Ridiculous prices for Retro Games on auction sites – Case 1

I was just surfing through a popular auction site’s Vintage & Retro Gaming listings as I do and came across a Cascade Cassette 50 for the Sinclair ZX81. Not a really rare piece of software by any stretch of the imagination but as with all ZX81 software these days, getting rarer and therefore expectedly more expensive year on year. Be prepared to normally pay anything between £5 to £10 depending on condition and the number of bidders.

But this Cassette 50 is different. “How so?” I hear you ask. Is it a pre-release copy? No. Has it got an unusual inlay with a typo? Erm, no… In fact this piece of software has only one thing that makes it so special. It’s price.

cascade50

A Buy It Now for £50.00? I would normally laugh at the price and move on but this seller is either taking the p*ss or has no idea of the value of this item. They either want to convince an unsuspecting newbie collector into thinking it is super-rare when it isn’t or they need to learn its true market value before listing it.

From the listing:

“This is Very common for the Sinclair ZX Spectrum, but Extremely rare for the ZX81.”

No it’s bloody not.

A seller has every right to sell an item for what they want and I acknowledge that. But con-artists deserve to be treated with contempt, whether they are selling you a second-hand car or selling you Cascade’s finest on an internet auction site. I have the nasty feeling that they know full well how much it is really worth…

Somebody make them an offer for £5…

UPDATE: Surprise, surprise, the auction ended without a buyer. Shocking that. Anyway at the time of writing they have relisted the item for £40. Still £35 too expensive I’m afraid…

5 Comments

  1. Hehe, yes Cassette 50 is possibly a title I would maximum pay £1 for if it was the C64 version. There are some sellers that have no idea what its worth often listing things that you can buy for a few quid from other sellers listing in the same category.

    The fact is that many games were manufactured in hundreds of thousands copies and I dont think we are at the point where we have an equal amount of collectors… fortunately. 🙂

  2. I just put a rare 2600 cart in action at GameGavel.com – It already has a bid for US$1,999 on it! I guess that’s ridiculous, but I’m not complaining…

  3. @Peter Engelbrite

    Can I ask what cartridge it was you were selling and how much it finally went for?

    Ant

  4. Author

    Apparently the aforementioned seller has put this on the WOS forums:

    “I see they have removed my username from the picture now, it was still on there a few months ago when I last looked. Should’ve had them done for slander really, but couldn’t be bothered.”

    For everyone’s information, the image has never been changed and I NEVER put a name to the shame. So please stop the lies you use to add drama to your tall tales.

    And sue me dipsh*t. Just because you can rip people off doesn’t mean you should. It’s the selfish, misinformed minority like you who slowly ruin our pastime then have the gall to moan because you have been called out. If I find you doing it again, I’ll call you out again sucker. Believe it.

  5. what to say, all of the sites are filled with this nonesense. “Tales of ” series for 350 euro?
    Not a single game is worth that amount of money.

    And please don’t come with the excuse that they are “collector items”.
    Games are ment to be played, not collected on some shelf to gather dust.

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