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No, you aren’t having a stroke — you read that correctly. An infamous game for the original Nintendo Entertainment System is up for auction, and it’s commanding ludicrous prices.
As detailed over on auction house Goldin’s website, a copy of Nintendo World Championships 1990 is up for sale, with the auction set to end at 10 p.m. Eastern on August 8. This incredibly rare game is already commanding an insane asking price of $160,000 ($195,200 once you factor in buyer’s premiums), and there’s a good chance it’ll continue to go up as the auction draws to a close.
But you might be wondering: what is this game? Why have I never heard of it? And why is it so gosh darn expensive? These are all fair questions, so let’s dig a bit into the history of one of Nintendo’s most interesting “releases.”
One cartridge to Rule Them All
Back in 1990, Nintendo decided to put on a nationwide video game competition, touring over two dozen cities across America to find the country’s best gamers. In what is widely considered to be the first official esports event, the Nintendo World Championships tasked players with setting a high score on a customized cartridge that the publisher hacked together.
The game in question, often referred to as Nintendo World Championships 1990, features small sections of the original Super Mario Bros., 1987’s Rad Racer, and Tetris. Players were given a total of 6 minutes and 21 seconds to complete three custom challenges in each game and rack up a high score for submission.
Three winners from each touring city (split across three age groups: 11 and under, 12-17 years old, and 18-plus) were given a copy of the standard, grey cartridge version of Nintendo World Championships 1990, and were also invited to attend the world finals held in Los Angeles. However, while these grey cartridges were certainly special in their own right, Nintendo also produced 26 gold cartridges, which were given out to winners of a Nintendo Power contest. These gold cartridges function the same as their grey counterparts, with the main difference being they were colored gold.
Worth Its Weight in Gold
As you can imagine, Nintendo World Championships 1990 has become a highly sought-after item in the video game collecting community, and given their scarcity, both gold and grey versions rarely go up for sale. With retro gaming booming during the COVID-19 pandemic, it should come as no surprise that the gold cart that’s being auctioned off by Goldin is commanding such a high price, even though the game itself is missing its label.
“As far as we know, and until as recently as a few months ago, of the 26 copies of this gold game, which carries a resemblance to the famed The Legend of Zelda gold cartridge, there are only 13 copies extant, making this highly coveted piece of video game history akin to the great T206 Honus Wagner in esteem and rarity,” explains Goldin. “The condition sensitivity of these gold cartridges is due to a lack of packaging, and the label applied to this specimen is missing. The dip switch, allowing adjustment for time, is still present.“
We’re not taking bets on what the final sale price will end up at, but we wouldn’t be shocked to see it going for half a million dollars. For those of you who’d rather save your money, you can always pick up a deluxe set of Nintendo World Championships: NES Edition, which comes with a replica gold cartridge at a fraction of the price!
