GemuBaka

I was surfing through my old computer yesterday and I came across a bunch of files for articles I had previously written for other gaming sites. Among them were a group of articles I did after attending the East Coast Gaming Expo in 2006 and amid that batch of articles was a piece based on one of the few 1990 Nintendo World Championship carts in existence being present at the show. It's owner: None other than Ed Fleming, founder of VGXPO, which will be taking place this year from Oct. 9-11 at the Pennsylvania Convention Center in Philadelphia. The event is recognizing its fifth anniversary, which is definitely commendable. VGXPO has had its share of ups and downs it seems, stemming from articles I tend to read about it online, but my only personal experience with anything regard the show stems from the following article I printed three years ago:

Many gamers have heard of it, but only a select few can claim ownership of the highly coveted Nintendo World Championship 1990 competition cartridge. One such gamer, Ed Fleming, was on hand at the East Coast Video Game Expo to proudly display what is commonly known as the “Holy Grail of NES collecting.”

Fleming prominently displays the cartridge while promoting America’s Video Game Expo, which he founded. However, what may be the best part of the display for gamers is the chance to actually play the cart.

Used only in the Nintendo World Championship tour in 1990, the cartridge is a special challenge combination of Super Mario Bros., Rad Racer and Tetris. When a judge starts the competition with the second controller, gamers are then cued to get ready and prepare for about five minutes (depending on the dip switch setting) of high-pressure gaming.

While anyone can just play the games as intended, the addition of scoring as high as you possibly can in just a few minutes in multiple games adds quite an edge for gamers looking to test their mettle. Challenge one requires players to tally 50 coins as fast as they can in Super Mario Bros., then challenge two pits them against stage two of Rad Racer. Once the exhaust settles from Rad Racer, the competitor uses any time left over to score as high as they can in standard type-A Tetris.

Once the time is up, the game tallies your total score, which was used as the competition scores during the time of the 1990 tour. A total of 116 cartridges were printed during the tour – 90 were given away to the NWC finalists and 26 special gold-version cartridges were awarded as Nintendo Power prizes. Given the extremely limited print run, it’s no surprise the cart sells for thousands of dollars.

“On Ebay it currently goes for about $9,000,” said Fleming. “I’ve even been offered $9,000 today (at the East Coast Gaming Expo). It’s said in about 15 years the value will rise to about $100,000. It’s like the Babe Ruth or Mickey Mantle rookie card for (video game) collectors.”

Fortunately for Fleming, his price tag was a lot lower – free.

“I received it from a friend who worked at Tengen at the time,” he said. “He was a finalist in the competition.”

Fleming told him about another competition in China which he could not attend and his friend gave him the cart. Even though Fleming keeps an eye on what value the game carries, money is no object to him.

“I always get offers,” he said, “but I just can’t sell it. I love this stuff. We go out (to events) and try to evangelize it and just let people know that it does exist. I hope when kids see this they get interested in collecting as well and it lets them know that someday they too could have something like this. It’s a great initiative to grow the industry.”

Honestly, I kind of dig the crazy Ben Franklin promotion thing he had going on for 2006 ...

Thinking back, it was kind of amusing because the whole time I talked to Mr. Fleming, he wanted nothing more than to promote his show and, in complete, 100 percent honesty, at that time I was infinitely more interested in checking out the NWC cart. That cart is the lore of legends and it is pretty much presumed you will never be able to see, let alone, play an NWC competition cartridge. Thus, the game embraced me with its legacy, luring me over like a siren leads a sailor into the abyss, and when you pile on the fact Ed graciously let me play the cart, for the next 15 or so minutes, nothing else in the world existed in my mind. Not only that, I had just driven eight hours and spent hundreds of dollars attending the East Coast Gaming Expo - turning around in just one month and adding 16 more driving hours and spending even more money wasn't a logical thought in my mind at the time.

Three years have passed and I still haven't attended a VGXPO event. Hopefully, this year will be a little different as long as the planets align and luck is with me - Philadelphia isn't exactly a jog around the block for me and freelance journalism hasn't been the kindest to my wallet the past couple of years. However, the people involved and the retro show sound too good to pass up. Maybe this year I'll be able to pay more attention to VGXPO instead of ogling off past Mr. Fleming and salivating over what is the publicly declared the most valuable video game in the world.