Overstreet Oversights

[The Kaptain]

Has anyone noticed any major oversights or errors in the Overstreet Price Guide?

 

I ask because I think of the OSPG as the bible of comics, and if I can't trust the OSPG, who can I trust?

 

Example 1: They do not note that X-Men (vol. 2) #128 is the first appearance of Fantomex. Also, they do not value the issue any higher than recent non-key issues.

 

Example 2: They note that Miracleman 15 is "scarce", but they define "scarce" as 20-100 copies in existence. Clearly, there are thousands of copies of this book out there. Some say that OSPG uses two definitions for "scarce", but if another comic is listed by the OSPG as "scarce", which definition are they using?

 

Example 3: They do not list some very popular series, such as Heavy Metal magazine, or Grimm Fairy Tales. I'm sure there are others, but those are the only two I know of off the top of my head.

 

Just wondering what other oversights or errors I might be missing.

 

Thanks.

 

 

[Mark 1]

Their pricing isn't up to the current market prices.

 

That's the biggest issue with OSPG

[Bookery]

There are a number of odd inconsistencies in Overstreet... some of it is just old stuff that got added over the years and never got corrected or cleaned up.

 

For example... OPG lists the Don Winslow of the Navy pulp because it has interior comic pages. The pulp is scarce, and a high-grade copy will go for around $800... but not the $4900 listed in Overstreet. Yet Overstreet doesn't list the much rarer and more in-demand Flash Gordon pulp, which also has color comics inside... or any of the Spicy line of pulps which contained comics sections.

 

He does however list the Out of This World Adventures pulp (again... has an interior comics section). This is a fairly common sf pulp, and goes for up to $100. But OPG lists it for $1,150!!!

 

The Donald Duck linen book is listed (at a highly inflated price) but is not remotely a comic book, but the dozen or more other linen books put out by Disney in the same format at that time are not listed.

 

Heavy Metal was listed in the early guides, but OPG decided it was too adult and dropped it from later editions (which has hurt its collector value immensely).

 

It's a big guide with a lot of data... and as such anomolies and just plain errors slip through.

 

[Bookery]

My biggest beef is that the OPG puts so much effort in keeping up with and adding the hundreds of new issues that come out each year, that have no "collector" value as of yet. I suspect so much time is spent keeping up with that, that a more accurate analysis of price trends on truly collectible issues falls by the wayside, or is subject to simple annual formula manipulations.

 

If a comic book isn't worth at least $10 in 9.2, it shouldn't be listed in a price guide. Coin guides don't go out of their way to tell you what this year's used nickel is worth. Paperback guides didn't fill up hundreds of pages in unreadably small print listing every best-seller that came out 6 months ago.

 

Since OPG isn't a checklist, and there are lots of small press comics it doesn't list anyway, why waste so much space telling you a contemporary comic is worth cover price or less?

 

[jaeldubyoo]

OPG has become too unwieldy. With new comics to list each year, when will it become too much? And how can it come close to being current? In this day and age, I don’t think it can keep up with its current format. It's already outdated by the time it is published. What they need to do is go digital and maintain a database with more current information and with one that can be more easily expanded.

[Benjamin Grimm]

I don't use Overstreet for moderns, only bronze age and older.

[Marty Mann]

Still trying to find out about my copy of PETER PENNY And His MAGIC DOLLAR.

OVERSTREET lists two (2) versions, neither of which are mine.

I have tried to contact them but never receive a response.

 

mm

[Mister_Comics]

There are a lot of comics that are not listed in the OPG. Get rid of the Big Book section and add the missing comics to the guide. Its a COMIC BOOK PRICE GUIDE afterall, not a Big Book Guide. The Big Book section does nothing for many comic collectors.

[comicdonna]

Here's an interesting, related thread.

 

http://boards.collectors-society.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=4162470&fpart=1

 

Arnold Blumberg even made a few posts.

 

Don't know why I'm bothering, especially since there's always such politeness and respect on these boards for fellow human beings. I particularly love the insults toward my doctoral degree, which is *offered* by the University of Baltimore but *recognized* everywhere as exactly what it is - a terminal doctorate that took years of my life and extensive theoretical and practical work. But that's OK, insult away. And just to clarify as I take it some others already did:

 

"Part of the confusion may be that the thesis "The Bronze Age started the night Gwen Stacy died" was Arnold Blumberg's in an article he wrote a few years ago in Overstreet. "

 

This is the line that apparently started all this, and it's wrong. Jeff and I - and yes, we were the editorial heads of Overstreet at the time and Bob stood behind everything we said - wrote that article to try to clarify the Overstreet reasoning behind the various Age labels and throw out some new ways of looking at them. Nothing was really changed or moved at all, and never once did I even entertain the notion that 1973 or Gwen's death should be the *start* of the Bronze Age. What we were instead offering as a way of thinking was that the Ages could be seen not just in terms of single-issue turning points but rather as years-long "shifts" during which one Age gave way to another. In that article we suggested that the Bronze Age, which began with GL/GA #76 and so on, could be seen to settle fully into itself when Gwen's death rolled around. That's all. The start wasn't moving at all, we were just suggesting a transition period that ended in '73.

 

But keep on misquoting me and insulting my genuine academic work and credentials if it makes you feel better about yourselves.

 

 

No, absolutely true, you're right. And many of us wish they had made it a Ph.D. as they originally intended so that we all don't have to keep explaining it to everyone. But they thought something "unique" would be more exciting to market. Oh well.

 

And yup, that was the general idea. The transitional idea was mainly an intellectual exercise that grew out of us talking about how it was difficult to nail down just one single comic book that was a lone turning point for an entire era. Sure, a handful, and staggered from different publishers, but since the whole thing is artificial anyway slapping labels on segments of history, we were interested in coming up with a nice reasoning by which we could point to the Overstreet labels and say "this is why we thought this."

 

It was fun at the time, and not intended to cause foaming-at-the-mouth arguments.

 

 

Not sure if this still holds but, for overstreet sugestions:

 

http://boards.collectors-society.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=875055&fpart=1

[InvstmntComcSuply]

My biggest beef is that the OPG puts so much effort in keeping up with and adding the hundreds of new issues that come out each year, that have no "collector" value as of yet. I suspect so much time is spent keeping up with that, that a more accurate analysis of price trends on truly collectible issues falls by the wayside, or is subject to simple annual formula manipulations.

 

If a comic book isn't worth at least $10 in 9.2, it shouldn't be listed in a price guide. Coin guides don't go out of their way to tell you what this year's used nickel is worth. Paperback guides didn't fill up hundreds of pages in unreadably small print listing every best-seller that came out 6 months ago.

 

Since OPG isn't a checklist, and there are lots of small press comics it doesn't list anyway, why waste so much space telling you a contemporary comic is worth cover price or less?

 

+1

 

But the reason why they continue to add all the new issues each year is because it feeds the collector/speculator psyche to see $4 next to all of their recent purchases.

 

If he only listed the ones that were worth more than cover, let alone the ones worth $10 or more, he would sell far fewer guides. Additionally it would be even easier to see how far behind their pricing is.

[MK Ultra]

I thought there were some "mistakes" in there to deter/identify plagarism?

[ThoseBackPages]

the book sucks

[Mister_Comics]

All this talk about this book started this age and this book started that age. I grew up buying comics before any ages were being talked about. I say do away with all these age categories. They were not needed back then and they certainly are not needed now. You want to categorize comics do it by decades. Whoever started separating comics by golden age, silver age are insufficiently_thoughtful_persons. They just were trying to come up with something fancy to say. Instead of saying Oh I got a comic from the 40's or I got a comic from the 50's. Whipty-doo I got comics from the 40's and 50's sounds a lot better to me.

[conditionfreak]

My biggest beef is that the OPG puts so much effort in keeping up with and adding the hundreds of new issues that come out each year, that have no "collector" value as of yet. I suspect so much time is spent keeping up with that, that a more accurate analysis of price trends on truly collectible issues falls by the wayside, or is subject to simple annual formula manipulations.

 

If a comic book isn't worth at least $10 in 9.2, it shouldn't be listed in a price guide. Coin guides don't go out of their way to tell you what this year's used nickel is worth. Paperback guides didn't fill up hundreds of pages in unreadably small print listing every best-seller that came out 6 months ago.

 

Since OPG isn't a checklist, and there are lots of small press comics it doesn't list anyway, why waste so much space telling you a contemporary comic is worth cover price or less?

 

+1

 

The OPG used to be a fun read, and I admit. I used to get a kick out of reading that a book I bought the previous year for $1.00, was now "worth" $7.00.

 

But alas. It was not true. I was extrememly lucky if I got half of what I paid for the book. Let alone what Overstreet said it was "worth". But it was more accurate than the Wizard Price Guide.

 

Let's not discuss how much money was removed from collections, by the introduction of CGC. An OPG Near Mint, became a VF, after CGC came about. Dropping two grades, (NM-VF/NM-VF). That can be the subject of another thread.

 

Or not.

 

 

[RockMyAmadeus]

Clearly, there are thousands of copies of this book out there.

 

[The Kaptain]

Clearly, there are thousands of copies of this book out there.

 

 

[Magneto]

My biggest beef is that the OPG puts so much effort in keeping up with and adding the hundreds of new issues that come out each year, that have no "collector" value as of yet. I suspect so much time is spent keeping up with that, that a more accurate analysis of price trends on truly collectible issues falls by the wayside, or is subject to simple annual formula manipulations.

 

If a comic book isn't worth at least $10 in 9.2, it shouldn't be listed in a price guide. Coin guides don't go out of their way to tell you what this year's used nickel is worth. Paperback guides didn't fill up hundreds of pages in unreadably small print listing every best-seller that came out 6 months ago.

 

Since OPG isn't a checklist, and there are lots of small press comics it doesn't list anyway, why waste so much space telling you a contemporary comic is worth cover price or less?

 

Great point!

[valiantman]

All this talk about this book started this age and this book started that age. I grew up buying comics before any ages were being talked about. I say do away with all these age categories. They were not needed back then and they certainly are not needed now. You want to categorize comics do it by decades. Whoever started separating comics by golden age, silver age are insufficiently_thoughtful_persons. They just were trying to come up with something fancy to say. Instead of saying Oh I got a comic from the 40's or I got a comic from the 50's. Whipty-doo I got comics from the 40's and 50's sounds a lot better to me.

 

Someone should put those comments about decades IN Overstreet.

Maybe in the dealer/collector reports section of the 2012 edition.

Maybe in the report written by some guy named "Greg Holland".

 

[zosocane]

It's a bit sad to see how the OPG has declined in utility the last decade, failing to take into account the changes brought to the marketplace by the objectivity of CGC grading and GPA price reporting. Today I only use OPG as a literary reference book to assess what is the first appearance of X or whether a certain artist penciled a book, etc. For pricing, I think the data is largely useless. Instead I use GPA and/or HA or eBay reported sales.

 

 

[Doohickamabob]

Whoever started separating comics by golden age, silver age are insufficiently_thoughtful_persons. They just were trying to come up with something fancy to say. Instead of saying Oh I got a comic from the 40's or I got a comic from the 50's. Whipty-doo I got comics from the 40's and 50's sounds a lot better to me.

Dividing comics by decade is just as arbitrary and makes far less sense from the standpoint of how the comics industry changed due to historical events and market forces.