Two weeks ago, the same seller again listed a bunch of the cards. Repeating the process, I set my sniper and watched as none of the cards had any bids going into the last day Would this end the same way, with me being outsniped?
Nope!
This time, I was the only bidder on the nine cards that he had that I needed. I got each of them for 99¢. The was a nice turn of events since because of my bidding on the last batch, the buyer that got them paid a whole lot more than 99¢. That left me feeling a little guilty, but a whole lot richer...and my apologies to whoever I bid up...I hope that it wasn't one of the Cubs collectors that follow me.
I was able to add nine cards to my collection. Along with these, I already had the Darwin Barney card and Nate Schieholtz from the earlier auction. I'm now three cards short of the entire team set, still needing Anthony Rizzo, Jeff Samardzija, and Luis Valbuena. Hopefully my Japanese supplier will list these three soon.
Here's a look at the nine I picked up...
And how many of the nine are on the Cub's 40 man roster right now?
Three...Castro, Jackson, and Russell.
Do the yellow stars represent the amount of star power the player has? If so, interesting to see Camp and Castro at the same level and Russell as just one star.
ReplyDeleteAnd do the black top/bottom borders on Soriano and Marmol mean they have leveled up or something? Enquiring minds want to know!
If I was fluent in Japanese I might be able to help....any reader from Japan out there that know the rules of the game??
ReplyDeleteRegarding the stars, it's related to the arcade game these originated from.
ReplyDeleteDuring the game you have a salary cap of sorts and can only have up to a certain number of "stars." As you advance during the game, the more "stars" you're allowed to use. This is ensure fair play and to make sure a guy who just dropped thousands on yen on the best players available can't use them too soon.
Plus in Japan not too many follow the MLB very closely so those stars help people know who's "good" on a scale of 1 to 8.
Nice pickups. If you need any translations I'd be more than glad to help.
Oh and cards generally have black borders if they have at least 6 stars. Players with 5 or less stars get white borders.
ReplyDeleteAlthough there exceptions where players with 5 stars have black borders, but as of right now I don't know the mechanics behind that.
Thanks for all the info...have you played the game at all?
DeleteYes, when I was living in Japan in 2012 I played the game very frequently. I even tried going after the full '12 set. Only 3 cards left :).
DeleteAll very interesting, thanks!
ReplyDeleteZippy - Just curious, what is the going rate for packs or singles in Japan? Is this seller making money on "dime box" cards or barely breaking even?
As I understand from watching videos on it, you get a card from the machine every time you play the game. It supposedly costs around $2.00.
Deletehttp://razcardblog.blogspot.com/2013/10/what-ebay-hath-wrought-19-sega-card-gen.html
This forum thread also has a lot of information about the cards, pictures of the game machine, etc.
Deletehttp://www.blowoutcards.com/forums/baseball/364301-topps-sega-card-gen-japanese-product.html
Well when you play the arcade game you get 1 card per game, and one game costs 200 yen ($2.00 USD).
DeleteOther than that you can only get them from card shops as singles. The prices vary from store to store and largely depend on who's on the card. There is also a 60 card subset featuring foil versions of a select 60 players and those cards can also command a hefty price depending on who the player is. Last I checked the Cubs didn't have anybody in the subsets from '09, '10, '11, '12 or '13.
As for whether or not the seller is breaking even, judging from how low these are selling for and how high shipping costs from Japan can be. I'd say they're just barely breaking even but leaning more towards losing money.
DeleteOh, and that thread was started by yours truly ;).
I kind of wondered if you might be the person who started that thread.
Delete