This has been something I’ve been thinking of for a long time, just curious what others would think.

Considering the prolific nature of repro sellers, I’m wondering if maybe we should have a shop here to help try to “reel” it in. It’s clear there’s a demand that we (uncle tusk) can’t provide. This would be a “cart only” release, as to make it more affordable, I’d leave the CIB stuff up to Uncle Tusk still.

My idea is, a few of us (myself included) have cart programmers. If we can work something out where we can sell the carts, have Kevin make a little something on his carts, and have the homebrew dev get a little something too. Hopefully then we can curb some of the demand out there and direct profits where they should go. The community.

I’ve got ideas for identifying our carts as well, with a custom label and “easter eggs”

I dunno, what do you guys think? I was also thinking the cart only release as it won’t step on anyones toes like devs who want to create/sell their own CIB like Thunder envisioned.

Just a thought, curious what others think about it.

Have been considering this, too. I think the best way would be to have a classified ads section on the site where every member can post ads to buy, sell or trade Virtual Boy stuff. It would function sort of like a shop and should be a much cleaner and more visible way for people to offer their stuff.

For example, Kevin could use it as a store front for his products like HyperFlash32, NES Freak could offer his repair services, eventually we can sell our TeamVUEngine games there and of course it would be a good way to sell authorized CIBs of homebrew games.

Furthermore, if it’s not PVB itself that is offering stuff for sale, but users doing private business without any mediation fees, then this can stay a non-commercial site and I won’t have to look into the legal side, pay taxes on it and shit. 😉

I agree with it technically being on a more “user to user” basis rather then have a mediator. I think pretty much all of us here are on the up and up and if we sell other peoples work then authorization and compensation should always be in check.

I just think it’s a good way to help combat random unauthorized sales. If we don’t have an alternative, then it’s hard to expect people to not buy them and support those types of sales.

[Pistachio]

I am new here but I would like to see something like this, especially for back catalog titles. A trust system would be helpful. Take a look at bitcointalk.org and how they do trust. Maybe a custom made tamper-evident hologram sticker on each cart would step it up a notch and add collectability of official carts. You could add a window to the sticker for a serial number for each cart.

Something like this on each cart but with Planet Virtual Boy,
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• This reply was modified 3 years, 11 months ago by Pistachio.

I like the idea of a way to easily list, sell, buy, rate, and provide feedback being incorporated into this site.

I do not like the idea of making something “limited edition” just to curb “piracy”. One ROM for this type of release, another for the public, yet another for a demo, one locked to a specific EMU, one that has Easter-eggs, one cart that has a special sticker, one that has blinking lights….

With respect, let’s not turn VB into the NES scene. People who care know what’s “official” and what’s not. If you see the need you can do something with a paper certificate, but grading and plastic packages is what helped turn the NES and the SNES into a chaotic, cash-heavy, egoistic mess. PlanetVB and VB in general is still full of good people with their heads on straight.

Two cents.

Hmm, I feel this is being taken the wrong way.

There wasn’t any intention of suggesting making anything limited or special. Just to make it easy for people who want to have a cart and also make sure they’re helping support the dev that made the homebrew.

Was just a dumb thought.

If someone here does not create an avenue for people to buy physical carts of back catelog homebrew games, people will eventually start to look to third party sellers. The resale price on short run releases is too high. For example, Bound High is on ebay for $350 CIB, a third party seller has it listed for $79 cart only and another for $48 cart only. Or, Faceball Remastered is listed for $79 on one site and not listed at all on the other site. It would be great if there was another option.

I think the core sentiment is good.

If a PVB member already has a cart programmer, what’s the absolute minimum, breakeven price they could charge for a VB repro with any given ROM on it? If you take that number, add a couple bucks that would go to the original dev (where applicable) and even a couple bucks for the trouble of flashing and mailing the carts, would that total be able to undercut the absurd prices we see on ebay? If so, I think it’s worth setting up that avenue. Making it somehow identifiable as a PlanetVB product might be a neat bonus, but no need to make anyone think they’re somehow better than any other repro.

Then just find someone willing to do it, since orders would spike.

Splain wrote:
Then just find someone willing to do it, since orders would spike.

I agree, but what about getting consent from developers? Thunderstruck made it clear that he disagrees with anyone selling carts with his work on it. Are his views on this still relevant after he decided to walkaway? I don’t know about other developers. How many would agree to something like this?

My guess is they can probably sell for around $79-$99, cart only. This is going by an olderish cart price I got a little while ago.

The “easter egg” I mentioned at first was a stamp or sticker or something on the inside of the cart. Make it easy to double check its origin in case of purchasing used.

Obviously consent from developers would be necessary, this wouldn’t happen at all without it. Same with using labels created by others.

However, this is all just overly optimistic thoughts.