I think the funny thing to me is like what exactly is being “authenticated”? Protostoise and FPO and disco holos and playtests, it’s very clear these are artifacts from the development cycle. To say they are authentic is to say that they were really made and used in prototyping. But what is the purpose of the Prerai? If authenticity is simply a case of being produced “by the right people” then why are Akabane’s playtests not authentic?
Basically it’s like slabbing a 1999 internet rumor. I understand the power of a good story and I’m not really skeptical that this copy isn’t an “original” Prerai. I just feel like there’s never been a good explanation to what an “original” is and why it was produced other than to be a meme or joke.
It is surprising, particularly as Nat Turner said in a recent interview, “you can’t just rely on provenance” and “we are not in business of grading stories”
Tbh, I felt exactly the same after the Protostoise got graded and all four were available for sale within a few days after CGC released their article (a day after I released my own article on E4.. - to which I later edited in more information from the CGC article). To quote myself:
Yeah basically the contradiction here is the essence of what I’m getting at.
Frankly I think this topic - whether it was CGC grading a copy or PSA - basically will affect none of us and doesn’t really matter in the grand scheme so I’m pretty unbothered. Whether it sells for $200k or $1M is also something I could not care less about, it’s up to the interested parties to decide how much they value the story.
Just wanted to say that even though my last post was critical, this is not a topic I really wanted to get lost in the sauce on and would probably suggest that as general advice. Unlike the playtest situation there are no “victims” here so best to just let it ultimately not bother you.
Someone please correct me if I am wrong, but in the past, PSA would only authenticate items that were found in published documentation, correct?
I think their move to broaden their authentication for these oddities without published documentation is an acknowledgement that not all cards created in the factories would have been published, but I am still curious what parameters they would need in order to properly authenticate or why they would even bother with this now (further pop culture recognition?). It seems they are also now authenticating the inverted WB Promos:
@pfm - If memory serves, PSA was originally inclined to authenticate the Akabane’s protos, but they could not identify a reliable process to differentiate between copies and originals, which is why they chose to not authenticate these. Assuming this line of decision making were still the case, they must have a way to differentiate between “real” Prerelease stamps and forged ones.
I always assumed you could in theory take a 1999 base set Raichu and stamp it yourself today, it can’t be that hard to get a stamp made.
It seems PSA have had someone say “Oh yeah I worked there, here’s my payslips and proof I worked there. I have a stack of stuff that shows I had access to these and I’m the guy that sold the last one on”. And PSA have accepted that as proof - for better or worse.
Meanwhile I’ve sent in an inverted back base set 1999 Raichu card and they refused to give me the inverted back error despite there being 20+ base set cards in their pop report with the error (just no Raichus to date). I use a middleman from the UK so had to get them to send it back in and PSA told them they wouldn’t acknowledge that error any longer.
Even more confusing - they have changed the label and recognised it and not told me or the middleman, I only know from looking up the cert and presumably would only have found out once I got it back in hand.
I totally accept we’re in the nichest of niches here but it starts to get a bit confusing when we’re talking about variants of the same card. PSA accept stuff then don’t accept it while they then appear to be taking the word of “celebs” and former staff members.
thing about super niche ultra rare stuff like this tho is that they actually performed way better before covid stuff like the nintendo power world championship carts also used to sell for insane amounts relative to other video games at the time but nowadays even though they have increased in price the growth rate of the not nearly as rare but super popular stuff would destroy their comps. i’m sure the same thing happens in other collecting categories as well
like those super common base set charizords would probably be up by like 10-100x more over the same time period
You have an interesting point that the valuation is based on how much people like the story. I have trouble seeing why the story is so enthralling. The provenance stuff and the marketing posts from CGC for similar things just seem like an artificially created market.
To me, the story comes down to that a couple employees saved some printing offal from a long time ago and are selling it during a market boom
Why pay a premium for something created by random employees while they were just messing around?
(Meme incoming)
It’s like a line cook from the first McDonald’s store preserved a burger that had extra pickles on it and goes around asking for 100k for it
stuff like the nintendo power world championship carts also used to sell for insane amounts relative to other video games at the time but nowadays even though they have increased in price the growth rate of the not nearly as rare but super popular stuff would destroy their comps. i’m sure the same thing happens in other collecting categories as well