Updated

Updated · GoNintendo · Jul 29

3 Rare Super Mario Bros./Duck Hunt NES Carts Head to Goldin as 1993 Variants Eye 5 Figures

Updated

Updated · GoNintendo · Jul 29

3 Rare Super Mario Bros./Duck Hunt NES Carts Head to Goldin as 1993 Variants Eye 5 Figures

Q: What happened to the three missing Mario cartridges from the 1995 shipping box before the historic August 2026 auction?

No one knows. The reporting says the shipping box was labeled for 100 Super Mario Bros./Duck Hunt cartridges, but only 97 were inside when Kevin Braun’s cache was examined, and there is no documented account of what became of the other three. The clearest published detail comes from Jason Ganos, who helped identify and market the find. He said “there’s no telling where the other three copies went,” indicating that their whereabouts before the August 2026 Goldin auction remain unknown. The box had reportedly been shipped on Dec. 1, 1995, later ended up with a seller’s grandfather through a precious-metal recovery business, and then sat in Braun’s storage for years, leaving multiple points at which the missing cartridges could have been removed, lost or separated. What is established is that 97 sealed copies were recovered and authenticated by PSA as genuine, with three selected for the Aug. 12, 2026 auction. But based on the available reporting, the fate of the missing three cartridges before that sale has not been determined or publicly explained.

Q: Why did PSA award its first-ever perfect 10s to a mass-produced Mario game hidden in a Wisconsin storage unit?

PSA gave its first-ever perfect 10s to these Super Mario Bros./Duck Hunt cartridges because they combined an extraordinary state of preservation with a previously unknown late-production variant of a landmark NES release. Although the game itself was mass-produced, these 97 copies were anything but ordinary. They were discovered still individually wrapped in original plastic baggies with manuals attached, a packaging detail that appears to have protected them for decades in near-pristine condition. After authentication, PSA graded 60 copies at 9.8, 31 at 9.6, one at 9.4, and five at a perfect 10—the first 10s PSA has ever awarded to an NES cartridge. Their significance was not just condition. Experts initially questioned whether they were fake because the cartridges showed unusual traits not seen on standard copies: a different rear label, a manual with different language and dates, and a different motherboard with previously undocumented text. PSA ultimately authenticated all 97 as genuine, indicating they were likely made in late 1993 and may represent one of the last production runs of the NES combo cart. That combination—authenticity, rarity, historical importance, and untouched condition—explains why a common title suddenly became grading history. In collectible markets, a mass-market game can become exceptional when it survives in a form no one knew existed and in condition almost no examples retain.

3 articles · Updated · GoNintendo · Jul 29

Three newly identified Super Mario Bros./Duck Hunt NES cartridges will go to Goldin Auctions on Aug. 12, with bidding set to run for three weeks.
Late-1993 manufacturing, unusual back labels, different-language manuals and distinct motherboards set the copies apart from the common combo cartridge and underpin expectations that each could fetch five figures.
OneStopWonders owner Kevin Braun found the cartridges in a boxed lot, with each copy still individually wrapped and carrying a manual attached to the back.
The sale will test demand for what collectors believe are among the last printed versions of the NES pack-in title and a rare variant never widely seen before.