Rare Game Boy Prototype Cartridge Draws $25,000 Bid

Collectors can currently purchase a pre-release version of a 1998 Nintendo Game Boy title for at least $25,000. The item is a prototype cartridge of Pokémon Red, and it has received one bid at the Goldin auction. The listing remains open, and the final price may increase before bidding concludes.

Experts at PSA authenticated the cartridge and confirmed its status as a technical rarity. They were unable to read the full data set but successfully accessed the first 32KB of the contents. PSA described this partial read as technically unique. The agency stated that the readable game data is completely identical to the U.S. retail version. They expressed confidence that the unreadable sections match the standard release as well.

The physical cartridge differs from standard retail units in specific ways. It bears a sticker with the label DMB-MBC-16M-FLASH and the part number DMG-(F)KGDB-01. The report suggests DMB refers to Dot Matrix Game, the console's internal codename, and MBC stands for Memory Bank Controller. This controller chip allowed games to use more than the 32KB ROM limit of the original hardware. The 16M designation likely indicates 16 megabits of flash-writable memory. The cartridge is also physically longer than a standard Game Boy unit.

PSA identified two differences in the header data that do not change how the game plays. One offset is incorrectly set to 55 when it should be 00, and a calculated checksum reads CB rather than 20. The auction listing calls the board a previously undocumented development unit, although the specific part number has appeared in other records. The Rare Gaming Dump wiki lists the same number for a 2000 development cartridge that used a similar 16-megabit Sharp flash chip.

The 1998 release of Pokémon Red, along with Green and Blue, started the global franchise. Red and Blue together sold more than 31 million copies. A commenter on the original report noted that this specific copy appears to be a master version that can be powered on and played normally. They also mentioned that a Nintendo employee sold a batch of similar demo cartridges in 2015. These details come from a reader comment and have not been independently verified.