Gallery: The 12 Most Expensive Videogames in Tokyo
ROBERT GILHOOLY01time-gal
TOKYO — Some Japanese videogame collectors won't settle for perfect copies of titles they played in their youth. For a handful of devotees, it's all about getting their hands on the rarest retrogames in the world, some of which were manufactured in batches of just a few hundred. Some of these singular games graced store shelves for only a moment; others were given out as contest prizes. But Tokyo game stores will hand them over to you — if you've got a wallet bursting with cash. In the United States, game prices can rise and fall based on "hype and demand," but in Tokyo's Akihabara electronics district, a retrogame's relative scarcity drives pricing, collector Jason Wilson told Wired.com in instant message. "When only a handful of games are made, they can charge what they want for it," said Wilson, who lives in Nashville. "It won't necessarily sell — but if you *have* to have it, this is where you would get it." Such retrogames used to be spread all over Akihabara, but these days the rarest ones have funneled into three specialty stores: [Mandarake](http://ekizo.mandarake.co.jp/shop/en/), [Trader](http://www.e-trader.jp/index.html) and [Super Potato](http://www.superpotato.com/). Feast your eyes on 12 of the most expensive game cartridges in all of Akihabara, photographed in the three retrogame superstores. If you bought the full dozen, it would cost you 1,248,150 yen — about $15,250. __Above:__ Time Gal -------- __The Price:__ 68,250 yen (approximately $833) The original [Time Gal](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time_Gal) was a 1985 arcade game released by Taito. Like Dragon's Lair, it used animation clips stored on a laserdisc for graphics. Home versions were released on platforms like the Sega CD and PlayStation, but the most faithful translation was this version for the laserdisc-based Pioneer LaserActive platform. Games on LaserActive can sell for upward of $100, but Time Gal is by far the most expensive. This copy is actually a bargain — the piece of paper in the lower left corner says the paper *obi* wrapped around the left side of the disc has slight damage, resulting in the price being lowered. (Said damage is apparently invisible to anyone who is not an anal-retentive Japanese store clerk.)
ROBERT GILHOOLY02gradius
Gradius (Archimendes edition) ----------------------------- __The Price:__ 69,800 yen (approximately $852) Konami's classic shooter [Gradius](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gradius) is one of the easiest games to find on the Famicom (8-bit Nintendo) platform. But this special edition is one of the rarest. Archimendes was a brand of cup Ramen. The company ran a promotion in the '80s, giving away 4,000 specially tweaked copies of Gradius. Besides the sticker on the box, the in-game graphics were modified slightly: Bowls of Archimendes replaced your spaceship's power-up capsules.
ROBERT GILHOOLY03metal-slug-x
Metal Slug X ------------ __The Price:__ 75,000 yen (approximately $916) Games for SNK's Neo Geo platform were identical to their arcade counterparts, a rarity in the early '90s. This faithfulness to the arcade machines came at a steep price: Neo Geo cartridges started at around $200 when they were released and climbed from there. One of the most expensive Neo Geo games in Tokyo is this copy of Metal Slug X for sale at Super Potato. This series of super-difficult side-scrolling shooters is one of the most popular on the platform. The games have been re-released many times, though, so you don't need to drop $900 just to play this.
ROBERT GILHOOLY04radac-tailor-made
Radac Tailor-Made ----------------- __The Price:__ 79,800 yen (approximately $975) If I understand this correctly, tire and bicycle manufacturer Bridgestone produced this piece of Famicom software to help its customers build their own custom bikes from the company's assortment of parts. Radac Tailor-Made was thus only given out to Bridgestone dealers, who would probably set it up in their shops so potential customers could play around. Besides illustrating just how pervasive Famicom culture was in the '80s, Tailor-Made is now one of the rarest Nintendo cartridges on the secondary market.
ROBERT GILHOOLY05wwf-raw-and-spider-man-maximum-carnage
WWF Raw and Spider-Man: Maximum Carnage --------------------------------------- The Prices: 79,800 yen (approximately $975) and 98,000 yen (approximately $1,197) Now-defunct U.S. gamemaker Acclaim was always ready to make a quick buck. Toward the end of the life cycle of the Mega Drive (Sega Genesis) in Japan, the company took some of its U.S.-developed games and dumped a handful of copies into the Japanese market, just to capitalize on the few Eastern gamers that wanted to play cheapo licensed drivel. Two such games were on display in Super Potato when we checked, WWF Raw and Spider-Man: Maximum Carnage. Acclaim's other super-rare Mega Drive releases include Virtual Bart and Batman Forever.
ROBERT GILHOOLY06shock-troopers-second-squad
Shock Troopers Second Squad --------------------------- __The Price:__ 98,000 yen (approximately $1,197) Much like Metal Slug, Shock Troopers is a series of cartoony shooters for the Neo Geo. This one is significantly less popular, though. Home versions of the two games were only released in Japan, and this sequel never even made it to U.S. arcades.
Simplified cutaway drawing of MSFC FPO's 1965 Mars/Venus manned flyby spacecraft design. The letters are identified in the text. Image: NASA MSFC.07darius-alpha
Darius Alpha ------------ __The Price:__ 98,000 yen (approximately $1,197) Another giveaway game, with less than 1,000 copies of [Darius Alpha](http://www.ravengames.co.uk/engine6.htm) distributed by NEC to dedicated PC Engine (TurboGrafx) gamers. To get it, you had to buy both the cartridge *and* CD-ROM versions of the shooter Darius Plus, then send in your UPC codes and cross your fingers. Trivia: Like the cartridge version of Darius Plus, Darius: Alpha features slightly enhanced background graphics when played on the SuperGrafx console.
ROBERT GILHOOLY08kunio-kun-dodgeball
Kunio-kun Dodgeball ------------------- __The Price:__ 98,000 yen (approximately $1,197) Technōs Japan's series of *Kunio-kun* games gave us classics like River City Ransom and Crash 'N the Boys' Street Challenge, which are gaining a bit more notoriety these days thanks to copious allusions in Scott Pilgrim. The regular version of this Kunio dodge ball game for the Super Famicom (Super Nintendo) isn't that hard to find. This gold-colored cartridge, however, was only given out to [winners of Technōs' dodge ball tournaments](http://www.racketboy.com/retro/nintendo/snes/2008/02/the-rarest-and-most-valuable-super-nintendo-snes-games.html). One would think that such a trophy would go right over the winner's fireplace for all time, but hey, even hard-up actors sell their Oscars sometimes. Sitting to the right of Kunio-kun Dodgeball is what would be the 13th-rarest game in Akihabara if this list went up that high: Radical Dreamers, a spinoff of the popular Squaresoft role-playing game Chrono Trigger that had to be downloaded onto a blank cartridge via the Satellaview satellite gaming service. At 59,800 yen (approximately $730), it's expensive in its own right.
ROBERT GILHOOLY09z-gundam-hot-scramble-final-edition
Z-Gundam Hot Scramble Final Edition ----------------------------------- __The Price:__ 148,000 yen (approximately $1,808) Another limited-edition tweak of a common game, but with a twist. The Famicom game Z-Gundam Hot Scramble was the first game based on the popular giant-robot animation series to be released on a home game console. Like many Gundam titles, it puts you in a first-person viewpoint, so you can see the world as if you were piloting the iconic giant mechs. The silver-colored Final Edition, limited to 1,000 copies and given out by Bandai to contest winners, makes a change that [fans of the game apparently love](http://www.hardcoregaming101.net/zgundam/zgundam.htm): The inferior 2-D side-scrolling sections were removed, and the game features only the 3-D combat levels. Bonus: When Nintendo released its Famicom Mini line of 8-bit ports to the Game Boy Advance in 2004, Bandai made and gave away 2,000 copies of a GBA version of Hot Scramble, which itself now fetches well over $150 in Akihabara.
ROBERT GILHOOLY10yoshis-cookie-kuruppon-oven-de-cookie
Yoshi's Cookie Kuruppon Oven de Cookie -------------------------------------- __The Price:__ 157,500 yen (approximately $1,924) Released by National (a brand of Panasonic) for the Super Famicom, this special edition of the matching-puzzle game Yoshi's Cookie was commemorated with the release of a cooking appliance called the Kuruppon Oven. Only 500 were given away. The game is significantly different from the standard Super Famicom release, featuring a full "adventure mode" in which Yoshi wanders around on a map. Yoshi can also pop into his kitchen to learn how to cook real-life versions of the cookies in the game. It's probably because of the significant gameplay differences that the price has climbed so high relative to the other rare games of Akihabara.
ROBERT GILHOOLY11all-star-power-league
All-Star Power League --------------------- __The Price:__ 178,000 yen (approximately $2,174) Compared to this one-in-a-million rarity, Time Gal is common as dirt. Power League is a baseball game released by Hudson for the PC Engine. According to the sign that Super Potato affixed to this game, the childrens' comic magazine *Coro Coro Comic* ran a drawing and gave out just 100 copies of All-Star Power League, which presumably has been altered to feature a lineup of the hottest Japanese baseball players of the late '80s. With only 100 in existence and only one up for sale, this tiny lump of silicon and plastic is the most expensive game in all of Tokyo. The slip of paper inside the case is the original documentation, which has likely bumped up the price of this copy considerably.
