Sold Some Games For the First Time

I hadn't planned on getting a DSi but then I gave my old DS Lite to my girlfriend to study for her Eiken and it seemed like the perfect excuse. Of course, I didn't want to pay full price for a hardware upgrade that is a little hard to justify IMO. So, I decided it was the perfect chance to unload some of my games that were collecting dust.

Now, this was a big thing for me. Previously, I was a collector through and through and I'd never give up any game, DVD, or CD that I'd bought. This led to a collection of more than 1,000 DVDs along with hundreds of games. Moving to Japan was the start of breaking that cycle with it being unrealistic to either ship my entire collection here or even store it all in my smaller apartment. So eventually, I gave away most of my DVDs and nearly all of my old games and systems.

Despite my best efforts to cut back on game purchases, I still managed to amass a small collection of about 60 or so DS, PSP, 360, and PS2 games in the last couple of years. Not much to most people but it was already beginning to cramp my cupboards style. Now, I had recently discovered this cute little game store near my place and upon asking, I found out they buy 360 games from other regions (even PAL! They had a PAL GTA4 on the shelf). So I decided this was a good chance to clear some cupboard space.

First, I put together a collection of 7 DS games and 3 360 games that I wanted to get rid off. Upon arriving at the store I told the staff that I had games I wanted to sell. They asked for some form of ID and my foreigners card, which includes both a photo and my address, was more than adequate. Then one of the staff members took my games out the back, presumably for a quick look over, and then came back about 5 minutes later. He asked if I wanted to sell any of the games separately or if just as one big bundle was OK. I said I didn't care and all together was fine. So, finally, I wrote my name and phone number on a receipt and collected 9,700 yen in cash. All in all, relatively painless.

Now what might be more interesting than the above ramble is what games I sold and what the sale value of each game was. It was only later that I realized that the receipt I was given listed each game individually along with the sale amount. The games were as follows:

[NDS] Tetris DS - 2,200 yen (Japanese version)
[NDS] Tales of the Tempest - 400 yen (Japanese version)
[NDS] (A Japanese / English dictionary) - 1,000 yen (Japanese version)
[NDS] Osu! Tatakae! Ouendan - 1,600 yen (Japanese version)
[NDS] Kakitorikun (Kanji writing practice) - 400 yen (Japanese version)
[NDS] Phoenix Wright 2 - 1,000 yen (Japanese version)
[NDS] Phoenix Wright 3 - 1,000 yen (Japanese version)
[360] Dynasty Warriors 6 - 1,000 yen (Japanese version)
[360] GTA 4 - 600 yen (Asian version)
[360] Bioshock - 500 yen (Asian version)

It was when I saw the low trade in prices for GTA 4 and Bioshock that I realized why the guy had asked me if I wanted to sell any games separately. So even though the store does buy 360 games from other regions, it's clear they don't exactly pay top dollar for them. Still, it's not all bad, as I was able to get a copy of the Darkness for 800 yen, and Oblivion for 1,200 yen the previous week. Being able to get English language 360 games for so cheap at a local store is a nice luxury to have. Hopefully some other lucky foreigner can get my Bioshock and GTA4 for dirt cheap!

Also, interesting to note the relatively high trade in price for Tetris DS (which I'd bought second hand anyway). This game hasn't seem a reprint in years and second hand copies seem to sell strictly in the 3,200 to 4,000 yen range (I paid 3,500 for mine).

The conclusion to this story is that I bought a second hand white DSi in basically as new condition, for 14,800 yen. With the games I sold and a 100 yen coupon (woooooo), it brought the cost down to a nice even 5,000 yen.

Anyone else had any interesting experiences selling games recently? Or maybe you just want to curse me for selling Bioshock for $5?