I've been thinking about each region and noticed something:
Japan - Cheap authentic good games you can find everywhere
China - Literally $5 pirated multicarts like the 198-in-1 or 400-in-1 multicart, which are insanely awesome.
Former USSR - Pirated games you can't easily find elsewhere (like Flintstones at Dinosaur Peak, or LITTLE SAMSON!)
South America - Sega is mainly the main console manufacturer but there's lots of stuff like the NTDEC family game
North America - Overpriced $50 copies of SMB and Duck Hunt.
Especially on eBay, I often need to pay $12.00 for a Famicom game that would be 500 yen or less in Japan. Although there are occasionally some good sellers, it's mostly insane prices. A few minutes ago, I searched for a copy of Rockman on eBay and one of them was $125.00! I looked again on Amazon, the cheapest one they have is $44.00. These are both used and unboxed copies.
North America is tough to find games, especially Canada. Even shitty games are at least $10-20 in retro stores. Buying online is the only way!
Europe isn't better either. I buy mostly online.
I went to one of Canada's 'best', and only, game stores called A & C games to check there Famicom selection. They had to go to the basement to get the big tote of crappy carts. Starting from $10, you can buy games like Soccer and Baseball. Those dumb Bandai Dragonball games and whatnot are like $20-30 each. That's basically all they have. Read Famicomblog's article on this Toronto game shop if you want more details.
well anything north America is still better than Australia.
i find a good price here and there but mostly non existant sales and what is for sale is usually way over priced..
i guess senseiman is the bees knees for all of us outside of japan.
Before I found Ali Express I used to go to a place in BC called Gamedeals, which was pretty good, at least for consoles. The reason I stopped going there is because my parents told them I was burning Dreamcast games. Now they hate me.
Their NES carts were over priced though, but it wasn't that bad, around $10 for something Bionic Commando or Battletoads, stuff you could only find for $30 at other places.
EDIT: I forgot to clarify the "value" part of Ali Express mainly comes from the fact that they sell multicarts, so the only reason you pay $1.66 for SMUSA is because you got it on a $10 multicart. AE is useless for collectors that want authentic games.
The US economy right now is stagnating- wages are shit & so people are attempting to generate income via second hand markets. Prices surge on anything with even the whiff of nostalgia.
Post Merge: December 07, 2014, 12:27:46 pm
For example: http://shopgoodwill.com/search/SearchKey.asp?itemTitle=Nintendo&catid=0&sellerID=all&closed=no&minPrice=&maxPrice=&sortBy=itemEndTime&SortOrder=a&showthumbs=on
This is very true. I see plenty of imported famicom and super famicom cartridges in the retro shops, but have only come across 2 pirates in the wild ever. Granted I don't go to flea markets, but it still seems rare in US. I bet you can find some in Mexico however, so not all is lost for NA.
I live in LA and have had practically zero luck with not only Famicom and other import games, but with retro gaming in general. There's one pretty fantastic (but pricey) store in North Hollywood called Game Dude (http://www.gamedude.com/ (http://www.gamedude.com/)) that has a decent collection of old stuff, but I bought them out of their tiny collection of Famicom games the first time I went there. I pretty much rely on everyone here for Famicom goodies.
I've never bought games in the United States except for some $2 Street Fighter PS2 game I saw at a shop around the time the Wii U was about to come out. But in places like the USA and even Canada people "used to play" NES, they don't play it anymore. It's, from what I can gather, MUCH more alive in Japan, China, and Eastern Europe. Heck, you can still buy the original Dendy in Russia, Subor's churning out consoles like no tomorrow, and not to mention Hyperkin and their Retron 1/2/3. (Retron 5 is like an ouya with a cartridge slot.)