Re: [SWCollect] Rarity Scale
I like the idea! S could also stand for Super-Unique, Special or even Super-Duper! ;) Perhaps we could also make a scale for general covetedness (does this word even exist?!) of a game? I for example have several extremely rare (probably an U on the CURIOUS scale ;) ) RPGs that aren't coveted by anyone, hence they are usually sold cheap. -- Pedro R. Quaresma Salvador Caetano IMVT Div. Sistemas de Informação / Systems and Information Division Administração e Desenvolvimento Lotus Notes / Lotus Notes Administration and Development [EMAIL PROTECTED] // +351 22 7867000 (ext. 3492) Toyota Prius '01, Aqua Ice Opalescent, 37K km., Esperanza 'People don't quit playing because they grow old. They grow old because they quit playing.' - Oliver Wendell Holmes Para: [EMAIL PROTECTED] A/C: Ref: cc: (bcc: Pedro Quaresma/SCAETANO) Assunto: [SWCollect] Rarity Scale Hugh Falk [EMAIL PROTECTED] 28-01-2004 04:44 Solicita-se resposta a swcollect Hey guys, This group has tackled the issue of a condition grading scale. Does anybody think it's worth trying to put together a rarity scale? You knowto judge how common a game is. I'd recommend we call is the CURIOUS scale: Common Uncommon Rare Imaginary Oddity Unique Shameless placeholder to complete acronym Seriously, there are a few sites that do this specifically for cartridge-based media, but wouldn't it be nice to have one for our hobby? How would we judge rarity? We could poll the list of collectors for starters. A place like Brad's computer game collector site (http://www.computergamecollectorcom) would be ideal for tracking this info if it was supported by most of us. We could then add more subjective info like the number of times a game was spotted on eBay. It would be great if we could actually track this as part of the DB. Anyway, I know this is ambitiousa lot more ambitious than the condition grading scale, but what do you think? Speaking of ambitious, I'll be looking into hotel conference rooms this week. Hugh ToyotaShopping - A sua Loja Toyota Online http://www.toyota.pt
Re: [SWCollect] Rarity Scale
First of all, the acronym was basically a joke, but if it sticks, thats cool with me. Another reasonable option is to name it after whatever site is going to host the list (like the Mobyscale.) But if we do go the acronym route: - Imaginary is meant for games that are only rumored to exist. For example, Mt. Drash before any of us had one. Or the fabled green-box Ultima VII (I just made that one up). Suspended is not Imaginary. - Oddity is a bit of a stretch. I dont even know if its useful, but it could be used for bad production runs, etc. Maybe it is a modifier. - Unique means one of a kind. This would apply to a master disk/cart or if there was only one known copy of a game in the world. Lets avoid saying a game is more unique or some similar designation. I, O Unique would be very rarely used. These would just be used to account for weird stuff out there. 99% of all games would be C, U or R. I like S standing for scale. Makes sense although CURIOUS Scale would be redundant as Dan points out. One more note this is a rarity scale. It is not meant to imply value. It is just meant to designate rarity. Value and rarity do not necessarily go hand in hand. Of course, one of the benefits of having a scale is that worthless games designated Rare might go up in value if the market grows and pays attention to the scale. Production numbers aren't needed, but could certainly be helpful if known. Having this integrated into eBay would be awesome. Of course, if it were going to happen it would likely be a feature for other (more popular) collectibles first comics, baseball cards, etc. If we have our act together, we could certainly apply the feature to games as well. In the meantime, it would be great to see people on eBay regularly referencing the Mobyscale for condition and the CURIOUS Scale for rarity just in the text of the ad. Hugh -Original Message- From: Dan Chisarick [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Jan 28, 2004 5:54 AM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: [SWCollect] Rarity Scale I love the idea. While a clever acronym I'm not sure what is more rare than 'unique', let alone what word starts with 's' that embodies that. I'd suggest just letting 's' stand for 'scale'. Of course then you run into usage like ATM Machine (where if you expand the acronym the sentence sounds silly). As for rarity assessment wouldn't production numbers be needed? I mean there are loads of worthless games out there that you never see on ebay because no one would buy them, not that they are uncommon. Also the effect of one game selling well tends to 'scare' other copies up for auction. Someone commented that its hard to find Black Magic, but I found it in the first 30 days of looking. But its possible that if one or two of these sold that others may follow. Still, I don't think that stops us from taking a swing at it. Start with a list, and amend it over time. Its bound to be a little off until it gets some feedback into it. I'd humbly suggest the original Akalabeth and Mt. Drash would be Oddity. Stuff like Starcross and Suspended would probably be Imaginary. What'd be *incredibly* cool would be to get the grading scale and the rarity scale integrated into ebay :) They have drop-downs for lots of other things, why not this? On Jan 27, 2004, at 11:44 PM, Hugh Falk wrote: Hey guys, This group has tackled the issue of a condition grading scale. Does anybody think it?s worth trying to put together a rarity scale? You know?to judge how common a game is. I?d recommend we call is the CURIOUS scale: Common Uncommon Rare Imaginary Oddity Unique Shameless placeholder to complete acronym Seriously, there are a few sites that do this specifically for cartridge-based media, but wouldn?t it be nice to have one for our hobby? How would we judge rarity? We could poll the list of collectors for starters. A place like Brad?s computer game collector site (http://www.computergamecollector.com) would be ideal for tracking this info if it was supported by most of us. We could then add more subjective info like the number of times a game was spotted on eBay. It would be great if we could actually track this as part of the DB. Anyway, I know this is ambitious?a lot more ambitious than the condition grading scale, but what do you think? Speaking of ambitious, I?ll be looking into hotel conference rooms this week. Hugh -- This message was sent to you because you are currently subscribed to the swcollect mailing list. To unsubscribe, send mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of 'unsubscribe swcollect' Archives are available at: http://www.mail-archive.com/[EMAIL PROTECTED]/
Re: [SWCollect] Rarity Scale
Sounds cool. I'd agree that TWO ratings might be better - one for 'rarity' and one for 'value'. The Giant list of Classic Game Programmers is a good source of game names and authors for starts. Digital Press publishes a rarity guide for video game cartidges (and some computer games), avaiable for $25. Thus I imagine it would be something along these lines? I agree the best way to start is we all make our own rarity lists and then we average the results or something. It would also be important to distinguish between different versions of the same game, which may very greatly in value. For example, Ultima II comes in a large box, a small sierra box, and a small Black on-line box. Wizardry II comes in a flat folder package, and a shiny box like wizardry I. Each of these has different rarities. Even the rarity for different computers can vary although this is generally less important since most of us (?) do not collect the saem game for multiple computers unless there are other differences besides the floppy disk. Common Uncommon Rare Imaginary Oddity Unique Shameless placeholder to complete acronym -- Howard Feldman Author of the Search for Freedom Computer Role-Playing Game Visit its homepage at: http://deep.mshri.on.ca/people/feldman -- This message was sent to you because you are currently subscribed to the swcollect mailing list. To unsubscribe, send mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of 'unsubscribe swcollect' Archives are available at: http://www.mail-archive.com/[EMAIL PROTECTED]/
Re: [SWCollect] Rarity Scale
Dan Chisarick stated: What'd be *incredibly* cool would be to get the grading scale and the rarity scale integrated into ebay :) They have drop-downs for lots of other things, why not this? Because everything would become Mint Shrinked and Unique. 8) -- Lee K. Seitz [EMAIL PROTECTED] -- This message was sent to you because you are currently subscribed to the swcollect mailing list. To unsubscribe, send mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of 'unsubscribe swcollect' Archives are available at: http://www.mail-archive.com/[EMAIL PROTECTED]/
Re: [SWCollect] Rarity Scale
Stephen Emond stated: Rarity, value and desirability are all difficult things to measure with any accuracy - especially when relying on eBay for information. I'd consider desirability to be a very subjective thing. Most of you would love to have a MS Mt. Drash, but it wouldn't really do anything for me. (Please don't burn the heretic.) Theoretically, value should be equivalent to some equation combining rarity and demand. The problem, as you pointed out below, is demand/desirability fluctuates as people come and go, lack or have extra funds, etc. For rarity knowing production numbers WOULD be great, but finding the original numbers would not be easy. It also wouldn't take into account how many copies exist today. Agreed. Value is something that could be more accurately measured but it would take a LOT of research. Values also have a way of hitting extreme highs and lows based on how the auctions are advertised, who sees them, who has the money at the time, etc, etc, etc. With VGs (for the most part) you only need to worry about the overall condition a minimal amount of contents: Cart/CD, Manual, and Box. True, but let me give you a bit of background. I believe the first video game rarity list was created by Craig VGR Pell for Atari 2600 games. IIRC, the early drafts only had four or five ratings: C = common U = uncommon R = rare ER = extremely rare NR = never released ER is the one I forget if it was there at first. Later, he added: UR = unbelievably rare which I believe he used primarily for games that only existed as prototypes. (It was between ER and NR.) Obviously, there's a few problems with this; mainly too many Us and Rs. Other people started their own rarity lists for other systems with slightly different variations (for example, futher breaking things down to C- (really common), C, and C+ (common, but not as common as just C), etc.), but most did something along these lines. I don't have the earliest Digital Press Guides, but as some point they decided to implement a numeric system from 1 (common as dirt*) to 10 (mind-bogglingly rare*). Atari Age (www.atariage.com) followed suit, although they and Digital Press often disagree about precisely what numbers best describe some games. Then DP realized that just because a game is rare doesn't mean it's value is necessarily high, so they added prices to their guide. However, if a game is so rare that an actual dollar figure is impossible to suggest, they simply use $$$. * That's not what they actually call them, but that's the intent. All these factors can make creating such a rarity / price guide difficult - but not impossible. I'd say the best way to create such a guide is to start with a database. Since everyone here has their own particular interests (Ultima, Sierra, Infocom, etc.) we could all contribute based on those interests. Useful fields could include: - Game Title - Platform / Format (5.25 / 3.5 / CD / etc) - Version / Printing - Completeness This could be hard to arbitrarily and succinctly note. - Overall Condition (to be useful this shouldn't be too obsessive - I suggest a simplistic Good / Fair / Poor system with perhaps a separate option for shrinkwrap) I suggest using the abbreviated MobyScale form (e.g. Good/Fine). - Auction # (reference only - to avoid information duplication) - Auction Date (to see how many copies turn up monthly / yearly) - Final Bid (obviously for determining value) - # of *Unique* Bidders (not counting multiple bids by same bidder - to help measure desirability) This is a good idea. For a time, I created my own spreadsheets of prices for Pac-Man Fever items and Rom action figures. You can find the summary of my findings at http://home.hiwaay.net/~lkseitz/cvg/PacmanFever/ and http://home.hiwaay.net/~lkseitz/comics/Rom/actionfig/where.shtml, respectively. The most difficult thing to determine from an eBay auction is condition, particularly if there's no photo. And given that not all sellers are collectors, determining version, completeness, or sometimes even platform might be difficult, especially if they don't answer e-mail. Keeping these lists up took a fair chunk of time, though, which is why I eventually gave it up. If there are any suggestions please add them. If there are volunteers to actually manage such a database, good luck :) I'd actually consider starting a project like this but I'm already in the middle of two massive collector's guides. A third would likely kill me. Mind if I ask what kind of guides? -- Lee K. Seitz [EMAIL PROTECTED] -- This message was sent to you because you are currently subscribed to the swcollect mailing list. To unsubscribe, send mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of 'unsubscribe swcollect' Archives are available at: http://www.mail-archive.com/[EMAIL PROTECTED]/
Re: [SWCollect] Rarity Scale
Lee K. Seitz wrote: Atari Age (www.atariage.com) followed suit, although they and Digital Press often disagree about precisely what numbers best describe some games. ..and further complicating matters is that the guides are limited to their fields of expertise or opinions. For example, I own 250+ Dreamcast games, and I can assure you that DP's Dreamcast section is all out of whack (same goes for the suggested dollar value). I can only assume this because no single one of them is a DC fanatic or was very much into the DC scene. -- Jim Leonard ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) World's largest electronic gaming project:http://www.MobyGames.com/ A delicious slice of the demoscene:http://www.MindCandyDVD.com/ Various oldskool PC rants and ramblings: http://www.oldskool.org/ -- This message was sent to you because you are currently subscribed to the swcollect mailing list. To unsubscribe, send mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of 'unsubscribe swcollect' Archives are available at: http://www.mail-archive.com/[EMAIL PROTECTED]/
Re: [SWCollect] Rarity Scale
Jim Leonard stated: thing that it would be impossible to tackle it with any degree of accuracy. For example, knowing production numbers isn't enough -- there are games that had extremely high production numbers that fetch high numbers on ebay; by the same token, there are games that had very low production runs (1 or less) that are not in demand and sell for prices in the single digits. So it is my personal opinion that any sort of rarity scale would have no common frame of reference or definition. Jim, I think you're mentally associating terms that don't necessarily go together. I see a similar problem in the MobyScale FAQ, now that I look at it: Rare isn't an indication of condition; it's an indication of value. This is incorrect. Rare is an indication of how easy or hard it is to find an item. Rarity and demand combine to create the game's value. As I believe you yourself have said previously on this list, a game can be extremely rare, but if no one's interested in it, the price (value) remans low. If one could attain omniscience, one could instantly assign a rarity to any computer game given an agreed upon scale. (Agreeing on the scale is a whole other matter.) It would only change when sufficient copies of the game were destroyed to knock it up to the next level. Given our limitations, though, we can only make educated guesses for rarity. There would be regional differences, but those would theoretically even out (I think). Also, if a large stash of a particular game were found, the rarity might go down. A rarity list is certainly possible, however it would take a lot of work by a dedicated group of collectors over a long period of time. -- Lee K. Seitz [EMAIL PROTECTED] -- This message was sent to you because you are currently subscribed to the swcollect mailing list. To unsubscribe, send mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of 'unsubscribe swcollect' Archives are available at: http://www.mail-archive.com/[EMAIL PROTECTED]/
Re: [SWCollect] Rarity Scale
Lee K. Seitz wrote: Rare isn't an indication of condition; it's an indication of value. You are right! I have corrected that in the MobyScale right now. The new entry reads: Q: Why isn't Rare on the grading scale?br A: Rare isn't an indication of condition; it's an indication of availability. Thanks for catching that. -- Jim Leonard ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) World's largest electronic gaming project:http://www.MobyGames.com/ A delicious slice of the demoscene:http://www.MindCandyDVD.com/ Various oldskool PC rants and ramblings: http://www.oldskool.org/ -- This message was sent to you because you are currently subscribed to the swcollect mailing list. To unsubscribe, send mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of 'unsubscribe swcollect' Archives are available at: http://www.mail-archive.com/[EMAIL PROTECTED]/
Re: [SWCollect] Rarity Scale
On Jan 28, 2004, at 2:47 PM, Jim Leonard wrote: [Snip] When I tackled the grading scale along with Chris, Hugh, Tom, et al, it was because we were all using *different* terms for the *same* things. It was an effort to define logical/sane grades, what made something fall into each grade, and assign them terms that were consistent. All of those elements were never under debate; only their terms (and how to arrange them) were. But a rarity scale would be constantly debated: Are production run numbers the only factor to consider? Or is it the demand for that item compared to its availability? If the latter, how can you determine demand and availability accurately enough for an official rarity list? (hint: you can't) Even worse is that production numbers are really being used as a rough indicator of surviving copies. _That's_ the number you need and the one you'll never really know. -- Edward Franks -- This message was sent to you because you are currently subscribed to the swcollect mailing list. To unsubscribe, send mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of 'unsubscribe swcollect' Archives are available at: http://www.mail-archive.com/[EMAIL PROTECTED]/
Re: [SWCollect] Rarity Scale
Ultima II is also in the Ultima Trilogy :) Distinct from the others because the splash screen says Origin and not Sierra. On Jan 28, 2004, at 1:18 PM, Howard Feldman wrote: Sounds cool. I'd agree that TWO ratings might be better - one for 'rarity' and one for 'value'. The Giant list of Classic Game Programmers is a good source of game names and authors for starts. Digital Press publishes a rarity guide for video game cartidges (and some computer games), avaiable for $25. Thus I imagine it would be something along these lines? I agree the best way to start is we all make our own rarity lists and then we average the results or something. It would also be important to distinguish between different versions of the same game, which may very greatly in value. For example, Ultima II comes in a large box, a small sierra box, and a small Black on-line box. Wizardry II comes in a flat folder package, and a shiny box like wizardry I. Each of these has different rarities. Even the rarity for different computers can vary although this is generally less important since most of us (?) do not collect the saem game for multiple computers unless there are other differences besides the floppy disk. Common Uncommon Rare Imaginary Oddity Unique Shameless placeholder to complete acronym -- Howard Feldman Author of the Search for Freedom Computer Role-Playing Game Visit its homepage at: http://deep.mshri.on.ca/people/feldman -- This message was sent to you because you are currently subscribed to the swcollect mailing list. To unsubscribe, send mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of 'unsubscribe swcollect' Archives are available at: http://www.mail-archive.com/[EMAIL PROTECTED]/ -- This message was sent to you because you are currently subscribed to the swcollect mailing list. To unsubscribe, send mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of 'unsubscribe swcollect' Archives are available at: http://www.mail-archive.com/[EMAIL PROTECTED]/
Re: [SWCollect] Rarity Scale
Pedro Quaresma schrieb: I like the idea! S could also stand for Super-Unique, Special or even Super-Duper! ;) Oh silly me! I just now understood what Hugh meant with completing the acronym slaps head Marco -- This message was sent to you because you are currently subscribed to the swcollect mailing list. To unsubscribe, send mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of 'unsubscribe swcollect' Archives are available at: http://www.mail-archive.com/[EMAIL PROTECTED]/
Re: [SWCollect] Rarity Scale
[EMAIL PROTECTED] schrieb: That's the spirit, C.E.! I think we could at least start a running list and watch it grow over time. It has to start somewhere. I'll host it on GOTCHA unless somebody has a better suggestion. I can start with about 100 games I've searched for regularly on Ebay over the years. I have a pretty good feel for them in terms of availability. You guys could then go through and make comments where you think they're wrong. I've seen 50 of those on eBay in the last year...that's not rare. You can also grow the list with your own personal searches and experience. Do you think about using a CGI script? I'd like to base the CURIOUS Scale solely on a game's availability on on-line auctions. This represents the general availability to the buying public and is as good an indicator as I can think of. It would work like this: In the last 2 years, a complete (VG/VG or better) version of this game has appeared on an on-line auction approximately: 20 times or less = Rare 21 - 80 times = Uncommon More than 80 = Common You could put condition into the formula as a modifier. Imaginary, Unique and Oddity would have to be determined by the group. Hm, Imaginary - Not even a single appearance Unique - 5 times or less Oddity - Any game that was not a regular publication You could combine Oddity and the other gradings. Obviously this is based on complete speculation, but who would be better to speculate on it than us? Honestly, I think auction availability is a better indicator of availability than just about anything else (including production runs). Since it is an indicator of how many are for sale on the open market. Sure there may be a box of Drash's in a warehouse somewhere, but how many of us will ever have a chance to buy them? We won't...unless they show up on eBay. Well, any grading will always be subjective. We as individuals choose certain factors in our grading and collectively we can arrive at a common denominator that represents us as a group. Others might choose other factors. Marco -- This message was sent to you because you are currently subscribed to the swcollect mailing list. To unsubscribe, send mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of 'unsubscribe swcollect' Archives are available at: http://www.mail-archive.com/[EMAIL PROTECTED]/
Re: [SWCollect] Rarity Scale
Stephen Emond schrieb: For rarity knowing production numbers WOULD be great, but finding the original numbers would not be easy. It also wouldn't take into account how many copies exist today. It's hard to even imagine, but there are people out there who just toss old games in the dumpster - who would want a 25 year old game??? (Ok, you can put your hands down now...) As others mentioned, I don't think production numbers are that much important. What matters is what turns up on ebay, the one place accessible to all of us. They are probably thousands of Ataris E.T. catridges still buried in some desert in New Mexico, but they will never turn up on ebay - still you got a pretty high production number for that cartridge. If we include production numbers into a formula, we'd have to include many factors we can't determine: production number total, percentage of said production destroyed due to being not sold, sold but destroyed by owner, etc. Marco -- This message was sent to you because you are currently subscribed to the swcollect mailing list. To unsubscribe, send mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of 'unsubscribe swcollect' Archives are available at: http://www.mail-archive.com/[EMAIL PROTECTED]/
Re: [SWCollect] Rarity Scale
If anyone can write an app to poll eBay for a given list of games and track the numbers, our job is done. This whole scale can be automated. Game rankings can change in real-time based on actual eBay data. Hugh -Original Message- From: Marco Thorek [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Jan 28, 2004 9:39 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: [SWCollect] Rarity Scale [EMAIL PROTECTED] schrieb: That's the spirit, C.E.! I think we could at least start a running list and watch it grow over time. It has to start somewhere. I'll host it on GOTCHA unless somebody has a better suggestion. I can start with about 100 games I've searched for regularly on Ebay over the years. I have a pretty good feel for them in terms of availability. You guys could then go through and make comments where you think they're wrong. I've seen 50 of those on eBay in the last year...that's not rare. You can also grow the list with your own personal searches and experience. Do you think about using a CGI script? I'd like to base the CURIOUS Scale solely on a game's availability on on-line auctions. This represents the general availability to the buying public and is as good an indicator as I can think of. It would work like this: In the last 2 years, a complete (VG/VG or better) version of this game has appeared on an on-line auction approximately: 20 times or less = Rare 21 - 80 times = Uncommon More than 80 = Common You could put condition into the formula as a modifier. Imaginary, Unique and Oddity would have to be determined by the group. Hm, Imaginary - Not even a single appearance Unique - 5 times or less Oddity - Any game that was not a regular publication You could combine Oddity and the other gradings. Obviously this is based on complete speculation, but who would be better to speculate on it than us? Honestly, I think auction availability is a better indicator of availability than just about anything else (including production runs). Since it is an indicator of how many are for sale on the open market. Sure there may be a box of Drash's in a warehouse somewhere, but how many of us will ever have a chance to buy them? We won't...unless they show up on eBay. Well, any grading will always be subjective. We as individuals choose certain factors in our grading and collectively we can arrive at a common denominator that represents us as a group. Others might choose other factors. Marco -- This message was sent to you because you are currently subscribed to the swcollect mailing list. To unsubscribe, send mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of 'unsubscribe swcollect' Archives are available at: http://www.mail-archive.com/[EMAIL PROTECTED]/ -- This message was sent to you because you are currently subscribed to the swcollect mailing list. To unsubscribe, send mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of 'unsubscribe swcollect' Archives are available at: http://www.mail-archive.com/[EMAIL PROTECTED]/
