If all went according to plan, Zack Whalen is about $2,000 richer now.

Whalen, a junior psychology major, dashed through the Carousel Mall food court at 5 a.m. Thursday, hopping from table to table and dodging knocked-over garbage cans to earn his spot in Best Buy’s line for one of Sony’s coveted Playstation 3 gaming systems.

Best Buy only had a reported 34 units in stock, so the other 200 eager buyers who showed up will just have to wait until after Christmas.

The twist is this: Most of those waiting in line at Best Buy didn’t even plan on keeping their PS3. Instead, they said they planned on selling their systems for at least twice the cost.

It’s a new trend in next generation video gaming. The prices for new systems are high, and the demand for the latest system almost always exceeds the supply. Parents who can afford to buy their spoiled little Johnny or Suzie a Playstation 3 are better off waiting at home and buying the system for double or triple the price from a determined college student than waiting in line for 24 hours. In the 45 minutes I spent talking to people in the Best Buy line, two different people came up offering to buy a spot in the line for $1,000. Both were rejected. The offers could only go up.

‘If I don’t get a Playstation, and still sell my spot for $2,000, I’ll be happy,’ Whalen said.

And the demand for the systems will skyrocket once customers clear all of them from store shelves. Bids on eBay for the Playstation 3 hover around $1,200, with some bundles that include games and accessories going for more than $12,000. If these are the prices before the official launch date, expect the numbers to soar as the holidays draw closer. Sony is only shipping about 400,000 units for today’s North American launch date, and the prospect of any more units showing up between now and the end of the year is doubtful.

Gaming is no longer about the latest system and what it can do. Instead, it’s some kind of off-beat nerd contest about who can be the first on the block to have it in their living room. For a lucky few, money is no object, and they have no problem shelling out the extra thousand just for the bragging rights.

With any luck, video game companies will get their acts together by the time the next batch of new consoles are ready to hit store shelves. They’ll learn to avoid the same mistakes as this year and keep their consoles reasonably priced and in stock.

Steven Kovach is a featured columnist whose columns appear Fridays in The Daily Orange. E-mail him at sjkovach@gmail.com.

Published on November 17, 2006 at 12:00 pm