No, you didn’t wake up in an alternate reality where 8-bit game consoles are as far as humanity has progressed in the year 2016: the NES Classic Edition is actually selling for hundreds — and in some cases many thousands — of dollars.
eBay, the last bastion of true capitalism left in our once great society, never fails to surprise when it comes to premium prices for in-demand, short-supply items. The NES Classic Edition is no exception, but where we might expect to see the highly sought-after retro re-release selling for a few bucks more than its $60 MSRP, we instead see some truly outrageous price tags.
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Most of the Classic Editions that have been successfully sold on eBay are priced anywhere from $150 to $250. That on its own is a hefty premium for a $60 device, but it’s nowhere near some of the truly ridiculous figures that eBayers have been apparently willing to pay.
There are more than a handful of units that have successfully sold for $3,000 or more, and several more at $4,000 and $5,000 price points:
There’s at least a few people who thought $10,000 was a reasonable asking price for a $60 hunk of plastic and metal that plays 30-year-old games as well:
And even one brave soul who, out of what can only be described as sheer fanaticism for old, blocky Nintendo pixels, shelled out a cool $88,888.88:
What in the name of Shigeru Miyamoto is wrong with these people? Okay, so the $88k one is almost certainly either some kind of an error, a scam, or a test listing that somehow made it into the archives and was proudly labeled as “Sold” by eBay’s system, but is the same true for all the rest?
Most of the sellers with sold listings for thousands of dollars have massive feedback scores and spotless eBay reputations. Surely not all of them are scams, right? That leaves us with the grim reality that somewhere out are nostalgia-deprived Nintendo fans who paid $5,000, $6,000, or even $10,000 to relive a small piece of their childhood. What a time to be alive.
