There are two triggers. Firstly the XBOX 360 store closing and secondly is the rise in TH-camrs making videos about collecting, hidden gems and games you have to get before the store closes.
The games aren't going anywhere. They existed before the store closes and will exist afterwards. Those people who wanted physical could have bought them before. The people who buy digital care about digital stores. It's like a neighbor who has a dog. Should you have a dog too? If you don't care about dogs, then you don't want a dog. I believe there are two things driving the current run on games - hype and targeting of specific games by sellers. It's now a meme that closing digital stores, limited editions, etc. create FOMO. Those who didn't care about physical are influenced into thinking they should. The people who only care about digital and are affected by the closing store have options to get their digital game downloaded on their box (official and unofficial). Why else would someone who cared about digital dip into the available physical copies? I think most of the people who want physical games are focused on the 360 supply now and have no gauge in determining availability. How often does Knight's Contract get posted on ebay? If someone misses a copy at auction, will another turn up tomorrow, a week, 3 months, a year, etc.. Maybe it's really easy to walk into game stores , flea markets, and other aftermarket retail around where someone lives. Maybe those games turn up more often at those outlets than ebay or other online stores. I think the only thing that is gone from time is those digital only experiences like playing the game of the moment online. There are projects which revive or rebuild game hosting servers for certain games, but they never will be at their peak again. People have nostalgia for physical and digital spaces.
@@WhatsOnMyShelf Really though you have to look ok at older consoles to realize that availability and price will be changing going forward. Loojk at consoles like the PS2 original Xbox and GameCube. These have alot of titles that don't come up often unless you are searching specifically for it and when you find them alot of those command fairly high prices. It's not long before 360 and PS3 games are exactly the same story. Despite whatever is pushing the prices up now is the right time to be getting them for the simple fact that if you want these games it's only going to get harder to find them and costlier to pick them up. In alot of ways I think that there is some justified hype going on because we all understand and recognise the pattern of where it is and where it's going to go. There will never be a time when there is a game that someone wants and can't get it but that doesn't mean it's going to get easier, it will only be harder and more expensive. Yes it will plateau but not yet and we have not seen the final point of where that's going to be. Simple supply and demand and right now the demand is high and I don't see much sign of that easing up. I think most people buy a mix of online and physical and I don't think one affects the other much one way or another. Rereleased games are one thing that has the biggest impact.
@@Kenno10rapid Right, as demand decreases, so too will prices. Atari saw it happen. The consoles of the pre-2000 era have already seen plateauing. Talking with a lot of gamers my age and as I see on YT, some get frustrated with the hobby because they refuse to pay $2K for Little Samson, for instance. Another thing is time. The hobby of finding, saving to buy, and just playing is seen as less important. As the number of those people leave the hobby, the prices drop as sellers want a return. There is FOMO for sellers as well where they like to sell before prices drop even in the short term. I've seen some sales of collections on ebay where people will sell at half the going rate which is a telltale sign of someone leaving or finding another way to play. In regards to the remasters, I question whether they have lasting impact on the current generations interested in retro. People said that for Wii's VC releases. They had an initial negative impact on prices, but eventually the prices regained strength. Lots of games on PS1 store had this too. Look at where the PS1 is going now. Again, I do think this has it's limits. I don't think anyone can be certain what happens to the broad interest in retro five decades from now when there have been multiple generations of non-physical kids. My guess is based on the comic market. There are kids interested in 60s Spidey comics, but rarely do they go after the physical issue. The comic market is pretty much an asset market where slabbed comics matter. That may happen with games where only slabbed copies matter (new, used) and people only play digitally.
@@Kenno10rapid i kinda disagree, i dont think ps2 games will get much more expensive than they are now... unless the yters post about them for 5 months straight.
Agree, though there's a 3rd trigger which coincided with those mentioned; and that is games being suddenly delisted. Spec Ops the Line is a famous example but more recently The Crew. This has only fed the fire of grabbing physical.
I don't think it's just market manipulation. A lot of us are looking at the state of modern gaming, and realizing there are a lot of newer games that aren't as fun, and going back to old games and platforms. The abundance of remasters basically supports this mindset as well. I've bought a ton of 360 games personally in the last year. However, I can't recall spending more than $30 on any from my local shops. I don't have a physical release of Darkest of Days or The Last Templar, though. Oh no.
Market manipulation involves more than just buying obscure titles and hyping them. It's the overall phenomenon around store closures. Digital buyers are the only people who should care about digital closure. The same people who wanted to get a physical copy of the game might eventually get it; however, all the attention from videos creates a false depiction of reality that the games are going to disappear fast. The 360 and PS3 have been seeing some strange prices surges overall in my opinion over the last four years. These are young systems which still have a lot of viable supply.
It's the big gaming TH-cam collectors that drive prices up on video games. It's always that hidden gem they talk about and everyone jumps on ebay to buy it after watching, the game is a load of rubbish but it's got to be good if Metal Jesus says it is....lol Tbh here in the uk xbox 360 games are everywhere. It's all heresay and like you said i would like to know the people that actually buy 360 games at £200.00 because they must be brain dead. Here's my advice, just buy a game that you want to play and not just to put on your shelf for looks and don't worry about the xbox 360 store arcade games because most of them are a pile shite.
I agree that people here raise awareness of certain games. Depending on how tuned in you are, you might not realize there's something you would enjoy unless you stumble across it in a TH-cam video. My awareness of everyday releases started to wane during the PS3 / 360 years and there's no keeping track of everything being released today. The libraries for modern systems, PS4 onwards is so vast. I'm on the same page about game libraries. Just get what you think looks interesting. The library will grow. I do understand where the fullset people are coming from, though it must be exhausting, especially if you're not going after a tiny set like the 32X.
The 360 had lots of great games that were truly fun to play. This basic formula seems to be diluted in the modern console. There are only a handful of games I would call great released in the last 5 to 10 years. Of course that is my personal taste. Game like doom, metro, rage, insurgency sandstorm.Who wants to pay for a download game that will have no servers in 6 yrs.
The 360 was the lead platform so it received the majority of titles, and those titles were ported to its generational brethren. With age, gamers become jaded since most of the experiences are the same with better graphics or sound or just bigger worlds or add a little more complexity like you can have damage to your armor or even build you own. Sometimes there are truly unique ideas and unique ways to play such as my favorite example from the PS3 / 360 era, Mirror's Edge. I'd say the most interesting things should be done in VR. The format is still fresh. I understand that experiences requires adapting to this format and it still feels more complicated to use than picking up a controller and pressing power.
@@WhatsOnMyShelf yes. It sparked me collecting physical overall for everything. Im returning to physical copy movies when possible. OG Xbox games and PlayStation
@@SpookbotTV There are a lot of exclusives on the XB and I can't think of ports that look or play worse on og XB. I think the only downside is the optical drive. I know they can be replaced, but I'm not sure they can be replaced with something better than the stock DVD drive.
Game selling people and stores with deep pockets buy the em all up and manipulate prices to make huge profits sitting on otherwise games that was 5$ (trash)
There is a TH-camr called 'TVM' he mentioned about wanting to buy promo copies of games ... next thing you see lots of people on Reddit going "I have this promo copy of X, how much is it worth?". Then you had 'Retro Ghetto' (TH-camr) saying about PS3 Essentials being desirable so all the sheep went out and bought all the fodder essential release games due to him hyping it up.
Yeah, there are definitely spikes caused by people here on YT. It's natural to discuss things that interest us. Back in the school days, I remember discussing Shenmue a lot and a bunch of us got it when it was released. That circle of influence is small. The reach with YT is vast and with enough subs to help the algorithm draw people to your vid, the affect has been recorded multiple times. I don't know if any of the people on YT intentionally draw interest in a game with the specific purpose of raising the price, but mentioning something like, 'I wonder why this middle of the road game has so few copies on ebay is so cheap, considering the atmosphere of retro.' I always had plans of doing a series of videos like that--not 'hidden gems', but rather weirdly how this game has so few copies and is cheap. I can see how producing some video like that could be a double-edge sword. I would caveat that I can't vouch for quality, but that doesn't seem to matter with collectors. It's pretty much hype that keeps Little Samson at $2k-$3k. It's a great game, but man, do I really want to spend that? That's more than my rent!
@@WhatsOnMyShelf I know people have accused MJR of hyping up prices on a game to increase the value of his collection. However i dont know if thats true or just totally down to 'circle of influence' as you quite rightly said.
@@SecretOfMonkeyIsland784 The value of the collection is only there, if it is sold. It's also a lot of work to sell an entire library of games. Claims like this are specious. MJR has a lot of viewers. The more fans there are, the more there are anti-fans. I recall this was a thing brought to my attention when I used to listen to Howard Stern (I'm not a fan or anti-fan now). People called into the show to specifically say they don't like anything he says and get fired up about it.
@@SecretOfMonkeyIsland784 Another thing to think about with MJR and other big people in the gamer community is that making YT vids is their job. They release videos that are trendy to have content to keep viewers. I have doubted the authenticity of topics covered by these channels because they pump out vids, in order to get paid. Less videos = less money (and also less relevancy to viewers). Maybe there are people that make money on here and cover topics they truly care about, and maybe they can even do it in a more laid back fashion.
Many You tube content creators have always been accused of click bait. Large number of these creators have created fear for clicks and consequently artificially increase prices. Not much one can do except don’t buy the games at these prices and drive the demand down along with the prices.
@@WhatsOnMyShelf Only because we give it to them by clicking. It is difficult but we have to try and refrain when the description starts with "you need to, now" to click on that video.
@@CaptSpeirsB744 That's what I'm saying, man. People have control whether they click, whether they buy, etc. Imagine if everyone didn't buy any 360 games for over a year. Sellers would deem them as a loss. There was a time when og XBox was like that. Sellers couldn't make any money on the majority of titles so they didn't sell them.
For me it's stackable achievements why I wanted culdcept saga was $12 I was like ill grab it later lmao $180 now. Crash time I got 15 last year now 100 terrible game also lmaoo
I wonder how it got there. I played some of the PS2 version and thought the concept was unique, but pretty niche. With the amount of copies posted and sold regularly, I might assume there is an appeal to the formula. Maybe people just want something different. The price is total HYPE though.
There are a lot of effects that cause this. Delisting of once downloadable games, expired movie (transformers, spiderman, 007) or music licenses (GTA) that prevent a remaster, missing backwards compatibility (flatout UC) and the demand for uncut video games from the states. European and especially germanversions of the games are usually much lower in price because they are cut (fallout, quake 4, saints row, fear, left 4 dead ...). You were able to download these games uncut from other marketplaces via vpn, but this opportunity will be gone on july, 29th.
I agree, those who wanted these specific version would want them; however, the people buying primarily digital have a different mindset than those who fill shelves with plastic cases. I've encountered many 30+ year-olds who just aren't buying physical any more because of space. There is a hyper-focused attention on the physical supply of 360 games currently, and those who were always interested in getting physical feel the urge to buy before they believe games will hit prices that are unattainable for them. If people were casually picking up and selling games, there probably wouldn't be this spike in prices so fast, simply because the demand would not be there.
Most of the people scalping likely dont even play the games they purchase. Why the hell are people buying games they wont even play? I collect quality games that I know will be played to completion and cant be played on PC. Most of these spikes are for games that are above average at best and usually have better PC ports with higher framerates and mods...
There have been complete set collectors in nerd markets for a while. I don't think it's exclusive to the nerd culture though. Regarding PC, I question how much cross-over there is between the platforms. I recall hearing a lot of gamers shift towards PC during the PS4 XBone era since those platforms had similarities with PCs like the game must be installed before playing and hardware generations were getting half-steps instead of simply the cut-down models like slims of the past. Personally, I buy games if I come across them cheap and they look decent or I've heard decent things about them. It's really easy to build a massive library for consoles that are on the way out. Even the big guys, Game Stop will fire sale games for less than $5 near the end.
Dark is the perfect example of a game targeted for profit. I don't know if the game was talked about in hype videos since I didn't engage with those. What I notice is that I stumbled across the game in February for as cheap as $2 on ebay. I noted it because there were less than ten copies posted on the US ebay store, where you restrict results to those only listed by US sellers. I've been into the retro scene for some time now, and this is a pattern. I intend to make a series about it, but I don't know when that will happen. I wanted to make this vid about 2-3 months ago.
Ive been collecting 360 games since last year. I was nastolgic for the system, the games were cheap (I keep getting lots and bundles online, paying 1-3 bucks per game on average), and it feels like the last Xbox system that cared about preserving the games on disc. Now games are spiking up and its been harder to even buy these games. I really gotta look hard for a good deal now. Such a shame.
Yeah at this point having a retail console and an RGH console is where it's at. With RGH 3.0 you don't anything beyond a couple of wires and a resistor. Some models require a diode like the falcons and later model Corona boards require a post fix adapter but with the right tools it's a easy to moderate difficulty solder job but if you're a newbie to soldering I wouldn't recommend it as your first rodeo with an iron.
Im from the European market so i tend to follow the cex base values on games more than what these guys say and i always buy em either at cib or below preferable below. Im currently trying to get all PAL releases which is easier said than done.
Paper Mario is a bad bad example for a price spike and drop. This game fell under the port to the other consoles category. That is why there is that late end of 2023 price drop. That is because it was first released to the Nintendo online service and later on announcement for the physical release of the game happened. So this resulted, that people that got this game, just so that they could play it could now go and get the switch version of the game. At the same time there were decent amount of copies released, so now the game is searching its value reasonable to the Gamecube collectors.
you know is BIG FOMO going around when GameStop started selling 360 games again. literally in the middle of the xbox ones cycle it was impossible to find 360 games in gamestop. ill admit tho this FOMO has introduced me to some games that look fun but aren’t worth the price!!
I've been buying 360 games for MANY years, over a decade, saying they were gonna be worth something one day, and that the bargain bin prices were the time to buy. Everyone said I was crazy. 360 games, worth more than $5? No way they said. But, really, WAY.
That's true that resellers try put the prices up by buying many copies of the same game. They will look for a game that didn't sell many copies and usually they are the games that reviewed badly. It makes so much sense now. TH-camrs say this game is a hidden gem then ebay guy goes to try sell that game for more money But the thing is alot of us wouldn't of known about that certain game before it was mentioned in a hidden gems video. So people saying youtubers ruin collecting is false. The fact is if you are collecter you should be buying PS4 and Xbox One games right now. For me personally i will never have the space so I just enjoy watching other people's collections. Nintendo Switch game cases are small so maybe I should go for those games if they are ever cheap but I'm not sure if Nintendo switch games will ever be affordable to own them all.
It's funny how most of us sold our old gaming systems them rebought. The thing is these days we don't need to hold onto Xbox One because Series X is Xbox One on steroids. I think ps5 VR will be the next thing that goes up in price because they didn't make many units and physical games too because the demand is low now.
@@brandonlee7382 Vita cases are even more tiny than Switch, if space were an issue and you had to play only one system forever. I've always been the buy what you like gamer. The library comes naturally from that process. TH-camrs placing spotlight on certain games has a measurable effect, depending on the viewership. There are some channels I have recorded a direct correlation of video to price surge of game. Most of these channels are not the small time AVGN or Metal Jesus types, though they have sway too and it has been noted in the past. I don't believe those people do it out of some malintent. They have an interest and mention it. The audience responds naturally by getting the game to enjoy or hate. Some people buy things just because it's a quirk / oddity / meme. The PC market has a scene where gamers build decked out machines and cram them into beige boxes of 90s PC makers.
Been working on a complete 360 set for years.. fear its never going to happen now due to this, but its not the end of the world, its just games at the end of the day
They call it a spike for a reason. What is happening is due to the increased focus on the 360's supply of physical games. People don't know how long it takes to get a certain game at a certain price. For example, how often does a complete Culdcept Saga pop up? When people find that there are cheaper sellers trying to undersell and the the market is rife with copies, the average price will drop to some new high point. What it actually settles around is anyone's bet; however, I will say that games do tend to go up once they find a new high. Considering past generations, the $200 threshold is still relatively low for standard edition games.
Great video dude. I was really blown away by it. Its cool to actually see some content coming from you! Always enjoy your comments. FOMO is for real. I wonder too if people, like me, mainly made a Xbox 360 video just for the clicks or if it was trending? You mentioned it kind of came out of no where.. The Xbox 360 is one of my favorite consoles and it had a bunch of great games on it.. but you can still find most those physical games pretty cheap... at least the ones I loved anyways. lol
It's not the best time to buy 360. I'd say check back in 6 months. The 360 was undervalued because it was the lead platform during those years. There was a lot of cheap 360 stuff out there for a while. If there's another "recent" system that is similar and hasn't hit big numbers, it's probably the PS2. It was the lead. It had tons of games made for it, including obscure exclusives. It doesn't have a lot of super expensive titles. I wanted to make this video about 2-3 months ago when I noticed that Dark (2013) game was going anywhere from $40-60. It's just really hard to find time to film, edit, etc. I appreciate the comment.
ok so here are the things when game will not become expensive: 1. big game print especially on multiple platforms. If the amount of game copies is big enough, even exclusive games have no chance to rise the price (other than very very slow market progression as more and more copies will be damaged). That is why you have lot of copies of Halos, Assassin creeds for cheap. This is also the case for old Forza games and most of the EA sports games. 2. Game was properly ported to next gen console / consoles. If this is done, that will usually cap the previous gen versions at max of the price of the next gen or lower. This especially combined will create all those shelf filler games, even if the game had a very good reception (Bioshock games, Mass Effect games). 3. Game version on that specific console was inferior game version on other consoles (or was not considered definitive). a good example is Alone in the Dark for Xbox 360 is cheaper then the Infernal edition for PS3. Need for Speed Most Wanted for Original Xbox is way cheaper than Xbox 360 edition. 4. Game is backwards compatible and is at least accessible in current gen console eshop. Now while this may still spike some titles, the amount of price increase is lower compared to if the backward compatible game is removed from the eshop, because of some issues (like licensing). in these cases even if somebody would buy for example 100 copies of first Assassin Creed game, it will do nothing to the Ebay market (it may rise up the prices for couple of days, but then 200 more copies will rush back to be offered there and thus the price will decrease. When the game will become expensive: 1. very small game print and usually mild to bad game reception upon release. This usually results into a game to be rediscovered later on. It could be the so bad it is good case, or simply a type of a game that did not have a proper customer market at that time, but now it exists. A good example is Fire Emblem for Gamecube in North Amerika, at the time of release it had relatively small fan base in NA region and it was considered a failure. As a result no additional game print was made and publisher moved to the next system with their next game. And even Fire Emblem for WII did not have big enough print for current fanbase, that now wants to collect remaining Fire Emblem Games. 2. Game went under a radar at the time of release and barely anybody reported about that game. This is usually combined with a limited print amount as a result of a poor game sales. This is the case of a game like Fatal Inertia, which was completely unknown and rarely mentioned for years and is from a small developer. Once the game was discovered by general public which wants to complete their game collection, of course prices have spiked. 4. Specific version of a game is way superior than the other version of the game. So that is the case of Ultimate Marvel Alliance Gold Edition. You can get the standard version of the game for a very cheap price, but the Gold Edition is now very pricey, because it contained delisted DLC characters. Since the game was not ported with this DLC, that version of the game remains the ultimate experience version of the game. again just youtubers and forums would not be enough to push up this game, if there was not demand for it and enough Marvel fans, that want to play it or own it. 5. Original Game developer does not exist or original game code was lost. This can push up even a game from known company under the right circumstances. This would be the case of Wolfenstein game for Xbox 360 / PS3 if there were not enough copies on the market. But this is clearly the case of Bullet Witch for Xbox 360 6. Game was exclusive for a specific gaming system. Obviously exclusive games do have in theory potential to be more valuable if combined with other points (like low print and mild reception or dead developer). This would be again the case of Bullet Witch, that also happened to be exclusive. 7. Game had problematic licensing agreement and as a result it is delisted from eshops even if it is backward compatible. Now the lower chance of the game to be reworked, the higher chance for it to be demanded. That is why something like Spec Ops The Line, does have a good chance to be brough back (if there is a good will to rework this game, because removing licensed songs from the game radio will have no effect on a gameplay). Some games have medium chance to be revived (Marvel games if the developer will deem it to be lucrative enough to extend or renew licensing). And others have more or less no chance for revival (50 cents Blood on the Sand is a very good example of this. The game would have no sense without the main protagonist and there is almost no chance, that he would agree to the licensing or that it would make any profit sense). 8. Game required online verification system that does not exist anymore. As a result only certain versions of the game would still work. So this is clearly the case for The Darkest of Days for Xbox 360. You can see that the PC version is sold just for few $. That is because this game requires Xbox Live service, that does not work anymore. As a result, the only playable version is the Xbox 360 version, that uses console itself. (of course it also did not have big print, had poor release reception and for consoles it was exclusive to Xbox 360). 9. Release oddities. This has less to do with how complete the game is disc / cartridge and more about specific case, cover art, additional artbook or comic or additional Steelbook. Dragon Age origins collector edition with the Cloth map can be 2-3x more expensive than sold without it. Mind you, sellers may still list it as complete in a sense of game + case + user manual. Similar situation is a double price for Conan game for Xbox 360 with additional comic or Dragon Ball Z: Burst Limit with the bonus DVD. These add-ons will not add to your gameplay, but if the versions with them were severely limited, then they will rise over time because of the collectors demand. As you can see youtubers alone are not able to "manipulate" the market and neither are Ebay / Amazon / Craiglist / Kijiji / FB Marketplace. That is if, the game does not already have 1 or more predispositions. And while it is correct that shop closure announcement will push people to finish their collection while they can, the fact also is, that prices will not come back to the pre announcement status (even if many titles will have spikes and drops). What will also happen over time, that mentioned above games will be slowly disappearing from the market as they will find their way to the collectors hands. Your example of Little Samson price history is a bit problematic for a different reason. If a game has a very slow sale, when only few copies per year are sold, then you can see those big up and down spikes which are at the end of the chart, because with that high price, physical condition of a game matters a lot, so it is not just about it being complete or not, but also about how good or batter does manual, cartridge or the box look. Sometimes also a different system is snug in, because it was mislabeled by the seller and Pricecharting, only takes text into consideration and not the actual photos.
i'll be honest, i was in a fomo mood for the last little while but ive been buying gamelots off facebook and at a few stores and the games are 3-5$ ea, i've picked up a few obscures that I know about like Wet, Lollipop chainsaw, spec ops, lost odyessy, blue dragon and afro samurai, but i'm not looking to get the 200$ games. I'll just emulate them. And i honestly don't even plan to resell them, this is one of the only collections i can realistically have withbout breaking bank
I'm not sure which nearly-$200 games are worthwhile for 360. Maybe there will be a Little Samson on 360 eventually; however, I believe at some point the games turn into assets, which is a shame considering the original intent. I'd be curious about the game with the least prints on 360 and whether it sells for a higher price than something like a Culdcept or Operation Darkness. Still, considering where previous generations have gone with the pricing of some of their games, despite a predictable drop in the price of 360 games, the games will probably climb again to some new height. It's like that anecdote I gave about the pricing of Little Samson. It's the same game experience at $400, $1000, and $3000.
@@WhatsOnMyShelf yeah for the 360 it's a bit of a different breed since it's the most recent store closure and the fomo is making everyone hoard theres probably various games that are rares sitting in the bottom of a gas station clearance bin, and there's most likely a bit of market manipulation for some games and the only games id even consider worthwhile is the marvel games that are in limited supply because the gameplay and license is worth it to marvel and game collectors. I've got 300+ (about 30 sports titles that I'll never touch) physical copies now, and have slowly made my way through a few games and I do have to say the gameplay from games in the early 2010's is so much better than a lot of the games now with the same cookie cutter layout. Either way this is the collection that will make me rich with experience and achievements score. Probobly a small fortune in 20 years too
@@tonyhell234 I probably should have brought it up on the video, but this is a pattern when store closures are announced as that would have supported my argument. But, yes people don't realize that these announcements put more focus on the 360 physical supply. They get a fear that the games will never be attainable at the current price though they don't see this spike pattern. The cash supply runs out. Cvid was the exception because the gov gave people "free" money multiple and those people inflated the cost of collectibles. Regarding availability, I also believe there are boxes of unopened games sitting in a warehouse from what I've seen anecdotally. VGchartz puts Culdcept Saga at 120K games sold in the US. Is there a normal print run, or do publishers gauge interest ahead of time and print numbers in accordance to their estimate? Maybe it's different per publisher. That would really give people a sense; however, they can also simply watch how often the expensive games show up on the biggest auction platform.
Most of the price spikes are caused by TH-camrs hyping up the market with videos or by something like a film, new game causing renewed temporary interest (AKA Fallout TV Series). I have heard a few suggest the price will drop after the store closes but not fully return to original prices which i agree with. Many people are only buying the games for investment reasons so rarity and desirability of the title is all they are considering when buying. I am going to hold off on buying the odd pricier title i am after till post July 2024 and beyond when interest drops.
Yeah Fatal Inertia is a pretty good indicator of that. That game isnt even remotely rare, but every youtuber kept hyping it up for a year. Now its expensive. Before that happened. I could find a copy on marketplace etc. near every day for like 1-5$.
I have been collecting X360 games for years at absolute rock bottom prices. The fomo that has erupted in recent months was an opportunity for me personally to be sure which games I still wanted to add to my collection. I also have the advantage of living in the PAL region where fomo has not yet really penetrated and the prices here remain relatively lower than in the US. I eventually bought games like Bullet witch and Wet in full "fomo time" for 10,-€ each (the exchange rate of the euro is about that of the dollar) Games that I really wanted to add, such as Fist of the Northstar Ken's Rage and Kens Rage 2, I paid 25,-€and 30,-€ for. Ultimately, 35 is my max price for what I want to spend on a retro game unless it's sealed. Of course the prices will drop and my purchase price always remains a lot below the Ebay prices. I always buy locally and never use Ebay btw. This way you can never really pay too much for a game that can later drop enormously in price By the way, I wonder who those people are who buy a Wet or Ken's rage 2 for 70,- to 120,-€ or $. As a collector I would never pay such prices.Thx for you'r realy good insight on the subject.I like you'r style.
I appreciate the comment. This Collectors, note series has evolved over the years. It's style changes on a per video basis. The people paying these prices do not know what a spike is. My hope is that my video draws attention to the pattern and possibly reduces this type of run on the market in the future (high hopes for reach :) After releasing the vid, I realized I should have been more explicit about the unnatural focus on the 360 supply, it might help people realize that focus is normally spread throughout the game market and the acute period here should resolve itself shortly. If you enjoy WET, you probably would enjoy Stranglehold, if you haven't tried that already. It's another dumb fun shooter where you interact with a lot of the environment in gunfights. I don't pay too much attention to the European market since I live in the USA. With my limited knowledge, I thought it been the more affordable market though, yes, there are definitely outliers, especially those which the international community show interest like Banana Prince for the NES, mainly exclusives or those which made the jump from Japan to Europe but not to USA.
Strangehold was 1 of my last pick ups for 5,-Never played the game but looking forward to it.I also found Dead to rights retribution...probably in the same category. The PAL video game market is a bit annoying because every EU country (and there are many) release their own language version. From the X360/PS3 onwards, almost all games are playable in English by default and it is just the text on the box which can be in another language with the relevant language as an option in the menu.
Haha I'm glad youtube isn't smart enough to capture the multiple space hack. I've had comments where I wasn't even writing a "naughty" word, but YT warned me that I did when two words beside eachother in a sentence made a "you can't say this on television" word.
Man. I miss videos stuff. I have a bunch of stuff in raw. I have a crap ton of 360 games. Downloads was never my deal back then. I tried to watch my videos the other day but it’s all owned over stream. 3:43 also this is a dope party Duke shot right there No lie. I love this video.you got the game.
I'm surprised by the response I got from this vid. I've got a ton of raw stuff too. I know if I started uploading daily videos of my finds which I haven't uploaded, people would get sick. I thought of doing it. I have over a hundred pickup vids not uploaded. I thought of doing a 100 days of pickups. Sad thing is that it's so hard to spend time doing this. California is rough, if you're not making 120k. The sad part is that I've got challengers at the gsale game who drive a Tesla. That's a house on wheels and the dude still wants to steal from my plate. Yeah, man, if you're up to it, I'd enjoy any vid you uploaded. I normally queue up new vids from the game scene on Saturday while I do jobby jobs :( so don't be disappointed if it takes a while for me to leave a comment.
@@WhatsOnMyShelf yeah I’m kinda the same. Put it up when I can. It’s not like this is going anywhere. lol. Also my computer needs to get fixed soon. I prefer that editing suite since I paid real money for it.
@@meanmachine5598 Did anyone see the price of Dynasty Warriors Fist of the North Star 2? When would you see that with a dynasty warriors game? Fist is still a relatively obscure series in the West too.
@@WhatsOnMyShelf I have Fist of the North Star 1 & 2 on 360 bought them from Ebgames back when they were clearing out 360 games years ago. I know that 2nd one was pretty rare even back then when I picked it up for $15 but I don't think I could ever sell it, I love those games. I also wouldn't look at it as a dynasty warriors game, it has similarities for sure but the combat with the combos and cool effects makes it feel more like a beat em up for me anyways. I get tired of the dynasty warrior games pretty quick, there is no depth in their combat.
@@meanmachine5598 I understand. I'm the same way with the Gundam Dynasty games, but I do recognize their repetitive nature. I've always felt the Dynasty games are pretty bland. They do a lot of good fan service though. In the original Dynasty Warriors series, they cater to fans of the back and forth struggle over land in China.
Man I am SO glad I started collecting for the 360 a couple years ago not because of trends or hype (there was literally none at the time ofc) but because I genuinely love the 360 since I grew up with one. Some of the games I bought for dirt cheap have already tripled or quadrupled in price! Ridiculous! Because of this bs, i’ve already been looking into physical ps4 and switch games I might want to pick up sooner rather than later because I can already see these doorknobs trying this crap with those systems too in a few years.
It's a multitude of factors. The intense focus on 360 supply right now doesn't help. Those people focusing on 360 now might have originally been focused on getting the latest Switch or PS5 game. PS4 and XBONE have really cheap games now. You can find a lot for $10 or less.
Xbox One games in the UK are ABSURDLY cheap. It is absolutely incredible how many sealed (won't keep them sealed) games I have bought for £5 or less. Ok to Good games at that, not fodder. I picked up loads of Microsoft Studios games (Because they are on game pass) for under £3. Sunset Overdrive cost me £1.50 from CEX as did State of Decay 2. I am grabbing XONE games before these absolute mutant youtubers artificially inflate those prices once they have had their way with Xbox 360 and PS3 when that store closes.
@ChilliKnightOG Yeah, that's my thought, too. lol, xbox is so cheap. Why not, I'm mostly a pc player but have been getting into the series x. I also figured that the price increased rumors of Gamepass from a few months ago. I'd start buying it up, lol. I got lucky buying GameCube and 360 before they went crazy. Hopefully, that doesn't happen to Xbone, but you never know.
Good luck with that. There are tons of cheap sealed games for $10 and under, but there are SO MANY GAMES! Man, there was a time I would know most of the new releases.
I wonder how many people who watch vids like yours are paying the hype prices. If they are, they aren't taking the message. Maybe it comes with age and seeing patterns repeat, in order for people to convince themselves. This will probably happen similarly on PS3 once Sony makes the official announcement for their store. They retracted a previous announcement and I remember similar discussions around that brief one week period.
@WhatsOnMyShelf I think we're seeing it a lot over here with people on TH-cam collecting certain types of games I.e Platinum sets, red spines etc people follow and do the same and the prices bounce up, but it soon calms down. I think the same will happen with the 360, especially when people realise they are paying over the odds for some 360 games which are very average, just hyped! 😆
@@pixelpaul_pxp I find it weird--the whole attention 360 is getting. Maybe it's because retro is broadly a thing nowadays. The last official NES game in USA was produced in 1994. The NES market started to draw wider interest in 2012 in the USA. That an 18 year gap. The last 360 game was made in 2018, I believe. Six years really isn't a lot of time to grow a nostalgic audience, in comparison. Caveats are that the game industry and its audience have grown and inflation. Some games saw a $20-40 boost during this hype cycle. Back in the 90s, $20 meant something. Maybe a $50-60 game is looked as a expendable. I don't know. I'm pretty tight with money and always try to swing a bargain. It's rare that I just buy something at the suggested price without some "scheme" to recoup the cost by selling other items in bought a lot or similar situation.
@WhatsOnMyShelf we're very similar then mate, I very rarely spend big prices for older games, as cheap as I can find and if it's not cheap enough, I just don't get and will wait! But 360, I think there's a current gen knock on, in that people just aren't getting enough new games and looking to older gens to get more gaming, and xbox/ps3 was fairly affordable for that. There's the shifting demographics of who has the nostalgia for that gen too and has that disposable income too I guess.
@@pixelpaul_pxp Yeah, I keep hearing that there are no games. I don't have a PS5, but I see trailers for games from time to time that make it on my wantlist. I'm not a hardcore buyer. I've waited forever to buy games and suffered regret about retro. I can think of some games that were $25 and suddenly they are priced rock solid $100+ now. I always believe that I will get a better deal. It's worked out OK for most games though. I don't think that will be a problem for the PS3 / 360 / Wii generation for some time. My guess is that many haven't exploded into a billion bits.
@@TheRedmondGamer I saw a video of a seller who put a chunk of change into BCFX well before civd. I assume there's no video which drove gamers to this obscure sports ball game during this recent 360 heat. It's not necessarily that it's sports ball and nobody want those games as there are some titles which get hyped up because of their obscurity such as N7 Tecmo Basketball. I think what makes rare titles worth something is that they are actually rare. It would have been difficult to source a lot of Stadium Events and have the forethought that it would reach such heights.
EU market is quite different and Xbox collectors are more scarce. Prices have seen an uptick but not nearly as much. Btw, Dark is more common in Europe, still in the obscure-ish side, but it was made by a European studio iirc, and most x360 collectors have always been aware of it. I think it's pretty decent, the meta score is way too harsh.
Europeans are more wise and circumspect then. In regards to middling games, maybe the kind retrospect has something to do with having a library full of games and not willing to get rid of those that are OK. I've read reviews in retro mags where they trash a game or give up on it. Later, retro fans will say it's 'not bad'. There was a phrase in the US we used bitd - a weekend rental. The game earned that nickname because we could rent the game from a store, beat it during a short time, and be glad we played something new. There were better games on the horizon. Most weekend rentals could have used more time in the oven. My library has tons of mid-tier games :) I try not to pay a lot for any of my games.
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There are two triggers. Firstly the XBOX 360 store closing and secondly is the rise in TH-camrs making videos about collecting, hidden gems and games you have to get before the store closes.
The games aren't going anywhere. They existed before the store closes and will exist afterwards. Those people who wanted physical could have bought them before. The people who buy digital care about digital stores. It's like a neighbor who has a dog. Should you have a dog too? If you don't care about dogs, then you don't want a dog.
I believe there are two things driving the current run on games - hype and targeting of specific games by sellers. It's now a meme that closing digital stores, limited editions, etc. create FOMO. Those who didn't care about physical are influenced into thinking they should. The people who only care about digital and are affected by the closing store have options to get their digital game downloaded on their box (official and unofficial). Why else would someone who cared about digital dip into the available physical copies?
I think most of the people who want physical games are focused on the 360 supply now and have no gauge in determining availability. How often does Knight's Contract get posted on ebay? If someone misses a copy at auction, will another turn up tomorrow, a week, 3 months, a year, etc.. Maybe it's really easy to walk into game stores , flea markets, and other aftermarket retail around where someone lives. Maybe those games turn up more often at those outlets than ebay or other online stores.
I think the only thing that is gone from time is those digital only experiences like playing the game of the moment online. There are projects which revive or rebuild game hosting servers for certain games, but they never will be at their peak again. People have nostalgia for physical and digital spaces.
@@WhatsOnMyShelf Really though you have to look ok at older consoles to realize that availability and price will be changing going forward. Loojk at consoles like the PS2 original Xbox and GameCube. These have alot of titles that don't come up often unless you are searching specifically for it and when you find them alot of those command fairly high prices. It's not long before 360 and PS3 games are exactly the same story. Despite whatever is pushing the prices up now is the right time to be getting them for the simple fact that if you want these games it's only going to get harder to find them and costlier to pick them up. In alot of ways I think that there is some justified hype going on because we all understand and recognise the pattern of where it is and where it's going to go. There will never be a time when there is a game that someone wants and can't get it but that doesn't mean it's going to get easier, it will only be harder and more expensive. Yes it will plateau but not yet and we have not seen the final point of where that's going to be. Simple supply and demand and right now the demand is high and I don't see much sign of that easing up. I think most people buy a mix of online and physical and I don't think one affects the other much one way or another. Rereleased games are one thing that has the biggest impact.
@@Kenno10rapid Right, as demand decreases, so too will prices. Atari saw it happen. The consoles of the pre-2000 era have already seen plateauing. Talking with a lot of gamers my age and as I see on YT, some get frustrated with the hobby because they refuse to pay $2K for Little Samson, for instance. Another thing is time. The hobby of finding, saving to buy, and just playing is seen as less important. As the number of those people leave the hobby, the prices drop as sellers want a return. There is FOMO for sellers as well where they like to sell before prices drop even in the short term. I've seen some sales of collections on ebay where people will sell at half the going rate which is a telltale sign of someone leaving or finding another way to play.
In regards to the remasters, I question whether they have lasting impact on the current generations interested in retro. People said that for Wii's VC releases. They had an initial negative impact on prices, but eventually the prices regained strength. Lots of games on PS1 store had this too. Look at where the PS1 is going now. Again, I do think this has it's limits. I don't think anyone can be certain what happens to the broad interest in retro five decades from now when there have been multiple generations of non-physical kids.
My guess is based on the comic market. There are kids interested in 60s Spidey comics, but rarely do they go after the physical issue. The comic market is pretty much an asset market where slabbed comics matter. That may happen with games where only slabbed copies matter (new, used) and people only play digitally.
@@Kenno10rapid i kinda disagree, i dont think ps2 games will get much more expensive than they are now... unless the yters post about them for 5 months straight.
Agree, though there's a 3rd trigger which coincided with those mentioned; and that is games being suddenly delisted.
Spec Ops the Line is a famous example but more recently The Crew. This has only fed the fire of grabbing physical.
I don't think it's just market manipulation. A lot of us are looking at the state of modern gaming, and realizing there are a lot of newer games that aren't as fun, and going back to old games and platforms. The abundance of remasters basically supports this mindset as well.
I've bought a ton of 360 games personally in the last year. However, I can't recall spending more than $30 on any from my local shops.
I don't have a physical release of Darkest of Days or The Last Templar, though. Oh no.
Market manipulation involves more than just buying obscure titles and hyping them. It's the overall phenomenon around store closures. Digital buyers are the only people who should care about digital closure. The same people who wanted to get a physical copy of the game might eventually get it; however, all the attention from videos creates a false depiction of reality that the games are going to disappear fast.
The 360 and PS3 have been seeing some strange prices surges overall in my opinion over the last four years. These are young systems which still have a lot of viable supply.
I'm only buying xbox 360 video games that I want to play
Right on!
Facts!
I'm only buying 360 Video games I might play somtimes
@@hollllllllz You can't play all the games all the time ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
It's the big gaming TH-cam collectors that drive prices up on video games. It's always that hidden gem they talk about and everyone jumps on ebay to buy it after watching, the game is a load of rubbish but it's got to be good if Metal Jesus says it is....lol
Tbh here in the uk xbox 360 games are everywhere.
It's all heresay and like you said i would like to know the people that actually buy 360 games at £200.00 because they must be brain dead.
Here's my advice, just buy a game that you want to play and not just to put on your shelf for looks and don't worry about the xbox 360 store arcade games because most of them are a pile shite.
I agree that people here raise awareness of certain games. Depending on how tuned in you are, you might not realize there's something you would enjoy unless you stumble across it in a TH-cam video. My awareness of everyday releases started to wane during the PS3 / 360 years and there's no keeping track of everything being released today. The libraries for modern systems, PS4 onwards is so vast.
I'm on the same page about game libraries. Just get what you think looks interesting. The library will grow. I do understand where the fullset people are coming from, though it must be exhausting, especially if you're not going after a tiny set like the 32X.
Exactly my thoughts I just buy games that looks interesting to me and I could see myself playing those. FOMO is Bs
The 360 had lots of great games that were truly fun to play. This basic formula seems to be diluted in the modern console. There are only a handful of games I would call great released in the last 5 to 10 years. Of course that is my personal taste. Game like doom, metro, rage, insurgency sandstorm.Who wants to pay for a download game that will have no servers in 6 yrs.
The 360 was the lead platform so it received the majority of titles, and those titles were ported to its generational brethren. With age, gamers become jaded since most of the experiences are the same with better graphics or sound or just bigger worlds or add a little more complexity like you can have damage to your armor or even build you own. Sometimes there are truly unique ideas and unique ways to play such as my favorite example from the PS3 / 360 era, Mirror's Edge. I'd say the most interesting things should be done in VR. The format is still fresh. I understand that experiences requires adapting to this format and it still feels more complicated to use than picking up a controller and pressing power.
For me it was the talk of Xbox not making a new console and going all digital. It made me go back to physical media at the start of the year.
I haven't heard that one yet. Are you digging into the original XBox library as well?
@@WhatsOnMyShelf yes. It sparked me collecting physical overall for everything. Im returning to physical copy movies when possible. OG Xbox games and PlayStation
@@SpookbotTV There are a lot of exclusives on the XB and I can't think of ports that look or play worse on og XB. I think the only downside is the optical drive. I know they can be replaced, but I'm not sure they can be replaced with something better than the stock DVD drive.
Game selling people and stores with deep pockets buy the em all up and manipulate prices to make huge profits sitting on otherwise games that was 5$ (trash)
There is a TH-camr called 'TVM' he mentioned about wanting to buy promo copies of games ... next thing you see lots of people on Reddit going "I have this promo copy of X, how much is it worth?". Then you had 'Retro Ghetto' (TH-camr) saying about PS3 Essentials being desirable so all the sheep went out and bought all the fodder essential release games due to him hyping it up.
Yeah, there are definitely spikes caused by people here on YT. It's natural to discuss things that interest us. Back in the school days, I remember discussing Shenmue a lot and a bunch of us got it when it was released. That circle of influence is small. The reach with YT is vast and with enough subs to help the algorithm draw people to your vid, the affect has been recorded multiple times.
I don't know if any of the people on YT intentionally draw interest in a game with the specific purpose of raising the price, but mentioning something like, 'I wonder why this middle of the road game has so few copies on ebay is so cheap, considering the atmosphere of retro.' I always had plans of doing a series of videos like that--not 'hidden gems', but rather weirdly how this game has so few copies and is cheap. I can see how producing some video like that could be a double-edge sword. I would caveat that I can't vouch for quality, but that doesn't seem to matter with collectors. It's pretty much hype that keeps Little Samson at $2k-$3k. It's a great game, but man, do I really want to spend that? That's more than my rent!
@@WhatsOnMyShelf I know people have accused MJR of hyping up prices on a game to increase the value of his collection. However i dont know if thats true or just totally down to 'circle of influence' as you quite rightly said.
@@SecretOfMonkeyIsland784 The value of the collection is only there, if it is sold. It's also a lot of work to sell an entire library of games.
Claims like this are specious. MJR has a lot of viewers. The more fans there are, the more there are anti-fans. I recall this was a thing brought to my attention when I used to listen to Howard Stern (I'm not a fan or anti-fan now). People called into the show to specifically say they don't like anything he says and get fired up about it.
@@SecretOfMonkeyIsland784 Another thing to think about with MJR and other big people in the gamer community is that making YT vids is their job. They release videos that are trendy to have content to keep viewers. I have doubted the authenticity of topics covered by these channels because they pump out vids, in order to get paid. Less videos = less money (and also less relevancy to viewers). Maybe there are people that make money on here and cover topics they truly care about, and maybe they can even do it in a more laid back fashion.
Many You tube content creators have always been accused of click bait. Large number of these creators have created fear for clicks and consequently artificially increase prices. Not much one can do except don’t buy the games at these prices and drive the demand down along with the prices.
People don't realize they have control.
@@WhatsOnMyShelf Only because we give it to them by clicking. It is difficult but we have to try and refrain when the description starts with "you need to, now" to click on that video.
@@CaptSpeirsB744 That's what I'm saying, man. People have control whether they click, whether they buy, etc. Imagine if everyone didn't buy any 360 games for over a year. Sellers would deem them as a loss. There was a time when og XBox was like that. Sellers couldn't make any money on the majority of titles so they didn't sell them.
For me it's stackable achievements why I wanted culdcept saga was $12 I was like ill grab it later lmao $180 now. Crash time I got 15 last year now 100 terrible game also lmaoo
I wonder how it got there. I played some of the PS2 version and thought the concept was unique, but pretty niche. With the amount of copies posted and sold regularly, I might assume there is an appeal to the formula. Maybe people just want something different. The price is total HYPE though.
There are a lot of effects that cause this. Delisting of once downloadable games, expired movie (transformers, spiderman, 007) or music licenses (GTA) that prevent a remaster, missing backwards compatibility (flatout UC) and the demand for uncut video games from the states. European and especially germanversions of the games are usually much lower in price because they are cut (fallout, quake 4, saints row, fear, left 4 dead ...). You were able to download these games uncut from other marketplaces via vpn, but this opportunity will be gone on july, 29th.
I agree, those who wanted these specific version would want them; however, the people buying primarily digital have a different mindset than those who fill shelves with plastic cases. I've encountered many 30+ year-olds who just aren't buying physical any more because of space.
There is a hyper-focused attention on the physical supply of 360 games currently, and those who were always interested in getting physical feel the urge to buy before they believe games will hit prices that are unattainable for them. If people were casually picking up and selling games, there probably wouldn't be this spike in prices so fast, simply because the demand would not be there.
Most of the people scalping likely dont even play the games they purchase. Why the hell are people buying games they wont even play? I collect quality games that I know will be played to completion and cant be played on PC. Most of these spikes are for games that are above average at best and usually have better PC ports with higher framerates and mods...
There have been complete set collectors in nerd markets for a while. I don't think it's exclusive to the nerd culture though. Regarding PC, I question how much cross-over there is between the platforms. I recall hearing a lot of gamers shift towards PC during the PS4 XBone era since those platforms had similarities with PCs like the game must be installed before playing and hardware generations were getting half-steps instead of simply the cut-down models like slims of the past.
Personally, I buy games if I come across them cheap and they look decent or I've heard decent things about them. It's really easy to build a massive library for consoles that are on the way out. Even the big guys, Game Stop will fire sale games for less than $5 near the end.
Bro, I played Dark back in the day, it's like $5AUD on the Xbox 360 Store so I'll pick that up before the closure, but I'd NEVER pay a premium for it.
Dark is the perfect example of a game targeted for profit. I don't know if the game was talked about in hype videos since I didn't engage with those. What I notice is that I stumbled across the game in February for as cheap as $2 on ebay. I noted it because there were less than ten copies posted on the US ebay store, where you restrict results to those only listed by US sellers. I've been into the retro scene for some time now, and this is a pattern. I intend to make a series about it, but I don't know when that will happen. I wanted to make this vid about 2-3 months ago.
That game is so crap
Ive been collecting 360 games since last year. I was nastolgic for the system, the games were cheap (I keep getting lots and bundles online, paying 1-3 bucks per game on average), and it feels like the last Xbox system that cared about preserving the games on disc.
Now games are spiking up and its been harder to even buy these games. I really gotta look hard for a good deal now. Such a shame.
RGH 😎
Yeah at this point having a retail console and an RGH console is where it's at. With RGH 3.0 you don't anything beyond a couple of wires and a resistor. Some models require a diode like the falcons and later model Corona boards require a post fix adapter but with the right tools it's a easy to moderate difficulty solder job but if you're a newbie to soldering I wouldn't recommend it as your first rodeo with an iron.
I have bought many of my cildhood games that me and my brothers would play. Also bought games that i wanted as a child but didn't have the money.
Im from the European market so i tend to follow the cex base values on games more than what these guys say and i always buy em either at cib or below preferable below. Im currently trying to get all PAL releases which is easier said than done.
Paper Mario is a bad bad example for a price spike and drop. This game fell under the port to the other consoles category. That is why there is that late end of 2023 price drop. That is because it was first released to the Nintendo online service and later on announcement for the physical release of the game happened.
So this resulted, that people that got this game, just so that they could play it could now go and get the switch version of the game. At the same time there were decent amount of copies released, so now the game is searching its value reasonable to the Gamecube collectors.
you know is BIG FOMO going around when GameStop started selling 360 games again. literally in the middle of the xbox ones cycle it was impossible to find 360 games in gamestop.
ill admit tho this FOMO has introduced me to some games that look fun but aren’t worth the price!!
For real? I thought they discounted them into oblivion. It makes you wonder what they have in storage.
I was just in game stop yesterday it's a small selection but it's there@@WhatsOnMyShelf
dude drops a banger video after a year - hells yea man. Some good food for thought here.
I've been buying 360 games for MANY years, over a decade, saying they were gonna be worth something one day, and that the bargain bin prices were the time to buy. Everyone said I was crazy. 360 games, worth more than $5? No way they said. But, really, WAY.
I had it with paying above $60 for 360 games.
Lol don't pay more than $29
That's true that resellers try put the prices up by buying many copies of the same game. They will look for a game that didn't sell many copies and usually they are the games that reviewed badly. It makes so much sense now.
TH-camrs say this game is a hidden gem then ebay guy goes to try sell that game for more money
But the thing is alot of us wouldn't of known about that certain game before it was mentioned in a hidden gems video. So people saying youtubers ruin collecting is false. The fact is if you are collecter you should be buying PS4 and Xbox One games right now. For me personally i will never have the space so I just enjoy watching other people's collections. Nintendo Switch game cases are small so maybe I should go for those games if they are ever cheap but I'm not sure if Nintendo switch games will ever be affordable to own them all.
It's funny how most of us sold our old gaming systems them rebought. The thing is these days we don't need to hold onto Xbox One because Series X is Xbox One on steroids. I think ps5 VR will be the next thing that goes up in price because they didn't make many units and physical games too because the demand is low now.
@@brandonlee7382 Vita cases are even more tiny than Switch, if space were an issue and you had to play only one system forever. I've always been the buy what you like gamer. The library comes naturally from that process.
TH-camrs placing spotlight on certain games has a measurable effect, depending on the viewership. There are some channels I have recorded a direct correlation of video to price surge of game. Most of these channels are not the small time AVGN or Metal Jesus types, though they have sway too and it has been noted in the past. I don't believe those people do it out of some malintent. They have an interest and mention it. The audience responds naturally by getting the game to enjoy or hate. Some people buy things just because it's a quirk / oddity / meme. The PC market has a scene where gamers build decked out machines and cram them into beige boxes of 90s PC makers.
Been working on a complete 360 set for years.. fear its never going to happen now due to this, but its not the end of the world, its just games at the end of the day
They call it a spike for a reason. What is happening is due to the increased focus on the 360's supply of physical games. People don't know how long it takes to get a certain game at a certain price. For example, how often does a complete Culdcept Saga pop up? When people find that there are cheaper sellers trying to undersell and the the market is rife with copies, the average price will drop to some new high point. What it actually settles around is anyone's bet; however, I will say that games do tend to go up once they find a new high. Considering past generations, the $200 threshold is still relatively low for standard edition games.
Great video dude. I was really blown away by it. Its cool to actually see some content coming from you! Always enjoy your comments. FOMO is for real. I wonder too if people, like me, mainly made a Xbox 360 video just for the clicks or if it was trending? You mentioned it kind of came out of no where.. The Xbox 360 is one of my favorite consoles and it had a bunch of great games on it.. but you can still find most those physical games pretty cheap... at least the ones I loved anyways. lol
It's not the best time to buy 360. I'd say check back in 6 months. The 360 was undervalued because it was the lead platform during those years. There was a lot of cheap 360 stuff out there for a while. If there's another "recent" system that is similar and hasn't hit big numbers, it's probably the PS2. It was the lead. It had tons of games made for it, including obscure exclusives. It doesn't have a lot of super expensive titles. I wanted to make this video about 2-3 months ago when I noticed that Dark (2013) game was going anywhere from $40-60. It's just really hard to find time to film, edit, etc. I appreciate the comment.
ok so here are the things when game will not become expensive:
1. big game print especially on multiple platforms. If the amount of game copies is big enough, even exclusive games have no chance to rise the price (other than very very slow market progression as more and more copies will be damaged).
That is why you have lot of copies of Halos, Assassin creeds for cheap. This is also the case for old Forza games and most of the EA sports games.
2. Game was properly ported to next gen console / consoles. If this is done, that will usually cap the previous gen versions at max of the price of the next gen or lower. This especially combined will create all those shelf filler games, even if the game had a very good reception (Bioshock games, Mass Effect games).
3. Game version on that specific console was inferior game version on other consoles (or was not considered definitive). a good example is Alone in the Dark for Xbox 360 is cheaper then the Infernal edition for PS3. Need for Speed Most Wanted for Original Xbox is way cheaper than Xbox 360 edition.
4. Game is backwards compatible and is at least accessible in current gen console eshop. Now while this may still spike some titles, the amount of price increase is lower compared to if the backward compatible game is removed from the eshop, because of some issues (like licensing).
in these cases even if somebody would buy for example 100 copies of first Assassin Creed game, it will do nothing to the Ebay market (it may rise up the prices for couple of days, but then 200 more copies will rush back to be offered there and thus the price will decrease.
When the game will become expensive:
1. very small game print and usually mild to bad game reception upon release. This usually results into a game to be rediscovered later on. It could be the so bad it is good case, or simply a type of a game that did not have a proper customer market at that time, but now it exists.
A good example is Fire Emblem for Gamecube in North Amerika, at the time of release it had relatively small fan base in NA region and it was considered a failure. As a result no additional game print was made and publisher moved to the next system with their next game. And even Fire Emblem for WII did not have big enough print for current fanbase, that now wants to collect remaining Fire Emblem Games.
2. Game went under a radar at the time of release and barely anybody reported about that game. This is usually combined with a limited print amount as a result of a poor game sales. This is the case of a game like Fatal Inertia, which was completely unknown and rarely mentioned for years and is from a small developer. Once the game was discovered by general public which wants to complete their game collection, of course prices have spiked.
4. Specific version of a game is way superior than the other version of the game. So that is the case of Ultimate Marvel Alliance Gold Edition. You can get the standard version of the game for a very cheap price, but the Gold Edition is now very pricey, because it contained delisted DLC characters. Since the game was not ported with this DLC, that version of the game remains the ultimate experience version of the game. again just youtubers and forums would not be enough to push up this game, if there was not demand for it and enough Marvel fans, that want to play it or own it.
5. Original Game developer does not exist or original game code was lost. This can push up even a game from known company under the right circumstances.
This would be the case of Wolfenstein game for Xbox 360 / PS3 if there were not enough copies on the market. But this is clearly the case of Bullet Witch for Xbox 360
6. Game was exclusive for a specific gaming system. Obviously exclusive games do have in theory potential to be more valuable if combined with other points (like low print and mild reception or dead developer). This would be again the case of Bullet Witch, that also happened to be exclusive.
7. Game had problematic licensing agreement and as a result it is delisted from eshops even if it is backward compatible.
Now the lower chance of the game to be reworked, the higher chance for it to be demanded. That is why something like Spec Ops The Line, does have a good chance to be brough back (if there is a good will to rework this game, because removing licensed songs from the game radio will have no effect on a gameplay). Some games have medium chance to be revived (Marvel games if the developer will deem it to be lucrative enough to extend or renew licensing). And others have more or less no chance for revival (50 cents Blood on the Sand is a very good example of this. The game would have no sense without the main protagonist and there is almost no chance, that he would agree to the licensing or that it would make any profit sense).
8. Game required online verification system that does not exist anymore. As a result only certain versions of the game would still work.
So this is clearly the case for The Darkest of Days for Xbox 360. You can see that the PC version is sold just for few $. That is because this game requires Xbox Live service, that does not work anymore. As a result, the only playable version is the Xbox 360 version, that uses console itself. (of course it also did not have big print, had poor release reception and for consoles it was exclusive to Xbox 360).
9. Release oddities. This has less to do with how complete the game is disc / cartridge and more about specific case, cover art, additional artbook or comic or additional Steelbook.
Dragon Age origins collector edition with the Cloth map can be 2-3x more expensive than sold without it. Mind you, sellers may still list it as complete in a sense of game + case + user manual. Similar situation is a double price for Conan game for Xbox 360 with additional comic or Dragon Ball Z: Burst Limit with the bonus DVD. These add-ons will not add to your gameplay, but if the versions with them were severely limited, then they will rise over time because of the collectors demand.
As you can see youtubers alone are not able to "manipulate" the market and neither are Ebay / Amazon / Craiglist / Kijiji / FB Marketplace. That is if, the game does not already have 1 or more predispositions.
And while it is correct that shop closure announcement will push people to finish their collection while they can, the fact also is, that prices will not come back to the pre announcement status (even if many titles will have spikes and drops).
What will also happen over time, that mentioned above games will be slowly disappearing from the market as they will find their way to the collectors hands.
Your example of Little Samson price history is a bit problematic for a different reason. If a game has a very slow sale, when only few copies per year are sold, then you can see those big up and down spikes which are at the end of the chart, because with that high price, physical condition of a game matters a lot, so it is not just about it being complete or not, but also about how good or batter does manual, cartridge or the box look. Sometimes also a different system is snug in, because it was mislabeled by the seller and Pricecharting, only takes text into consideration and not the actual photos.
The only thing that makes a game expensive is if people care (in other words, hype).
I bought my xbox 360 about a year ago glad i missed the start of the spike.
i'll be honest, i was in a fomo mood for the last little while but ive been buying gamelots off facebook and at a few stores and the games are 3-5$ ea, i've picked up a few obscures that I know about like Wet, Lollipop chainsaw, spec ops, lost odyessy, blue dragon and afro samurai, but i'm not looking to get the 200$ games. I'll just emulate them.
And i honestly don't even plan to resell them, this is one of the only collections i can realistically have withbout breaking bank
I'm not sure which nearly-$200 games are worthwhile for 360. Maybe there will be a Little Samson on 360 eventually; however, I believe at some point the games turn into assets, which is a shame considering the original intent. I'd be curious about the game with the least prints on 360 and whether it sells for a higher price than something like a Culdcept or Operation Darkness. Still, considering where previous generations have gone with the pricing of some of their games, despite a predictable drop in the price of 360 games, the games will probably climb again to some new height. It's like that anecdote I gave about the pricing of Little Samson. It's the same game experience at $400, $1000, and $3000.
@@WhatsOnMyShelf yeah for the 360 it's a bit of a different breed since it's the most recent store closure and the fomo is making everyone hoard theres probably various games that are rares sitting in the bottom of a gas station clearance bin, and there's most likely a bit of market manipulation for some games and the only games id even consider worthwhile is the marvel games that are in limited supply because the gameplay and license is worth it to marvel and game collectors. I've got 300+ (about 30 sports titles that I'll never touch) physical copies now, and have slowly made my way through a few games and I do have to say the gameplay from games in the early 2010's is so much better than a lot of the games now with the same cookie cutter layout. Either way this is the collection that will make me rich with experience and achievements score. Probobly a small fortune in 20 years too
@@tonyhell234 I probably should have brought it up on the video, but this is a pattern when store closures are announced as that would have supported my argument. But, yes people don't realize that these announcements put more focus on the 360 physical supply. They get a fear that the games will never be attainable at the current price though they don't see this spike pattern. The cash supply runs out. Cvid was the exception because the gov gave people "free" money multiple and those people inflated the cost of collectibles.
Regarding availability, I also believe there are boxes of unopened games sitting in a warehouse from what I've seen anecdotally. VGchartz puts Culdcept Saga at 120K games sold in the US. Is there a normal print run, or do publishers gauge interest ahead of time and print numbers in accordance to their estimate? Maybe it's different per publisher. That would really give people a sense; however, they can also simply watch how often the expensive games show up on the biggest auction platform.
Most of the price spikes are caused by TH-camrs hyping up the market with videos or by something like a film, new game causing renewed temporary interest (AKA Fallout TV Series). I have heard a few suggest the price will drop after the store closes but not fully return to original prices which i agree with. Many people are only buying the games for investment reasons so rarity and desirability of the title is all they are considering when buying. I am going to hold off on buying the odd pricier title i am after till post July 2024 and beyond when interest drops.
Yeah Fatal Inertia is a pretty good indicator of that. That game isnt even remotely rare, but every youtuber kept hyping it up for a year. Now its expensive. Before that happened. I could find a copy on marketplace etc. near every day for like 1-5$.
I have been collecting X360 games for years at absolute rock bottom prices. The fomo that has erupted in recent months was an opportunity for me personally to be sure which games I still wanted to add to my collection. I also have the advantage of living in the PAL region where fomo has not yet really penetrated and the prices here remain relatively lower than in the US. I eventually bought games like Bullet witch and Wet in full "fomo time" for 10,-€ each (the exchange rate of the euro is about that of the dollar) Games that I really wanted to add, such as Fist of the Northstar Ken's Rage and Kens Rage 2, I paid 25,-€and 30,-€ for. Ultimately, 35 is my max price for what I want to spend on a retro game unless it's sealed. Of course the prices will drop and my purchase price always remains a lot below the Ebay prices. I always buy locally and never use Ebay btw. This way you can never really pay too much for a game that can later drop enormously in price By the way, I wonder who those people are who buy a Wet or Ken's rage 2 for 70,- to 120,-€ or $. As a collector I would never pay such prices.Thx for you'r realy good insight on the subject.I like you'r style.
I appreciate the comment. This Collectors, note series has evolved over the years. It's style changes on a per video basis.
The people paying these prices do not know what a spike is. My hope is that my video draws attention to the pattern and possibly reduces this type of run on the market in the future (high hopes for reach :) After releasing the vid, I realized I should have been more explicit about the unnatural focus on the 360 supply, it might help people realize that focus is normally spread throughout the game market and the acute period here should resolve itself shortly.
If you enjoy WET, you probably would enjoy Stranglehold, if you haven't tried that already. It's another dumb fun shooter where you interact with a lot of the environment in gunfights.
I don't pay too much attention to the European market since I live in the USA. With my limited knowledge, I thought it been the more affordable market though, yes, there are definitely outliers, especially those which the international community show interest like Banana Prince for the NES, mainly exclusives or those which made the jump from Japan to Europe but not to USA.
Strangehold was 1 of my last pick ups for 5,-Never played the game but looking forward to it.I also found Dead to rights retribution...probably in the same category.
The PAL video game market is a bit annoying because every EU country (and there are many) release their own language version. From the X360/PS3 onwards, almost all games are playable in English by default and it is just the text on the box which can be in another language with the relevant language as an option in the menu.
All TH-cam m o r o n s talk about rarity and prices xbox 360
Haha I'm glad youtube isn't smart enough to capture the multiple space hack. I've had comments where I wasn't even writing a "naughty" word, but YT warned me that I did when two words beside eachother in a sentence made a "you can't say this on television" word.
Man. I miss videos stuff. I have a bunch of stuff in raw.
I have a crap ton of 360 games. Downloads was never my deal back then. I tried to watch my videos the other day but it’s all owned over stream.
3:43 also this is a dope party Duke shot right there
No lie. I love this video.you got the game.
I just got an idea…. Gonna do a vid soon.
Should I brand this new video as a response to this video?
When I stop. I’m dead.
I'm surprised by the response I got from this vid. I've got a ton of raw stuff too. I know if I started uploading daily videos of my finds which I haven't uploaded, people would get sick. I thought of doing it. I have over a hundred pickup vids not uploaded. I thought of doing a 100 days of pickups. Sad thing is that it's so hard to spend time doing this. California is rough, if you're not making 120k. The sad part is that I've got challengers at the gsale game who drive a Tesla. That's a house on wheels and the dude still wants to steal from my plate.
Yeah, man, if you're up to it, I'd enjoy any vid you uploaded. I normally queue up new vids from the game scene on Saturday while I do jobby jobs :( so don't be disappointed if it takes a while for me to leave a comment.
@@WhatsOnMyShelf yeah I’m kinda the same. Put it up when I can. It’s not like this is going anywhere. lol. Also my computer needs to get fixed soon. I prefer that editing suite since I paid real money for it.
I've recently sold half of my 360 collection to capitalize on the price hikes on some of these mediocre and bad games
Fatal Inertia, paid like $15 sold for $160 game was crap and happy to unload it
@@meanmachine5598 Did anyone see the price of Dynasty Warriors Fist of the North Star 2? When would you see that with a dynasty warriors game? Fist is still a relatively obscure series in the West too.
@@WhatsOnMyShelf I have Fist of the North Star 1 & 2 on 360 bought them from Ebgames back when they were clearing out 360 games years ago. I know that 2nd one was pretty rare even back then when I picked it up for $15 but I don't think I could ever sell it, I love those games. I also wouldn't look at it as a dynasty warriors game, it has similarities for sure but the combat with the combos and cool effects makes it feel more like a beat em up for me anyways. I get tired of the dynasty warrior games pretty quick, there is no depth in their combat.
@@meanmachine5598 I understand. I'm the same way with the Gundam Dynasty games, but I do recognize their repetitive nature. I've always felt the Dynasty games are pretty bland. They do a lot of good fan service though. In the original Dynasty Warriors series, they cater to fans of the back and forth struggle over land in China.
I'm grateful to you for showing me your Xbox 360 video game collection
Crazy that i actually do want ninety nine nights 2😂 to play
Hey, there are people who enjoy Neptunia games, though I question their motives.
Man I am SO glad I started collecting for the 360 a couple years ago not because of trends or hype (there was literally none at the time ofc) but because I genuinely love the 360 since I grew up with one. Some of the games I bought for dirt cheap have already tripled or quadrupled in price! Ridiculous! Because of this bs, i’ve already been looking into physical ps4 and switch games I might want to pick up sooner rather than later because I can already see these doorknobs trying this crap with those systems too in a few years.
It's a multitude of factors. The intense focus on 360 supply right now doesn't help. Those people focusing on 360 now might have originally been focused on getting the latest Switch or PS5 game. PS4 and XBONE have really cheap games now. You can find a lot for $10 or less.
Hey!!! You have enough money in Xbox 360 games to buy a new home after July 29 😅
You kiddin :) Houses are crazy expensive and the rates are impossible. Homes start at 700K where I live. Most are +1M.
And here I am going for a complete Xbox one collection lmao
Xbox One games in the UK are ABSURDLY cheap. It is absolutely incredible how many sealed (won't keep them sealed) games I have bought for £5 or less. Ok to Good games at that, not fodder. I picked up loads of Microsoft Studios games (Because they are on game pass) for under £3. Sunset Overdrive cost me £1.50 from CEX as did State of Decay 2. I am grabbing XONE games before these absolute mutant youtubers artificially inflate those prices once they have had their way with Xbox 360 and PS3 when that store closes.
@ChilliKnightOG Yeah, that's my thought, too. lol, xbox is so cheap. Why not, I'm mostly a pc player but have been getting into the series x. I also figured that the price increased rumors of Gamepass from a few months ago. I'd start buying it up, lol. I got lucky buying GameCube and 360 before they went crazy. Hopefully, that doesn't happen to Xbone, but you never know.
Good luck with that. There are tons of cheap sealed games for $10 and under, but there are SO MANY GAMES! Man, there was a time I would know most of the new releases.
@WhatsOnMyShelf yeah it's rough lol but with the gamestop 4 for 20 and the but 2 get 1 it makes it's alot easier
very nice
Thanks
I posted a video recently saying very similar, people need to calm down a bit and stop feeding the hype! Great video mate.
I wonder how many people who watch vids like yours are paying the hype prices. If they are, they aren't taking the message. Maybe it comes with age and seeing patterns repeat, in order for people to convince themselves. This will probably happen similarly on PS3 once Sony makes the official announcement for their store. They retracted a previous announcement and I remember similar discussions around that brief one week period.
@WhatsOnMyShelf I think we're seeing it a lot over here with people on TH-cam collecting certain types of games I.e Platinum sets, red spines etc people follow and do the same and the prices bounce up, but it soon calms down. I think the same will happen with the 360, especially when people realise they are paying over the odds for some 360 games which are very average, just hyped! 😆
@@pixelpaul_pxp I find it weird--the whole attention 360 is getting. Maybe it's because retro is broadly a thing nowadays. The last official NES game in USA was produced in 1994. The NES market started to draw wider interest in 2012 in the USA. That an 18 year gap. The last 360 game was made in 2018, I believe. Six years really isn't a lot of time to grow a nostalgic audience, in comparison. Caveats are that the game industry and its audience have grown and inflation. Some games saw a $20-40 boost during this hype cycle. Back in the 90s, $20 meant something. Maybe a $50-60 game is looked as a expendable. I don't know. I'm pretty tight with money and always try to swing a bargain. It's rare that I just buy something at the suggested price without some "scheme" to recoup the cost by selling other items in bought a lot or similar situation.
@WhatsOnMyShelf we're very similar then mate, I very rarely spend big prices for older games, as cheap as I can find and if it's not cheap enough, I just don't get and will wait! But 360, I think there's a current gen knock on, in that people just aren't getting enough new games and looking to older gens to get more gaming, and xbox/ps3 was fairly affordable for that. There's the shifting demographics of who has the nostalgia for that gen too and has that disposable income too I guess.
@@pixelpaul_pxp Yeah, I keep hearing that there are no games. I don't have a PS5, but I see trailers for games from time to time that make it on my wantlist. I'm not a hardcore buyer.
I've waited forever to buy games and suffered regret about retro. I can think of some games that were $25 and suddenly they are priced rock solid $100+ now. I always believe that I will get a better deal. It's worked out OK for most games though. I don't think that will be a problem for the PS3 / 360 / Wii generation for some time. My guess is that many haven't exploded into a billion bits.
Most 360 rare games are trash
What is "rare" anyways?
TH-camrs didn't cause the surge in Xbox 360 prices...I did. 😏
I'm sure you were a contributor. We all are.
He bought 15 copies of Fatal Inertia to sell lol
@@meanmachine5598 Nah...it was Zumba Fitness. HODL to the moon! 😂
@@TheRedmondGamer I saw a video of a seller who put a chunk of change into BCFX well before civd. I assume there's no video which drove gamers to this obscure sports ball game during this recent 360 heat. It's not necessarily that it's sports ball and nobody want those games as there are some titles which get hyped up because of their obscurity such as N7 Tecmo Basketball. I think what makes rare titles worth something is that they are actually rare. It would have been difficult to source a lot of Stadium Events and have the forethought that it would reach such heights.
EU market is quite different and Xbox collectors are more scarce. Prices have seen an uptick but not nearly as much. Btw, Dark is more common in Europe, still in the obscure-ish side, but it was made by a European studio iirc, and most x360 collectors have always been aware of it. I think it's pretty decent, the meta score is way too harsh.
Europeans are more wise and circumspect then. In regards to middling games, maybe the kind retrospect has something to do with having a library full of games and not willing to get rid of those that are OK. I've read reviews in retro mags where they trash a game or give up on it. Later, retro fans will say it's 'not bad'. There was a phrase in the US we used bitd - a weekend rental. The game earned that nickname because we could rent the game from a store, beat it during a short time, and be glad we played something new. There were better games on the horizon. Most weekend rentals could have used more time in the oven.
My library has tons of mid-tier games :) I try not to pay a lot for any of my games.
@@WhatsOnMyShelf My main problem is the youtubers hyping up games that arent rare and makign the prices high for no reason.