Sealed Zelda NES Game Donated to Charity Shop Sells for $411,278!

It’s no secret that retro games, and particularly those in good or excellent condition, have always commanded a very decent price in the collectible market. Over the last few weeks, however, it seems that the market is currently undergoing something of a boom. Not only have we seen a new record set with the sale of a sealed ‘Super Mario 64‘, but we’ve also seen some exceptionally surprising sales with copies of Skyrim fetching prices of $600!

Following a report via CNET, however, while this isn’t the first copy of The Legend of Zelda (for the NES) that has recently got a huge sale price at auction, the providence behind this specific new one is certainly more than a little bizarre. Why? Well, this sealed copy was donated to ‘Goodwill’, the American equivalent of an Oxfam shop!

‘Goodwill’ The Legend of Zelda Sells for $411,278!

At the time of writing, the details surrounding how this copy of ‘The Legend of Zelda’ ended up being donated to a charity shop are still more than a little unclear. As you might expect, however, representing one of the most iconic NES titles ever released, and still being in its original sealed wrapping, let’s just hope that whoever handed this over never hear about this selling for $411,278 because it’s pretty clear that they had no idea what was, at the time, in their possession!

While $411,278 might sound like a lot of money, however, there is every possibility that this could be worth even more than that. You see, at the moment, this doesn’t officially carry a ‘WATA’ rating. If the new owner does apply for this, however, if it achieves something in the region of a ‘9’ or above, it could easily see its value instantly doubled!

Why Can’t I Find Stuff Like This?

While notably valuable items turning up at charity shops isn’t unusual, or at least not unheard of, what is surprising on a personal level is that the charity shop itself clearly recognised what they had here. Remember, places like this are 99 times out of 100 more used to just dealing with bags full of clothes and unattractive knick-knacks. Kudos to them though because I can’t help but feel that if they hadn’t, or at least in 90% of charity shop instances, this might’ve ended up being poked among the various DVDs for $5 (and if I found that, I think I’d soil myself!).

If you do, however, want to learn more about this, you can check out the official Goodwill listing via the link here!

What do you think? – Let us know in the comments!