A sealed World of Warcraft Collector’s Edition was sold at auction for $21,600 today, with the April 20 sale on collectible auction sites Heritage Auctions setting an all-new record for the most expensive PC game ever sold.
This 2004 Collector’s Edition boasts the full version of WoW on CD-ROM and DVD-ROM, a one-month subscription to WoW, the official WoW soundtrack, a 200-page hardcover art book on the art of WoW, a behind-the-scenes DVD, an exclusive in-game pet, a cloth map featuring the continents Kalimdor, Azeroth, Khaz Modan, and Lor Daeron, a signed collector’s edition game manual; and a ten-day guest pass.
All in all, it’s a hefty package—though it’s all sealed up in a graded slab.
What makes this sale so interesting is that this is now the most expensive PC game ever to be sold at auction, and it blew the previous record holder out of the water too. According to Heritage Auctions, the previous record holder was for a 1997 sealed PC version of Resident Evil, which sold for just under $3,000 this month.
More often than not, when we’re buying a game, we don’t think about whether it could one day be an item that could go for thousands at auction, especially if it’s unopened—so this lucky WoW player certainly got a lovely surprise after the sale.
While this may seem like an expensive purchase to some, this pales in comparison to the most expensive video game ever to be sold, which was the sealed copy of Super Mario 64 as it sold for an auction bid of $1.56 million.
But for one WoW fan, this Collector’s Edition was an opportunity of a lifetime.