Rare Prototype of the Nintendo Playstation Hybrid at Auction

While video games were a central part of the daily lives of millions of teenagers at the dawn of the 2000s, the existence of a prototype merging Nintendo and Playstation is almost a myth. And yet there was a time when Nintendo and Sony considered collaborating on an innovative console. However, the two companies went their separate ways with Nintendo introducing the 64 and Sony the Playstation.

Prototype of the "Nintendo Playstation", 1990-1992, image © Heritage Auctions

A copy of the 'Nintendo Playstation' from 1990-92, perhaps the only witness to the potential merger between the two gaming giants, will be offered at auction for the very first time. According to Heritage Auctions, this is the only prototype that still exists from a series of 200 copies that was designed to accommodate both cartridges and optical discs. The 199 others were then destroyed, and this one would have been as well if not for Ólafur Jóhann Ólafsson, the head of the American division of Sony Computer Entertainment.

Ólafsson continued his career at Advanta Corporation, before joining Time Warner, and took the prototype with him. In bankruptcy, Advanta had to liquidate its assets, and among them, the Nintendo Playstation, which Ólafsson had forgotten about after his resignation. Acquired for just US$75 (£57) by an employee of Advanta, the console started a new life: the new owner, aware of the uniqueness of the machine in the world of video games, started to exhibit it at fairs and conventions, even offering visitors the opportunity to test it.

The console is also now capable of launching games. According to Heritage Auctions, the CD-ROM drive did not work when it was discovered in 2009, but has since been repaired by Benjamin Heckendorn, a console designer known in the YouTube community.

The owner has now decided to auction the prototype. While the estimate has not yet been revealed by the auction house, the console could attain a record, especially with such a history and degree of rarity. In March 2019, an extremely rare Nintendo cartridge of the video game Super Mario Bros sold for the record price of $100,150 (£76,100).

The auction will start online on 14 February, and the sale will take place in early March. Devoted gamers certainly have their eyes on this unique prototype: the webpage for the Nintendo Playstation already has more than 65,000 visits.

Find all games and toys at auction on Barnebys

About the author

Laurianne Simonin

Laurianne Simonin is the Managing Editor at Barnebys Magazine. She has been writing for Barnebys French Magazine since 2018. After studying arts and photography, she worked in various cultural enterprises, both in galleries and in the museum sector. With a penchant for discoveries and objects with singular stories, Laurianne has written on a wide range of subjects ranging from archaeology to cinema, but is particularly fond of writing in-depth articles on ceramics, Art Deco and Japanese art. Laurianne is now Editor-in-Chief and oversees the editorial strategy of Barnebys' six language platform.