Archive for the ‘ GameCube ’ Category

Low On Cash, Still Game Hunting

An Unexpected Sale

An antique store near work had an outdoor sale where people were able to bring things and set up for basically a collective garage sale in the parking lot. I didn’t expect to find anything, and I still hadn’t recovered from Retropalooza, but I still stopped. No games, but the original Star Wars trilogy on VHS for $3 was a great deal!

While I was there, I did a quick check inside and found a booth with games was doing 50% off sale, so I picked up Paperboy 2 and Bubble Bobble on NES as well as XIII on GameCube and Brutal Legend on PS3. I already had some of these, but they’d make for good trade offerings later. I also got a sealed copy of Has Been Heroes for half off, which was nice since I’d been wanting to pick that up anyway.

Shortly after, GameStop had a B2G1 sale, so I picked up Tokyo Mirage Sessions FE, Kirby & The Rainbow Curse, Sonic Lost World, Sonic Boom (I’m a sucker for getting all the Sonic games, even the bad ones), and Snoopy’s Grand Adventure. All of these were bought with store credit, so I didn’t feel like I was doing too bad in what should have been a financial recovery period.

I did, however, snag Wolfenstein + The Old Blood combo for cheap online from Amazon. Despite these few purchases, the cost wasn’t too high and I still didn’t consider myself back in game hunting just yet.

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Super Mario Odyssey, Asdivine Hearts/Ys Origins, and Undertale were pre-orders that came in.

A Long Intended Sale

 

Despite being low on cash, I had recovered a little from a few sales of doubles and there’s a sidewalk sale in downtown Dallas on the first Saturday of each month I’d been wanting to check out for a long time, but just hadn’t gone to yet. The sale actually starts on Friday night around 7PM officially. I decided I’d make the trip to check it out.

When I first got there, there was nobody there. A couple of vehicles sat in the area, but nothing for sale. The site said people tend to get there early and are looking at things as they’re unloaded and I started to wonder if the sale was still held.

I walked around a while and finally saw someone setting up. I asked if this was smaller these days and they said people usually get there later. I decided to walk around some and, although I didn’t want to spend more money on dinner, I wasn’t going anywhere (I already paid for parking), so I went to Hooters.

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You must answer three riddles and determine which owl is the liar before entering.

After eating, and killing some time, I went back out and a few more people were set up, but nothing too impressive. There was one GameCube game, a Simpsons game, that might have been worth picking up for a trade or flip, but they wouldn’t budge on price at all. Finally, someone pulled up and had some gaming items, including an original NES complete in box! It was priced slightly high, but still fair, but they didn’t have anything that interested me.

I was told there was one guy that usually came and had a huge set up and he might have games, but it would be another hour before he arrived. I was tired and sleepy, but figured I’d wait around until 11. Sure enough, he showed up.

As he and his team unloaded things, I actually lent a hand, helping organize some things on their table to maximize their available space. Eventually, I did see some games start to come out. Tomb Raider games for Playstation (disc only) and a few Xbox titles. I snagged FF X-2 and Fable cases with manuals (no games) and Rock Band on Wii as well as the Oblivion Collector’s Edition on Xbox 360 and Race Drivin’ CIB for Sega Genesis.

Still nothing amazing and I wasn’t sure I’d want to buy these after all. Then I spotted the portable screen for the psone! That was worth grabbing and ultimately was only $5. I kept looking as they put more out, but didn’t see anything else. As I started to decide it was mostly a bust, I opened a little case that turned out to be full of Leapfrog cartridges…..and The Legend of Zelda Collector’s Edition disc! I’d been looking for that, though I wanted it complete. Still, for the overall price, I took all the games, plus a PSP game and a Spongebob GameCube game, as well as a Warcraft CCG raid deck for Black Temple all for about the cost of just the Zelda disc.

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All for $25, worth around $100

I’ll probably check the sale out again in the future. You never really know what will be there and that Zelda disc was an exciting find to end the night.

2018
01/07
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CATEGORY
GameCube
NES
Nintendo
Playstation
PS3
PS4
Retro Game Collecting
Switch
Video Games
Wii U
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Retropalooza 2017

Despite a lack of updates here, I’ve been insanely busy the last few months 2017 and a great deal of that busyness has been due to three things. First, of course, was game hunting itself, but for the last six months of the year, I was working on converting my father’s vinyl collection to mp3 to give him for Christmas. That was about 200 albums in total, which required each one to be recorded on each side, then converted with meta data added in. In addition to this project was organizing another large quantity of items, but that’s where this story will eventually lead.

While I normally wouldn’t reach back and relate game hunts from months back, these sort of snowball into the biggest gaming find I’ve ever experienced, so it’s worth telling the whole story over the course of a few posts.

So get your Super Scope, put on your Captain N jacket, and strap in. We’re going on a game hunting story time adventure!

Retropalooza 2017

On October 7th and 8th, The Game Chasers held Retropalooza V in Arlington, Tx and despite the relatively close scheduling between it and Let’s Play Game Expo, of course I had to go. I had spent about half the money I set aside for Let’s Play at that convention, so I assumed I would spend about the same about, and the remainder of my game hunting cash, at Retropalooza.

In addition to that cash, I had a number of the sealed games from the Half Price Books gold mine for trade. As is becoming tradition, my first stop was at seeing the Nostalgic Nerds at their table to see what they had. Honestly, not too much caught my eye with the exception of Kickle Cubicle and Mega Man X3. That price tag on Mega Man X3 caught my eye as well, though. As expected, it was pricey. Around $250, though the quality of the label certainly demanded a high price tag for a rare game.

I wasn’t looking to wipe myself out immediately and wasn’t sure I wanted to spend that much on a game in general, so after we chatted a bit, I moved on to see what else was around. As always, Retropalooza had a ton of vendors and they all had great stuff. Prices weren’t outrageous, though some were higher than I was willing to pay and a few a little higher than I thought was reasonable. Of course, as with most conventions, you can usually negotiate if you buy a stack of things.

The first booth we came across that really caught my attention was a small one, a bit cramped with 3 tables in a “U” shape that only allowed a couple of people to stand in there at a time. My friend Phil looked over some of their hand held games while I waited to get in. Nothing much on top of the table really got my interest other than Winback Covert Ops for N64 at a fair price (finally) and Tiny Toon Adventures 2 on NES, but there were boxes and tubs under the table that weren’t open. Only one was and I wondered what might be down there.

The one box that was open had the Nintendo Power StarFox 64 promotional VHS, which was kind of interesting. I remember having it as a kid, so I pulled that out, but nothing much else in there besides Powerpuff Girls Relish Rampage (Pickled Edition) on GameCube, which was on my hunting list. A few more good games were there, but nothing else I was looking for from my list.

Moving over to the closed boxes, I opened one to take a peek and saw a pretty good stack of things. Namely NES game boxes. In great condition! I asked about Super Mario Bros 3 and he wanted $10. Star Tropics complete in box (with the letter) was about $10 as well. Lion King for SNES box, GBA Sonic collection, Sonic Advance box. An Akira figure of Kaneda with the motorcycle for a few bucks. Digimon World and Digimon World 3 were super cheap as well! Then, Castlevania: Symphony of the Night on Playstation. It was a blank case, but the disc was in great shape and it had the manual. Normally $30 for just the disc, for $5, it was a steal!

Phil got a few things from them as well, but we combined it into a single purchase and started Retropalooza off taking a pretty big chunk out of my cash, but we got far more value than what we paid.

I stopped by The Gamer Chasers booth and caught Billy clearly up way too early for his liking. It was almost 10AM and he informed me it was closer to the time he normally went to sleep, not got up. They’re not kidding on the show when they say he’s not a morning person. I purchased a Caught ‘Em Slippin’ t-shirt and each season of the series on DVD, but left them with Billy to, over the course of the convention, get everyone to sign them. I managed to get Billy & Jay, Melvorn, AlphaOmegaSin, and Woods, but it would take a return on the second day to manage to get Dodongo’s signature.

A big goal of this convention was to finish off the last of my N64 targets. I had just gotten Winback Covert Ops, leaving Loderunner 3D and Goemon’s Great Adventure to be found. Towards the end of my winding through the booths set up, I finally found one with the last of my N64 targets, and for reasonable prices. Done and done. I was finally finished with my N64 collection. I didn’t go for a complete collection and don’t plan to, though I might start keeping more if they fall in my lap. For what I set out as my goal on the system, though, I had finished that set. Plus, a booth cut a price to almost half off to convince me to add StarCraft for N64 to my collection as well.

Finally found Crystal Castles and the Tron games for Atari 2600 and I picked up a few manuals as well.

As the day was winding down, I got Ar tonelico from YouTuber Scottsquatch and on my way out, I picked up Animal Crossing (with the memory card), Wild Arms 2, and Spawn on SNES.

Overall, a good day and certainly the bulk of my spending and game finds, but there were still some gems to pick up upon returning the next day!

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Day 1 was not too shabby!

Day 2 – Return to Castle Retropaloozastein

 

The second day is usually either pretty light or extremely heavy, depending on your luck. Sometimes vendors want to go deep on discounts and clear as much as possible so they don’t have to load everything to take back. That wasn’t on my mind, though, with so little left in my wallet. Don’t let that deter you at a convention, though. I know someone that made a wild pitch of $10 for an entire box of games and walked away with them. Nothing great, all commons, but they traded into a local store and he got enough credit to get a high value game from said store for essentially the $10 he spent.

I hadn’t had any luck with trades the first day and the second proved lackluster in working any trade deals as well. Although I had some good titles, sealed games didn’t grab much attention since they’re hard to move and take longer to find a buyer.

I picked up an SNES Super Scope for $5, which was just a fun thing to have, even though I’ll never really use it. The big score out and about was a booth that I guess had opened a lot more of their crates and were trying to clear them out. Crate after crate of Atari 2600 games at $3 each or 3 for $5. I knocked out 9 Atari 2600 titles I’d been looking for and was more than happy to do so.

Wrapping up the day, I rounded back to Nostalgia Nerd’s booth and took a final look at what they had. I had a few things they were interested in taking as trade and so, with a combination of trades and the last of my cash, I got that Kickle Cubicle and, of course, that Mega Man X3, completing my SNES Mega Man X trilogy. And, as tends to be my luck, Mega Man X3 has steadily dropped in value since I bought it…. but I have a beautiful condition label and it’s a great game, so I can’t be too disappointed.

I didn’t quite end the day there, as I finally decided to add one final N64 game to my library that wasn’t on my original list. Since I had Goemon’s Great Adventure, I decided to sell some Texas Instruments game cartridges and used the money to pick up Mystical Ninja starring Goemon to have both Goemon N64 games.

Finally tapped out and rather tired of two days of convention walking, I headed home. Of course, an hour before the convention ended, I came back when I realized I had left my Super Scope with the Nostalgic Nerd guys so I wouldn’t have to carry it around. It was this final hour return run that let me get Dodongo’s signature on my Game Chasers DVDs as well.

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Day 2 wasn’t as hefty, but Mega Man X3 was a huge addition.

And with that, finally, Retropalooza 2017 drew to a close for me. I thought my game hunting was pretty much done for the year. After all, October leads right into holiday shopping season and Christmas gifts would need to be bought, but of course….

2018
01/04
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Atari 2600
GameCube
N64
Nintendo
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Impromptu Fox (Game) Hunt

Aug 9, 2017

After Let’s Play Game Expo, my friend Phil (@terranceharken) still had the itch to hunt for some games. He wasn’t able to return to the convention on Sunday, so his haul was lighter and he was just really wanting to try and find some new gems. We’ve been friends since grade school and we normally hang out and check out an anime or play games once a week, but he wanted to go hunting this week instead.

As I determined this was “his” hunt, I volunteered him to drive and we headed out.

Since he works nights and I work days, it puts limited time on the options for game hunting and poses serious challenges for the idea of doing game hunt videos at flea markets and garage sales. Truth be told, I’ve long thought we’d not have much luck game hunting on a weeknight since our options are limited, but we’ve had some luck in the past.

I suggested with the limited time we had, we hit pawn shops this time, so we headed off.

First Stop – Goodwill

Goodwill has become extremely hit or miss and I rarely find anything of value. Occasionally they’ll get a good bundle in, but they typically put those in auction either online or in store now. It’s still worth stopping in and checking their games and CDs for the off chance something worthwhile got mis-sorted. We came across a very good condition Guitar Hero II guitar with strap and game case/manual (no disc) still in the box. For a couple bucks, I took it.

Second Stop – First Cash Pawn

I’ve had good luck with this pawn shop chain, finding Wii U games for $5-$10 when they were still worth $30 and coming across some PS3 and Wii games for good value in the past. This stop was severely lacking in games, but they had a $10 Wii U Pro controller. I’ve been wanting one for a while, so I grabbed that in a heartbeat! So far, Phil’s hunt was proving fruitful for me, but not so much luck for him.

Third Stop – Entertainmart

Found in Arlington, TX, this location was featured in the first episode of The Game Chasers. The location has drastically shrunk since it first opened. It closed off its separate game area and brought it into the main area of floor space. It’s since been dwindling the games and everything was marked down or even ½ off when we were there. The music section was a fraction of what it once was. It feels like the place is going out of business.

I talked to one of the employees and it turns out I was right. Sort of. They’re not going out of business, but they’re shifting their focus of what they want to offer. For video games, that means current and previous gen, not older stuff. They’ll still do movies and music as well, and they’re planning to move to a smaller location next year. Personally, I think they’re making the wrong move focusing on current & previous gen games. Plus, they’re moving closer to the Arlington area mall, which puts them in direct location competition with a GameStop inside and outside the mall.  I don’t expect we’ll find any good deals there in the future.

Fourth Stop – Cash America

Another Cash America stop, but this one had quite a few things. Phil went ahead and got Final Fantasy XII Collector’s edition steelbook. I found 11 games for $1 each. I’ll rarely pass on a $1 game. Adding the FFXII to my stack, I got the whole bundle at $5 the total, bringing Phil’s game down to about the sweet spot to pick it up.

Fifth Stop – Game Over Games

I’ve been to Game Over outside Austin, TX before and I didn’t find much I was willing to buy. Most of their games seem terribly overpriced. I found a few Atari games at this location that I needed, but they came out way higher than what I’d pay on eBay. Most PS2 and Xbox games seemed to hover around $20, even when they’re $10 on eBay. I understand stores having some mark up for overhead, but double the price of an Ebay purchase seems really high.

However, I’ve seen others comment that their more common games are overpriced, which are what the casual buyer is more likely to look for and buy without concern, while their rarer games tend to be priced fairly or even at reasonably good deals. This allows collectors to hit their store for the rarities while the store is supported by non-collectors just looking for old games to play. I guess that makes some sense, but it doesn’t keep me coming back in.

Despite my opinion, Phil found a number of games he was looking for, including Sonic 2 on Master System, and some Game Gear titles, for reasonable prices and finally made this hunting trip worth his time.

Final Stop – Movie Trading Company

We mostly went into Movie Trading Company expecting to find nothing because their prices are typically $5 higher than eBay averages, but we were hoping to find something we needed/wanted just to get a bag for all the games in the car outside. We had a couple of stacks and no bag, so hopefully we’d find something.

We looked. We searched. We hunted. We didn’t find anything.

As we were calling it quits, we checked their case one last time and found Grandia Xtreme for a fair price, about $7 under online average. It was complete and on my list, so I bought it to get us a bag. As we were checking out, though, I spotted a Mario statue. It turned out to be a DS holder I’d had been interested in the past. His hat was damaged, the bill of the cap broken off but still able to hold in place. They had it marked at $20 but with the damage, they offered to do ½ off, so I went ahead and took it as well.

Overall, not a bad haul for a day I expected to be fairly empty. Just goes to show, you really don’t know what you’ll find or where. It’s all a matter of going out and looking.

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Game Spent Value
Guitar Hero II $3 $20
Top Gun: Fire At Will $1 $5
Disney Infinity 2.0 $1 $2
Cars $1 $5
Need for Speed Most Wanted PS3 $1 $10
Need For Speed Underground – Most Wanted Disc $1 $10
Wipeout In The Zone $1 $5
Shrek the Third $1 $3
Top Gun Combat Zones $1 $4
Madagascar $1 $5
LotR Return of the King $1 $6
Simpsons Road Rage $1 $5
Grandia XTreme $20 $27
Wii U Pro Controller $10 $20
Mario DS Lite Holder $10 ~$45
Total $64 ~$150
2017
09/06
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Fox (Game)Hunts 7-22-17

Author’s Note: I’m trying a particular method for writing these game hunting “hunter’s journal” entries. The format and writing style will likely change as I decide what I like best, and what readers seem to like best.

6:40 AM

I had found a Craigslist post for a garage sale that had video games the night before. An e-mail to the poster had confirmed the games were for PSP and PS2. As the correspondence had come back late in the evening, I had elected to retire for the evening rather than answer the query as to any titles I was in search of. My PS2 list is still rather long, so I expected I would simply see what was there on the morrow.

Upon waking, I looked to the clock and had the dreadful realization that I had over-slept. Not by much, but mere moments can prove all the difference when hunting elusive video games. I quickly put the dog out and brushed my teeth before throwing on clothes. I called for the dog to come in, but she ignored me. Going out, she was around the house and upon seeing me, excitedly followed back inside. Another minute lost.

In the car, I drove as fast as I dare go, wary of surpassing posted limits, but making all haste possible. The address of the garage sale wasn’t far, but time was ticking and each red light taunted me. Upon reaching the proper street, a sign posted at the end indicated I had entered a digit wrong in GPS. I hurried to the sign’s address to find no games. Returning to the initial address, I now spotted the location of the morning hunt! The sale was to start at 7 AM and I was still a bit early at 6:55 AM. Hurrying up the drive, I learned the games were purchased in full approximately 10 minutes prior, leaving only Scrabble for Playstation behind. The seller, a kind gentleman I placed possibly in his 40s at most, shared that the games had actually included Playstation 1 titles when he listed Final Fantasy Tactics and Xenogears as examples of what he had.

Not wanting to inflict further disappointment, I did not ask what he had charged. In hindsight, despite the late hour, I should have replied to the e-mail and perhaps even offered to buy them the night before, but alas, I did not and could only move forward.

With Let’s Play Game Expo two weeks away, I had not planned to go garage sale hunting, but out and with the bitter taste of lost games in my mouth, I decided to do a little bit. Finding a post with a CIB (Complete in Box) PS2 in the photo, I headed for another sale. I worried I was again a step behind. After all, another hunter was in the area, so I assumed they would already be on the trail of this one as well.

7:15 AM

I arrived at the house to find no sale. Checking the listing again, I realize it started at 8 and there I sat pondering the best course of action. Ultimately, I decided to wait, hoping for an early start. Not long after, the garage door opened and a short, Asian woman pulled the care out to park in the drive way. I opened my door and half stepped out, asking her if the sale was still scheduled to start at 8. She confirmed the start time and apologized. About 15 to 20 minutes later, she came out again, as well as her husband, who came towards my car.

I got out and he said they had some things to set up, but would start now and I could come look. As I walked up, I told him what I was interested in and they had it sitting on a shelf in the garage. He said something to his wife before going inside, which I thought sounded like he was speaking Japanese. Upon looking at the games, I realize they were all Japanese releases! There was a GunCon 2, which was black rather than the bright orange of the US release. They were asking $50 for the CIB PS2 and games as well as $50 for the CIB Wii and games. A fair price on both, but I only had $100 in my pocket and a game convention in 2 weeks, so I passed.

7:25 AM

I was considering giving up for the morning, but there was another sale just around the corner from the last, so I stopped to check. As I walked up, I spotted a few Wii games along with Call of Duty on PS3 and PS4. They asked $2 each on the Wii games and $5 each on the Playstation titles. I knew Mario Party 8 was worth about $20 and New Super Mario Bros. Wii was worth about $10, so I took them. I had to check values, but went ahead and picked up Michael Jackson The Experience, Brave, and Wii Sports. I tend to always pick up Wii Sports as it sales on eBay for $10 in the cardboard sleeve. This was a Nintendo Selects copy in a plastic case. He agreed to $8 as that was all I had without breaking a bill.

Upon returning to my car, I realized I had not checked to ensure the discs were present and immediately proceeded to do so. Mario Party 8 had no disc, but it was in Michael Jackson’s case. Brave had Michael Jackson. Wii Sports had Wii Sports. I went back and showed them, thinking I would swap the game for Disney Princess My Fairytale Adventure if they didn’t have the disc. Ironically, I should have picked it up first as it’s worth more than Brave.

The man’s wife told him it might be in the Wii, which was in a box right there by the front door. He plugged it in and pressed the button and sure enough, we found Brave. He said the system wasn’t working anymore and I asked what he planned to do with it. He was planning on seeing what a store would give for it, thinking they could fix it. Since I’ve been getting into the repair hobby on consoles, I was interested. For another $10, I got the Wii system with 2 controllers, 2 nunchuks, all hook ups, and the Disney Princess game thrown in.

7:40 AM

Feeling much better about the day’s outing, I had one more stop I wanted to go to, though it was a good 30 minute drive away and would not open until 10 AM. I decided to backtrack and stop at all the signs for garage sales I had passed. The first one I stopped at had a pair of Guitar Hero guitars with their boxes for Nintendo Wii. Normally I’m not interested in the instruments, but it made me ask if there were games and the older gentleman who was busy with numerous people at this sale said there were! Only, he wasn’t sure where they were.

We began searching, looking around different boxes as his wife was asked where they were. I was about to give up and leave him my contact information when his wife found them. Nothing incredible, but 007 Nightfire on GameCube and NBA2K13 for Wii made it worth the $1-$2 each they were asking. I went ahead and took the guitars for $1 each as well. They also had the manual for Pokemon Red & Blue, which was included at no cost.

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9 AM

I continued to stop at any signs I saw on the way, but mostly came up lacking. A Nintendo DS Lite for $2 was my only find before heading for a small resale shop’s closing sale.

IMG_8355[1]

Looks like poor Kirby’s gotten beat up.

10 AM

Once I arrived at the shop, I saw they had Wii accessories and Disney Infinity figures priced rather high to be considered a real deal, but not completely unreasonable either. I kept looking. In the back with a box of casette tapes, I found a pair of N64 games. Sports titles, but $2 each. To finalize the hunt, I picked up a Tiger Handheld Baseball game for $1 to go with them.

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Pulling out of the shop and heading home, I stopped at a final garage sale, but had no luck. Satisfied with the morning results, I headed home to prepare for the evening’s activities: a Facebook group’s game meet up.

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Game Spent Estimated Value
Mario Party 8 $2 $20
New Super Mario Bros Wii $2 $10
Michael Jackson The Experience $2 $10
Wii Sports $2 $10
Brave $0 $10
Disney Princess My Fairytale Adventure $0 $18
Wii System with controllers and hook ups $10 $50
NBA2K13 $1 $15
Ultimate I Spy $1 $4
Game Party 3 $1 $5
007 Nightfire $2 $9
Guitar Hero III $1 $5
Guitar Hero III guitars in box $2 $10
Nintendo DS Lite $2 $20
Track and Field 2000 $2 $11
NBA Showtime NBA on NBC $2 $5
Tiger Handheld Baseball $1 $10
TOTAL $33 $232 Estimated

Facebook Game Group Meetup

5:30 PM

I spent the midday getting all the extra games I have together for a Facebook group meetup. I didn’t think I had anything truly worthwhile at this point, but it was worth taking. My goal was to sell and trade without spending any money.

Upon arriving, I looked around at what people had out. A decent spread of NES and SNES, Wii, PS2, and Playstation games, but little N64, which are what I’m particularly hunting right now. I did meet someone I knew to trade Phantasy Star Online on Dreamcast for Fighting Vipers on Sega Saturn. I also had my first sighting of live chodes in the wild as both Billy and Jay from The Game Chasers showed up.

Finding some small space to utilize, I brought my boxes in and set them up for people to look through. A few found things they were curious about, but no purchases or trades. Once things started to clear out a bit, I moved to a table with more room. Still not much overall, but I sold a few Atari games, Rampage Total Destruction on GameCube, and Bottom of the 9th on N64 for around $22 total.

I had left my higher value items in the trunk, but kept eyeing the table next to me where a guy had Earthbound and Suikoden II. After offering to trade the Tiger Handheld Baseball for Suikoden II was declined (though it was clear it was a struggle for the guy, I assure you!), I knew I’d have to trade some big titles. I loaded up what I had out and brought in the good stock.

He was willing to trade Suikoden II for Dokapon Kingdom CIB on Wii, Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker CIB on GameCube, and Super Smash Bros. Melee without a manual on GameCube. I was hesitant to make the trade. These were quality trade bait for Let’s Play Game Expo and had a value of about $165 vs Suikoden II’s $140 average. I started to back out to wait for the convention.

Taking another look, I examined the Suikoden II’s case, manual, and disc. They were in immaculate condition. Despite the value disparity, I decided two common GameCube games I paid $7 for was worth adding to the Dokapon Kingdom trade. We shook hands and I knocked off one of the hard to find, and second most expensive, game on my Playstation hunting list.

img_83661.jpg    IMG_8368[1]

IMG_8367[1].JPG

As I left, I noticed Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II for NES in a very nice box. The guy wanted $30, but would take the game out and do $20 for the pristine box and manual. I went ahead and spent the $20 I had made selling the earlier games.

All in all, not a bad day.

Game Spent Value
Suikoden II $97 spent on games traded for Suikoden II $140
TMNT II Box & Manual $7 spent on games sold, then cash spent for the box & manual $30

On to Let’s Play Game Expo!

 

2017
07/28
POSTED BY
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GameCube
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Playstation
Playstation
Retro Game Collecting
Video Games
Wii
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Going Retro: Getting into Game Collecting

Disclaimer: The top image is not my game collection….yet!

I went to GameStop a few years back (I don’t have nearly as much of a problem with them as some) and saw a friend of mine who was the store manager at the time. Before I left, she recommended I read Ready Player One by Ernest Cline. Her recommendation was so high that I wound up going to Barnes & Noble the same time to pick it up. I read the full book in a flight to Seattle and back.

I loved the book, but it also kindled a fire in me for nostalgia of my own childhood, primarily for video games. I started thinking about my backlog of games on current consoles and, like many gamers, wondered if I’d ever get through them all. Then the idea hit me: If I couldn’t play through all the games, why not start collecting them and curating a library of of the best ones?

I started by going to garage sales and looking for older games. One of the first I went to I met a guy who was also collecting and working towards a complete North American licensed release NES library. He invited me to join a Facebook group and I began to realize how many people were into retro game collecting. I decided I need t obetter define what games I wanted to start building my own library.

What Games To Get?

I started by thinking about consoles. I still had my NES, SNES, N64, GameCube, Genesis, and PS3 at this point. I decided I would try to get all the consoles I had played growing up and a “Top 100” library of the best games on each system. Then I’d also include memorable games I enjoyed as a child if they weren’t on the “Top 100” list. This meant acquiring an Atari 2600, Sega Saturn & Dreamcast, a Playstation and PS2. I didn’t include hand held systems as they have never been a big interest for me.

To determine a “best of” hunting list for each system, I started with sites like IGN and GameSpot that had done “Top 100” articles before. Next, I went to fogurms where posters had debated their picks for the best games with discussion and votes moving games up/down the list and adding/dropping off the list. I took the titles that appeared across each list and made that my Hunting List.

For example:
IGN Top 100 NES Games
Retro Sanctuary Top 100 Best NES Games
Game FAQs Top 100 NES Games

All in all, I actually came up with a list of:

  • 106 Atari 2600
  • 164 NES
  • 147 SNES
  • 101 Sega Genesis
  • 88 N64
  • 95 Sega Dreamcast
  • 83 GameCube
  • 215 PS2
  • 220 PS3

Obviously the “Top 100” grew with the additional titles I remembered and moreso as I decided to include infamously bad titles and all RPGs.

Benefits of the List, and How to Use It

I highly recommend creating a list to work from, even if you are going for a complete library of every title on a system. Put the list in Google Drive and get the app on your phone. I use a spreadsheet listing the titles and their Pricecharting value across 6 rows to minimize scrolling, divided up by systems. This way your list is always on hand and you can make sure you don’t buy a duplicate of something you’ve already picked up (so long as you update and save the file in Google Drive, of course).

I did mention I keep the price for each game from Pricecharting on my list. I’ve seen in some groups there are people who think Pricecharting is crap and should never be used. I’ve yet to understand why some think this. Pricecharting basically tracks prices of completed auctions from eBay to give an average price. Using completed auctions ensures you’re getting information based on what people are actually willing to pay. I don’t advise taking it as the absolute price, though. You can look at the auctions the data is coming from to make sure they’re recent. If not, you can go to ebay directly and see what recent prices were on sold listings. Sometimes Pricecharting doesn’t have recent data on their averages, but I find this an uncommon occurrence.

One thing to remember is these are largely eBay based prices, so I think it’s safe to push for a bit less than those prices since a seller would lose 10% to eBay fees, not to mention the hassle of shipping.

Where To Hunt for Games?

The simple answer is: everywhere.

Garage Sales / Flea Markets / Thrift Stores / Antique Stores
Obviously these are all hit or miss, but you never know what you might find. I always keep an eye out for other items completely unrelated to video games that I can flip for profit to further pay for game collecting such as vintage posters, Disney or Warner Bros. items, or anything that I think might be worth reasonably more than is being asked.

GameStop
If you’re looking for XBox 360, Playstation 3, Wii, or Wii U games, it’s worth looking into GameStop prices. There are some titles I’ve gotten much cheaper at GameStop than Pricecharting shows, meaning you’re actually better off with GameStop, especially if you have their Power Up Reward card. A few examples as of the time of this writing:

Sakura Wars on Wii is worth $25, but $13.50 with discount at GameStop
Arc Rise Fantasia on Wii is worth $34, but $27 with discount at GameStop
Ar tonelico Qoga: Kneel of Ar Ciel on PS3 is worth $22.50, but $9 with discount at GameStop

If you’re really lucky and can find a copy of Dokapon Kingdom at GameStop, it will run you $45 rather than $80 for just the disc.

It’s just a matter of researching the titles you’re looking for and checking if they have them near you, then going or calling to verify if they’re complete with manual. If you hunt during a Buy 2 Get 1 Free weekend, you can really clean up.

Half Price Books
People in a lot of gaming groups hate Half Price Books, primarily because they overprice games. I’ve found some stores do, some don’t, and some are reasonably in line with Pricecharting prices. I find it’s worth looking at least and I tend to drive around to as many as I can on the coupon weeks for 20-50% off coupon purchases. That’s how I got Skies of Arcadia on GameCube for $35 and Mario Cement Factory for $50.

Game Stores
The chain stores, such as Game X-Change, are unlikely to offer real deals unless you catch them slipping on values. Sometimes you’ll find fair prices on titles you’ve been looking for but haven’t had luck finding. Game X-Change also offers a B2G1 deal on all games $7.95 or less. This doesn’t help as you get to a point where you’re hunting more expensive titles, of course.

Your best bet is small independent stores where the owner is more likely to be willing to work a deal with you if you buy multiple games at a time and return with repeat business.

eBay
Of course, this is sort of a last resort, but if you’re patient and watch close, you’ll sometimes catch good deals on games you’ve been looking for with no luck for a long while.

Facebook Groups
You’ll find Facebook groups where people buy, sell, and trade their extra games. I recommend taking some time to get a feel for how the group is and if you want to work with them for trades.

Gaming Conventions
If you want to get a good deal at conventions, you probably want to work on your haggling skills and still go in with good games to trade and cash to spend. The last few conventions I’ve been to weren’t too great for deals, but were full of rare things you won’t find at the average store. You might use conventions to target rare and hard to find additions for your collection.

2017
04/19
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Growing Up Gaming – PS2 & GameCube

We now reach a milestone in my gaming experience as I entered a new phase of my life. The majority of my experiences with both GameCube and Playstation 2 is set at college where I had both consoles and continued to play EverQuest. I spent the first two years of college going to a 2 year (or junior or community) college and saved money by continuing to live with my parents. I don’t have any stark memories of these consoles during these 2 years as I still spent most of my time on the PC.

As I detailed previously, I was deeply into EverQuest, so a lot of my time was spent on that. I also played a fair bit of Diablo, but the bulk of my time was EverQuest with a little still spent on Star Wars Jedi Knight: Dark Forces II. My console time started up again the latter half of my college career when I went to a university. I lived in a technically on campus apartment complex with four small bedrooms, two bathrooms, and a living area with kitchen.

I was fortunate enough to share the apartment with three guys I knew from high school. One hooked up his Dreamcast in the living room and I provided the GameCube as these two were designed with four player hook ups. The Playstation 2 was in my bedroom. I remember two of the first games I got for PS2 were Dark Cloud and Ephemeral Fantasia. I didn’t get too far in Dark Cloud and although I really enjoyed Ephemeral Fantasia, I never finished it. I didn’t like the ticking clock mechanic for Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask, but found it acceptable here for some reason.

The coolest part of Ephemeral Fantasia was, like Ocarina of Time, playing music. It was more challenging than the ocarina music and I seem to recall there was a free form option as well, but I may be wrong on that.

I had to use an online guide to get pointed in the right direction at times, but the game was fun. It is probably the one PS2 game I would most like to revisit and play through fully that I didn’t complete in the past. Even though it wasn’t reviewed terribly favorably, and is probably fairly average at best, I enjoyed it.

The next memorable game I’d note would be the first Spider-Man game based on the Sam Raimi film. The game itself was a decent game, and I played through it on normal, then on the harder difficulty and had a lot of fun… until a level chasing Green Goblin through the city. Oh the profanities that came from my room were of great entertainment to my roommates (one of whom equally entertained us with the same playing Dreamcast fighting games).

Spider-Man 2, however, was leaps and bounds above the first with the first open world New York City and actual web swinging physics. If there was no building for a web to theoretically attach to, you could shoot a web in the direction. Combined with button combinations to pull off acrobatics while web swinging, the game was fun to just swing around the city being the wall crawler. Speed was based on releasing your web at the right time, you dived off buildings rather than just jumped off, there was a lot of intricacies put into web swinging. Honestly, after they simplified web swinging in the next game, I don’t feel any have matched the feel of it since this one.

Of course I picked up Final Fantasy X, the first fully voice acted Final Fantasy game. I remember particularly liking the Sphere Grid leveling progression system and I never really felt the voice acting was terrible. Looking back, even Tidus’ horrid laugh doesn’t bother me too much. I feel in the context of the scene, it’s supposed to be cringeworthy and awkward. It’s a forced laugh, that’s the whole point of that scene. Nothing’s funny, nothing amusing has happened, he’s forcing a laugh for Yuna’s sake. But that’s just me, I suppose! To Zanarkand is also one of my favorite pieces of music from Final Fantasy as a series.

While people were getting their violence kicks in Grand Theft Auto games, I opted to be violent on The Punisher instead. Not the best game ever made, but still fairly solid and it had the over the top “execution” kills if you had an enemy at the right place when they were almost finished off.

Over on the GameCube, there are a few games I particularly enjoyed, but possibly not the first one would venture to guess. First and foremost is probably Hunter: The Reckoning. Based on the tabletop RPG by White Wolf, the video game was a four player isometric game akin to Diablo and with the four of us in the apartment, it was a lot of fun. We played through it a few times and I believe we beat it as a group on the hardest difficulty. An amusing memory was being surrounded by enemies everywhere and telling our friend playing the biker character to use the cleave ability to which he yelled back “What’s a cleave?!”

Similar to Hunter: The Reckoning, a one of the roommates and I played the GameCube Baldur’s Gate: Dark Alliance. Hours upon hours were sunk into that game, playing late into the night, much to our roomate’s chagrin. Put away the torhces and pitchforks, though, as the same friend and I also played Baldur’s Gate on PC (though we never finished it….we got so close to the end and never knew it).

Continuing the trend of these isometric RPGs, X-Men Legends and X-Men Legends II were a huge draw for the same friend that joined me on Baldur’s Gate. Playing as the X-Men and actually building a team that you could play off each other with combos was great. While Marvel: Ultimate Alliance came in the next generation, I’d love to see a new X-Men Legends game.

Similarly, there’s Champions of Norrath, a game set in EverQuest’s world of Norrath. While the game made absolutely no geographical sense for those who knew the world from the MMO, it was fun enough to play. With Daybreak Games shuttering EverQuest Next, I’d honestly love to see a new single player EverQuest game set in Norrath akin to the Champions titles or more like Dragon Age, The Witcher Series, Kingdoms of Amalur, or in an Elder Scrolls style.

I loyally continued with the Star Fox franchise as well, picking up both Star Fox Adventures and Star Fox Assault. Surprising enough, I think I actually enjoyed Adventures more. I would have liked Krystal to have been a more active partner in the story rather than trapped in a crystal (har har), but having enjoyed Ocarina of Time, I liked Legend of Star Fox: Adventures in Time well enough as the game basically blended Zelda concepts and put Fox McCloud in place as the protagonist.

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“YOU STOLE MY GAME, FOX!”

Knowing the history of the game, even setting it in Star Fox universe, I’ll agree I’d have preferred Krystal to be the protagonist, perhaps rescuing the Star Fox team after being forced to land on Dinosaur Planet after a battle or the like. Star Fox Assault, on the other hand, seemed like a less than superb attempt to recapture Star Fox 64’s polish, but the dog fights never felt as hectic as they did on N64. The graphics were certainly a nice step up from N64, though.

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As always, Slippy. As always.

I had been thrilled with Resident Evil 2 through Code Veronica, so when the original was remade on GameCube, I picked it up. I believe I may have played only part of Playstation’s version and after finishing GameCube, I went back to play it again fully. I also enjoyed Resident Evil 0. Does anyone ever wonder what happened to Billy after all these years? In the same vein as Resident Evil, Eternal Darkness: Sanity’s Requiem was a great game as well.

Another game I can’t recall which I played first, spanning both consoles, is Metal Gear Solid. I don’t recall if I played the original on Playstation or if I went back to play it after Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes on GameCube. Meanwhile, Playstation 2 had Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty and later Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater, all of which I played as they released and thoroughly enjoyed. Well, maybe less so on Metal Gear Solid 2. Sorry, Raiden, but I’m not a fan of yours.

raiden_naked-article_image

I don’t remember all the details, but I was a fan of Buffy the Vampire Slayer prior to college, so I did pick up the game “Chaos Bleeds” on GameCube to play. Though I don’t remember much of the game, I remember I did like it overall both in story and gameplay. I seem to remember the combat wasn’t too bad.

Lastly for these consoles, I’d note The Lord of the Rings movie tie ins, The Two Towers and Return of the King, the latter of which improved greatly over the former. For some reason, I played Two Towers on PS2 and Return of the King on GameCube, but I don’t think there’s much difference between the two to really warrant suggesting one system over the other. A bit of a smaller scale Dynasty Warriors combat with RPG character progression, the games followed the general story and were fun to play.

A few honorable mentions would probably be Okami on PS2, Enter the Matrix on GameCube (I liked it at the time), Star Wars: Rogue Leader & Rebel Strike in the Rogue Squadron series on GameCube while Jedi Starfighter was on PS2, Onimusha series on PS2, True Crime: Street of LA on PS2, and Forgotten Realms: Demon Stone on PS2 (why Wizards of the Coast hasn’t done a full Drizzt or Elminster game is beyond me).

I played Smash Bros. Melee a little, but we overall preferred the original on N64 more than the GameCube version in the apartment. I never did play Twilight Princess, though I’ve since picked it up and hope to eventually, though I’ll likely play the HD version on Wii U.

Moving on from college, though made for Playstation 2 it was brought to PC, where I played it. That game would be Final Fantasy XI. I had stopped playing EverQuest by this point and a friend of mine was excited for the Final Fantasy MMO finally coming to America. Three of us signed up and started it, but I didn’t last nearly as long as others did.

The Vana’diel March is still one of the most memorable pieces for me.

There were a few problems from the start, such as randomized server placement making us delete and recreate characters until luck put us on the same server. The only other option was a ridiculously cost prohibitive friend invite pass to bring another player to your server. I want to say it was 100,000 if not 1 million gil, which might have been reasonable for the Japanese players who had a year of economy going, but American players were started on the same servers with no gil and an economy already rife with inflation.

I fell behind my friends as they played up to 12 hours a day for a couple weeks when they were between jobs and eventually found myself spending more time shouting “Looking for group” to find a party than actually playing the game. Thus ended my stint in Final Fantasy XI. Now that the PS2 servers are down and I presume the PC servers will follow one day, it would be nice to see Square Enix create a single player version to keep the game alive in some form for the future. Perhaps the mobile edition they’ve mentioned is their intent to do so in a different format.

The last game I played on PS2 was Final Fantasy XII. I enjoyed it to some extent, but wasn’t a fan of the MMO grind in a single player game, perhaps partially because of my distaste for grinding after Final Fantasy XI. Still, I had every intention of continuing to play the game through to completion, but when the Playstation 3 came out, I sold my PS2 when I got a first gen PS3. The problem was the PS3 wanted to pump Final Fantasy XII through in 1080p and the game looked more pixelated and messy than a Playstation 1 game. As such, I’m eagerly looking forward to another chance with this title with the forthcoming HD remake.

Final Fantasy: Star Wars on Ivalice

That’s all for my trip down memory lane with the Playstation 2 and GameCube. I’d estimate there are only three posts left in this series and the next one will bring us right back to the world of MMOs with the one that changed the landscape forever: World of Warcraft.

2017
03/25
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National Videogame Museum Opens Its Doors

The National Videogame Museum (NVM) opened in Frisco, TX on April 2, 2016. It was a bright, sunny Saturday morning. 10:00 AM, to be precise, was the opening of the doors. I was there and I was excited. Obviously, it’s taken a while for me to get to writing my thoughts on the grand opening of the nation’s, the world’s, first museum dedicated to the history of video games (I use “video game” though the museum officially uses “videogame”).

I had arrived at the Frisco Discovery Center, where the NVM is located, at 10:05 with a bit of a hurried step. I wanted to get in with plenty of time to look around as I was meeting someone in 3 hours to hand over some video games I had accumulated that weren’t going into my collection. I knew the doors opened at 10, so I went right in. And found the line. I followed the line outside again and saw just how many had arrived to see the history of their hobby.

There were a lot. The Museum holds about 240 people and the line was well out of the building and along the sidewalk, starting to curl around the build like a human formation of Nibbles.

0001 Outside

One or two people showed up

I stood in line with a mother whose 7 year old son was running around playing with other kids while they waited. Preston was here to see more about video game history, particularly Pac-Man and Galaga. I learned something from Preston’s mother in the hour we waited outside.

Pixels was a good movie. That’s right, Pixels.

Pixels

Yes, THAT Pixels.

Preston saw Pixels more than once in theaters and probably a dozen times at home since it released on blu-ray and DVD. Pixels introduced this young boy to Pac-Man, Donkey Kong, Q*bert, and made him want to learn more. He went to Google and began reading about these games and these characters and when they came out. He grew interested not only in the games themselves, but their history.

If a 7 year old boy loves a movie about video game characters, and that movie drives him to pursue the history of the industry, then I have to say the movie did something right. Adults and critics may not like it, but if it stirred the interest and curiosity of children, then it’s a good movie by my measure.

And so, there we were, at the first museum in the nation that would let him explore more of that history. TekForce was present and volunteered to provide music and MC the waiting room that we reached at 11 o’clock. I was able to speak with him a moment and learned that the museum was expecting 1,500 visitors for the grand opening day. In the first hour, they were adjusting expectations to 4,000. They underestimated how many people would come out for the grand opening.

As we waited for our ticket groups to be called there were pictures available to color, music played, and a couch set up with a Wii U and Super Mario Bros. available to play. Kids were having a great time. There was also trivia to win prizes – the question I was present for was regarding Pac-Man’s original name (The answer is Puck Man).

At 11:35, our ticket group was called up and we finally went into the NVM lobby to pay for our tickets to the museum proper. Tickets are $12 for adults, but include $1 worth of tokens for the arcade at the end of the museum. By noon, 2 hours after arrival, I finally set foot inside.

The Museum is divided into 16 stages, all of which cover a different portion of video game history.

IMG_7651.JPG

But first, you’re greeted by Mario

 

Stage 1, “Begin” covers the early days of video game history. In fact, with Ralph Baer’s “Brown Box Prototype” on display, it might be safe to say this touches on video game pre-history and then advances through history from there.

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An important aspect of the NVM is that it’s not just exhibits to look at and read. There are a lot of interactive features at the museum, mostly in the form of playable games in the exhibits. Almost every Stage has something you can play.

IMG_7539

Just like the one you grew up with, right?

Stage 2, “Timeline” is the most time consuming interactive option. With screens set up above oversized Super Nintendo controllers, this allows visitors to browse every single video game console ever released to get some information about them. Release year, MSRP, some highlighted games, as well as notorious games, and some of the most valuable on the system can be reviewed. There are 53 different consoles to read about, all of which are on display on the wall.

Stage 3, “Third Party” showcases a number of the third party titles that helped consoles excel with the public. Pitfall, which is playable in the exhibit, Stampede, Megamania, River Raid are on display in their original boxes in a display case while some notable Nintendo entries from Activision share the bottom shelf of the display with Ghostbusters and Ghostbusters II, Rampage, and more.

Stage 4, “Control” is, quite simply, a full wall with a history of controllers through the years. Multiple controllers from each system are displayed, as well as a disassembled Atari 5200 controller.

Stage 5, “Portable” explores portable games. Game n’ Watch is on display, along with others that pre-dated the Game Boy most think of when “portable gaming” is mentioned.

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Again, there are playable games set up here as well. However, one of the most notable items features in this display is the Barbie Edition Game Boy, which is an unreleased prototype Game Boy Pocket. Supposedly the deal never went through and only two of the systems, along with a gaudy carry case, were made.

Stage 6, “Crash” is ironically my favorite exhibit, despite its dark days in gaming history. It deals with the video game crash of 1983. The first thing I liked was the introduction plaque does detail that the cause of the crash is much more complicated than the simple examples often cited, but not without being self aware of these rumors. Poor E.T. still appears in the stage’s image, even though it’s acknowledged the game was not the cause.

What I really liked about this exhibit, though, was the “going out of business” store front. With various 80s items such as Pac Man trading cards and bubble gum under the glass, a Top 5 sign for the week’s hottest games (which includes E.T., I might add), and a sign indicating the store is going out of business, it’s a very nicely done presentation.

IMG_7577

I promise I was also NOT the cause of the crash.

Stage 7, “Rise” presents the return of video games, stronger than ever, on both computer and with the Nintendo Entertainment System. A lot, and I do mean a lot, of set ups are here to play and interact with.

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At this point, as you venture through the museum, you’ll find the bathrooms. Not exactly something you’d think worth mentioning, but this is the NATIONAL VIDEOGAME MUSEUM, so of course the bathroom entries are worth mentioning with their clever indication of “Men’s” and “Women’s” signs.

 

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Women’s

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Men’s

Stage 8, “Create” presents games moving from just being games and actually involving the user in the creative process. Games like Mario Paint are on display, but I wasn’t able to spend much time hands on (there were a lot of people here, remember?).

Stage 9, “Invent” presents a theoretical game studio’s office. Games adorn the shelves, a PC and work station are present, various articles and news clippings are framed on the walls.

Stage 10, “Transmit” discusses the rise of online gaming with various Blizzard entries, Quake, and two terminals that visitors can use to communicate and send a webcam image to each other on either side of the exhibit with.

Stage 11, “Listen” details music coming into games more with entries such as Parappa the Rapper and, of course, Guitar Hero and Dance Dance Revolution.

Stage 12, “Unplugged” is likely to surprise many visitors with the various board games that were released based on video game properties. Frogger, Q*bert, Pac-Man, Legend of Zelda, and more are all on display.

Across from “Unplugged” is an exhibit showcasing various items. Systems, the Pokemon series, rare and valuable games, this section is an eclectic mix of things that didn’t belong to a single exhibit, but are definitely fun to look at.

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Before venturing to the next stage, there’s also an exhibit with various pieces of merchandise, including the wearable Mega Man helmet.

Stage 13, “Family” accurately portrays a family living room from the 1980s, with a console hooked up for play on the television, a fake plant, wood panel walls, and a Dogs Playing Poker painting on the wall! There are even family photos on display.

Stage 14, “Sanctuary” depicts a teen’s bedroom. Bear in mind, the NVM is in Frisco, Tx, so if you aren’t a Cowboys and Rangers fan, forgive the decor!

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A Pac-Man throw pillow, 80s movie posters, a record playing 80s music, and a Mario phone. It’s worth noting that the visitor I caught in this picture….still had trouble with the NES Zapper hitting the ducks in Duck Hunt.

Stage 15, “Respect” isn’t an exhibit so much as an art display. A cube art mural of Ralph Baer hangs near the conclusion of the museum tour.

Stage 16, “Bonus” is a collection of framed posters, displays, arcade machines, and a life size statue of Gabriel Belmont. Along the wall next to Stage 16 are a line of consoles, all of which had someone playing them. I did get to finally play a bit of Bonk’s Adventure on Turbo Grafx-16, though. Above the consoles is a mural with a number of recognizable video game characters.

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Stage 16 leads to an 80s style arcade to conclude the tour of the National Videogame Museum. The lights are dark and lit more by the neon marquees and the screens of video games than overhead light and it was packed with a person on just about every cabinet. A machine is in the arcade to give tokens for dollar bills in case your 4 tokens from entry aren’t enough to get your gaming fix.

Finally, you exit the arcade to find yourself in the gift shop. I didn’t look at everything, but overall they had some cool items in there. Some books particularly caught my eye and they were all priced reasonably compared to Amazon.

I’ve gone on for over 1700 words about this museum and don’t think I’ve scratched describing it. I was hopeful for this endeavor after visiting the “History of Videogames” exhibit at the Experience Music Project museum in Seattle, WA, but this is far beyond what was presented there.

The one thing I’d like to see NVM add if they are ever able to expand in size is to build a display library for every system. The curators, I believe, have only brought out a small part of their overall collection. I would love to see a glass display shelving every Atari or NES title in their boxes. In time, seeing every video game on every system lined up on shelves, their spines facing out would be truly a sight to see.

If conclusion, if you’re in the DFW area in Texas and have time to get to Frisco, the National Videogame Museum is well worth your time. I only had a couple of hours available and don’t feel like it was remotely enough time. I’m looking forward to going back with friends when they come into town, but I might have to sneak an extra trip before they make it.

My only hope is that they get repeat business and are able to stay open for a long time to come. Video games have become a huge part of our culture, both in America and across the globe, and it’s great to see a museum preserving and sharing their history.

 

2016
05/04
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Introduction to Ninja Fox Games & More

I thought about jumping right into this blog with a first article, but decided introductions were in order first, for both the blog and the author.

I was born in January 1981 and when I was little, a good friend of mine had an Atari 2600.  The first games I remember playing are Pac Man, Chopper Command, and Joust.  From that point on, I’ve been a gamer my entire life.  In elementary school, I worked with my parents’ help to sell raffle tickets for a fund raiser and won the first place prize for selling the most tickets. I won $100 and used that money to buy a Nintendo Entertainment System.  My dad and I would play Super Mario Bros. together to see who could beat it first.  My dad rescued Princess Toadstool before I did, but I beat the game with the fire flower’s power first.

That first taste of video game victory was so sweet.

A few years later during a trip to visit a relative in Houston, TX, I bought the Super Nintendo Entertainment system which still has some of my favorite games of all time.

Oh Squaresoft, I miss you…

I later purchased a Sega Genesis and Sega Game Gear, a Game Boy Pocket, and a GameBoy Color.  I never bought a Sega Saturn, but I rented it from the local Blockbuster and remember playing Panzer Dragoon.  I was primarily a Nintendo guy with my Sega experience mostly contained to Sonic the Hedgehog and a few other titles, but like so many other RPG fans, I jumped ship when Final Fantasy VII came out on the Playstation.

Because this was mind blowing cutting edge polygons right here.  And because we fell in love (lust?) with Tifa Lockheart.
Coincidentally, this was my standard team!

I didn’t completely abandon Nintendo considering I came back to the N64 two years later.  I continued with the GameCube as well as the PS2 and later the PS3 and I’ve recently gotten a Nintendo Wii and got a release Playstation 4.

By 2013, I had sold a lot of my games, but had kept all my consoles and I discovered there are a lot of people out there who, like me, still love the old games as much as new ones and there are groups out there focused on collecting retro games.  I decided that I wanted to gather up some of the old games and start to dig more into the history of video games over the years and decided I’d go back and get every system I’ve ever played in addition to the ones I’ve owned through the years and plan to build a “Top 100” library for each console.

My library now includes:
Atari 2600
Nintendo Entertainment System
Game Boy
Sega Genesis with Sega CD & Sega 32X
Game Gear
Super Nintendo Entertainment System
Sega Saturn
Sega Dreamcast
N64
GameCube
Playstation
Playstation 2
Playstation 3
Playstation Vita
Nintendo Wii
Playstation 4

Fair warning now, I’ve never been an X-Box fan and have never played X-Box, X-Box 360, nor do I have any interest in the X-Box One.

I’ve also got a fairly well rooted history with MMORPGs as well!  I played EverQuest for about 4 years, Final Fantasy XI for 1 year, World of Warcraft for 9 continuous, uninterrupted years, dabbled in Lord of the Rings Online, Vanguard: Saga of Heroes, and Final Fantasy XIV before finally moving currently into Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn.

So there you have my background in Video Games, but what’s up with the title of this blog saying “& More” huh?  Well, I’m not just a gaming geek, I’m a well rounded geek/nerd!

At age 10, I picked up X-Men #1
https://i0.wp.com/static1.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20091219024361/marveldatabase/images/c/c3/X-Men_Vol_2_1_Variant_C.jpg
So now I’ve been collecting comic books for 23 years.  I’ve focused on X-Men, but I’ve collected quite a few Uncanny X-Men, a full run of Wolverine, and full run of Amazing Spider-Man from its first relaunch/renumbering (later dropped for the standard numbering) along with a decent mix of other titles from Marvel, an occasional run in Batman, and some other publishers as well.  Currently, Superior Spider-Man (soon to again be Amazing Spider-Man) and IDW’s TMNT are my favorite monthly books and I’ve lost so much interest since Marvel Now!, my ongoing subscription to Wolverine and any X-Titles is really in question.

I also am a bit of an otaku, having started with Sci-Fi Channel airing what was then Saturday Anime, but often called Japanimation at the time with Akira, Vampire Hunter D, Project A-Ko, and one of my favorites to this day, Record of Lodoss War.

1673159-lodoss
Kind of surprising how well D&D works as an anime.

Over the years, I’ve continued to watch anime and have attended A-Kon in Dallas, TX for the last nine years with 2014 being my 10 year anniversary in attendance.  If I get any readers to this blog who love anime, don’t hesitate to e-mail suggestions to watch!  This anime interest has extended into a few series of manga, though I don’t tend to pick those up anymore simply due to the sheer volume of a series and the cost in keeping up with it.

My interest in anime has also led me to a financially semi-unhealthy interest in statues and figures, which weren’t so bad contained to anime, but got a bit insane expanding to the statue maquettes from Sideshow Collectibles of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and the Fellowship of the Ring (where’s Merry and Pippin, Sideshow?!)

I also enjoy a lot of different movies, TV series, animated series, and web series such as the Jace Hall Show and Felicia Day’s The Guild!

So that explains the “Games & More” so we’re all done!

Wait, what’s up with the whole “Ninja Fox” thing?  Well, to put it simply, I like foxes and I like ninja.  A friend of mine and I were developing a web comic that I’m now planning to move to a novel format and one of the main characters is based off Japanese kitsune myths and is admittedly one of my favorite characters in the series.  The character’s name is “Swift” (yes, that just might be a slight homage to this guy) and he’s a ninja and has fox ears and a tail.  On various forums and online games I’ll use NinjaFox, or SwiftNinjaFox as a handle.

So there you have it. A potentially unnecessarily long introduction to this blog.  I look forward to writing and sharing more thoughts, opinions, and perhaps a small helping of nonsense.

-Jeff “SwiftNinjaFox”

2014
02/09
POSTED BY
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