The Retro Event 8, a collector's preview

The Retro Event calls itself New Zealand's biggest retro gaming and collectibles expo, and for anyone who grew up on cartridges and memory cards it is the closest thing this country has to a retro games market day. Volume 8 is on Saturday 21 November 2026 at the Due Drop Events Centre in Manukau, South Auckland, the same venue as Volume 7.

This is an independent preview. Kiwi Game Bazaar has no arrangement with the organisers, and the details below are from their own listings as they read on 15 October 2026. Check retroevent.co.nz before you go, in case anything has changed.

The essentials

• When: Saturday 21 November 2026, 10am to 5pm. VIP tickets get in from 9am.
• Where: Due Drop Events Centre, 770 Great South Road, Manukau City, Auckland. Parking is free.
• Entry: online, $15 for adults (18 and over) and $10 for teens (13 to 18), plus booking fees; children 12 and under are free. At the door it is $20 for adults and $15 for teens. There is also a cheaper pass for the last hour, 4pm to 5pm. Prices as listed on 15 October 2026.
• Tickets: through Eventfinda, linked from retroevent.co.nz.

What's there for game collectors

The event covers far more than games: movie cars, cosplay, vinyl, Star Wars and Pokémon all share the floor. For collectors, the parts that matter are the vendor market, billed at 400 tables, and the free-play retro gaming, with arcade cabinets, classic consoles and tournaments. Expect a mix of private sellers, shops and traders, which means prices and descriptions vary from one table to the next.

Do your homework first

A market is the best place to find something you didn't know you wanted, and the worst place to work out whether a price is fair. A few minutes beforehand helps:

• Know what it costs in a shop. Look up the games you're hunting on this site. Each game's page shows which New Zealand shops have a copy tonight, at what price and in what condition, so you have a number to hold a stall's price against. The in stock shelf lists everything currently available.
• Know what "complete" means for that game. A complete-in-box copy has its case or box, the manual and the game itself. The complete in box shelf shows what shops are asking for those.
• Check the region. A PAL copy plays on the consoles New Zealand shops sold, and an imported NTSC-U or NTSC-J copy may not, depending on the system. The imports shelf collects copies shops say are Japanese releases, and each game page separates releases by region.
• Browse by era. If you want to see what came out on a generation of consoles before you go, start with the sixth generation, the PlayStation 2, GameCube and Xbox.

Missed the one you wanted?

Not every game turns up on the day. On any game's page you can ask for an email when a copy appears at a New Zealand shop, with no account needed. How stock alerts work explains the details.

Have a good day out, and if you spot something on the site that looks wrong, the contact page reaches the person behind it.