In what may be the strangest news story you read today, THQ's Golden Wii is now available for auction. It was originally sent in 2009 to Buckingham Palace as part of a marketing stunt for Big Family Games, a mediocre game that you've never heard of. As per Danielle Robinson, THQ’s product manager at the time:
The Royal Family is arguably the most important family in the country so we felt that they had to have a copy of the new game. But we thought that Her Majesty the Queen wouldn’t want to play on any old console, so an extra-special gold one was commissioned. We hope that she and the rest of the Royal Family enjoy the game!”
Ironically, the Royal Family never did get to enjoy the console or the game. The Palace Correspondence Team has a strict policy when it comes to gifts, and so the Golden Wii was promptly sent back to THQ's offices, where it eventually ended up on the Goldin auctioning site some thirteen years later.
In case you're wondering, the Golden Wii is actually made of gold, with both the console and controller plated in 24 karat gold. Sadly, both have some minor wear to them, with the controller "displaying scattered chips to the gold plating." The bundle includes the console, controller, a copy of Big Family Games, a sensor bar, and the rest of the cables needed to play the Wii. The Golden Wii will also come with a Letter of Provenance that attests to both its history and authenticity.
Interestingly, this isn't the first time the Golden Wii has been up for auction. Last year it was put on sale for $300,000, and it ultimately didn't sell due to concerns over the account selling it. Basically, EBay had a change in policy that made it difficult for new accounts to sell valuable goods (such as a $300,000 Golden Wii), and so the auction was eventually shot down.
However, right now the bidding on Goldin is currently at the much more moderate price of $2,000. This is most likely due to the fact that the auction has only just started-there's 15 days and 11 hours left-so the auction could shoot much higher and perhaps even eclipse the $300,000 mark. Perhaps working against is the fact that a 24 karat gold Xbox One sold for a mere $10,000 back in 2018. To counter this the Golden Wii was valued at $1 million by "some top end gaming industry people" back in Gamescom 2019, so who knows? We'll see.
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