PS1 Games way too expensive on Ebay

[Jon1]

Jaguar games are reasonably priced. Most games go for like $10, and that's acceptable because there were only a few hundred thousand of each game ever produced. Crash Bandicoot probably had about 5-10 million copies made, and it's on cd nonetheless. And I'm supposed to pay $20 for that? Give me a break, they're clearly manipulating the prices because they're trying to rip us off as much as possible. In this economy, it's criminal.

[PacMan000]

Demand plays a factor.

More people want PS1 games than Jaguar games, just like when they were new. This drives the PS1's price up to the same level as the harder-to-find Jaguar games.

[Burk1]

 Games have trends. Wait a few months,and Crash will be under 10 bucks again. I sell a lot on ebay,and rarely do I get much more than half of those overpriced buy it nows. Wait for it to be auctioned,or check amazon,or the often overlooked half.com . I use videogames.pricecharting.com . It gives you an average price of SOLD games, so you know what is a fair auction price. It also shows the price trends for the prior few years of each game. Sometimes you may be buying at a price peak. This often happens seasonally or when sequels get released. 6 months ago, Shadow of the Colossus was a 25$ game,and now its 10 bucks. Be patient,and like others have stated,look for the lots. Sometimes you might win crash for 20$ with 5 other games.I stopped selling individual ps1 games for the most part because I felt they were underpriced. It is a fickle market to be sure.

[0-Storm]

I like your theories PSX & think they hold a lot of truth. I love collecting video games, but don't like the possibility that 40 years from now my collection will be worthless.

I need to remind myself to buy what I will actually play. Getting something for a good price that I won't use may still be a pretty stupid purchase.

[VideoGameCritic]

It seems like games for a certain system are in high demand when the system is new.  When the system is discontinued, the value of these games drops for a few years.  Then for some reason people tend to discover a system and the prices climb.  Maybe the PS1 has reached that point.  I have to admit that in the early-mid 2000's I didn't like the prospect of playing PS1 games.  Now they really fascinate me.

As for Ebay, I agree it's getting harder to find deals.  Worse yet, it seems like the selection is a lot smaller across the board.

[Orion1]

PS1 prices peaked several years ago and have been declining ever since.  That includes Ebay sales.   The average PS1 game sells for about $6, but in 2008 the average was about $10.

Here's the chart:

http://videogames.pricecharting.com/console/playstation?sort-by=name

The Crash games may not have followed the same pattern.  However, I think I bought all of them for $2 each at my local game store.  Sometimes the game stores are the best place to buy "common" mass produced games since their shelves get filled to the brim with trad-ins.  The opposite is true for rare titles.  Those physical stores will make you pay plenty for the items in their special glass cases.

Also factored into the PS1 prices falling is the fact that a lot of them are getting re-released on PSN.  

As far as the prices of the overall used game market, the "retro" movement seemed to reach it's peak in 2008.  I say that after examining all the charts they have available on the site whose link I posted above.  The biggest exceptions are the NES and SNES prices, which seem to constantly go up.  A few select, ultra rare Nintendo games may be tugging up the averages though.