Item — HN Reader

Something that I wonder about when I see the 'final' results like these NES cartridges sealed in a graded plastic box as a collectible.

Surely the market value of these will only hold up as long as they're within the normal lifespan of the people for whom the original NES is a nostalgia item?

For example: If you were born in 1978 and were 7 to 8 years old when your parents bought the original NES and brought it home with a small selection of games, that's probably a core memory for you. And probably exactly the same demographic now who will pay big money for these things.

But as this generation of people ages, do people who have no childhood memory of a NES (or SNES, or Genesis, etc) because they were born in 1999 consider these things to have any value? Will their value drop significantly when there's no longer a population of age-range-appropriate nostalgic collectors to buy them?

If these are being treated as some kind of "how many dollars per unit" valuable commodity to be traded/hoarded, is it the best possible solution to convert a collection of something like this into currency before the collectors age out of the market?

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For an anecdote in a different direction, my father bought a Ford model T a few years ago. Now, "classic" cars of the 60's and 70's are still very popular among those who lived through that time. Maybe your family had one or there was a particular car you wished you could have had. I don't think the model T works like that. Next year, all model T's will be 100 years old, so even if you are 95 today, when you started driving, the newest model T would have been a 20 year old car.

I've been with him to a couple of the local model T club meetings. The demographics are interesting. I was the youngest person there. My dad (late 60's) was the second youngest. But you have to remember that nobody alive, even the real geezers, has experienced a time when a Ford model T wasn't an old car. So by all means, it seems like this hobby should have died out decades ago, even as it continues to die out today. Very strange.

As it stands, it looks like a decent condition Model T can be bought these days for 10-20K, only a bit more than the inflation-adjusted original price. But, I don't really know what the collectors market was like at peak nostalgia.

I could see the NES being comparable to the Model T.

People are going to know what an NES or an “original Nintendo” is for decades, just like we all know what a Model T is.

My buddy's teenager has a collection of old systems, sort of does it as a hobby. I am not informed, but I guess they don't pay high for stuff.

Googling "psa graded 9.6 NES mario bros" turns up some absurd looking dollar values. I can totally see collecting old video game stuff as a hobby when we're talking about things that a teenager can get for free or nearly free. There's just a vast amount of consumer goods sloshing around North America and lots of peoples' aunts/uncles probably have a SEGA Genesis with some games in a cardboard box on a shelf in the basement.

Or for a few dollars/nominal cost. Sort of like the people who are buying and restoring 30-year old i386 gaming PCs for retro stuff, you can find the hardware for free if you talk to enough older people. Or find a way to intercept it before people literally huck it into a dumpster or take it to electronics recycling. Same for some people who luck into getting nice old 27 inch Sony Trinitron CRT TVs for free.

But when we're talking about thousands of dollars or more per unit for a sealed (so you can never actually open or play it without ruining its value and grading) game in a plastic box, that's a whole other ball game...

Define “high” here - I grew up collecting NES gear and games from the flea market as a teen (circa 2005) and it was perhaps $30 for a working NES console, most games were $5. Perhaps $10-20 for a Legend of Zelda or Super Mario Bros. Few times a year some empty-nesters would hold a yard sale at the flea market and one could snatch up their grown children’s abandoned childhood games, negotiate $20 for the whole box.

Nowadays you go to the flea market it’s a full-time reseller charging e-Bay influenced prices on all products. There’s no deal to be had. Feels like a death of an era sadly.

My personal theory on that is that you bought all your stuff at a specific time (like 2005 or prior) before the population of original 1980s NES-game-owners became old enough, established in their careers and started having enough disposable income to buy back all their childhood favorites in a new collection, driving up the market price per piece.

You get some inter generational nostalgia going on - I inherited my grandmothers NES which I have fond memories of playing any time I visited her.

I don’t play it as much as she did (I have modern games in my backlog to play as well) but I do occasionally buy more NES games to add to the collection.

I was borin in 1990, yet I still cherish the atari vcs I have

Honestly, I don't think the average nostalgic Gen X-er is that interested in a sealed video game cartridge.

I think the "sealed, unopened, graded" flavor of collecting is always more of a niche thing, and the actual market potential of tapping into American Gen X video game nostalgia is more clear when you look at sales of the NES/SNES Mini plug and play consoles or the Nintendo Switch subscription for classic games.

Collecting is an absolute rabbit hole, and it's often intrinsically tied to the "lore" and history of the collection's theme/genre more so than a collector's personal feelings of nostalgia.