Amazon Selling Super Famicom for $5,500

Amazon.co.jp is listing Nintedo’s classic Super Famicom (SNES), now nearly 20 years old, for the extravagant price of ¥500,000. The item in question is described as “new”…

You can look at (or even buy) the console here.

Just below the new item we see normal second hand Super Famicom in “passable” condition selling for ¥3,000, and there are reports on 2ch of prices as low as ¥500 in physical shops.

The price of games and similar, particularly unopened new ones, has also been increasing dramatically in recent years. The ¥400,000 explosive materials handling training tool for the Famicom is a good example of such.

Given the availability of all manner of emulators and virtual systems, to say nothing of actual sequels and remakes, surely this can only point to retro nostalgia and collectors combined with ever decreasing supply as the main cause of the increasing prices for the elusive new systems still remaining?

Whilst the wisdom of buying flaky old paintings in anticipation of their value increasing is not generally questioned, buying consoles and games, which can typically fail easily from sheer age, does not seem a trade with quite the same level of security about it?