Atari game cartridges dug up from New Mexico landfill rack up $37,000 on eBay

The videogame of the film E.T. The Extraterrestrial was deemed one of the world's worst and was buried only to be dug up and sold for a bundle.

15:12 17 November 2014

A cache of around 800 Atari video games that was buried in a New Mexico landfill has been dug up and sold on eBay, generating $37,000.

Among the titles were the infamously bad videogame tie-in of Steven Spielberg's celebrated family film E.T. The Extraterrestrial - a game that was such a flop it had to be buried to get rid of it.

A film company documented the dig and confirmed that the auction of games for the retro console raised $37,000.

One of the company's consultants, Joe Lewandowski, said: “It’s really gratifying to see that happening because again to everybody it was a bunch of garbage in the landfill. You’re kind of nutty to go dig it up.”

A boxed version of E.T. alone sold online for $1,534. Other cult classics including Asteroids, Centipedes and Warlords were found in the landfill site.

The town of Alamogordo are the legal owners of the findings because they own the city's landfill. The proceeds will go into a city fund.