The global video game market is worth over $85 billion today. We’ve come a long way from the Magnavox Odyssey, the first console ever sold back in 1972. In that time, countless games have been created. One site came up with an estimate of 1,181,019 games but then acknowledges this doesn’t include any old PC or console games for systems like the NES, SNES, Commodore 64 and many others. And it’s true, it may be impossible to guess how many have ever existed, but it’s safe to say it’s been millions.
Of all of those millions, some have definitely been harder to come by than others. We may never know about custom games or even some of those Magnavox Odyssey games that are so rare they haven’t existed in decades. But there are some rare games that have achieved a nearly mythical status amongst gamers. Let’s check out 10 of the most coveted.
10. Where in North Dakota is Carmen San Diego
Back in 1985, the world was first introduced to Carmen Sandiego. Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego was such an immensely popular computer game, it even spawned a TV show and a Netflix series in the modern era. And it taught kids geography, so they were learning while they were entertained.
Made by German developer Brøderbund, it spawned one remarkably rare yet official spin off game called Where in North Dakota is Carmen Sandiego. This was the only state-specific version of the game ever made.
Around 5,000 copies were made in conjunction North Dakotan schools to teach kids about the state, but they were designed for the Apple II and consisted of a series of floppy disks. There’s a good chance some of you have never even seen a floppy disk, so you can imagine what happened to this game. Technology moved on, and many were just trashed.
A copy was found in 2015 and the game data was preserved, but as for the floppies themselves? Those may never be seen again.
9. Mangia
Every so often, a truly odd game shows up that is just a head scratcher for anyone who plays it. Mangia is one of those games, if you can find it. It was released for the Atari 2600 back in 1983 and the gameplay is decidedly bizarre.
Players take control of a child being fed pasta by his mother. You eat plate after plate until you explode. But you can throw the pasta to the cat or dog, but if your mom catches you, she’ll feed you three times as much.
Back in 2012, a copy of the game sold on eBay for $1000. At that time, only a couple of copies were known to exist anywhere. They sell for anywhere from $370 to $760 these days, but there’s also just one or two being sold in any given year.
8. Lakers vs Celtics for Sega Mega Drive
There are a number of Lakers vs Celtics games in existence, but the version made for the Sega Mega Drive back in 1990 for European gamers is undoubtedly the rarest of all. That’s because it’s believed the game was actually set to be recalled due to a licensing issue with the NBA in Europe at the time. The result was only 192 copies even being made and only 14 known to currently exist. It was so rare that for years, no one was sure it even existed. The game was officially released or legally allowed to be sold at the time.
The Sega Mega Drive was just the Sega Genesis outside of North America, so the game itself was not unique. North American copies of the game are fairly easy to come by. But the packing, manual and return slip were unique for this limited run version and that makes it a standout. Of the few copies in circulation, one sold on eBay in 2017 for nearly $4,500.
7. Red Sea Crossing
When it comes to serious money for rare games, Red Sea Crossing has to enter the conversation. The Atari 2600 game was very much inspired by the much more familiar game Frogger. You help your little character get from one place to another while avoiding lethal obstacles. Only in this case, you’re not a frog, you’re Moses, and the game is a sidescroller. In 2012, a copy of the game sold at auction for $10,400.
Red Sea Crossing was developed by an independent programmer back in 1983 and apparently only 100 copies were ever made. Of those, only two are known to still exist. Prior to 2007, most of the gaming world had no idea the game existed at all. In that year, the man who sold it at auction found it at a garage sale.
After some research, a handful of old magazine ads for the game were found, describing it as coming with a coloring book and an audiotape. Another copy of the game once sold for $14,000 on eBay. To date, no one has found a copy with the book and tape included.
6. Birthday Mania
Kids love video games, and that has been true since their inception. That’s likely why programmer Anthony Tokar came up with the idea for Birthday Mania back in 1984. He designed the game himself after learning how to program for fun and advertised it in the Newark Star Ledger newspaper in New Jersey. The game could be personalized for a child’s birthday. A buyer would mail Tokar a check and he would program the kid’s name into the title screen. After that, gameplay was simple and players had to blow out falling birthday candles.
It’s believed only 10 or so copies of the game were ever sold due in part to gaming experiencing a decline in 1983 and the fact the game was never commercially released and instead was only available if you saw that ad in a New Jersey classified.
In 2009, a copy of the game sold for $6,500 though it would likely fetch more if another turned up today. Tokar gave away the rights to the game a few years back on the condition that if anyone were to reproduce and sell it, proceeds would go to charity.
5. Air Raid for Atari 2600
Released in 1982, Air Raid came in a very unique sky blue case that also had a little handle on top so you could really yank it out of your 2600 like a boss. It’s also worth a tidy sun these days with a copy discovered at Goodwill selling in 2021 for $10,590.79. That was actually lower than a sealed copy sold with the instruction manual in 2012 that pulled in an impressive $33,433.30.
The game was discovered by a Goodwill employee who had to check and see if the game was worth anything. The distinctive color and shape really makes it a standout. Goodwill wrote at the time that there were only 12 copies have been found and sold, but other sources note that only five sales as collector’s items are known.
4. Nintendo World Championships
The idea of a professional gamer is part of the culture today, but even just a few years ago, many people would roll their eyes at the idea. Surely no one could play video games for a living. But the idea has been simmering for decades. Take, for instance, the 1990 Nintendo World Championships. This was by no means the first big video game tournament ever. Atari had held one in 1981 with $50,000 in prizes.
In 1989, Fred Savage starred in the movie The Wizard, about a pair of brothers heading to California to play in a Nintendo tournament. The whole movie was basically a massive Nintendo commercial, and it paid off. It also made sure every kid knew that a video game tournament was a real thing. One year later, the 1990 Nintendo World Championships included 8,000 players in 29 cities. The tournament even came with its own exclusive World Championships game, never meant to be played outside the confines of the tournament itself. The cartridge featured three games – Tetris, Rad Racer and Super Mario Bros. It’s estimated somewhere around 100 of the games were smuggled out.
In 2014, a copy with a torn off label sold for $100,000. Another sold at auction in 2021 for $180,000, while also acknowledging the game was once traded for a $550,000 Tom Brady rookie card.
3. Mean Girls
Mean Girls was a surprise hit film in 2004 starring Lindsay Lohan and written by Tina Fey. The movie has become something of a cult classic and even inspired its very own video game, which was made for the Nintendo DS some five years after the film’s release.
The game, which didn’t even feature Lohan on the cover allegedly because of her reputation at the time, was thought to never have actually been released at all for quite some time. That didn’t stop someone from finding it, though. After some years of hunting, investigating, and pleading, a woman named Raven, who had made a career out of detailing lost and forgotten DS games, caught the eye of one of the Mean Girls developers who shared a copy with her.
The game was debugged and emulated, and finally a playable version was released. The DS version may have been released on a very limited basis in Europe, but no one has claimed to have an actual copy of it, so maybe not. If that’s the case, it’s possible there are literally no genuine copies of this in the wild.
2. Stadium Events
Sports games have been big since gaming began. Pong is, after all, a sports game. In 1987, during Nintendo’s NES glory days, the game Stadium Events was released and allowed players to compete in four different Olympic-style events. The game itself is not particularly remarkable, especially since it was re-released in 1988 as World Class Track Meet. And therein lies the secret to this game’s rarity. Under the original title, only about a dozen copies are known to exist.
Two thousand copies of the original game were produced and 200 were shipped to stores. The game, made by Bandai, was to be played with something called the Family Fun Fitness Pad, one of those floor mats like the kind made popular by Dance Dance Revolution. However, Nintendo bought the rights to the pad during the shipping of the game and then recalled all the shipped copies so it could be rebranded as the Nintendo Power Pad.
The unsold games were sent back to the company, but a handful would have been sold already, and those are the rare versions out in the wild today. One copy sold for $13,105 in 2010. A factory sealed copy went for $41,300. The problem with this is that there are so many non-rare versions out there that people try to palm off as the real deal.
1. Sealed Super Mario Bros
So when it comes to the most valuable game of all time, and the most rare, it’s hard to top Super Mario Bros. But how could that be? It’s arguably one of, if not the most well known, games of all time. It all comes down to the details.
In April 2021, a sealed copy of Super Mario Bros sold for a stunning $660,000. The game had sat untouched in a drawer for 35 years and was sealed, unmarred, and essentially perfect. But it wasn’t the most expensive game of all time. Just a few months later, another copy of Super Mario Bros sold at auction for a staggering $2 million, making it the most expensive video game purchase in history.
Like the $660,000 copy, this was one professionally graded and in pristine condition. It was also one of a limited print run, making it more rare than your run of the mill Super Mario Bros you might find out there. With all those factors together, it may be the only version of the game meeting all those criteria in existence.