Saturday, September 14, 2013

And So the Infernal Importing Madness Begins . . .

As I mentioned in an earlier article, I recently purchased a Famicom, Neo Geo Pocket (not Color, mind you) and WonderSwan (never heard of it? Neither had I before this purchase). It was just some sort of weird divinely thing where a co-worker sent me a link to a pseudo-Craigslist ad for the Famicom. Looking through the other stuff he had for sale, I came across the other two systems. He had originally wanted $50 for everything ($30 for the FC and $10 each for the others), but I offered $30, thinking I was low-balling and would get a counter-offer, and he accepted!

The LOOT!
Now, before this occurrence, I had little interest in import gaming and had never sought out foreign gaming stuffs before. But these just so happened to fall into my lap, so who was I to say no. I had the money and was certainly excited about the whole process of countering and purchasing. In an effort to find out more about the systems I had just purchased, I searched on the internet (as I, like most of you, do for all things I wonder about). I was surprised to see that while there are some resources for the Famicom, there are very few for the handheld systems. And just try searching for price guides for any of them. Forget about it. Well . . . maybe they exist on Japanese sites? I dunno, I don't speak Japanese.

I did find a pretty good resource for Famicom games at famicomworld.com. I like that it allows you to filter your results to your liking. Unfortunately, it's not totally complete as it's missing many games' ID number/code and doesn't always mention the NES version.

So . . . this leads me to a little (ha!) project I've started. Following in the footsteps of some of my favorite price guide sites, rarityguide.com and videogames.pricecharting.com, I've started tracking the eBay sales of these three systems and their games. Sure, it's not complete, and it's pure insanity to track multiple completeness-condition as well as accessories, and I'll be working on this for years to come, but I figure, if it's something I can put out there on the internet to share with the English speaking world, then why not?

I hope to turn this into a monthly-type post. Feel free to ask any questions or correct any misinformation you see. Enjoy!

[Edit: Sheets removed.]