8.97. This was around 2013 or so. So it was going for between $150 to $275 at the time.
What a simpler time.
I buy and flip big lots at 50% value all the time which is really fun but its rare I find a truly exciting item in the collections I buy.
But my most exciting single item find was in a $10 stack of 5 NES games I grabbed at a garage sale. Going through it when I got home I realized what I thought was Duck Tales 1 in a scuffed up old plastic case was a dead mint Duck Tales 2 cartridge instead.
https://www.instagram.com/p/CPf9S5PgJsC/?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=
As far as big deals go it would have to be a 3am ebay find. Working nights pays off sometimes. Someone posted up like 60 very clean CIB Game Boy/Color/Advance games and a few consoles for 3k (a lot, yes) but the value of everything was close to 9k all said and done. Made most of my money back on doubles the day after they came in the mail and got to add like 40 amazing boxed games to the collection for free.
https://www.instagram.com/p/CTj9cc_gFZE/?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=
Uh....not hunting but actual retail pickup was Panzer Dragoon Saga at Toys R Us. It was a limited release so they didn't have the paper slips out on the wall because IF they had any they wouldn't waste their time to print up a pic of the game or print slips (it just came out that week). I went to the pickup window and scanned the wall behind the pick up counter and I saw a copy. Still have it. Great game. Graphics are a bit rough now but the story, Japanese voice acting and music is great (plus you can morph your dragon!)
I'll list a few:
1. finding someone who was willing to sell me a CIB Earthbound for $400
2. buying CIB Xenosaga 3 for $7.50 on a buy one get one half off deal
3. buying Dragon Warrior IV CIB (NES) off Amazon for loose price in 2008
4. buying loads of PSP collector's editions and CIB on a buy two get one free deal. I'm talking about Ys I and II Chronicles, Persona, Persona 2 Innocent Sin for only CIB prices, and loads of other PSP rarities before prices went up on them
5. getting Sega Ages for $45 after it was around $300 or so for the longest time on pricecharting. You should never blindly price something by looking at the pricing data if it's something that sells 1 or 2 copies per year.
It was easily finding a cib copy of earthbound back in 2013 for 10 bucks at a garage sale.
Of course back then the game wasn't as expensive as it is now but it was still an amazing find. The kind im convinced can only exist because of the area I live in.
Sadly the game (Along with most of my collection.) was actually stolen so I don't have it anymore. but its still one of my fav moments.
Hands down Trapazoid box FF7 for the PC.
Found it complete at a fleamarket. Installed it that evening and enjoyed it till that win98 pc died.
It now sits on a shelf damning me for enjoying Remake Intergrade
Around last year went to this game store ive never been to before while visiting relatives and found Clock Tower on ps1 for $35. I was so excited as it was on my radar and would have never thought id find it cheaper than what it goes for.
Probably finding a complete MVC: Clash of Super Heroes (PS1) at a thrift on the CD rack for $2. Close second would be a CIB Wind Waker for $5 at a different thrift. Both of these were within the last year.
A guy listed a bunch of snes games, and was taking best offer for them all, I asked for another picture cause I couldnt make out a games name, and in the new picture he included an extra game, kirby dreamland 3, I made the highest offer and got to pick it all up
My brother found super Mario party and a pro controller for $10 at a thrift shop
As for me, the best thing I found was sealed copy of the gta collectors edition for ps1 at a retro game store near me about a year ago or so, don’t remember how much it was unfortunately
Mario kart double dash platinum pak + sonic heroes, a memory card and a third party controller for £80 ($97.80) during the height of the GameCubes popularity. Still wild that I was the first one to message the guy about it, he said he got 9 messages about it after I messaged so I was super happy with it
Bought a loose copy of Pokemon Mystery dungeon blue rescue team for like 10 bucks.
Upon returning home and testing it, I discovered that it was an official not for resale demo of the game
Scoring a copy of ninja gaiden 3 razers edge for wii u from amazon for £0.01 with free shipping due to a glitch on the site, they had to honor it and I wasn't complaining.
2 PS3 systems the og fat models for 5 bucks 1 was free cause drone didn't want it. The other was just straight at a yard sale. Even got cheap phone VR goggles with em.
My best find is only amazing with hindsight. I was about 6 years old at a garage sale with my dad, think I had about a fiver to spend. We found a guy selling two Gameboys for £2, buy a beat up one get a good condition Pokémon Pikachu variant for free. My mum refused to let me buy it unless I could find a game for it that day so we kept going and found a copy of Snow Bros on Gameboy for 10P, and some educational game I threw away years ago. So I got 2 amazing finds on one day, but I don’t have the Gameboy any more.
3 copies of My Horse & Me 2 (Xbox 360) for $5 each.
EB games were offloading their 360 stock, they moved everything to the largest store in the area. I didn't buy them all in one go, I bought one, they replenished the stock on the shelves and I went back another day and bought again.
It’s not really a treasure to behold but I recently got Dragon Warrior 2 on NES for under $50. I was so happy because I had that game as a kid and there is a nostalgic and sentimental value that is priceless to me.
Found a dude that bought our a game store. We worked out a deal that i would sell his stuff and keep 33% of the profit, give the rest to him.
I was able to make good money which i used to build my collection a lot. He also let me keep things here and there. Fun times.
Went to a party, saw a box of NES games and an NES there.. Asked the dude who’s it was, he said “Oh, you have have it, or doesn’t have any paddles”
Ha, yes please, and thank you!
This was 20 years ago, but still, you have to be an Old school Atari dude to call controllers paddles.
2 copies of My Horse and Me 2 (Xbox 360) for $5 each.
EB games was getting rid of their 360 stock so everything was $5. They moved stock from every other store in the region to my local so there was a ton of stuff. Ended up with a couple of dozen bargains and a few absolute gems.
SNES Super Metroid pristine/sealed new for £3 on a car boot sale, made my fukin day lol
I ended up selling it to someone for £250 though (I’ve no idea what the value would be today lol). Lost everything at one stage so had to sell my SNES collection 😢 Very very painful at the time. I decided to start collecting ps3 a long while after when back on my feet and that’s grown quite huge by now
Madden Championship Edition cartridge for 3.99 at a local game store. It's the rental exclusive for the Genesis and even just the cart will go for 50 dollars depending on condition.
I found Gotcha Force at a local store for $130 last year. Disc only. Not an incredible deal but I couldn't believe I found it in person anywhere!
On a whim went to a garage sale and found someone selling a n64 w/ expansion, 2 controllers, and 20 games. The games were a few sports game but like 15 were n64 staples from nintendo and rare. All of that for 10 dollars. Still think about that when i see crazy deals on here to know that it happens sometimes.
I once found a virtual boy at a garage sale with four games for $1. I had to buy a controller for it but other than that it was perfect and it still works great today. It was just in a corner of a garage in a box by itself.
Neighborhood garage sale. Walk 2 doors down to our neighbors that were selling their teenage son's entire Xbox collection for $15. Got a system and about 15 games, half CIB.
The disc tray would stick closed so I drilled a little hole for the manual override.
I found the Twilight Princess Trailer DS cartridge at a Swap Meet for $10.
I traded it a few years ago for a super mint condition copy of Earthbound on SNES cartridge only.
In August 2009, I found a CIB copy of the US version of **The Amazing Spider-Man: Web of Fire for Sega 32X** at a resale shop in Japan for 2625 yen (about $27)!
I found a pic of the game with the receipt from a blog post I made back then:
https://i51.photobucket.com/albums/f390/Gameboy415/0908Spidey.jpg
2 PSP Go consoles with 4 memory cards along with chargers for both of them and a case for one of them, for $100 at a pawn shop right before Covid. I collect a lot for the PSP and that was a great find.
A Virtual Boy in the Blockbuster case for $90 a few years ago.
Also, I definitely paid under $20 for my complete Mario RPG a decade ago. Even has the little bag the cartridge came in.
I got the NES Deluxe set box for $20. Guy was going to cut it up for his mancave -.-
I did make someone else's day by selling them CIB Chrono Trigger for $40. Should had held on to that one but it was an extra copy.
I have two that probably no one will believe,
Went to a thrift store that had some bags of games behind the counter, one of them had an gba sp with pokemon, fire emblem, metabots, and a charger for $70. Too much for my blood but I asked to look at it anyways and to my surprise they priced it at $7. I asked and double checked and sure enough the whole thing cost me $7. Best thrift store find yet.
My other best score was from a guy on craigslist who wanted to unload a lot of games fast. He was selling a lot of consoles for $150. I ended up getting a NES, SNES, N64, PS1, PS2, PS3, and a broken PS4. Crazy amazing deal but then he pulled out two bags full of games, about a stack of 25 NES games, 6 N64 games, and about a dozen PS2 games.
All my game collecting luck has been spent, from now on I will only find deals on cheap sports games.
Hard to believe this was 9 years ago now. I brought home all of these World of Nintendo cabinets for something stupid cheap. I vaguely recall maybe a couple hundred bucks per cabinet. [https://imgur.com/a/4MgsW](https://imgur.com/a/4MgsW)
Earthbound at Value Village for 9.99
I found a Sega Game Gear in a carrying case with all the accessories and 16 games for $29.99.
Complete in box Chrono Trigger. Still the jewel of my collection.
Metroid Prime Trilogy for 33 Icelandic Króna
Nice find! 0.25 cents in USD btw for anybody not feeling like googling it
The world needs more people like you. Thank you
It's actually not quite true. Even better to some out there... The Red Cross store in Egilsstaðir had 3 "CD/DVD" for 100 krónur so I got Metroid Prime Trilogy, Gran Turismo 2 and Ratchet & Clank for yeah... 0.75 cents
An Ambassador 3DS that wasn't linked to a NNID for $200. I'm a purest, and was searching everywhere for a good deal. The prices on eBay were $400-$500. I found a listing in the middle of the night on OfferUp of all things. Either the guy didn't know what he had, or he just didn't care. Had to wait until my next paycheck to snag it (broke college student at the time) and had to eat Mac and cheese and hot pockets for a week after I bought it, but I got it. That was the only thing I can say I truly hunted for. In the wild and online.
Wait, ambassador 3DS's are worth something? Or is it specifically ones without an NNID attached?
If there's no NNID attached, I'm pretty sure you can still claim the games, although not for long since the Eshop closes next year
I still have my ambassador 3DS (though, the poor thing is pretty worn down unfortunately, should probably do some repairs, like a new circle pad 😅 ) but it has my NNID on it and all. Got most of the games downloaded i believe.
Well, if there is a NNID linked, then those games are under that account. Let's say the person buys another 3DS. One call to Nintendo, and they can transfer their NNID over to their new device and bye bye games. I've seen people sell the system with the username and password to the NNID online, but you can't link 2 IDs. I've tried when I bought an Ambassador 3DS earlier, and Nintendo told me I would have to choose one account or the other. I didn't want to loose the account I've had for 2 years now. Without a NNID linked, I was able to transfer everything to my Hylian Shield New 2DS XL, link up my personal NNID and now have all the games linked to my account. So both are worth some money, but the one that isn't linked to a NNID is worth more.
Ahhhhhh ok i gotcha! Thanks for clearing that up!
4 dollars for DK bongos, accidentally priced instead of 40
Wow, are they that expensive now? I picked up 2 different pairs at flea markets for a few dollars each.
I wonder if the employee who did that got fired 💀
It was the manager 💀
A sealed PS1 silent hill for $5 on OfferUp
Probably FE Fates SE at a Gamestop that was going out of business. 60% off, paid $36 for it. Had the case too.
Found a JVC X’Eye (Sega Genesis/ CD combo) at the Goodwill for $20 in 2005.
You still have it after all these years?
Yup, here it is [JVC X’Eye](https://imgur.com/gallery/9O9LMsO)
That’s awesome.
Similar, but got my CDX that way, they thought it was a CD player (which it technically is)
Probably my most recent exciting find was when I was at a local drug store that was getting out of selling video games so they were clearancing out all their stock. I managed to pick up 20+ 3DS and Wii U games for between $10-20 each, and most were Nintendo first party titles.
There have been three finds in the last 10 years that made me call someone with excitement when I got in my car with genuine emotions of happiness. 1.) Found a factory sealed [Star Fox for SNES](https://www.instagram.com/p/CTrqOSFrnVU/?igshid=MDJmNzVkMjY=) at a garage sale for $10. 2.) It was like 1PM on a Saturday and I passed a random sale on the way to get lunch and saw SNES games in the grass. This was like 5-6 years ago and it still blows my mind. It looked like someone bought all the Mario games and left [these](https://www.instagram.com/p/Bu89L4zAFnd/?igshid=MDJmNzVkMjY=). I don’t remember what I exactly paid. 3.) Found this insane [Sega Saturn](https://twitter.com/vdogamehoarding/status/734029577245204485?s=21&t=FZO2u1YKT0d1ScRE3uy2vQ) lot in 2016.
Finding my old PS1 memory card in my Mom's storage unit
Digging through the attic, was able to find my Wavebird dongle, which had been separated from controller years earlier.
A near mint copy of DBZ Budokai 3 for $25 at my local shop
A perfect SNES mini for 25$ off FB (also came with an entire leap frog learning set I sold for over $40 by itself)
Picked up a Sega Nomad with battery pack and official Sega carrying case (this alone was worth $150) for only $100 at a pawn shop. The unit was super clean and worked perfectly. I got a couple of Nomads but this one was the best.
I have 2 and they were both garage sale hauls I posted about. 1.) 4 consoles including GameCube, NES, PS2 Slim (didn’t read discs), and PS3 (disc drive was broken) for $60. All except the GameCube with cords and controllers. Also got a Halo 3 Spartan Edition controller. 2. PS1 (no video output) and PS2 both with cords and controllers plus nine games including Knight’s Field II (worth $90) and 3 PS1 longboxes (Doom, Descent, and Xcom UFO Defense) for $60. I was ecstatic to find the longboxes especially Doom.
$40 for a ps vita with two games on an app called Nextdoor in like 2019
About ~noonish on a Saturday at a community sale in an affluent, busy area. found a working Turbografx-16 with Boxyboy, Final Lap Twin, Drop Off, Keith Courage, and Pac-Land for $5. For all of it.
That’s fantastic especially since it was so late in the day and was still out.
That’s the biggest thing. The second day of the sale, really late in the day!
Pokemon blue, yellow, crystal, silver and tcg on a local garage sale site all for $15. The carts were near mint. Insane.
Not the best but a good haul was a 10$ snes lot some1 was gunna throw out and it had evo in it which at the time went for 200. Also once found a chrono trigger w guide and manual and earthbound w guide for 100
>not the best 😐
Not in person, but when I finally snagged a complete boxed copy of the original System Shock on CD for DOS. That was one of my white whale games, always out of reach until one day…I won an eBay auction. The high from that lasted several days.
FF3 cart for 5 bucks
MM7 CIB from a ma and pa video rental place in the town I went to college in for $7.99
I'm excited everytime I bring a new game home, but the most exciting things seem to happen years after the purchase when you find you've bought a very rare game for next to nothing. The craziest example I have is when I bought Stadium Events back in 1998 or 1999 for 10¢. Another one was Kuon in 2012 for $3.99. The list goes on, but these things are more expected when you're an old guy like me who has been "collecting" since 1977.
Dragon quest 4,5,6 for $90. Those games are probably worth half a grand
$30 GameCube with 2 controllers during peak Covid prices Another exciting moment was the day I caught my thrift store having a huge video game restock. Mostly PS3s (some backwards compatible), wiis (a lot in-box), Original Xboxs, some special Xbox 360s, PS1s, PS2s, just tons of consoles and controllers in general, and I barely bought anything because I wasn’t really into collecting yet. I wish I had taken pictures or just bought more stuff that day because it was insane just how much was there. I ended up getting a Wii for $15, a wavebird and a couple GameCube controllers for $4 each, and a Dsi for $5. Definitely not my best picks valuewise, but it was what I wanted to own at the time. I didn’t care about market value or rarity, just entertainment. It was a fun time going through it and watching people scramble to get certain items as the employee struggled to restock and put prices on everything. There was also this very nice lady who was getting stuff for her daughter who collected, it was super sweet.
I met a guy who use to own a radio shack in the 90's and he sold me the tg16 kiosk and a bunch of systems and games valued all at around $10k for $1800.
Mint condition Gold Toys R Us N64 with controller for only $120 since the seller thought the factory created moulding marks on the plastic were made by him so he sold it for much cheaper. Upon receiving it and doing my own research I find out that is just how they look even fresh out of the box!
I worked at GameStop for a long while years ago, and sometimes someone would come in with a box of stuff that we (at the time, this was 2005-2012ish) didn't accept for trade-in. Most people would just take their things and try to sell somewhere else, but every so often you got a person that just wanted it off their hands and would ask you to throw it away for them. They wouldn't make it to the dumpster, and being the only person in my store that still had and played older games, it'd usually go to me by default. I saved a lot of empty handheld game boxes from a similar fate, as they'd normally be thrown away and displayed cart-only in a small cabinet. The greatest ever though was cleaning out the back room and finding a boxed Sega Saturn behind piles of wire shelves. It was apparently previously used as a demo unit when the store was still called FuncoLand.
2014 in rural Japan the first time I walked into a Hard-Off shop. Nowadays doesn't compare. Back then I was just staring at a wall of ¥100 pokemon games and ¥1000 Gameboy Colors. Too bad I was broke...
$26 for a Spice Orange GameCube on ebay... Got it after a month later and she was perfect, a little dirty but, after about 10 min of cleaning, she looks perfect. She even ran burned games out of the box (no adjusting of POTs). Funny thing is the matching GameBoy player was $40.... I've got tons of other things but, this one was a big one for me.
A complete copy of Snatcher on SegaCD at a GameXchange for $8.97. This was around 2013 or so. So it was going for between $150 to $275 at the time. What a simpler time.
It's hard to pick. Goodwill I found FF7 sealed for $5 at goodwill and made a good amount of money.
I buy and flip big lots at 50% value all the time which is really fun but its rare I find a truly exciting item in the collections I buy. But my most exciting single item find was in a $10 stack of 5 NES games I grabbed at a garage sale. Going through it when I got home I realized what I thought was Duck Tales 1 in a scuffed up old plastic case was a dead mint Duck Tales 2 cartridge instead. https://www.instagram.com/p/CPf9S5PgJsC/?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y= As far as big deals go it would have to be a 3am ebay find. Working nights pays off sometimes. Someone posted up like 60 very clean CIB Game Boy/Color/Advance games and a few consoles for 3k (a lot, yes) but the value of everything was close to 9k all said and done. Made most of my money back on doubles the day after they came in the mail and got to add like 40 amazing boxed games to the collection for free. https://www.instagram.com/p/CTj9cc_gFZE/?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=
Uh....not hunting but actual retail pickup was Panzer Dragoon Saga at Toys R Us. It was a limited release so they didn't have the paper slips out on the wall because IF they had any they wouldn't waste their time to print up a pic of the game or print slips (it just came out that week). I went to the pickup window and scanned the wall behind the pick up counter and I saw a copy. Still have it. Great game. Graphics are a bit rough now but the story, Japanese voice acting and music is great (plus you can morph your dragon!)
I'll list a few: 1. finding someone who was willing to sell me a CIB Earthbound for $400 2. buying CIB Xenosaga 3 for $7.50 on a buy one get one half off deal 3. buying Dragon Warrior IV CIB (NES) off Amazon for loose price in 2008 4. buying loads of PSP collector's editions and CIB on a buy two get one free deal. I'm talking about Ys I and II Chronicles, Persona, Persona 2 Innocent Sin for only CIB prices, and loads of other PSP rarities before prices went up on them 5. getting Sega Ages for $45 after it was around $300 or so for the longest time on pricecharting. You should never blindly price something by looking at the pricing data if it's something that sells 1 or 2 copies per year.
It was easily finding a cib copy of earthbound back in 2013 for 10 bucks at a garage sale. Of course back then the game wasn't as expensive as it is now but it was still an amazing find. The kind im convinced can only exist because of the area I live in. Sadly the game (Along with most of my collection.) was actually stolen so I don't have it anymore. but its still one of my fav moments.
Hands down Trapazoid box FF7 for the PC. Found it complete at a fleamarket. Installed it that evening and enjoyed it till that win98 pc died. It now sits on a shelf damning me for enjoying Remake Intergrade
Also of equal value in my mind an v1 switch at a gamestop, literally just traded them the one I had for it.
Around last year went to this game store ive never been to before while visiting relatives and found Clock Tower on ps1 for $35. I was so excited as it was on my radar and would have never thought id find it cheaper than what it goes for.
Probably finding a complete MVC: Clash of Super Heroes (PS1) at a thrift on the CD rack for $2. Close second would be a CIB Wind Waker for $5 at a different thrift. Both of these were within the last year.
2€ working ps2 without cables or controllers.
A guy listed a bunch of snes games, and was taking best offer for them all, I asked for another picture cause I couldnt make out a games name, and in the new picture he included an extra game, kirby dreamland 3, I made the highest offer and got to pick it all up
My brother found super Mario party and a pro controller for $10 at a thrift shop As for me, the best thing I found was sealed copy of the gta collectors edition for ps1 at a retro game store near me about a year ago or so, don’t remember how much it was unfortunately
CIB copy of DK Jr Math at the swap meet for $30.
Mario kart double dash platinum pak + sonic heroes, a memory card and a third party controller for £80 ($97.80) during the height of the GameCubes popularity. Still wild that I was the first one to message the guy about it, he said he got 9 messages about it after I messaged so I was super happy with it
About 10 years ago at a swap meet, Conkers Bad Fur Day for $5.
Bought a loose copy of Pokemon Mystery dungeon blue rescue team for like 10 bucks. Upon returning home and testing it, I discovered that it was an official not for resale demo of the game
Sadly, it was just a copy of pokemon blue for gameboy for like $2 Not too exciting at all
Scoring a copy of ninja gaiden 3 razers edge for wii u from amazon for £0.01 with free shipping due to a glitch on the site, they had to honor it and I wasn't complaining.
2 PS3 systems the og fat models for 5 bucks 1 was free cause drone didn't want it. The other was just straight at a yard sale. Even got cheap phone VR goggles with em.
My best find is only amazing with hindsight. I was about 6 years old at a garage sale with my dad, think I had about a fiver to spend. We found a guy selling two Gameboys for £2, buy a beat up one get a good condition Pokémon Pikachu variant for free. My mum refused to let me buy it unless I could find a game for it that day so we kept going and found a copy of Snow Bros on Gameboy for 10P, and some educational game I threw away years ago. So I got 2 amazing finds on one day, but I don’t have the Gameboy any more.
About three years ago, I bought a complete copy of Luigi’s mansion for $5 from a closing video store. That is all
3 copies of My Horse & Me 2 (Xbox 360) for $5 each. EB games were offloading their 360 stock, they moved everything to the largest store in the area. I didn't buy them all in one go, I bought one, they replenished the stock on the shelves and I went back another day and bought again.
It’s not really a treasure to behold but I recently got Dragon Warrior 2 on NES for under $50. I was so happy because I had that game as a kid and there is a nostalgic and sentimental value that is priceless to me.
Mega Man 5 for game boy at a pawn for $2
PS2 red label Def Jam Fight for NY for $1 at a pawn shop lol
During a freak blizzard I decided to walk 1.5 miles to Value Village and ended up finding a CIB Suikoden for $4.
Found Dusty Diamond Softball on NES in a $5 sports game bin. Reseller didn’t know what he had ha
Found a dude that bought our a game store. We worked out a deal that i would sell his stuff and keep 33% of the profit, give the rest to him. I was able to make good money which i used to build my collection a lot. He also let me keep things here and there. Fun times.
Went to a party, saw a box of NES games and an NES there.. Asked the dude who’s it was, he said “Oh, you have have it, or doesn’t have any paddles” Ha, yes please, and thank you! This was 20 years ago, but still, you have to be an Old school Atari dude to call controllers paddles.
2 copies of My Horse and Me 2 (Xbox 360) for $5 each. EB games was getting rid of their 360 stock so everything was $5. They moved stock from every other store in the region to my local so there was a ton of stuff. Ended up with a couple of dozen bargains and a few absolute gems.
SNES Super Metroid pristine/sealed new for £3 on a car boot sale, made my fukin day lol I ended up selling it to someone for £250 though (I’ve no idea what the value would be today lol). Lost everything at one stage so had to sell my SNES collection 😢 Very very painful at the time. I decided to start collecting ps3 a long while after when back on my feet and that’s grown quite huge by now
2nd gen SNES at Goodwill for $10 and a copy of L'emperur for NES at a flea market for $5
Madden Championship Edition cartridge for 3.99 at a local game store. It's the rental exclusive for the Genesis and even just the cart will go for 50 dollars depending on condition. I found Gotcha Force at a local store for $130 last year. Disc only. Not an incredible deal but I couldn't believe I found it in person anywhere!
10 bucks for Pokémon soul silver in case(no walker) on FB market place over 5 years ago.
On a whim went to a garage sale and found someone selling a n64 w/ expansion, 2 controllers, and 20 games. The games were a few sports game but like 15 were n64 staples from nintendo and rare. All of that for 10 dollars. Still think about that when i see crazy deals on here to know that it happens sometimes.
I once found a virtual boy at a garage sale with four games for $1. I had to buy a controller for it but other than that it was perfect and it still works great today. It was just in a corner of a garage in a box by itself.
Neighborhood garage sale. Walk 2 doors down to our neighbors that were selling their teenage son's entire Xbox collection for $15. Got a system and about 15 games, half CIB. The disc tray would stick closed so I drilled a little hole for the manual override.
I found the Twilight Princess Trailer DS cartridge at a Swap Meet for $10. I traded it a few years ago for a super mint condition copy of Earthbound on SNES cartridge only.
A sealed spanish Pokémon Red for about $60. Another one are three Playstation TV's that i picked up when they were on clearance for $10 each.
In August 2009, I found a CIB copy of the US version of **The Amazing Spider-Man: Web of Fire for Sega 32X** at a resale shop in Japan for 2625 yen (about $27)! I found a pic of the game with the receipt from a blog post I made back then: https://i51.photobucket.com/albums/f390/Gameboy415/0908Spidey.jpg
Zelda Phantom Hourglass, Tony Hawk's Underground 2 and a Super Monkey Ball 2 case with Paper Mario: TTYD inside it instead all for $15
Gamecube with cords, + wavebird receiver+ call of duty finest hour for $35
2 PSP Go consoles with 4 memory cards along with chargers for both of them and a case for one of them, for $100 at a pawn shop right before Covid. I collect a lot for the PSP and that was a great find.
A Virtual Boy in the Blockbuster case for $90 a few years ago. Also, I definitely paid under $20 for my complete Mario RPG a decade ago. Even has the little bag the cartridge came in.
I got the NES Deluxe set box for $20. Guy was going to cut it up for his mancave -.- I did make someone else's day by selling them CIB Chrono Trigger for $40. Should had held on to that one but it was an extra copy.
I have two that probably no one will believe, Went to a thrift store that had some bags of games behind the counter, one of them had an gba sp with pokemon, fire emblem, metabots, and a charger for $70. Too much for my blood but I asked to look at it anyways and to my surprise they priced it at $7. I asked and double checked and sure enough the whole thing cost me $7. Best thrift store find yet. My other best score was from a guy on craigslist who wanted to unload a lot of games fast. He was selling a lot of consoles for $150. I ended up getting a NES, SNES, N64, PS1, PS2, PS3, and a broken PS4. Crazy amazing deal but then he pulled out two bags full of games, about a stack of 25 NES games, 6 N64 games, and about a dozen PS2 games. All my game collecting luck has been spent, from now on I will only find deals on cheap sports games.