Here’s a couple of recently ended eBay auctions that just about made my jaw drop.

The first, a complete set of Karaoke Revolution games for the PS2. Yes, I know they’re very much sought after, but the price? $800, sold to one “lvlovernpink.” Meanwhile, other complete sets sit unpurchased at $229. No one ever said eBay bidders were rational. (thanks to monkeydeew for the tip)

Karaoke Revolution 1 2 3 Party Country American Idol — ended price: $800

Silly me. I put in a bid of 3 GBP (about $6) on this next item, thinking that I actually had a chance of winning. I love Final Fantasy, but as I told my friend on this one, at $132, I don’t think the winner of this item can really be called a “winner.”

McDonald’s Final Fantasy Chocobo Dungeon Promo Moogle — ended price: 68 GBP, about $132 US

Gamestop just got wise to the fact that Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance is becoming one of the most sought-after Gamecube titles, perhaps due to the recent Wii sequel, Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn. They just raised the used price by 50%, from $19.99 to $29.99.

The fact that Fire Emblem is becoming such a hot collectible is especially interesting if you remember that Nintendo cut the retail MSRP to $14.99 just before it went out of print. In the past year, Gamestop’s used price has jumped from $12.99 to $17.99, then to $19.99, and finally to $30.

This isn’t the only ascending price at your local Gamestop — they recently jacked Pikmin up to $19.99 and Pikmin 2 up to $39.99, due almost soley to Captain Olimar’s newfound popularity in Super Smash Bros. Brawl.

JJ over at Video Game Price Charts has put up an interesting (albeit self-explanatory) post based on an idea that I submitted to them — to track Shin Megami Tensei Nocturne and Digital Devil Saga’s price crash after the recent Atlus reprints.

Here’s what Nocturne looks like, and it ain’t pretty:

For the record, I don’t think Amazon ever got the reprints of Digital Devil Saga — only Gamestop did. And to make matters more interesting, Gamestop is only selling the game as gutted and used, a process that they called “newsed” — new product converted to used. This means you can buy a new sealed Nocturne but NOT DDS; I believe means something interesting is going to happen in the long term: Sealed copies of DDS will keep a very high price while Nocturne’s is not as high, because new/sealed copies of DDS are generally not available, even now.

If you’ve read my previous posts, I still think Nocturne’s price will go up once the reprinted copies have evaporated. There’s a precedent for this — both Disgaea and Persona 2 have seen slow price growth even after reprints.

eStarland is having their semi-recurring “buy 1, get 1 70% off” sale on all used Playstation 2, Gamecube, Xbox, Game Boy, and Game Boy Advance games, accessories, and hardware.

Of special interest to collectors: they have a large selection of Game Boy Advance games that are complete with the boxes and manuals.

The promo code is: STARSALEPXG. Enter it at the top of the checkout page. This is a special advance code, as the sale has not yet been announced for the general public. The sale runs until June 15, 2008, so don’t miss it.

A book/video store about an hour from home is set to go out of business soon. It’s a chain of stores across the state, and they rotate merchandise from time to time. I hadn’t been to this store since January, but when I went this weekend, they had a goldmine of stuff that was definitely not there before, and all priced to sell.

The first thing I found when I walked in was a rack filled to overflowing with mostly junk Genesis and SNES sports titles. Funnily enough, they also had a ton of new-in-box PS1 “game enhancers” — ie, import enablers that plugged into the PS1’s parallel port (marked at $0.95 ea). Too bad they’ve sort of outlived their usefulness, ‘cos they were a fascinating device back in the day. (I even wrote a couple of FAQs about them for GameFAQs nearly a decade ago!)

On the back of the rack, I found an unexpected gem: Metal Gear Solid for PS1. It was the start of good things.

Next, walking down a main aisle, I spotted a box I’m well familiar with — DDR Mario Mix! No game, unfortunately, but $5 for the pad is still a good find. I’m betting someone traded in the game into Gamestop and they refused the pad “for sanitary reasons.” Apparently in Gamestop-speak, “sanitary reasons” translated to “We’d rather force people to buy our own branded pad and make profit from the ludicrous markup.” I digress.

Next, at the end of the computer and gaming aisle, there were 2 boxes full of lovely vintage 90s gaming magazines. I would have loved to have taken the 2 big boxes that they had home, but I know full well that I have no room for them, so I cherry picked the Final Fantasy covers.

And lastly, I discovered the crown jewel… on the bottom shelf of the computer aisle, stuck in sideways, I spied a red border that I have drooled over on eBay many times. Could it be? Yes! The Final Fantasy (1) Nintendo Power Strategy Guide, in excellent shape. I felt my heart flutter a bit. It’s not a particularly valuable item, but I have indeed coveted it for awhile, and this is the first one I’ve seen in person. Oh, the price? 50 cents.

• Dance Dance Revolution Mario Mix (pad only) — $5.00
• Metal Gear Solid (PS1 Greatest Hits) — $5.90 — this was mixed in with a bunch of crap sports Genny and SNES games, all priced $5.90. Have no idea where this gem came from!
• Tons of mid-90s gaming magazines — $0.50 ea

  And the crown jewel…

• Final Fantasy 1 Nintendo Power strategy guide — $0.50

Ah, ’tis the year of RPG reprints. One of the last high-valued RPGs on the PS2, Ar Tonelico, is getting a reprint later this month — a preorder page is now available on Rosenqueen, NIS America’s online shop.

Just a few months ago, Atlus reissued the obscenely rare Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne and Digital Devil Saga 1. Shin Megami Tensei Nocturne is available from both Play-Asia and Amazon (where it goes in and out of stock).

Until today, original prints of Ar Tonelico had been pushing around $70 on eBay without the box and around $80 with.

If the past is any indication, even the reprints may turn out to be good investments. Atlus reprinted Persona 2 and Rhapsody in 2005 and sent out massive numbers of copies to Gamestops around the country, priced at $29.99 each. Rhapsody’s price has slid to around $20, but Persona 2 has shot back up to $50-$70 on the used market, most likely due to the ongoing popularity of the series.

In other news, Ar Tonelico’s reprint might point to an upcoming US release of Ar Tonelico 2. Thelonepig on Cheapass Gamer emailed NIS’s customer serivce to ask about Ar Tonelico 2 coming stateside, to which they responded, “that they couldn’t make any formal comments, but that ‘you won’t be disappointed.’”

One of my local (franchise) Blockbusters cleared out a ton of their Gamecube games, including a bunch of first-party goodies. I got all of the following under a buy 2, get 1 free sale, making them roughly $6.67 a piece. You really can’t do much better than that for quality Gamecube titles.

Not to mention, I personally think the dominance of the Wii and its backwards compatibility is going to give the Gamecube a much more favorable retroactive “legacy” than the N64 had.

• Pokemon Colosseum
• Disney Sports Basketball
• Paper Mario
• Disney Extreme Skate
• Luigi’s Mansion (I really want to play this one someday)
• Mario Party 4
• Mario Golf
• Animal Crossing
• Star Wars: Bounty Hunter

After reading oodles about Hollywood Video’s financial woes in recent years, myself and other gamers have been worrying about their pretty-awesome game chain, GameCrazy. (Several GameCrazys closed when Hollywood Video shut down 400 or so stores last year.) I heard some good news yesterday from the manager at the Hagerstown, Maryland, store that it is set to expand soon.

The manager told me in a casual chat yesterday that even though the GameCrazy only takes up about 1/3 of the total floor space that it shares with Hollywood Video, it rakes in about 2/3 of the revenue yearly. So, as you might expect, the location is will soon shrink the floor space of Hollywood Video’s stagnating rentals and will be expanding GameCrazy’s retail space.

I hope this is the start of a trend for other GameCrazy locations, and quite frankly, it’s the first growth-oriented news I’ve heard coming out of the Hollywood Video camp in awhile.

He also told me anecdotally that the nearby Valley Mall, which has no fewer than 2 Gamestops inside, “hates” the nearby GameCrazy location because their better customer service is siphoning away customers. I believe it, although I’m not sure “Better service than Gamestop!” is actually a brag.

All in all, great news for gamers in western Maryland, especially ones who don’t like retail monopolies.