And within 5-10 years, no one is buying it to play...

It's a moot point.

If the original buyer bought to play, they wouldn't wait so long the cart goes bad.

And after 5-10 years there's no reason to overpay for a sealed copy to play.

You can just pirate a dump of the game and flash it on if you want to actually play it.

It’s a cognitive dissonance thing for collectors. They want the preserved, playable copy but they don’t ever want to break the seal because that lowers the value.

I bet there are a bunch of collectors out there in possession of empty game boxes (with placebo weights) that have been expertly resealed and then submitted to grading companies for a seal of approval.

The same as for a comic book that hasn't left it's rated sleeve in 30 years, and never will again without ruining the value.

It doesn't matter what happens after you open it, if no one is going to open it.

The value remains unchanged because long before degradation comes into play, what people are buying is the rarity.

I don't think collectors who buy sealed items ever intend to ooen it up, tbh

"and banning your account"

Yes. Most original NES, SNES, and Gameboy cartridges have probably lost their saved data by now, but the batteries can be replaced relatively easily. If I remember right, they're a standard type, like the ones used for watches or hearing aids.

I know that some my old NES games retained their data at least into the 2000s. Been a while since I pulled them out and checked.

Edit: I realize this article is talking about the game data, not save data. I don't know what type of memory older games used for the ROM or if it needs periodic power. I think the batteries were only for the writeable save data.