This decade has been crazy in terms of a ton of markets. Graphics cards are selling at 2000 dollars, Pokemon card booster packs are selling for 10 dollars, and don’t get me started on the Playstation 5. The retro video game market has been heavily affected as well, especially the 6th, and 7th generations of video game consoles. This market is insane, and you can easily triple figures getting two or three games. A friend of mine recently spent sixty dollars on a Playstation copy of Final Fantasy 7. Now if you can pay that money, that’s great, keep doing that, but not all of us have that kind of money to spend on tons of video games. I try to get deals when I get stuff in my collection, and I would like to share those with all of you.
This article is going to focus on tips, and tricks I know of and use when going out, and burying video games; There are four main labels of places I have, and I'm going to split the tips between the four-place labels. The place labels will be, thrift stores, retail, retro game shops, and eBay. Let’s start with the thrift stores.
Thrift Stores
Thrift Stores are usually places where people donate their things to be sold in the store. The main thrift stores I normally run into are Goodwill, Value Village, and Salvation Army, but they’re also a bunch of locally run ones owned by a small business, or organizations. It’s best to look around your area and find ones near you.
Now I'm going to cover some baseline tips I follow when I can go out thrifting. These are usually what I do, but that doesn’t mean they work for everyone, so you don’t have to follow all of these.
Don't rush through the store, take your time, and try to browse as much of the store as possible. Doing this can allow you to find misplaced items, items that are behind other items, and items that don’t fit in a category.
Get used to the pricing in your area. Usually, disc-based games will all share the same price at a store. Cartridges are a bit different, and the store will normally mark them. Of course, always make sure the product you're buying has a mark on it for the price.
Always check the DVD section. Thrift stores will normally mix their disc-based video games in the DVD section. Even if the store does separate their video games from the DVDs, it’s still wise to check this section, because sometimes employees will misplace a few games in this section.
Don’t pay a ton of money on games. The thrift stores do not guarantee the games work, so you’re always taking a chance when you shop. My ideal price for a game is one to two dollars, and I’ve seen prices as high as five dollars. Never buy a game for that much at a thrift store, unless it's a game you must have in your collection, and you feel confident it will work. Also, inspect the game’s condition before buying.
Remember, it’s your collection, so you choose whatever you want to add to it. Don’t feel forced to buy a cheap game you don’t want.
Retail
Out of the four categories, I shop retail the least, but that doesn't mean you can’t get deals on newer games from the last console generation. The best retail shop for games in my opinion is Best Buy because the games are not inside a glass display, so you can easily sort through them. I will also be mentioning Walmart and Gamestop in my tips.
For Walmart, you can download their app on your phone. Doing this allows you to scan items in the store, and get a price. Numerous people have found cheap games by doing this.
Always check the store's website if you are looking for a specific item to go on sale, or to find out if something on sale is in stock in a store.
Always look for games from the previous generation. PS4 and Xbox One should be going down in price, so if you collect for those two systems. If you do see any Wii U, 3DS, PS3, or Xbox 360 games, they should be cheap as well. However, I have noticed most stores are selling out of those fast.
Stay up to date on sales from the store. If you hear about a sale going on video games, look into it, and see if something you want is on sale.
If a store has a membership, then look into it, and say if the benefits outweigh the costs.
Gamestop usually has sales on their pre-owned games. These sales are usually something like four for twenty for pre-owned games that are ten dollars, and below. If you don’t mind the conditions of your games, then this is a great way to get some great games for cheap.
Video Game Stores
Video Game Stores that cater to retro gaming collectors are usually where I would go to get video games at market value. The reasons for this will be mentioned in my tips. However, not everywhere has easy access to these kinds of stores. Most of them are small businesses that only have a few locations. In my local area, there is only a small chain of about three stores near me, so the pickings are slim, but if you have one of these places near you, here are some tips.
Take advantage of the fact that you are in a store. Try to inspect the physical items, especially if you are buying an expensive game.
A lot of these stores allow you to trade in games, consoles, and accessories. You can use this to trade in stuff you own that you don’t want, get store credit for it, and use that to get stuff you want in the store. This can go well if you go thrifting. You thrift for cheap games, and trade them in to get more money.
Don’t only shop for the games at these stores. At my local stores, they normally carry other products such as video gamebooks. These other products are usually cheaper, and not at market value due to them not being the focus of the store, but that’s not always the case. Always look around, and if something seems cheap look into it.
Follow any social media platform that the store has if you can. Some stores will post news, and inventory there. My local shops normally post recent trade-ins of valuable, and high-demand games, to tell shoppers that they have those games. Sometimes they also post general news about the stores.
If you feel skeptical of your store’s prices, then you should use a site called pricecharting.com. These sites will give you the market value of any video game. Compare the prices of the store, and the site to tell if you are getting a good deal.
eBay
Now for the last of the four labels. Now you might be asking, why don’t I call this section online shopping? Well, in my opinion, eBay is the best place out of all of the other options for collecting retro video games, and other older things. Now it’s hard to get deals on eBay, but there are a few tips I can give to save money, but I'm also giving a few tips on not getting scammed on eBay.
Buy from sellers with a lot of positive feedback. I normally try to buy from sellers with 98% to 100% positive feedback. Never buy from a seller that has 95% or below, unless you’re ready to take that risk
Buying a wholesale lot of video games is a good idea. Typically when you buy from lots, you will be getting the games for below market value, when added up altogether. This is good especially if the lot has a lot of games you want.
Avoid products with stock images. Sellers that can’t take photos of the products they are selling usually lead to a bad experience. You also can’t inspect the product.
Use pricecharting.com to know the values of video games. This is especially important for eBay because a lot of sellers sell games at abo9ve market value.
If you’re interested in an item a seller is selling, put it on our watch list. Not only will this save the listing in the watch menu, but also a seller can knock off the price of their item a little bit, exclusively to watchers.
Those are some of the general tips I have for collecting and saving some money in this heated market. Maybe I can come back to this topic in the future, or maybe talk about some of my finds out in the wild, and online. This market will hopefully begin to drop down in a year, or two, since the pandemic effects should be fixed by then, but only time will tell.
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