Burning Crusade burning up eBay [update 1]
With less than a week to go before its Jan. 16 release, pre-orders for the limited edition collector's edition of World of Warcraft's Burning Crusade expansion are fetching prices as high as $400 on auction sites like eBay. While careful eBay buyers can get the game for as low as $110, ending prices on the site averaged just over $200, or just under three times the $69.99 retail price. For those who want to forgo the auction route, there's always the Amazon.com resellers, starting at $250.
The collector's edition includes lots of extra goodies, including an exclusive mount pet [update: couldn't keep my world of Warcraft creatures straight], making it a highly sought after prestige piece for many of World of Warcraft's 7.5 million subscribers. Blizzard has said the collectors edition will not be reprinted after the initial allotment, which has been sold out in pre-order for months.
The original World of Warcraft Collector's Edition still fetches auction prices hovering around $300 on eBay over two years after its extremely limited release. Will the Burning Crusade frenzy similarly endure, or will we see a console-style bottoming out of the auction market once the game is actually in stores?
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Wulf @ Jan 10th 2007 12:57PM
"including an exclusive mount"
It's actually an exclusive pet, similar to the ones made available with the original Collector's Edition.
jb2002smg @ Jan 10th 2007 1:20PM
Whew! Glad I preordered it back in October for $69.99 before all the real life "gold farmers" started gouging the Auction House.
Lenny @ Jan 10th 2007 1:31PM
Where did you read that there was an "exclusive mount?"
http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/burningcrusade/townhall/collectors.html
Psaakyrn @ Jan 10th 2007 1:34PM
And for the question posed, there's a significant difference between the console auctions and this one: This is a limited release, while the consoles will continue to enter the market over time. Yes the game itself will also enter the market over time, but the collectors edition would still likely see a substancial markup in price.
Jonathan Tran @ Jan 10th 2007 1:36PM
yeah the price won't go down,
even some Guild Wars CE boxes sell damn high, with prices climbing.
Then again, GW isssss better than WoW
Jellodyne @ Jan 10th 2007 1:37PM
For $400 it better come with a 2 year subscription card. It's bad enough they want us to purchase the game AND pay $15 a month AND buy the expansion pack for full retail game price. It's a cash Blizzard.
LMAO @ Jan 10th 2007 1:39PM
Hmm...Given that it's an online gaming. Even if you buy it before its release, can you actually play it before the street date?
ViperVisor @ Jan 10th 2007 2:06PM
I got 2 to sell so they better stay up in price. I want to wait and make closer to $200 profit per vs $100 that people are getting now.
That money = Wii money when some of the great upcoming games are out.
SymetriX @ Jan 10th 2007 2:16PM
Is this confirmed that the collectors edition is sold out in pre-order everywhere? Is there not a store that will sell the CE to people who wait in line for a midnight launch?
Jonah Falcon @ Jan 10th 2007 2:16PM
This is just plain retarded.
EdsHead @ Jan 10th 2007 2:18PM
I thought it comes with an exclusive pet, a baby of the new mount, not the mount itself. The mount is a flying mount versus the cat, ram, or other walking creature you can ride once you reach level 40 and spend 100 gold on. Am I right or wrong?
Kwipper @ Jan 10th 2007 3:30PM
Okay. I am not blaming the seller. The seller IMHO rocks! I am blaming the buyers! Who in their right might would pay 400.00 for something that most likely would be available at their local game store for 69.99!? These people need to have their balls chopped off so they don't spread their genes into the human gene pool. I would gladly be the one to do it too.
You're stupid, therefore you do not get to breed!
Ben @ Jan 10th 2007 6:13PM
Is it just me or does it seem like anytime someone talks about how many subscribers WoW has they tak on another .5 million users from the last reported number. I could have SWORN I read ont is site the other day that WoW had 7 million users, and now it's 7.5 million? Where do they come from?
~Ben
Tim @ Jan 10th 2007 7:07PM
the sad thing is that it was available for purchase a few days ago on the Blizzard store...
also the regular edition sold out on the Blizzard store before the colectors edition
Zegim @ Jan 11th 2007 12:29AM
So, people is eager to pay that much so they can get a fancy pet to brag about?
Great.
Theodore @ Jan 11th 2007 1:41AM
To Kwipper:
We really dont need to waste energy castrating those paying $400 for this.
Their own social awkwardness will ensure that they don't breed.
dixonij @ Jan 11th 2007 11:34AM
I'm sitting on my copy of the BC:CE for at least a little while. I don't necessarily want to sell it right away because I think that as soon as it is released the market will be flooded with people selling it. My plan is to sit on it and wait about half a year or so before selling it. By then demand should have been met for the initial rush. Then again, my plan could backfire dramatically...