Related buyer guides
playstationWhy PS3 Collectors Check the Model Number FirstFlip a fat PS3 over and read the sticker before you even glance at the disc tray. Those five characters — CECHA, CECHB, CECHC — decide what your library even is, because the PS3 is the rare console where the hardware revision matters more than most of the games it plays. Why collectors read stickers, not spec sheets The Japanese and North American launch units — the 60GB CECHA and 20GB CECHB from November 2006 — carry actual PlayStation 2 silicon on the board: the Emotion Engine CPU and Graph
nintendoCollecting the Nintendo 3DS After the eShop Went DarkWhen Nintendo ended new purchases on the 3DS eShop in March 2023, it didn't just retire a storefront — it turned every cartridge into the only remaining door into the library. Pushmo, Intelligent Systems' brilliant block-pulling puzzler, was digital-only. So was Game Freak's oddball golf-poker hybrid Pocket Card Jockey. Neither ever got a cartridge, so on 3DS there's simply nothing left to buy. Why the closure made cartridges the whole story Even physical releases lost something. Fire Emblem:
playstationCollecting PlayStation from Jewel Cases to Blu-rayFlip a PlayStation disc over and look at the colour. If the underside is black, you're holding one of the era's best details: Sony pressed PS1 discs on black-tinted polycarbonate, and that quirk is still the quickest authenticity check in the hobby. Bootlegs burned to silver CD-Rs give themselves away instantly. It's also lesson one in PlayStation collecting: the details carry the value. Five generations sit under one logo — the 1994 original, the record-breaking PS2, the PS3, plus the PSP and