Three pristine copies of the first ever Pokemon games, Red, Blue, and Yellow, were sold for an impressive sum of $2 million at an auction. This makes this trio of games the second most expensive retro games to be sold at an auction after a copy of Super Mario Bros received $3 million at an auction held in the month of June 2026.
Considering that Pokemon TCG cards from older expansions and sets continue to be sold at mind boggling prices (leading to issues with scalping), the fact that the Generation I games would receive high enough value should not come as a surprise.
Each of the Pokemon games sold had near perfect PSA scores
While PSA (Professional Sports Authenticator) grades are fairly often used to judge the quality of TCG cards, this also applies to video games as well. As for the sold copies, here’s how much they were graded:
- Red Version: 10
- Blue Version: 9.8
- Yellow Version: 10
It goes without saying these are amazing scores, even the one given to the Blue Version. Considering these games are three decades old (as a reminder the franchise celebrates its 30th anniversary this year), it is amazing to find any physical copies in working condition. Additionally, the PSA almost never gives perfect scores to video games but in this case, they apparently could not find any flaws.
That sais, it seems more likely that these games were never see any actual play. Instead, there will be attempts to preserve them as artifacts of gaming history. The sale was brokered by the brokerage service Nostalgix, from one anonymous collector to individuals as per their word. However, this trio of games has been referred to as The Dubal Collection, most likely referring to their high prices and the people who could afford to buy them.
Edited by Akash Sil
