A trio of retro Nintendo video game consoles considered the ‘holy grail’ for collectors could fetch up to thousands at auction.

The three consoles were officially licensed variants of the Game & Watch series used to promote Phosphatine, a popular French cereal and infant food product.

Nintendo first released consoles and games from the Game & Watch series in 1981, and prices on eBay for vintage examples start at around £45 but can rise to thousands of pounds for rarities.

Auctioneer Ewbank’s, based in Guildford, Surrey, said the specific type of console are particulary sought after.

James Spooner, head of retro video games, said: ‘Phosphatine-branded Game & Watch systems are considered a holy grail for hardcore Nintendo collectors.

‘It was discovered by the broader retro gaming community relatively recently, with only a single-digit number of verified units documented to exist in the world.’

The three handheld consoles include the Parachute [PR-21], Fire [FR-27], and Turtle Bridge [TL-28] games.

A surge in demand and prices for retro video games helped Ewbank’s to a premium-inclusive £200,000-plus over three sales in a single week last month.

‘A key factor has been PlayStation’s decision to stop selling physical product, so fans have been clamouring to get their hands on historic games and consoles that are now sought-after collectables,’ James said.

An empty box for a Nintendo 64 (N64) Mario 64 game had been expected to sell for £1,000 to

2,000, but ended up making a premium-inclusive £8,450. What made it so special was that it had been signed by the ‘father of modern video gaming’, Shigeru Miyamoto, Nintendo’s leading video game designer, producer and director.

Miyamoto signed the box for the vendor at the historical event at Virgin Megastore on Oxford Street in London on February 21, 2003.

This was the first and only public appearance and signing event in Europe of the creative mastermind behind globally iconic franchises like Mario, The Legend of Zelda, Donkey Kong, Star Fox, and Pikmin.

A First Print, factory-sealed Nintendo Game Boy Pokémon Emerald game, complete with red strip Nintendo seal, also had hopes of £1,000 to 2,000 but made £4,940, a price boosted by the absence of any damage to the seal.

Further success came for a factory sealed Nintendo Game Boy Pokémon Yellow, with a Nintendo Red Strip Seal, again with no breakages to the outer seal. A guide of £500-1,000 turned into a final selling price of £3,640.

Ewbank’s, who have been holding dedicated sales of retro video games for some time now, publish a guide to collecting them on their website.

Live online bidding begins on September 4.

Get in touch with our news team by emailing us at webnews@metro.co.uk.

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