In 2020, a prototype of the Nintendo PlayStation game console that never came to market sold for $360,000. Now, it’s up for sale at Heritage Auctions for $35,000. That device’s gamepad is up for grabs. That’s a staggering amount for an item that looks like a Super Nintendo controller but has Sony and PlayStation logos on its body.

In the early 1990s, Nintendo announced a partnership with Sony. The companies planned to create a game console that could work with both Nintendo cartridges and Sony CDs. At the time, discs were considered an advanced device because they offered 100 times more storage than traditional cartridges.

However, the collaboration did not last long and eventually Nintendo withdrew from the deal and became Philips’ partner in the ill-fated Philips CD-i project. At the same time, Sony continued to develop the PlayStation console independently. However, the Nintendo PlayStation console, which has become an extremely rare and expensive collector’s item in recent years, has reached the prototype stage.

A few years after the end of cooperation with Nintendo, the PlayStation logo was changed, and the first and second generation Sony consoles quickly overtook Nintendo devices. As for the Nintendo PlayStation prototypes, 200 copies were produced, most of which were destroyed when the companies stopped cooperating. Therefore, each preserved prototype has a greater value for collectors.