recommendation for a good rarity guide

[Zwackery]

I've been looking at a few print guides and comparing them with more updated online guides, but I'd be interested in any rarity guides that you can recommend for Sega Genesis games. (Mainly this is for tax purposes as I need to give donors receipts for fair market value of donated games.)

[+thegoldenband]

There's been strong resistance to this (a proper rarity guide) among Sega collectors, since it's feared it'll encourage the kind of speculation and gouging that's been rampant in the Nintendo scene for 4-5 years now or more.

 

I personally think that horse has already left the barn. Many non-obvious rare games have gone way up in price over the last 5 years, and a glance at Amazon will give you instant information about that. But there are still a fair number of titles that are undervalued relative to their rarity (and more than a few that are overvalued), sometimes dramatically. A rarity guide would make it easy, and it's not quite that easy as of now.

 

That said, price data (which is distinct from rarity data) can be had at sites like Pricecharting and RarityGuide.com, though you need to take it with a huuuuge grain of salt, as I'm sure you know. Condition is incredibly important with some titles, especially cardboard box games, and can make the difference between a $15 game and a $40 game -- but price charting sites aren't usually detailed or fine-grained enough for that. Same with posters, registration cards, etc. which can easily double the final sale price in an open auction.

 

And trying to gauge very low-value games, i.e. most sports titles, is extremely difficult since the advent of BIN pricing. Most are worth just a buck or two unless they're pristine and 100% complete, but who on Ebay will sell a game for $2?

 

There's also the rarity guide at Digital Press, but that's somewhat out of date IIRC.

[Zwackery]

I've been referring to rarityguide.com with some reservation. Since this is for tax purposes - I'm starting a video game special collection at my university's library - I'm not looking to lowball any donors, but I also don't want to be issuing $50 receipts for Madden 97 either. Rarity guides are speculative and contentious, but I need at least something I can point various administrative agencies to should any questions arise.