So the Matrix which is known to be a pricey rare laserdisc used to sell for $99 or $150 for quite a few years.

Now within the last six months standard price is $250 and climbing in the $300 range.

I know this particular title is a pretty desirable but I'm curious whats causing the price climb and if it's happening across all of the usual desirable titles and rare discs (even the HD Muse ones)

Is there a new collector base that is investing in our beloved laserdiscs causing the price rise?

I think it's really only specific titles, but they're definitely rising in price in general. Zeta will probably make some comment about collectards driving the prices up and he's not wrong.

Coining that word is surely Zeta's greatest contribution to the world!!

Agree. Common movies are plenty cheap because 99.9% of people that want to simply watch a movie don't care about LD. So this really leaves only the die hard and collectors market for any disc that is worth more than a few dollars.

Most LD movies can’t be sold even at 1/4 their original price. I almost never buy anything for more that retail.

The Matrix was like $40-70 when it came out. It had a trillion moron fans who even like the sequels so a brief trend of it selling for $300 twenty years later isn’t really that meaningful. MUSE titles have almost always been expensive because they made so few for such a small time span. Meanwhile %95 of the other 65,000 LD titles are at like $7 if not $0.70

So IMO LD is a hobby you can go totally broke on but it’s also very cheap compared to most hobbies as long as you decide you aren’t a power collector and that you only need 45 sealed discs that all cost $800 each. There are these weirdos who don’t watch LD or have an LD library they have a “collection”, much of it unopened, all the titles are hot stuff they are only buying because other people told them too. They collect late releases mostly. Those champions of humanity will massively drive the price up on a small selection of stuff (often literally just posting a range of catalog numbers they want like a broken robot born with no heart or something) but they will never make the entire hobby go up in price because they don’t even know what movies are unless they are valuable collectables. The almost never buy ANY of the actual cool stuff, just whatever sells for the most on eBay. It’s a blessing that that there are just way too many LDs out there and too few collectards to jack the price up on everything.

I did not invent the word collectard but I have used it a lot because it’s perfect.

If you want a good copy of The Matrix I’d suggest Blu-ray. If the color timing matters make a special calibration for just that purpose and save $250.

They fixed the color thing in the recent 4K release which also includes a fixed BD.

Oh no! Now my sealed LD of the best movie ever is worthless?

It SHOULD be but somehow it's not.

The color timing thing reminds me of Dracula (1979) [41057]
They say this has the color removed and later releases have even more color removed as per the directors wishes/orders.
You can boost the color on the LD and it has the color so its not a big deal but should be worth more as it is dracula?

Never understood why Matrix was so high in price and why most LDs don't lose value when a better replacement comes along.
It does for other markets other than first edition are books, but then again these are LDs not 80-400 year old books.

Thanks for the replies! I was wondering if new collectors from the retro video game or VHS scenes were now taking an interest in laserdisc. But it sounds like a few collectors who collect late release only (like MI:2 etc) are keeping those prices high. What's interesting is that Matrix though short printed does not seem altogether rare. It shows up alot on ebay but with steadily climbing prices. I'm glad to hear that current releases corrected the green tint as that is what made this disc so desirable really (and the sound).

I've also seen hugely inflated prices on Song of the South. If anyone was collecting in the 90s you'd know that title was everywhere and was printed for years in Japan. I find it amusing to see it priced high now and again

Like Zeta said are a 100 (a thousand?) better movies then the late releases that are reasonably priced and have great picture and sound. Just found it interesting that some prices are rising

I heard that in general people nowadays are investing in stuff now instead of leaving their money in the bank where it earns virtually 0 interest. This is part of the phenomenon of high LD prices I think.

I'm also probably not in the best position to comment on something like this since I live in a country where laserdisc was never picked up as a consumer format so I have to pay premium on discs just for the shipping alone, very few titles sold by collectors here are of any interest to me (and they cost a lot more than they would in larger markets, but also less than importing them myself), so it's really not a cheap hobby for me.

It's a good thing Japan still has reasonable shipping rates at least.

It just gets worse and worse. I am helping out a guy in Germany with his PS3 collection. Buying up games and shipping them without the cases (but including the art insert) to save on shipping. About $20 to ship 10 games that way instead of him paying more than that for one game via eBay's stupid global shipping program.

I'm sure GSP is useful for larger, heavier and more expensive items where the shipping would be quite high anyway, but if I'm trying to buy a freakin' bookmark that costs like three dollars and you could easily ship in a regular envelope and maybe sandwich it between some stiff cardboard sheets, but instead I have to pay 10x the cost of the item itself, f*** that!

The worst part is that this is a cost the seller never actually sees from what I understand, so they have no idea international shipping is so extrordinate and probably wonder why they're not getting any international buyers.

Yes with you on that.

Don't buy many LDs now but when I do most are from Japan.

Cheers

Am I missing something ??

$1,000 for 17 very common titles, not even in good shape
https://www.ebay.com/itm/Lot-of-17-Laserdiscs-LD-Wholesale-Movies/303238583070

$275 for a Top Gun Hi-Vision cover (no discs!)
https://www.ebay.com/itm/Top-gun-laserdisc-ntsc-japan-muse-hi-vision-just-the-cover-no-disc-inside-/273972600464

Julien

Holy sh** ! and it actually sold for that price ?
No, really, I can't believe some guy actually paid this much for those title (demolition man and outbreak )

The single cover also sold, but this is truly one of retro gaming "collectard" thing, selling just the cover or the box for the "rare" titles (exemple here).
But what is he going to do with just the cover, I mean, does he already have the disc but with no cover ? or is it just some (expensive) wall art ?

Well I know for older games sometimes you need to cobble together bits to make a decent CiB. Disc based games, well the disc might've been cracked like around the spindle hole so can't be salvaged. Simple marks the disc can be resurfaced.
Cart games; loose carts are more common and cheaper. Some people want CiB and some people just want a good cart.
If you get CiB and only want the game itself you can make some cash by selling the packaging/manual.

I guess LD is old enough that people might have good discs but the sleeve is s**t so they want a decent sleeve.
But yeah some people pay insane prices for stuff they want

And to say that I'm about to receive the complete Gundam memorial box That I only paid 28€ for and that the same seller is also keeping for me the Macross 15th anniversary memorial box for 35 until I can buy it to him...

Personally i think Hi-Vision LD's will always be slowing climbing