NES Classic Edition’s limited supply is attracting scalpers and their bots

It’s a few days since the NES Classic Edition launched, and it is nearly impossible to find online or at retail stores. Unless you are Mike Friend.

Friend (that’s a pseudonym) accidentally bought $500 worth of NES Classic Editions from Walmart on Tuesday. He was out running errands, and he wasn’t at home to turn off an automated software program (called a “bot”) that he uses to purchase items on Walmart.com the second they go on sale. The result was that he ended up getting multiple notifications from Walmart confirming his purchases of the NES Classic. It’s possible that while he was oblivious to Walmart.com running his credit card over and over for Nintendo’s hot new holiday item, that you were refreshing the page hoping to buy just one with no luck.