Video Games have been around since the late 1970s when the game pong came out. Ever since then video games have continued to grow. In 2019 the video game industry is worth over one-hundred and fifty billion dollars. When a new video game system comes out it typically lasts seven years before another new console will come out. With so many different video games coming out in a short time, this leads retro video games to become collectible, something Jon Smithers, the Manager at GameCycle on Wharncliffe road in London sees a lot in his store.
“Yeah I think video games are collectible because of nostalgia, we see people coming in here looking to relive their childhood asking for that old Nintendo game or that old Genesis game from their childhood and most of the time we are going to be able to help them out with that.”
Even though retro video games are collectible, Smithers explains which games he sees that are popular right now, especially during the holiday season this year.
“right now, the ones we see the most are going to be the Xbox One, the PS4, and the Nintendo switch because they are the most current consoles for the holiday season.”
Going back to the retro video games there are always some games that are going to be more collectible than other games and some games that are considered holy grails to collectors today.
“Anything Mario, I know that sounds cliche, but Mario always sells especially the N64 (Nintendo 64) Mario games, but their not that uncommon because so many people had them back in the day but there are what we get asked for most right now because they were so popular”
When people are collecting video games there are cycles of when certain video games are easier to find than others and times when some games and consoles are more collectible.
“Games go in cycles, for example, the Sega Genesis and Sega consoles, in general, go in cycles. For example, we’ll see a lot of people ask for the Genesis for a little bit and then slow down, but people are always going to look for the old Nintendo games because when it comes to Nintendo their products are always higher quality and more people remember games for Nintendo than they do Sega consoles.”
