
If you happen to have any old Nintendo games stored away in your attic, you might want to dig them out and check what their value might be today. You might just end up being $9,000 better off.
Scott Amos of Reno, Nevada recently found an old, 1987 NES game in his attic after looking through his childhood possessions. The game in question was Kid Icarus, still in the bag it came in with the receipt also correct and present. The receipt tells us that it was bought in December 1988 for $38.45 (just over $80 today according to an online inflation calculator), but has been completely forgotten about ever since.
Speaking to the Reno Gazette Journal, Amos says, "All the family has been trying to come up with a hypothesis. [My mom] thinks she put it there and never got it back out, and then it ended up in the attic."
It just so happens that Kid Icarus finds itself at the rare end of the scale for sealed NES games, resulting in something of a jackpot for Scott and his family. The game was put up for auction online at Heritage Auctions, where it just sold for a mouth-watering $9,000.

If we had a sealed copy of a game like that we'd struggle to give it away for any kind of money, but what an amazing find. As we said above, it might be a good idea to get searching those attics and garages!
[source comics.ha.com, via eu.rgj.com]
Comments 63
Probably bought by some rich guy who has so much money that 9 thousand dollars is like, Thursday night dinner and wine.
Oh yeah, you buy a $80 (modern dollars) present, and completely forget about it. mmmmm
Don't sounds super credible to me.
@Godzil I could see a wealthy family forgetting about it. 80 bucks is a big buy for a normal person, but some people spend more than that just on the bottle of wine they drink at dinner.
They had a plan for the future! It payed up...
@Heavyarms55 so like 8 gold steak dinners? lol
@Heavyarms55 Hmm yeah so they in reality don't care about the 9000 they gain from it.
I kept the AR cards from my 3DS sealed. I’m banking on them being worth thousands in 30 years’ time for my retirement
I found a sealed copy of NHL '96 on the Mega Drive going surprisingly cheap a while back. First thing I did was open it and play it. I know it is never going to be super valuable and games are meant to be played!
@Godzil Well they might care, but it's the way you care about what you spend on a nice dinner.
No thanks. I rather play the games instead
I would've just unsealed it
9000 dollars would be nice though...
Isn't it kind of absurd that an antique can be worth many thousands of dollars more, simply because a cheap plastic film wasn't removed?
At the local Goodwill about 10 years ago, they had a ton of sealed NES games in G to VG quality. Wish I would have picked them up.
As it is in its wrapper it is not fulfilling the reason for its being and this makes me quite sad.
Haven't they seen Toy Story 2 with Stinky Pete.
Uh I wouldn’t buy that sitting in an attic for that long it was probably exposed to extreme summer heat for 30 years.
@Heavyarms55 I dunno, I think a rich person like that would have different hobbies. Collectors are dedicated bunch, but you wouldn't think of someone like James Rolfe to be a millionaire.
Why the heck would somebody pay that much for it? I’m sure some of my interests don’t make sense to people, but man...video game collectors...man, I don’t get it.
@Kriven maybe he is hungry and thirsty? Or he has some dinner and wine issues...
@Heavyarms55 So? His money spends the same.
@Godzil How poor are you that $80 is a huge deal?
I have certainly forgotten about bigger gifts than that as a parent.
Grownups buy presents for their kids ahead of time and put them away for later. It is very easy to forget one or lose it in a closet or attic. So far I have been lucky enough to find them by the next christmas, easter or birthday, but I will eventually lose one.
I found a sealed pack of peparami from the early 90s in my loft when I moved in a few years back. The packs green and I guess the sausages are now too!
They will be on eBay tonight
This story made the National news here in the U.S.
“Speaking to the Reno Gazette Journal, Amos says, ‘All the family has been trying to come up with a hypothesis. [My mom] thinks she put it there and never got it back out, and then it ended up in the attic.‘ “
Kinda like Clark Griswold in Christmas Vacation.
@Godzil its happened to me, i have a brand new copy of earthworm jim 2 not opened cause when my parents bought it for me i got punished and they never gave me the game when i moved out of the house after i got married my mom gave me that my slingshot, bb gun, and a super soaker 1000 that she took from as a kid.
@USWITCH64 Sold! Perfect addition to my "molds of the world" collection.
$9000? Pfft!
That’s like dinner and wine for me.
This is the last thread I expected to find a lot of comments about people wining.....
Wow, so this copy actually has the security enclosure on it? It doesn't look like it's openable without the original release tool (or of course cutting away the security enclosure.)
I understand things like this being valuable because they're rare....yet, $9k for a sealed copy of a video game that $20 NSO subscriptions can play on current hardware..... it's not like it's rare content that doesn't exist anywhere, it's just the packaging/media that makes it special.
...and people say NSO doesn't offer anything of value for the fee.....
I'm honestly considering buying some games or limited collector's editions and then selling them for a neat profit in ten, twenty years...
@NEStalgia
I think the enclosure was provided by wata? (they verify authenticity of games and grade value, etc etc).
Why spend $9000 on a Kid Icarus cartridge when you could spend that on dinner and wine instead?
@Bunkerneath those 9000 can buy you a switch with a Nintendo on line subscription to play the game on it (with saves and rewind!)
You can use the 8500 left for a trip to Europe... (Dont forget to bring your new switch with you!)
@MrVariant Best comment on this entire thread, hands down. A meme that will never truly die.
@Markiemania95 I’ll concede as a broke dude working my tail off for the man, that having a couple of the best vintages of Margaux and Lafite topped up with the finest caviar and Kobe beef steaks is infinitely better than staring at Kid Icarus on a shelf. I’ll never know the pleasure of either but that’s just my guess 🤔
Meh, I would have rather have played the game than wait 30 years and get 9000...really. You only live once!
So... all of us should keep buying new games at Game Stop and in 30 years dig it back up out of our backyard? Sounds like a plan!
There are warehouses all over the planet with CIB new games that will never be found likely lol. Just to be the lucky guy who stumbles onto one.
Probably an intended Christmas present Santa forgot to put under the tree. It happens.
Lucky bugger.
@Lone_Beagle But the $9,000 is probably going towards something more meaningful to them in their one life.
From the headline, I assume someone found a Stadium Events. I mean, what other 1987 NES game could be worth a lot of money?
@MrVariant Perfect reference, lol
@NEStalgia this copy can be played in the next ten years anytime while your 20$ one can be played until nintendo lets you play it (and in 10 years it will be a 200$ copy while you can still loose access ANY day)
I have first edition pokemon cards. Quite a few actually. Hoping they will eventually fetch a tidy sum.
@arty77 While I'm not a fan of the problems of subscription model anything......in this case it would take 450 years to reach the break-even point, and you're getting other services included in that time....I think I can live with that
@Godzil - Even a normal person can forget about it. My mother bought my brothers and I a PS2 for Christmas, but then we were completely garbage so she nixed the surprise, never told us. But that January she also filed for divorce. Ten years later when we moved I found it, and learned the whole story.
This can easily happen to a simple game. Even at 80 bucks.
@DarkLloyd Dude there's multiple restaurants in L.A. where 2 can have an app, main course, bottle of wine and desert then with tip it's $15,000. I know that sounds crazy but it's real.
I certainly wouldn't struggle. That would help my family live an even better life than they already have. I would have no issues selling it, even with my ever-enduring passion for gaming, and all its endeavors.
@Markiemania95
It's nice to see a man who enjoys the finer things in life.
Bon appetit!
Far out, how can it just be forgotten about? This isn't like a Steam game you buy and never play, games were a lot more unique back then.
@SmaggTheSmug And I don't think James Rolfe would spend 9k on a game either.
@Kriven Golly how dare I reply to comments! I am just such a horrible dude! Forgive me kind sir and thank-you for your oh so useful enlightenment!
I don't leave games sealed for the payday but I do leave them sealed until I get to play them. My backlog is steadily growing at the moment though so if I don't catch up soon, I might be rich one day! 🤣
Seriously what an awesome story
The only sealed game I own is Cosmic Carnage. I paid $1.99 for it, assuming it would be used and a cart-only copy, but nope. It is sealed.
The only game I still have wrapped is Soul Calibur 2 on GC. For some reason I never got the time to play, and figured I might as well leave it wrapped in case I want to sell it. Now I'm convinced I should leave it wrapped! Viewtiful Joe 2 could be another still wrapped.
@Godzil a lot of parents shop early and often for christmas gifts. They may have bought it, hidden it so their kids wouldn't find it and forgotten/gotten misplaced it sat. It's not that unusual actually.
@Godzil you’re dumb he was a kid like he knew the value of a dollar and do you know how easily it is to forget about stuff like that I know as a kid I lost and forgot about a lot of games from my childhood I just overlooked and neglect in favor of other games that I liked at the time. You’re acting like he bought the game himself his mom got it for him, stuff like that happens all the time. I know I probably blessed people when I kept moving around as a kid I unknowingly kept leaving n64 and snes games around as a 21 year old I only have my 64 and snes console all my games and accessories were unfortunately forgotten about and left behind somewhere
@StevenG that’s true my mom did that to me one Christmas she forgot where she hid my presents and a flood happened and next thing we know my shoes and stuff was in the basement ruined
@SmileMan64 @Godzil good luck the value of modern stuff especially video games don’t have nearly the same value as yesterday’s items do and that’s do to the nostalgia factor
Who cares. If I have one and I am not telling everybody. I would just sold it secretly and keep private to myself. I hate "SHOWOFF".
i once had a gorf cart on the c64. My dad gave the c64 which was his to my uncle cause we had a sega megadrive but bet that gorf cart is worth a mint now.
@azoreseuropa Secret auction is probably going to get you much less. Probably the auction is what grabbed attention not the people selling it... though advertising doesn't hurt when you are trying to sell. Not much to "show off" except how the Mom was absent-minded and/or not good with money.
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