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Why are MK4, Mythologies and Special Forces so expensive on eBay?

Art Lean

Noob
Not that I need them as I own them in a box in storage somewhere, but out of curiosity I decided to look up on eBay as to whether there's any value in the jankiest games in the MK franchise, and to my utter amazement MK4, MK Mythologies and Special Forces are all apparently worth shit-loads (for an MK game at least)! Granted I don't know how readily they sell for these prices, but MK4 on PS1 and N64 seems to be listed for £50-£70 on average, Mythologies on both between £60-£200 and even the horrific pile of shit Special Forces is £60-£70 and a few have watchers.

I realise they're old so by their very nature they're a more limited commodity as time moves forward, but it's not like they were rare, hell Special Forces is not just awful but was also deliberately released as a bargain bin filler on launch day. Weirdly the still-thoroughly-exclusive MK Gold on Dreamcast doesn't seem to hold as high a price as bog-standard MK4 on either PS1 or N64, averaging more between £50-£60 when surely there must be less copies of that game in circulation? Ultimate MK3 on the Saturn, again surely a smaller rarer release due to the sales failure of the system, is on average £25.

I also checked out MK3 and Trilogy on PS1 and they only seem to sell for around £10-£15. Bizarrely the good spin-off Shaolin Monks isn't worth a thing. So considering how badly Mythologies and Special Forces played (which I dare say isn't even opinion-based, like MK4's merits might be, those two spin-offs literally play really horribly irrespective of at least MKM's contributions to the story), what on earth is the logic behind the collectable prices, why would anyone actually pay, say, £100 for something that's just objectively awful?
 
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I'm sure it's because they're rare.

And Mortal Kombat: Shaolin Monks on Xbox is expensive. The Playstation 2 version is not.
 

Art Lean

Noob
I'm sure it's because they're rare.

And Mortal Kombat: Shaolin Monks on Xbox is expensive. The Playstation 2 version is not.
Xbox Shaolin Monks is showing as £10 on average on my end here.

Special Forces wasn't worth the £15.99 it was released at, least of all four times that cost 20 years later because... 'rare'? :confused:
 

Shania Twain

That Don't Impress Me Much
Special Forces was barely promoted in the USA at least and super negative reviews. I doubt it had tons of releases so likely diehard MK fans would have it when it was possibly sold on ebay at super cheap prices or something. I dunno. so really if the going price is just 40 or so more then you may as well keep it?

Also...I think the reason MK Gold is as cheap as a ps1 MK4 is because it was a launch title for the Dreamcast so there is likely tons of copies out there. I mean I would guess anyway. Also, it is usually what a collector decides to keep in regards to what it is worth. For example, like action figures. I collect modern era 4inch GI Joe (or Action Man/Action Force as you may know in UK) figures and since many of the female characters were not released but as exclusives to collector's club subscriptions/comic cons, etc. they have far more worth cuz even if you decide to sell your collection those are ones I personally would keep. Sorry if I went off topic on a different franchise and such. Actually, you may like the live action movies based on some of your posts on here that I've seen. I did not realize you were from Europe. I mean...they might be silly but a lot of stuff takes place in Europe. and it has Sienna Miller. She's one of my favorite actors. It also has that one Dr. Who guy, Rachel Nichols, Channing Tatum, and the guy that is in Tomorrow Never Dies. You can prolly find it on HBO or something and the Sequel. okay. Done with my sidebar. lol.

-oh btw if you have the action force/action man figures i know they go for a nice penny on ebay. Especially the villains, The Red Shadows.
 

Art Lean

Noob
Special Forces was barely promoted in the USA at least and super negative reviews. I doubt it had tons of releases so likely diehard MK fans would have it when it was possibly sold on ebay at super cheap prices or something. I dunno. so really if the going price is just 40 or so more then you may as well keep it?

Also...I think the reason MK Gold is as cheap as a ps1 MK4 is because it was a launch title for the Dreamcast so there is likely tons of copies out there. I mean I would guess anyway. Also, it is usually what a collector decides to keep in regards to what it is worth. For example, like action figures. I collect modern era 4inch GI Joe (or Action Man/Action Force as you may know in UK) figures and since many of the female characters were not released but as exclusives to collector's club subscriptions/comic cons, etc. they have far more worth cuz even if you decide to sell your collection those are ones I personally would keep. Sorry if I went off topic on a different franchise and such. Actually, you may like the live action movies based on some of your posts on here that I've seen. I did not realize you were from Europe. I mean...they might be silly but a lot of stuff takes place in Europe. and it has Sienna Miller. She's one of my favorite actors. It also has that one Dr. Who guy, Rachel Nichols, Channing Tatum, and the guy that is in Tomorrow Never Dies. You can prolly find it on HBO or something and the Sequel. okay. Done with my sidebar. lol.

-oh btw if you have the action force/action man figures i know they go for a nice penny on ebay. Especially the villains, The Red Shadows.
I used to have some Action Force/GI Joe as a kid, always remember wanting the evil guy with the silver head, think he had a hang glider but the catalogue said he was exclusive to something. I think I had one of those Red Shadows guys in googling, masked nazis in red seems so familiar, but can't recall for certain, he was probably sold at a car boot sale we had :oops:

I know for certain I had the General mobile command base though, but the bastard thing arrived down from my mum's mail-order catalogue without the clip-in seats for the front cockpit, it was just a huge empty hole right through to our carpet underneath. Killed a lot of the fun of playing with it. Sadly I was always the boy who'd receive the dud toy with the manufacturing defect growing up (and when you'd opened it for Christmas you didn't want to send it back for a replacement).

But a lot of my Action Force/GI Joe memories I think are cross-wired with MASK? Especially since I tended to mix and match my action figure toys into all out battles.

But I can understand this stuff having value, they were toys many kids used and abused, much like Star Wars figures, hence why finding ones in good condition can be so collectable, especially as they're from what many believe to be the golden age of toys that were made with such ingenuity, complex design, realistic vehicles etc. Things like Starcom are still incredible technological accomplishments to this day; I showed Starcom toy videos to my son and his face lit up as he yelled "I want those daddy!!!!" and I said "you're over 30 years too late buddy!"

Mortal Kombat Special Forces on the PS1 however? A steaming pile of shit released at budget price on launch because even the makers knew it was a steaming pile of shit... yet now having a higher resale value than Ultimate MK11? I find it baffling. It's a game I only bought out of franchise loyalty when it came out knowing full-well it was terrible (well that and my girlfriend had dumped me the week prior so I wanted some retail therapy... needless to say it didn't cheer me up haha) and I think only played it once? I remember cheating my way through MKM because it was impossible, though I loved the concept and enjoyed the cheesy live action FMV (it was like an interactive episode of Conquest), but goddamn it was horrible to actually play. All I needed to do was watch Matt McMuscles' episode of Wha Happen? on MKSF and Maximillian Dood's abbreviated playthrough of MKM for the bad memories to come flooding back. Yet apparently there might be people out there willing to spend £70 on the experience for themselves? The world is crazier than I thought haha.
 
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Both Special forces and Mythologies are rare & retro now. Sub zero mytholgies is a side scroller, oldschool side scrollers are kinda expensive for most retro systems.

P.s Sub zero: Mythologies is a good game. Hard as nails, but awesome if you love classic MK. Man that game was so hard lol

MK:SF is crap, atleast for a MK game it is. The original idea looked very good tho.
 

Marinjuana

Up rock incoming, ETA 5 minutes
Old games, high demand

Random games like Gauntlet: Dark Legacy on Gamecube can go for twice their original price.

A game like Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance for Gamecube was well received but sold poorly and that game can sell for a couple hundred US dollars, it not selling well on release just means there is less copies out there.