This rare Japanese Neo Geo game’s value has jumped from $13k to over $30k in the past 6 years 

Recently, one of Japan’s “phantom” games has been spotted reselling for a shocking 4,800,000 yen (estimating to about $32k USD), convincing collectors that its value continues to rise through the years. The game in question is Chibi Maruko-chan: Maruko Deluxe Quiz, which was released by Takara in 1996 for the Neo Geo. 

Chibi Maruko-chan is a Japanese manga series that ran from 1986 to 2022 and tells the story of a girl called Maruko and the everyday life of her suburban family. The manga was adapted into a long-running TV anime series, earning wide national recognition. There were also various licensed Chibi Maruko-chan video games made, one of which came to be known as a “phantom game” due to its extreme rarity. 

The Chibi Maruko-chan: Maruko Deluxe Quiz that came out in 1996 was a Neo Geo port of an arcade game, and there are various theories about why it has come to be such a priceless piece of software. One of the factors was definitely its rather high original retail price, as according to Famitsu, it initially sold for 29800 yen (for reference, Super Mario 64 released the same year for 9800 yen). 

However, opposed to its high price, Chibi Maruko-chan: Maruko Deluxe Quiz was apparently not a very sought-after title. Speaking for Buzzfeed Japan, a former Neo Geo software developer commented that the main selling point of SNK’s Neo Geo was that it made it possible to play popular arcade fighting games like Fatal Fury, The King of Fighters, and Samurai Shodown on a home console, so the Neo Geo audience may not have meshed well with the slice-of-life Chibi Maruko title. 

As demand was low, Chibi Maruko-chan: Maruko Deluxe Quiz barely appeared on the market, resulting in a very low number of copies in circulation. However, this scarcity caused the game’s value as a collectible to rise, and it had apparently already been reselling for a million yen only seven years after its release. 

Then, the year 2018 saw this price double – the Japanese collectible store Mandarake Complex suddenly restocked on the game, but its new price (box and manual included) was two million yen. Despite the premium price tag, Chibi Maruko-chan: Maruko Deluxe Quiz sold out in a single day. 

Post translation: I went to the Surugaya in Ota Road, and they had something amazing on display. The Neo Geo Chibi Maruko-chan: Maruko Deluxe Quiz is something you can only hope to see in real life before you die. I first thought, “oh it’s 480,000 yen, as expected of a national anime and predecessor of Sazae san, I should do a livestream of this” …but then I realized that it’s 4,800,000… 

Most recently, a used copy of Chibi Maruko-chan: Maruko Deluxe Quiz was spotted at a reseller in Osaka, Japan, and its price seems to have skyrocketed yet again, coming to a whopping 4,800,000 yen.