The Atari 7800's small library doesn't make it terribly exciting to collect for.
But it is one of those game systems that one can build a relatively complete collection
for without too much trouble. Most of the games released for the system were created
by Atari,
and of those many can be purchased, new, for $2.00 from O'Shea
Ltd. This is a great way to start your collection if you're new to the 7800.
Ironically, most of the hard-to-find titles for the 7800 were also produced by
Atari. These include games like Fatal Run,
Mean
18 Golf, Planet
Smashers, and Motor
Psycho.
Only three third-party companies produced games for the 7800: Absolute
Entertainment (6 games), Activision
(2 games) and Froggo
(2 games). Unlike their 2600 offerings, Froggo's games on the 7800 (Water
Ski and
Tank Command) are actually halfway decent. They're also the two most difficult
titles to locate. Of the third-party titles, Absolute's are the easiest to find
in the wild (or on eBay if that's your thing!)
The rarity scale is a general indicator of easy or difficult it is to come
across a game. The scale starts at 1 (very easy to find) and finishes at 10
(nearly impossible to locate). Thanks to auction sites such as eBay,
even extremely rare games come up for auction frequently enough, but these often
command a fairly high price depending on the rarity.