When Tribute.ca launched, way back in 1996, we were some of the first people to frequent it. I know as we won a lot of the contests that they had. The prizes were usually for movie passes but they also had some merchandise.
In 1999 I won a copy of the Zelda: Ocarina of Time for the N64. Since that was not a system that we had at that time, we didn’t open it. We didn’t know any friends with a N64 or we would have probably given it to them as a gift. It used to hang around on my bedside dresser for a while until we moved a few years later. Since then it has been boxed away.
In going through our storage locker recently, we came across it again. Since it was still sealed, I was wondering if I could trade it in for maybe a copy of the Wii Sports Resort. But I was not in a rush to deal with it.
One of the people at work mentioned that it might have some real value. So we looked into and discovered that some highly graded sealed copies went for some really crazy amounts – like over $200,000. But they were usually selling in the $1400 - $4000 range. Finally getting around to checking with PnP games (a local used video game store) and they offered $450. If they had offered $1000, we probably would have taken it.
Instead we looked online for where to sell it and contacted Heritage Auctions to see if they were interested in
selling it. They were. I sent them a few pictures and they gave an estimate of $2000 to $6000 but this would greatly depend on the condition. They would take 15% for auction costs and would take the grading costs (they figured about $100) out of the total price for which it sold.
I shipped it to them (insured of course). So if nothing comes of it I am out the shipping costs of $120 as well as the $450 I could have gotten from PnP. They had some issues with the box, thinking it might be resealed, so they returned it without getting it graded.
So I will wait a bit before I send it WATA directly to get graded. Then we will see.
