Update: The auction has ended with a winning bid of $3150. That's right, $3150. There's no missing decimal. That's three thousand, one hundred and fifty dollars. Yowzah.
There's no word yet on whether the buyer wants Romero to sign the diskettes, but given the selling price I'd say it's the least he could do.
Original story:
Doom 2 first released 23 years ago, finally bringing the Mancubus and super shotgun into digital being. Back then you could get it on a CD-ROM—which were still pretty expensive back then—or you could get it on five floppy disks. A copy of the latter, without its box or manuals, is currently on eBay with its current bid set at $900. The reason it's so expensive is that the disks belong to John Romero, id Software co-founder, Doom co-creator, and level editor extraordinaire.
Considering it doesn't have a box or manual, that seems a bit steep. But they do belong to Romero after all, and on the eBay listing, he even promises that he'll sign them if the buyer sees fit. "These are the originally shipped DOOM 2 floppies (3.5") for PC and compatibles," Romero writes. "The version is 1.7 (the first DOOM 2 version). NO BOX included—these are only the 3.5" disks."
The condition of the set is "very good", with no defects other than natural wear of the glue that holds the labels to the disks. Romero had initially set the starting bid to $10, so even he's probably surprised by how much demand there is.
Here are some more images of the vaunted floppy disks for your perusal:
