There are plenty of old video games that have been sold at auctions for beaucoup bucks but few are as strange as the one recently sold through Heritage Auctions this weekend. A Super Mario Bros. 3 prototype sold for a large sum, proving that collectors will shell out a lot of money for a piece of Nintendo history.
When the auction ended on September 13, the final bid was $31,200. What makes this particular prototype so interesting is the cartridge itself, which is Frankensteinesque in appearance. It began its life as Kid Icarus but was later gutted and replaced with a copy of the third Super Mario Bros. game. The original image on the front is ripped in places to make room for the exposed EPROMs poking out of its insides and ‘Super 3’ is scribbled on the bottom with a blue marker. It’s not pretty, but it houses pre-release data for Super Mario Bros. 3, making it beautiful in a nerdy kind of way.
A Nintendo prototype rarely makes it out into the wild. The company is notorious for keeping all of its production materials, never allowing them to leave the company grounds, and even destroying or dismantling them once they’re no longer needed. The Heritage Auction listing says, “We have often heard from prototype collectors that developers tended to repurpose spare parts lying around the company to fashion them into prototypes.” This cartridge appears to be one of those that has been repurposed.
While 30k may seem like a lot of money (and it is), it is is a far cry from the most expensive games put up at auction. An original sealed copy of Super Mario Bros. for the NES once sold for $144,000. What made it so special was its packaging. The fact it had a cardboard tab instead of a plastic one made it quite the rarity. Believe it or not, it sold for much less than some other games.
These auctions show just how much people are willing to pay for a slice of nostalgia. Nintendo knows the appeal of nostalgia well and has made it a big part of the upcoming 35th anniversary of Super Mario. Nintendo laid out its plans with a surprise anniversary Nintendo Direct that announced new games, a new device, special events, and more. Most notably, it revealed Super Mario 3D All-Stars, which packages together Super Mario 64, Super Mario Sunshine, and Super Mario Galaxy for the Switch. Nintendo later released a Super Mario 3D All-Stars overview trailer to highlight what players can expect from the collection.
The price has rubbed some the wrong way, as the collection will cost as much as a new title, but the games being ported to the Switch are merely optimized and not fully remastered. The collection will only be available as a limited-run until the end of March 2021, which has also been a point of contention. Since people are scrambling to make sure they get a copy, at least one retailer is canceling pre-orders due to scarcity.
Source: Nintendo Life
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