The release of the original iPhone in 2007 shook the tech world to its core. Many of us laughed at the idea of a mobile phone that didn't have keys to type our texts, and while IBM's Simon Personal Communicator (SPC) from 1994 is technically classed as the world's 'first' smartphone, it's the iPhone that really bucked the trend. Coming in at $499 for the 4GB model and $599 for the 8GB, the iPhone wasn't exactly cheap, and if you still have one of the OGs, it could now be worth up to $190,000.
While the likes of Microsoft, Sony, and Nintendo are frequently teaming up to release limited edition versions of their consoles, Apple is a bit more selective about its collabs.
In 2024, it released a limited edition Zenless Zone Zero x iPhone 16 Pro that honors miHoYo's free-to-play action-RPG.
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Over on his YouTube channel, Mrwhosetheboss showed off the unique piece of tech and referred to it as 'absurdly rare'. Saying the only place you could buy the phone was a tiny popup shop in South Korea, Mrwhosetheboss used the Fiverr app to try and get as many people as possible to prove their citizenship and get in line.
It was a plan that worked, and on December 13, 2024, the YouTuber successfully brokered the purchase of the Zenless Zone Zero iPhone 16 Pro.
The phone was created to tease the release of a character called Hoshimi Miyabi in December 2024, meaning it's themed around her. Aside from that, it looks like a pretty normal iPhone in some fancy packaging.
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You can see Mrwhosetheboss' disappointment as he says: "It seems like Apple's willingness to collaborate doesn't extend to actually making the iPhone special edition. This is just a run-of-the-mill black iPhone 16 Pro.
"Man, could you not even have just engraved a tiny little number one of 50 or something."
He goes on to say the weirdest part of it all is that out of all the things Apple could collab with, its first official limited edition phone is to celebrate a 1.4 release of a free game that includes in-app purchases.
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Adding that 50 units was a 'meaningless' amount for a firm as big Apple to be messing around with, the clearly vexed YouTuber continued: "From the high of actually being able to get this, to the low of opening it and realizing that at its core, it is an iPhone with absolutely zero changes...It's a big drop, you know what, I'm bummed.”
Ranking his various rare finds, he stuck it firmly in the F tier. He doesn't reveal what he paid for the phone, but with the iPhone 16 Pro launching for $999, we imagine the Zenless Zone Zero version was sticking a fair few dollars on that.
Others were equally unimpressed, with someone else saying: "Was that even official collab? Looks like they just took a box of game merch worth 25 bucks, threw an iphone inside it and charged double for 'limited edition'.
Another concluded: "I bet the iphone was just the company which decided to spend money on 50 iphone 15 pro's, make custom cases and packaging, and told Apple, 'Hey can we sell your phone with our customization' and then sold them."
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It turns out you can't simply slap a standard iPhone in a fancy box and expect consumers to accept it.