Wata Folks Caught Buying and Selling Games?!
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- Опубликовано: 29 сен 2024
- Wata employees and founders may be buying and selling graded games with impunity, according to evidence revealed.
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#wata #heritageauctions #gradedgames
What do you think about Seth's revelation regarding Wata's Mark Haspel and my experience with Rich Lecce? Read more about Seth's story here: www.pro-gamer.co.uk/wata-co-founder-accused-of-breaking-company-rules-on-selling-graded-stock/
Love your show guys watch u all the time I ran into something similar happening with the Disney black diamond Vhs tapes
I believe you should have a new category which is scumbag seller of the year. At the end of the year you and Ian take all the scumbags of the weeks and vote on which one is scumbag seller of the year. I would like to nominate this one as scumbag seller of the year. Wata games is lost all their credibility in my opinion. I hope the FTC gets involved soon.
This "graded" non sense was getting out of control with sports cards as far back as the early 2000's. It has only gotten worse all around the collectibles industry since then. Sept. 10th when NBA 2K22 hits, the My Team cards will now have a digital grading case where you can "upgrade" the cards. As if that gambling loot system was not already bad enough, this coming version is going to be much different with literal digital versions of "grading cards." How can the same card pulled from different 2K packs grade differently ? Guess we will find out next week......
It’s gross. Did Haspel sell CGC comics when he worked there? I never liked Rich, the Pawn Stars appearance was marketing, he doesn’t care about games, just getting more money.
Crooked as a roach leg, tsk tsk tsk. I trust Seth, he's 100% on the level.
I'm pretty sure Denis knows employees are buying and selling wata graded games, he just didn't think anyone would find out
Bingo!
I’m smiling bcuz all those suckers who have sealed / graded games are pretty much worthless now
Well dang Ian. I was thinking of that same song when I was a minute in. His quest for money has him craving.
You think the bubble's finally gonna burst now?
@Robert Anthony
Within a month or two, a sealed SMB will go for a MAYBE a thousand bucks lol. At least that's what I'm hoping.
Buy my parrot hang gliders!!
Pat's broke now. Lol
Total frauds. I'm looking forward to Karl's followup video that he teased.
Yup I'm so impressed with his work it's really deserves an award or something
@@radcow In case any writers from Kotaku were wondering, THAT is game journalism
It's pretty smart.
@@aceone2156 talk about a game is not the same as saling a game 4 thosands of dollers and people are upfront about weather or not they where given a code or whatever. Thats the differance.
@@aceone2156 So collectors shouldn’t talk about games they love on RUclips? That’s kind of unavoidable isn’t it? Collectors love video games, so they’re gonna talk about them. That’s not even the same ballpark as the WATA scandal. You really think they don’t love the games they talk about and that it’s just a grand conspiracy to drive prices up? Duh
This is a common practice for top level employees at any business. The Nike scandal with a vp's son using her cc and employee discount buying massive amounts of hyped sneakers and reselling them just made everyone more aware. If Nike knew of that, you can bet Wata knew about this too but looked the other way.
Great point. It's rampant through so many companies, such a shame.
@@aceone2156 common practice? These kinds of activities are potentially illegal or considered fraud for a reason which involves keeping healthy capitalist markets functional. Capitalism does not mean taking a huge risk at getting caught creating fake unemployment accounts so you can "make money" defrauding state government.
@@aceone2156 Quit trying to be clever because you're not. You don't even know how to capitalize sentences. And land and property are essentially the same thing. Not to mention you're never the actual owner, the banks are. That's what annual taxes on your land are for. Try not paying them and see what happens. You're just bitter and jaded because you likely work at your local Wal-Mart and buy PS5's with your discount so you can try flipping them for double. Thinking you're some type of clever and savvy businessman for doing so. The shoe fit and now you're triggered.
He was trying to acquire "The Punk Collection"
I was going to say Contri Collection but Punk Collection sounds good too 😆
I wonder what's the most worthless thing I can acquire from The Punk Collection so I can say I own a one of a kind piece of history. Wait I know! I request to acquire TP from the collection. Yeah that's gaming related.
@@GodfathersGodfathernet Contri collection sounds better ;)
It's a common practice, and a felony to bid on your own auctions. EBay shutdown one of the biggest sports card sellers for doing this just last week.
It's funny because ebay tries to hide shill bidding and allowed it to happen unhindered for many years . They claimed they had computers monitoring shilling algorithms yet you'd see multiple (0) feedback bidders with hundreds of bids and dozens of bid retractions with 100% activity to a single seller and ebay's technology couldn't see blatant textbook shilling LoL.
A felony? What's the charge?
@@iyeetsecurity922 In the United States, bid rigging is a federal felony criminal offense under Section 1 of the Sherman Act. It’s fraud and anti-competitive. The act can be related to market manipulation as well.
@@Cursalock And if done through the internet like for example on Ebay it's considered wire fraud .
Wow, 99% of Mr. Haspels graded games on that site are WATA graded 9.4 or higher. What "privilege."
Easy to make almost any grading 9.8 or 9.6 ... it's a total frauding system
Always remember, that SM 64 graded at 9.8 had a damaged corner (lower left). Those grading are a joke.
Imagine a black lotus PSA 10 with a damaged corner. Would never happen.
@@madjoe8622 really? there was a PSA 9 sent to alpha investments that turned out to be a fake. guy lost 20k
This is like watching a Nightline story in real time. Following this entire thing from question to answer over the last few years has been fascinating.
Thank you so much Pat and Ian for your continued honesty.
Their brazenness reminds me of The Last Action Hero when Charles Dance goes to the real would and just ices a guy to test a theory. "Hello? I have shot somebody and I did it on purpose."
Absolutely fantastic comment
I know it's kinda screwed up, but that scene got me laughing. You're right though, it definitely applies to this situation.
great reference!
I wonder if he's selling all the pre-NES stuff on eBay, and has another person selling his stuff on Heritage. He's only come into games the last 3 years, invested loads, so it seems like a rat jumping ship before it sinks, or because of the Wata ties and money in that he is having to sell off his stuff off to prove his legitimacy going forward.
I honestly don’t even play video games. But I always watch this podcast…am I the only one?
Sometimes in my life ive deff watched this more than played games at the time.
This "graded" non sense was getting out of control with sports cards as far back as the early 2000's. It has only gotten worse all around the collectibles industry since then. Sept. 10th when NBA 2K22 hits, the My Team cards will now have a digital grading case where you can "upgrade" the cards. As if that gambling loot system was not already bad enough, this coming version is going to be much different with literal digital versions of "grading cards." How can the same card pulled from different 2K packs grade differently ? Guess we will find out next week......
Graded magic cards kinda suck too. The old formats are hard enough to play without all the rare shit being stuck in slabs.
Same with Pokémon and PSA
Or a Charizard card that got graded by PSA to a 10 and was refused a 10 by Beckett but then Logan Paul submitted the card and Beckett gave it a 10 to get Logan Paul to advertise them
If you had Shop At Home, you knew about Ken Goldin and Don West. Don had heart attacks live on air when shilling everything from Pokemon cards, Beanie Babies, and sports cards. Goldin was known to shill everything regarding Michael Jordin including his college acceptance letter. Goldin' involvement with video games collecting is scary!
Ya all silly. Least with sports card like real human, real historical record, maybe like you were there in stands for big game etc, completely surprised everyone despite rookie predictions for player etc, Super Bowl winning team collections, like my point being there is REAL WORLD history behind sports cards at least and really, yes modern card prices are silly but like talking about a card from 1950’s in good condition? THATS RARE. Lol
Freakin sealed skyrim? Or mario 64? Lol give you $5 and $5 respectively, even when was kid like forget Mario 64, give me nes/snes games any day.
WATA should be “decommissioned”.
These guys seem to have no limit to how low and scummy they'll go. This is currently a situation where these disturbing things are coming out in the open but the big players in sealed collecting have a lot to lose so they'll keep making excuses or just simply ignore it. Not just the Wata people, but well-known collectors in this market MUST start coming forward and acknowledging how problematic all of this is. IT'S THE RIGHT THING TO DO.
It's becoming very apparent that those who aren't established in sealed game collecting need to be very cautious because when the market finally takes the hit that's coming, they'll be the real losers. People spending big money on games that are only worth a fraction of what they paid 😟
Jim scalpering
Deniz con
Mark Haspaypal
Appreciate the coverage, Pat. This company seems to be filled with POS.
Damn, dude offered you $100K for the NWC gold cart. If Pat would have sold that cartridge it would have been one of the record breaking sales of 2021.
Pretty soon, when someone sees an acrylic case with WATA on it, it will devalue the game. Get RID of them!
I say remove that stupid label with a score and keep the protective plastic shell
@@chaosdimension6433 I say tear the friggin case off, rip the plastic factory seal. off, and play the damn game! THEN get a pvc case to protect the box, manual, and GAME for when you're not using it.
@@ghkillah1995 I agree buy games to play them not just because you think it will be worth money someday
@@aceone2156 Nobody is paying a million dollars for a mint original game anyways, those arescammers doing that with each other.
You'd have to be completely insane to bid/buy anything that has the WATA name on it.
@@bkirk0510 The value is absolutely, in PART, in the company that is "grading" it. I can slap a sticker on a sealed copy of the same Mario game and no one will care. The games themselves are not worth even remotely close to what they are "selling" for because the buyers aren't collectors, they're investers, investing into a company that is about to go to the crapper. Don't get me wrong, I get what you're saying, but the WATA name is about to be worthless. They're overgrading most every game.
@@bkirk0510 it is insane because those people are frauds everything with the name WATA on it has a stain of fraud on it
@@bkirk0510 No game will ever be worth $ 2 million and thats a fact.
Only reason to buy anything Wata now, is if the price is equal to or less than a non-graded sealed copy of something. The Wata name will carry no weight, but the actual item will still be worth something.
@@CharlesBrusch My thoughts exactly.
Super sketchy
"the art is the game". Love that point.
Wata graded games should be below loose price.
Wata/Heritage are a market makers (founders sell, and buy auction items: create value resell through grading). Unsure if illegal... "Essentially, the law allows shill bidding if a notice is posted in the terms of service..." I did comment elsewhere that if Mark didn't sign the employee contract, he is not bound by it. As a founder of a few companies, and an advisor to others, as an advisor I never signed an employee contract. As a founder I did because I was part of daily operations. But a co-founder left the company, and the employee contract was voided when they resigned, and signed the exit paperwork/NDA, etc. This is all feels sleazy but unsure if illegal.
It is blatant looking the other way and collusion, if Richard is a co-founder trying to sell the graded SM game on Pawn Stars and Dennis comes to give his expert advice. You think after walking into the store and seeing Richard; Dennis would be like "hey I know you, what are you doing here?"
Ive always thought it was nonsense. No one knows how many games they grade. No one knows the guidelines for the grading. And money knows money there all in it together to pump up the market
Wata 📉 Vga 📈
What’s going to happen at future expos with WATA booths?
He really deleted the eBay account after this. Truly wild.
The people that open packages and use the items as intended are the ones that get the true joy out of ownership and collecting. I never understood grading material items (very subjective) other than a way to hopefully make money on the back end and in that instance you are really losing the joy of the whole buy/ownership/collect experience. I would imagine people with tons of graded items have mountains of stress related to the buy in cost, storage and of course sending things in hoping to get a high grade back. In that aspect it seems much more wasteful than the person who wants to buy and actually enjoy the product. Maybe I am crazy here but that is just my opinion.
For a person who collects graded comics and cards and loves video games. I’m so glad I found your pod years ago so I never got scammed. Y’all the best
Super ironic that Video game collectors investing into WATA are the ones getting played.
Can’t wait for Heritage to start selling SMB/Duck Hunt for 10,000
Next theyll just use family members or spouses names until someone digs in and ties relations lol
I'm going to send my dogs turd in a box to WATA to grade. Hopefully it's in perfect condition 🤭
Going on Pawn Stars.. with an item like that.. They had no intention on selling it to the store. They are just falsely inflating the prices.
Precious Roy! Buy my graded games.... SUCKERS!
Am I too late to get my snes copy of Shaq Fu graded? Cause that's easily an 8.9 with box and all. Only a handful of people want it, so it should be worth around 2.5 million by my estimates.
XD Like actually wiping tears out of my eyes.
@@PutYourQuarterUpGaming Super kind of you, thanks :)
Reseller alert!
Take em down with sledgehammers!
No.
Fire!
_No._
*Sledgehammers on fire!!!*
So is he grading his own games ?
Tried looking up his seller account on eBay looks like might have deleted it?
It’s sleazy I agree. Why not capitalize off it and price your stuff ridiculously high and make them pay. Eventually the buyers dry up
Collectors Universe bought WATA last month for an undisclosed amount. The PR company doing damage control for WATA, Goldin Solutions actually works for the new owners. Goldin has done crisis management work for clients in the past but denied that the statement they gave to Kotaku (where they denied everything) came from the crisis management team but in doing so admitted that they still have such a team. Obviously that Kotaku statement DID come from the CMT but they want to pretend there is no crisis. The statement from Heritage Auctions is eerily similar. Pretty sure Goldin Solutions is acting for both parties. Neither party responded directly to the allegations of collusion. What a surprise.
Can Kotaku just goes bankrupt, they are annoying.
If you have money on these graded games, sell. Get back what you can. Don't try to tell the emperor that his clothes are beautiful because you can't accepted how rigged this entire ecosystem is.
Never buy anything "graded" because it could either be a fraud or absurdly inflated in "value".
Lol I always hated keeping stuff in boxes instead of using it.
Art Galleries have been doing this for years. But no one cares
If and when the Wata Grading fiasco really crashes prices down on new sealed games, I wonder how this might affect other graded collectibles? I would imagine those other markets would have a price dip as well. I always thought that Complete in Box collectors of video games makes more sense than sealed. But, when I see CIB games getting graded, I'm like really??
Of the Week or weak ?
Probably both
Omg. Are you serious?! This is insane. But no word form WATA.
Retro rick is a scum bag seller
Did Ian just make a Precious Roy joke?!
I had some people multiple times that tried to do the same thing with my Cheetahmen games. He tried to offer me like $800 for my Cheetahmen 2 with the box. I told him that those games are worth way more than that, especially since it is mint. I also told him that my games are simply not for sale. I hate scammers so much.
@Robert Anthony right, you would pay close to $5,000 for that game. :P
@Robert Anthony usually people who play roms don't appreciate the game. The point is, Cheetahmen is rare and a fixed number is known. I think it is much better than recent games. Speaking of games crashing, literally anything by Ubisoft. Lol
S-C-A-M-M-E-R-S
Don't get high on your own supply -Ian 2021
+1 for the Ice Cube/N.W.A reference.
Precious Roy is the perfect analogy for this group people, making lots of suckers out of a lot of people.
Wow! Being a grader and a seller at the same time!
This maybe the worst slumbag seller, ever. Just greed and grift
Outside of the scam that is going on, I don't understand graded games. There's no guarantee that the game inside actually works.
Imagine paying 2 million for a game that might not even work, isn't that the entire point of gaming. To play them
@@bkirk0510 It would be fine if the world didn't degrade and humans weren't so damn destructive, huh? I feel that comment for sure.
Very true it is just moronic all the value in this graded games bullshit solely relies on the condition of a 5 cent ordinary standardised plastic seal that is not even part of the actual game and the 50 cent boxes, the game itself can be defect long lost its function and you basically pay a million dollar for a faulty game
@@bkirk0510 with those other products they at least grade the condition of the actual valuable item and you can see that the item is not faulty with those. You can see if a comic magazin has intact pages, you can see if the cards are intact and with coins you are able to see the condition the actual coin is in but with a video game all of this is not the case the only things that get graded is stuff that is not related to the condition of the actual game
@@bkirk0510 yes and this is completely idiotic (in my opinion) a 5 cent plastic seal has no value and yet it is one of the main factors that should carry all the value? And faulty productions do happen games can be defect right out of the factory thats one of the main reasons why you get a returning period at vendors, also even if its not defect at the beginning an old game can stop working at some point even if it was never used. Is is absolutely possible that someone pays a million dollar for a defect game with this graded bullshit market for games
@@bkirk0510 i do get that people that buy those graded games don't really care about the actual game because they are investors but i think that is stupid. And the comparison with cards is not really accurate people buy cards to look at them that is the main value and the main reason for those cards to exist to put them in your album and look at them but for games the main reason why people buy them and the main bulk of those games value is to play the game on your Tv, that is the whole reason why games even exist to play them, so the item that carries all the value for games is the condition of the cartridge or disc
Of course Denis knows!!!
very interesting.. does that mean the bubble will burst on all collecting avenues ? sports cards, comics, video games ?? will be very interesting to see what happen, if anything happens over the next few months or year...
Buy my gold-dusted horse boots... SUCKERS!
♩WATA Games, WATA Games, makin' lotsa suckers outta gents n' dames ♩
Speaking of selling, what became of the Pat the NES Punk Sale?
Coming in 2022!
I dunno Pat - based on the sale of that $2m Mario Bros, you should offer to sell WATA your Gold NWC cart for $10m. That's a steal in comparison.
It's weird that I don't follow this channel or karl that closely but I got all of these videos suggested and I am glad I did.
you guys are doing great work for the video game collecting community.. keep it up!!
I wish we could all agree to just never buy anything these people will benefit from.. maybe take a month collectively off ebay bidding and let everything start getting down to normal.
I just went into a used video game store and a copy of Zelda :twilight princess had a sticker price of $169.99. Is this over priced?
Correct me if I'm wrong but wouldn't this situation be considered price fixing which is illegal. Here's the definition: Fixing is the practice of setting the price of a product rather than allowing it to be determined by free-market forces. Fixing is illegal when it involves collusion among two or more producers of a product or service to maintain artificially high prices or keep the prices they pay their suppliers artificially low.
I'd buy that for a dollar. Edit: Rather than over $1.01
I would never say anyone reading this should boycott all graded products in any market, but boy do I love cotts.
I get the distinct sense no one involved quite understood how much people like and care about video games as a whole. They never bothered to hide anything because their core audience wasn't gamers, it was rich people looking for the next alternative investment opportunity. Why hide when gamers are just a bunch of dumb kids and the rich don't care about ethics as long as there is money to be made.
As they are seeing now, they chose their bobble poorly. If gamers are anything they are a massive horde of obsessive weirdo's who will hound you to the ends of the earth if they think you've done them wrong. Normally this energy is put towards evil but if it can be harnessed to destroy some con artists? I'm all for it.
Im just gonna say it, I care nothing that people paid tons of money for these wata games..whether it was manipulation or not, there naive enough to over pay for a plastic box they obviously didn’t no the worth of it anyways and probably not a gamer…all I’m saying is people paying those prices are either idiots or have way to much money..but I do love your explanation of the art being the game/experience and not the box, nothing but the truth pat!
Hey, Guys! Another great video! GREED, GREED and GREED plain and simple!🤮
So eBay shows the average price and what they're doing is is trying to raise the average price on eBay.
Nothing surprises me anymore. Possibly trying to cash in before the handcuffs are put on.
My major problem I have with Wata is who THE FUCK gave these guys any credit what so ever?!
WATA is a scam.. I would never buy a graded game or get mine graded.. Pure utter nonsense. If nobody buys them, they become irrelevant
For this story to truly get the attention it deserves, some big publication is going to have to report on it. Then and only then may we see some sort of legal action actually take place. And I truly hope it happens, cus these effing scumbags need to be prosecuted!
This is why you dont get into fake markets like graded games and trading cards lol. You really can't tell anyone with more money then sense any better you're just arguing with a brick wall at that point.
Wataya doin!?
The best way to hose these guys is exactly what you're doing. Spread the word and hope it gets enough mass attention, that way no one will buy these games from these crooks and their plan will fail.
You guys need to watch John Riggs video “reasons not to buy the amico” it’s tragically bad.
And the art of a game isn't the subjective experience someone is projecting onto the game but has nothing to with the game itself. Using your burger metaphor, the art isn't the drive to the restaurant, or about you sitting in the dining room.
all these scum bags and their friends are probably buying and selling these games amongst themselves to get publicity and drive up their prices artificially
Pat will destroy you with his nes collection
@Robert Anthony bruh u just didnt get it ur response is asinine lmao
Near as I can remember, 2600 games never were sealed. This whole situation continues to reveal itself as a scam.
They were showing up on my feed on Facebook until I started calling them out
They did it with coins, they did it with comics, they did it with cards, they’re gonna do it with video games and they’re going to continue to fuck everybody
GetTheGregGames would DEFEND these conmen to death, LOL
why are they not in jail. and what did Jim Halparin do to the comic industry in the 90s......
i just put my sealed games in a cage so they stay safe and dont escape (dosent cost 300 dollars)
Wata has collusion and inside trading happening? I never would have thought.
I finally get that scene in the Wolf Of Wall Street now where he asks a group of guys to sell him a pen.
i like this scam, how can i join the rich boys getting richer? ...
Glad to see the scumbag seller segment again, it's like saying hello to an old entertaining friend.
Jim and his scammers will take the money and run while Denis the scammer will take the heat.