I can't be the only person who was inspired by Ryan Davis' Bombcast talk of Super Famicom lots. Since that aired, I've been trolling ebay for good Super Famicom lots. And I have seen some terrible bidding practices from other people. I won't claim to be a "power user" whatever the hell that means. But I like to think I know a couple things.

• Losing is fine - If you go in to an auction with the mindset of having to win. You are doing it wrong. It's a sale, not a shooting gallery at the fair. Winning doesn't make you better, losing does not make you less of a woman/man. Losing means you weren't willing to overpay.
• There is always another auction - anything worth buying will get listed over and over. Do you actually need a pile of Super Famicom horse racing games right now?
• Lots of bids means it's likely overpriced - if you have 3 people pulling out all the stops to win, it is too expensive. Unless there really is something in the lot worth tons, a bid war helps nobody.
• Bid once - Ebay only moves the price up to a small increment over the previous bid. So if the bid is $2 and you bid $4000, it only moves to $3. Know what you are willing to pay before you bid. Time after time, I look at the bid history and see people trade bids back and forth, or somebody keeps upping theirs by $1 over and over.
• Bid late - Preferably as late as possible. More time just gives people more options to bid and raise the price. If you have a fast connection and can be online when it ends, sniping is the way to bid. I try to never bid if more than 10 seconds remain on the clock. If you can't be there when it ends, by all means bid in advance.

I also found it good to look for auctions that end in the middle of the night / early in the morning in the US, and to be willing to stay up and watch the bidding til the end.

Less people will be awake at 4 am to edge their bid up over yours.

A good way to get deals on games, is to follow these steps.

• Type in the name of the console you want games for, so if you want SNES games type in SNES.
• Then define it by video games.
• Then sort it by auctions only.
• Then define it by auctions ending soonest.

Then you will see games ending in minutes that may have zero bids. I picked up Worms 3D for a penny this way, free posts and package so literally a penny.

http://www.estarland.com/

Save you some money and time.

I have only one piece of advice; make sure the games you're bidding on actually run on the console you're buying them for.

@Elazul said:

I have only one piece of advice; make sure the games you're bidding on actually run on the console you're buying them for.

This is good advice. It's an easy mistake to make, and there are some tricky sellers out there with intentionally confusing posts. Or people for whom English is not their native tongue.

Pictures can be representative of what you are getting instead of being the exact items(s).

Factor in shipping - In the end it's all the same money (yours) and what sellers charge varies wildly. Some use free shipping to attract business. Others overcharge for it to take a little more profit from ebay (they don't take a cut of shipping).