Vintage Video Game Collection Found in Nebraska Storage Could Fetch Six-Figure Payday
By David Propper
Published Dec. 1, 2023, 12:43 a.m. ET
More than 150 vintage video games stashed away in storage since the 1990s could lead to a six-figure payday for a Nebraska man who owns the collection.
The Super Nintendo and Sega Genesis games, once for sale at an Omaha video game store that closed in 1998, are yet again on the market after they were recently certified, sending video game lovers into a fever pitch.
Dubbed the Nebraska Collection, the cache of 173 cartridges could fetch somewhere in the six-figure dollar range, according to Chris Kohler, a collector and the editorial director at Digital Eclipse, as reported by NPR.
The games used to be in a store owned by Mark Odorisio, who put the games away in storage and only revisited the trove years later, which included hundreds of factory-sealed games. The discs were graded and authenticated, with the 173 games deemed most valuable.
“I said, ‘Mark, you need to make a decision about these games. What’s your plan?’” Mark’s brother Tim Odorisio recalled to NPR. “He said, ‘Well, I was just going to keep them and then when I died, it would go to the kids.’ I go, ‘We can’t … your heart’s in the right place, but your mind sucks.’”
Chris Thompson, who owns a chain of video game stores in Nebraska called Gameroom, is helping the brothers in their effort to resell the games. He put out a video in February 2022 of the stunning collection in multiple boxes.
One of the most notable games is a copy of Chrono Trigger, which is a cult classic roleplaying game. “The game itself is just this amazing masterpiece of the video roleplaying game genre that … a lot of people would say is the best video game RPG ever made,” Kohler told NPR. “Basically, this is as nice a copy of this particular game as you will ever see.” He believes single games can possibly sell for $10,000.
Thompson made clear in a recent YouTube video that single-game sales are not available, but someone can offer to buy the entire stock. Certain Sonic the Hedgehog, Jurassic Park, Star Trek and sports games are within the collection.