New High Prices for Viper Artwork

[JG]

While Sogna's greatest days are ow two decades past, any assumption that VIPER fandom is dead is misplaced. A few months back I mentioned a new auction record for VIPER artwork, a GTS cel that went for something around $560 USD. This morning, it was topped not once, not twice, but three times.


First, by this VIPER-V10 frame, which went for 66,000 yen, or the equivalent of $596.48.



Then global thermonuclear war broke out between multiple parties over this VIPER-RSR frame, which reached 203,000 yen, or $1,834.61.



And about the same time, two bidders drove up the price for the GTS cover artwork up to a new record of 259,000 yen, or $2,340.71. Yowzas!



I bid on some of the seller's other art but not successful on any of them. These three had already eclipsed what I would have paid for them. Frankly I don't like the window rectangle on the Asuka or Cala, or Cala's closed eyes for that matter, and of the eight or nine pieces available I personally ranked them near the bottom. Instead I went after the Carrera bukkake (V6 scene), Miki with towel on bed (near very end of CTR), and Raika angry face frames but each exceeded my personal value for them so I came away with nothing. I was also interested in that GTS cover art being both colored and unique, but it was already 36,000 yen when I was set to start placing bids this morning, and a bid on that would have preventing bidding on anything else. (And it would have proved fruitless anyhow.)

[Moge]

I'm continually amazed by the nostalgia people have for this franchise.

I'll repeat my expressed disappointment in the ip holder doing absolutely nothing with it other than making the games available for sale digitally.

[JG]

Not any new record today, but same seller is really making a killing of late. Guy had eight more pieces finishing today, and raked in about $3,300 on them (plus upwards of a thousand more on 15-20 non-VIPER pieces) I'm sure Yahoo takes a healthy cut of the profit, but it must be nice.

This is seven of them, a few minutes before most closed out. Three of them continued to rise and one had just finished (a VIPER-RSR piece where the Squid Devil monster rapes one of the stolen girls, which sold for a more reasonable 5750 yen, as it featured no core characters.)



I really, really wanted the Miki and Asuka peace signs. That's a cool piece. I went as high as 38,000 on it, which I think is the highest I've ever bid on anything, but that's not even halfway to where it ended. I wanted the Rise trio as well but it was already 102,000 when I woke this morning so I realized I wasn't getting it. I narrowly lost the GTS trio which I was less fond of but had a more reasonable price. (I had 18,500 and was sniped.) I was also interested in the Karin blowjob scene and was hopeful on it because it was still just 1,200 when I checked last night but had run to 30,000-something by morning. I might pay that much for unique art, but for one frame in a series that's more than I want to pay, even for one of my favorite scenes (because, as you all know, I'm a Karin-chan fan.) The Miki sex and Lilia sex were already higher than wanted to pay and I had little interest in the Nami or the RSR pieces.


Moral of the story is that there are some really deep-pocketed VIPER fans out there, willing to spend big on original art. Why a company wouldn't want to try to acquire the rights to make new games or an OVA is odd, as it seems they easily could recoup production by costs selling the cels at prices like this.

[黒い灯影]

damn.. i gotta get back on those auctions, i would've paid way more for the miki sex one

[G-1]

The Miki and Lillia Scene id want for sure. I'm sure somehow id run into one of these at a convention someday. I usually hit up alot of genga and cel tables alot.

[Moge]

Those prices are absolutely nuts

I like the Miki and Asuka peace sign one.

[JG]

damn.. i gotta get back on those auctions, i would've paid way more for the miki sex one

But that's my point. She has so much sex in the game that there's probably hundreds of frames. If the seller has them all he can throw out a new one every month for 10 years and maybe get $200+ for it each time. Being one of many, if you miss it one month, a similar frame may come around again someday.

The one-of-a-kind art is where I'd rather spend my money personally. That's more what I aim for.

My grief is that art like this used to be in the $30-50 range. I got several pieces over the last few years. For some reason in the past few months or so the prices have absolutely skyrocketed into the $70+ range, with alot of it being multi-hundred.

[Arizona]

It seems to me like certain retro collector markets started getting up there about six years ago, and then in the last two years prices on a lot of stuff has gone absolutely berserk. Even things that weren't really touched before are finally feeling it. I wouldn't be surprised if some seller are savvy enough to realize now might be a good time to part with a few items.

These games are 20+ years old by now, so I really doubt the rights holder can just make an anime or something and expect art from it to command these kinds of prices (nevermind whether they have the talent and budget aboard to make something decent). It's good business for whoever has these old things, but I don't know about a company - definitely don't know with something new.

That said, I'd think maybe taking a page from original Sogna and doing some merchandising would be a relatively low risk option. Like reproductions of the old games or trinkets or something. But I get the feeling the current rights holders are probably just kind of sitting on it and not really thinking about it at all.

[JG]

Dude made another $7700 dollars today (875100 yen) just off the VIPER art, and probably a few hundred more off Ranma and other stuff. I'm serious; the guy doesn't have to work - he can live comfortably just selling the artwork.

Odd bidding behavior though. A single blank and white drawing of the Asuka and Miki bukkake scene from the Lanjerie series was top price today (149500 yen), outdoing the unique art of the CTR promotional piece (115000) or the fully colored vinyl bag art (129000) which I thought would be far and away the most desirable. Boy I'd have liked either one of those and several others I placed bids on but again came up empty. The stuff I'd really want is way too expensive now, and the stuff I'd like to have but aren't overboard on always goes a little more than I'd be willing to pay. (And then there's a lot of stuff for which I think people are crazy to pay those kinds of prices.)

[Moge]

Those prices are absolutely bonkers. Really is a testament to how beloved the Viper franchise still is.

[Munemune]

Yeah, some Viper cels popped up in my poking around and they're like $700 ~ $1000 as starting bids right now!

[JG]

None that large this month, but every one of the dozen or so he posted went for more than $100 with the F40 Fan Book cover art pulling down over $400. I wanted one of my favorite pieces of unique GTS Girls art very much (I love the facial expressions on it), but I tapped out when the bidding got to about 28000 yen (around $250) and it finished 40000.

On the other hand he sold a lot of painted vinyl figurines this month rather than just the usual cels, including an Akira which sold for 75000 yen (about $650.) Thats the highest I recall seeing a figurine sell, painted or bare.

[JG]

The folly of some of these bidders going overboard one on frame from a scene with multiple frames. In the first post, I remarked how a Cala sex scene frame went for 203,000 yen. Another from that same scene went for a somewhat more modest 68,000 yen ($588) today. This is why I generally refrain from bidding on such art and advise others to do the same - stick to the unique stuff.

I'd have very much liked the V16 or GTS Drama CD artwork though. But they sold for 157,000 and 67,000 yen ($1,358 and $580), respectively. As a consequence, I chased a funny CTR teleca piece, but it too got a little higher than I was willing to go at 15,500 yen.

[JG]

Depending how you look at it, we have a new top price, folks. An Akira sex scene non-colored cel from Gokuraku VIPER Lanjerie Red went for a whopping 300,099 yen this morning, topping the previous record holder by about 16%.
However, because the yen is down, at today's exchange rate that price equates to $2,007.82 USD, which is about 16% the other way off the record. (Though still a stunning price to pay for a single piece of an animation sequence.)

[Moge]

That price

Just goes to show how much love there still is for the series.

[uphillbattle]

I was literally just in a bidding war for a few more production art pieces that showed up, needless to say I lost all of them. But yeah, every single listing was by one user, and it probably was the same guy, who is either a crazy collector in need of money, or a former worker for Sogna himself.

[uphillbattle]

final tally for his auctions that just ended is at 472,841 yen, a little over $3100 in todays exchange rate, I honestly must have bid a total of $2500 myself on the pieces lol. Honestly it makes me wish we could pool together and crush these auctions and bring em to the home team! Either that, or maybe motivate me to just make my own cel-like art work of our favorite viper girls.

[JG]

It's a former Sogna employee, most likely an artist who helped draw the in-between frame animations. They've sold enough to convince me that they are former Sogna/Silence employee, not a generic collector, and they sell some non-Sogna art too which leads me to believe they're a support artist-for-hire.

I also can't ever seem to win any to their auctions. I really don't want to be paying $400+ for the art, with some of them running upwards of a grand. I have them bookmarked because its two or three times a month they'll have these auctions - and much of it is unique promotional art.

[uphillbattle]

You were right btw! I value the promotion art pieces more, the production pieces did end up going the highest, because like you mentioned, they’re not animation pieces that don’t have dozens or even hundreds of frames during in-game scenes.

I was drooling for both the Akira and Asuka promotional pieces! But it seems when a certain person (or bot) was hellbent enough that I was auto outbid until I gave up when they both got to around $800.


I can understand why sex scene frames are valuable though , I couldn’t even successfully snipe the Raika rape scene frame

[JG]

I had hopes for the Raika scene staying low but it didn't make it. The M1 promotional art was surprisingly affordable until the last half hour so. Its the only one I ended up bidding on but it spiraled out of control too quickly.