Revelation
As soon as he hung up, he called his wife. With a shakiness in his voice that he couldn’t conceal, he told her to move the toy off the counter and hide it somewhere the kids couldn’t get to it.
She could hear from his tone that he was dead-serious. And she didn’t even ask why.
Back in 1988
Scott’s parents had purchased the game back in 1988 -- on the 8th of December, to be exact.
The game was for the original Nintendo Entertainment System, and they had bought it for their son as a Christmas present. But the Amos family had no idea that they were actually making the investment of a lifetime.
Nintendo Game
The popular Nintendo game was loosely based on Greek mythology and followed a cupid-like hero in his quest to rescue Palutena, a light goddess who was being held captive by Medusa.
Like most of the kids of the era, Scott simply cast it aside when he grew up. But, as Scott would find out, things from the past sometimes come back to haunt you.
Family Man
In 2019 -- more than three decades later -- Scott had married and had kids of his own. They had settled in his family home, which had been passed on to him by his late parents.
Although he knew the old house like the back of his hand, there was one place that nobody in his family had explored -- the attic. One day, Scott had some time on his hands and decided to clean it out.
Attic Find
When Scott came across the old game that had been stowed away in the attic, his eyes widened in disbelief. But he wasn’t just surprised that it was still there after all those years.
The game was in pristine condition and still in its original packaging! How had it gone undisturbed for so long?
Theories
"All the family has been trying to come up with a hypothesis," Scott told USA Today. "(My mom) thinks she put it there and never got it back out, and then it ended up in the attic."
And, no matter how hard Scott tried to recall ever owning the game, he just couldn’t remember… too much time had passed.
Long-Forgotten Present
Scott concluded that since the game was still unopened in its packaging and purchased on the 8th of December, it must have been a long-forgotten Christmas present!
He laughed when he saw the original price: it had been purchased for $38.45 -- which would be around $80 today. Scott had an unshakeable hunch that it would be worth a whole lot more than that now -- if he could prove that it was the real deal.
Authentic
Fortunately for Scott, proving the authenticity of the game wasn’t difficult. Besides the sealed packaging the game was still in, there was a receipt with the game.
The receipt revealed that the game had been purchased at JCPenney on the 8th of December, 1988. Although Scott was delighted to have found the game, its true value was still a mystery to him…
A Mistake
After finding the amusing time capsule, Scott went about his day as usual. Not giving much thought to his actions, he placed the game on the kitchen counter and stepped out to run some errands.
Little did he know, he’d made a huge mistake by forgetting the game for the second time. Would he pay dearly for it?
An "Easter Egg"
"I saw it was sealed, and I thought it was worth a couple of hundred dollars," Scott said. "I go to work the next day and emailed a couple of experts.
One of them wrote me back within 30 minutes and said, 'You have an Easter egg.'" With shaking hands, he immediately called his wife.
Worth A Pretty Penny
As soon as he heard that the game, a 1988 copy of Kid Icarus, was an “easter egg,” Scott knew what a mistake he’d made by leaving it on the kitchen counter.
He’d just found out that the game was worth thousands of dollars! "I didn't want the kids pulling it down or coloring on it," he confessed.
A Rare Collectible
Scott’s wife knew that her husband was dead serious when he told her to put the game away and make sure that the kids couldn’t get to it.
To hardcore retro gamers, the 1988 copy of Kid Icarus was a rare find indeed. Kid Icarus is one of the hardest NES titles to find in sealed condition,” said Valarie McLeckie, video game consignment director at Heritage Auctions.
Blast From The Past
“We feel that the provenance will add a significant premium for serious collectors,” Valerie added.
When retro enthusiasts got wind of Scott’s sealed copy, they went into a frenzy. Scott went about getting his copy of Kid Icarus looked at by an official video game grading service and nervously awaited their verdict.
Fewer Than 10 Copies
The experts gave Scott’s game a score of 8 out of 10! They also told him that there were fewer than 10 sealed copies of Kid Icarus left in the entire world!
Scott was sitting on a valuable goldmine -- the last sealed copy had sold for a cool $12,000! Heritage Auctions posted the game on eBay and the bids began to roll in…
Easy Decision
Unfortunately, Scott’s copy of Kid Icarus only sold for $9,000, but that’s not bad for a dusty old attic find.
But the decision to sell it actually came pretty easily for Scott: “I remember it being hard,” he said, “and I was never that good of a gamer guy."