Bingo. This is what would, if even, prevent it from hitting those high numbers. You've got the 5 or 6 collectors, maybe, willing to pay 1000+, maybe even 2K at the first auction. But once those collectors are out of the picture, you've got it sitting with a "market" price tag and no takers. A perfect example of a game like this is the Blades of Steel red label box. When I first started collecting, that was close to a 90 dollar game CIB. I remember scouring ebay and only finding sosafan's (i think) copy at a high BIN in his store. But once everyone who was willing to pay big for it got their copy, it quickly started diminishing in value, and I was having trouble selling my minty CIB for 20 bucks.

Of course it's different since the BOS is maybe a R7-8, but the amount of people who'll pay for the copy of a "rare" game is relative to how rare the game is and ultimately how expensive it will be because money talks, and pubes walk.

R10 Rare games usually keep their value. Snes is pretty hot right now. Looks to be worth a bit more than I thought. Wish you luck Gerald with whatever you do with this one...

But with capstones of a set, people aren't buying them necessarily based on future value.  They are buying it because they want to complete their set at any cost.  It's like when people make their WTB thread with a bounty 2 or 3 times market value.  They aren't offering that high just because they think they can sell it for higher at some point, they are offering high because they want that item in their collection right now without waiting any longer.

^Yeah, but it depends on how the majority is going to view this game (as SNES hasn't picked up like NES, this still has yet to be determined). Why not go for the normal orange version, some would say. Is it just a variant, or a something necessary for a complete set? You've already got a couple of these floating around most likely in the completionists' collections, anyways, so it might not generate as much legitimate interest as you would expect.

Then let me rephrase, I'm legitimate interest and I'm willing to pay significantly more than an orange version. I'm not saying I'd be high enough to win since there are some ridiculous spenders in SNES right now, but I know which values I would consider this an absolute steal at.

Thanks for all the replys everyone!

I'm thinking that this did come from a Nintendo employee..

The reason I sayt that is because I got a total of 8 games in the lot, all boxed and complete and 2  of them (Ultimate Fighter and Super Nova) had those yellow/transparent "Nintendo Promotional Offer" stickers on the box. Not exactly an open and shut case, but it points in that direction.

Blue Ember - I thought it was a joke or stock photo when I saw the ad too and all the way up until I inspected it, I thought it was gonna be a store display box or something! The CL market in our area is nuts, and I was not expecting this guy to call me back!

3 ninja's is way rarer

Man that box is beautiful! Looks so much nicer than the orange version.

Does anyone know the story behind the black box?

Nintendo internal release?

Capcom mail order exclusive?

Canned NTSC retail release with a few surviving copies?

BTW, this has to be the only case of a varient being more common in sealed form

how far are you from redmond and what other games did you get from the nintendo employee?

you washington members are so lucky to just be able to walk down the street and find prototypes or jump on craigslist and find black box final fight guy's....

Nothing else too crazy, but a few other good games: Legend, FFMQ, Ultimate Fighter, SOS, Super Nova, wolfchild and Rex Ronan.

I basically live down the street from Nintendo and MS. It's actually come in handy once before, I found a boxed Hello Kitty Xbox on CL severeal years ago. That's the only other time I felt like I was taking crazy pills up until I actually saw it

My buddy John found a prototype Final Fantasy for NES that used churches as save points! This one was a garage sale, I believe.

What's the print run on the Hello Kitty Xbox?  Wasn't it something obscure like 100 or 250?  I dabble in Xbox myself and have heard that is one of the most difficult console versions to track down.

Apparently 500, and you could only acquire it if you bought a certain Panasonic TV...in singapore. I remember hearing about it on gamesniped, but how would someone on CL in Washington have that? Pretty random.

i could see a sealed one going for upwards of 1000$, but a CIB with a little wear i think maybe half of that, possibly a little more. 600$ ish im guessing for value

either way, that is an awesome piece, ive never seen one before, only herd of it.

Very cool to see this!

A certain someone paid $6,000 for a sealed copy, and it was damaged too.

Yeah but really obscure niche stuff is highly volatile. I don't even really believe in past sales data on it honestly, it boils down to who are the big players in CIBs, who's been looking the longest, and who's willing to pay the most.

what makes this "really obscure niche stuff"?
as of right now, isnt this the only known CIB black box final fight guy out of 3 known copies?

too bad VGA doesnt "authenticate" extremely rare used CIB games, like coin graders do with rare coins that are "ungradeable".....yet.

i wonder how pissed the "gamers" would get if they started "authenticating" and slabbing all rare CIBs in any condition and not just new games? RIOTS

also, i would like to see stuff like the NWC carts or loose stadium events carts, authenticated and slabbed as well.

how many of these have beed found

http://www.gamesniped.com/wp-cont...

I'm pretty sure it's 3. I think Sosafan had one at one point, I know Buyatari has one and he might've traded his soso copy for a nicer one if I recall correctly, and I'm pretty sure there's one or two more floating out there.

It's the Earthworm Jim 2 one that I'm curious about--I've only seen one of those ever, I even forgot what it looks like. I think Buyatari had that one too.

EDIT: Did some searching and I believe Curtis has both of these sealed. I'd love for him to come here with some photos!

That's false.  There was never a VGA one on ebay.  In fact, I've never even seen this game graded.

I remember seeing a pic that Curtis posted of his VGA graded sealed copy and I think it had a score of 85.  I picked up a copy of the Zombies Ate My Neighbors varient box about a year ago on eBay, not sure how many are out there but can't be many.

^ I think you're right but it was most definitely never on ebay. If it was, I would have bought it

http://www.nintendoage.com/forum/...

Looks like it's Buyatari that has the EWJ2 box (but looks like he removed the pic from the thread). But, I thought the EWJ2 box he had was more of a prototype box than an actual retail release box. My memory could be wrong though.

way more than three of those zombies out there.    rare but there are a few here and there.