NES pickup February 27th, 2015

If you'll remember from one my last entries (from October of last year) we made a bit of a thrift circuit in the nearby neighboring cities. Yesterday my wife and I decided to leave the kids with my mother-in-law and take another such road trip.  We essentially travelled in a large circle visiting thrift stores in Armstrong, Salmon Arm and Kamloops.  12 hours, 400 kms and a few coffees later we returned with our treasures.  The route took us from Kelowna to Armstrong and Salmon Arm (via Vernon) then on to Kamloops and home to Kelowna (via Merritt).

Although I saw a few artifacts that would have made other retro game system collectors interested such as the Atari Touchpad (aka the Star Raiders controller) and a Colecovision Adam complete with some games on tape, I didn't even get a sniff of anything NES related until Kamloops.

Once we had visited a few of the second hand stores in 'Loops' we went to the local game store: All-A-Board games -- but found it closed. Fortunately they had only relocated and not closed up shop for good. We found their new storefront one street over.  From what I can remember their original location was a lot larger than this one and seemed to have more selection but they had said that a lot of their stuff was still in storage.  Despite that they still had some highly collectible cartridges on display.  Definitely a wish list of sorts with games such as Secret Scout and several of the multi-carts in the display case. Most of your run-of-the-mill cheaper games did not make the move with them and I presume are boxed up in a locker somewhere (waiting for the next season of Storage Wars: British Columbia edition).

Lining the, sparser than I remember, shelves were games priced between $20-80 which ran the gamut from totally worth it to IMO a little overpriced.  They had 2 copies each of a few of the unreleased titles:  King of Kings and Exodus (the former of which I already have), but even though I like the carts that look different than your average joe gray ones I didn't think it was worth the asking price. I almost grabbed Adventures of Lolo 2, but in the end I chose one I had been looking for for awhile: Little Ninja Brothers.  This is a game that satisfied my current game requirements of specialty store purchases: 1) it needs to be a fairly uncommon title and 2) it has to be halfway decent.  There are altogether too many games in the catalog that are rare by virtue of their being monumentally bad. Thankfully this one does not fall into that category and it is a cool looking RPG with above average music and graphics.  I look forward to playing through this game and perhaps posting a review some time down the road.

NES Carts:  459
Licensed games:  425/687
Unlicensed games:  34/90

NES pickups October 4th, 2014

Just a quick update to the collection. After work I picked up 4 more games from Shayne that he had kept aside for me: Alien Syndrome, Genghis Khan, Flying Dragon, and Xexyz.  I can't express how great it has been to meet all these other collectors and NES fans out there who so far have all been very helpful and friendly.  I found another contact that wants to trade games this week and perhaps even buy a few of my doubles.  It is always nice to be able to recoup a little bit of the money that I have put into this hobby, but like most things it usually goes right back into what your passionate about.  So given the contacts I've been making lately I see 500 games on the horizon and maybe not in the too distant future.    Highlights from this lot would be the Tengen game, Alien Syndrome (which I have on my M.A.M.E. machine and play from time to time and Xexyz which is really an underappreciated game in the NES library.

Checking on the score... these additions have the totals at:

Nes carts:  458
Licensed games:  424/687
Unlicensed games:  34/90

NES pickups October 2nd, 2014

Today Missy and I left the kids with Nan and went for a thrifting trip a few towns over.  Like a fool, I forgot my GPS at home so we were left to tracking using google maps and whatever free wifi hotspots I could find along the way.  Even with our technology challenged navigation we managed to find several of the second hand stores I'd made a list of the night before.  The first stop was the best for me as there was a Fantasy/board game specialty store two doors down from the thrift store stop.  While Missy went into her shop I ducked into All a-board Games and found a couple display cases brimming with retro goodness.  There were Retron consoles, a turbo-grafx 16, some n64 titles, snes and then finally I saw the NES section.  Wow.. there were so many great games. I had visions of supermarket sweep and imagined the damage I could do with an empty buggy and 60 seconds on the clock.  This was definitely an example of one of those 'if money was no object' situations.  After perusing the 40 or so cartridges for about 10 mins (while a group of guys behind me sat at a table playing a rousing game of dungeons & dragons or whatever today's equivalent board/dice/card game is) I came up with 3 games that were within my price range.

From this store I got:  Orb-3d,, Ninja Kid, & Vindicators.  Something that I found interesting was the sticker that is still on the back of the Orb-3d game.  It is (what I assume to be) the retail sticker from the original store it could have been purchased and/or rented from.  Not sure what other stops it made along the way, but at least at one point in this game's history you could walk into Rob's Video in Newport, KY slam down $95 and this classic was yours.   I love these stickers.  I like that they warn the renter to *please rewind before returning.  Apparently the Format of this game is Beta?  Hmm... pre-release?  or Betamax?   At any rate I got a chuckle out of that sticker and think I might just leave it on there for nostalgia sake.  If anyone has any idea when this business might have operated feel free to comment on twitter using the hashtag #8bitbobby   the Facebook page I found was:

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Robs-Video/117909535002280?sk=info

Anyway back to the blog.  There were a few other stops on our trip that had games, but the one place only had the very common ones and the other that had 1 or 2 I didn't have were asking too much for them so I passed.  I did find a very curious 'nintendo-related' artifact at Value Village though.  It is a Mario's Cement Factory Mini-classic keychain game. (Unopened from 1998).  Not the original LCD handheld unfortunately but a smaller, playable, re-release I presume.   A quick check on ebay showed an average sell price in around the $20-25 mark.  Not sure whether to trade, sell or just display it.  It is a neat little item.

All and all it was a really good day.  We managed to spend all of the money that we had taken with us on the trip and, without a solid backup plan, --night before payday and no plastic with us-- I was tasked with calculating the exact amount of money to hold back for gas to get us home.  At that moment I felt like Dustin Hoffman in Rain Man, pacing back and forth and repeating.... about $10, yah... $10.  We had a wonderful dinner out @ BP and spent all that we had in our pockets on vintage goodies, save for the slim fuel budget I guessed at.  Needless to say  I shaved it closer than a Quattro razor.  When we got back into town.. literally 2 mins from home, the gas light came on.  Whew.  The perfect end to a fun-filled day!  Stand-outs for today:  The cement factory mini-game, Vindicators (because it's a darker shade of gray) and I guess the sticker on the back of the Orb-3d game that makes for an interesting conversation.  Let's check on the score, shall we?

Nes carts:  454
421/687 Licensed*  
33/90 Unlicensed*

*  = totals are based on my own exclusions from Geekbox's List.

My NES Collection by the numbers part I

As a child of the 80s, the desire to collect was instinctual; almost intrinsic.  There were comic books, Star Wars figures, trading cards of all description but most notably hockey cards. The beautiful thing about collecting in those days is that the collections themselves were defined.  What I mean is that each series had a beginning and an end. It made completing a collection attainable.  They further made it easier by including a card with a checklist either as separate stand alone card or on the back side of a card(s) in the collection.

With game collecting there is no checklist on the back of a cartridge. We rely on the collectors we follow and those in the know to compile what they believe to be the most complete and accurate list of known game titles, variations etc.  The danger in that is it becomes difficult to know who's list should be followed, which list is most complete.  I have an app on my idevice that has been invaluable out in the field when I'm buying games both as a quick reference for approximate value of a game and as a checklist for which games I have and do not have, but it does not include some games.

After countless hours scouring forums, blogs, and youtube channels, (I found Pat & Ian's podcast on the subject particularly helpful), I have come to the conclusion that a collection guide (for use by hobbyists such as myself) should include only those games that could realistically be obtained.  The most complete guide I would choose to mold my checklist from is from Geekbox's NES Collection guide.  In the guide they list 687 licensed NES games.  After looking at the list, I would make certain deletions at least where my personal list is concerned.  First off I would remove games from the list such as Flintstones: Suprise at Dinosaur peak and Stadium Events.  The first because it was a Blockbuster exclusive rental game not for sale in the commercial market and the second one because it was recalled from store shelves and later reintroduced to the mainstream market as World Class Trackmeet.  I would strike from the list both of the Nintendo World Championships cartridges because there is only a little over 100 of them in existence (combined).  I would remove games that there was no change to the rom itself to improve gameplay or change anything about the game. These would include the gray variation carts of Legend of Zelda, The Adventure of Link, and the label variations of the games: Metroid, Blades of Steel, Wayne Gretzky Hockey and Gunsmoke.

With the unlicensed games I would remove 7 titles from Geekbox's list including:  Cheetahman II  as it was never official released, 6-in-1 by Myriad as it is identical to the Caltron release except for the label as well as any of the Aladdin Deck enhancer titles that they also had a separate version of that didn't require the enhancer (i.e. Fantastic Adventures of Dizzy, Micro Machines, Quattro Adventure, Quattro Sports and Linus Spacehead).  These deletions give us a total of 90 unlicensed titles that are unique (though some may still be near impossible to find).  

Now that being said, if any of these games were to fall into my lap I would most certainly keep them with my other games and treasure them every bit as much as those I would include in my collection totals (some even moreso).  What this little spin puts on a collection is a seemingly more realistic approach to collecting these games which helps to give novice collectors such as myself a sense that a complete collection could be possible.

So in terms of combined game titles I currently site at 451 (this does include both Adventure of Link carts).  I have 418/677*  Licensed games or 62% of the collection.  25/30 Blackbox games (for those unfamiliar these were the original launch titles for play on the NES system. They all featured pixelated (sprite art) and, as you'd expect, came in black boxes.  Some also include three titles that were released about the same time entitled the Graybox releases:  Metroid, Kid Icarus, & Rad Racer.
I currently have 32/90* unlicensed games.  I do get some gratification from the fact that one one of the other appendices on Geekbox's site is a list of 100 NES essentials (game titles that are must-haves either because of collectibility or playability) and of these I have 88%.

In future installments of this series I will delve deeper into the titles in my collection and discuss where I am at with some of the mini-collections in the nes library.

NES Pickups: September 27th, 2014

Today's pickups are quite special because they were a surprise!  I didn't realize that there was a trunk sale going on in our town and I was at work when my wife called me and said she was standing in front of a table of games.  She rattled off a bunch of titles and I relived my childhood briefly with the 'need it, need it, got it, need it got it" routine from the hockey card days.  At any rate there were two titles that I didn't have yet and one that (for the price) I couldn't pass up.  Hoping it will make a good trade sometime down the road.  

She picked up: Life Force & Wheel of Fortune (family edition) and for good measure the extra I got which was a double was the always entertaining Bubble Bobble.  The two new games bring my total to:  451

Another note of interest is that I have been trying to compile a list of my games which includes dates when they were acquired and the source.  This may be of little interest to anyone but me, but it will allow me to create some back blogs so to speak from the earlier times of my collection.  To do this I put on my detective cap and sifted through backups of old emails, bank statements and game lists. It has been a huge undertaking and even when I'm done there will be holes in the timeline because (prior to this blog) I did't keep very good records as to the who, what, when and wheres of my collection.  The standout from this set would have to be Life Force!  It is an extremely fun shooter that I played alot in my teenage years.  It is listed at #38 on IGN's top 100 nes games (and for good reason).  Happy hunting and thanks for reading!

Trade/Lot pickup September 21st, 2014

For a day that started with me skipping the flea market in order to host a garage sale I never would have imagined gaining 13 new carts!  While putting my feet up in between "customers" I got a notification about a closed group for Video game collectors in my area.  One of my friends sent me an invite to this group and so I clicked on it and began to peruse the site during my down time. I was pleasantly surprised to find that one of my new go-to-guys for games had recently been to Vancouver and hit up the garage sales down there.  In all he came back with dozens of new games; among them several that I did not have yet.  After trading messages back and forth all afternoon he finally came by and showed me his new cache of games.  We put together a deal that included some trades and some cash and in the end I walked away with 13 new games (pictures below).

It was very difficult to contain my enthusiasm when I saw the list of games he had picked up and this latest batch has helped me to complete my collection of Simpsons games, Star Wars games, and Quattro series games for the NES.

Today was what I would refer to as a pulp culture bonanza!  I picked up The Last Action Hero, Simpsons: Bartman meets Radioactive Man and Empire Strikes Back, There were more than a couple of standouts in this set but I would say the three above, as well as Kiwi Kraze, Fantasy Zone, and Tiny Toons Cartoon Workshop.  Many of the games from today I had not seen in the wild so far so that was extremely exciting.  All labels were more or less intact and the only real problem cart was the Last Action Hero.  It has some stubborn (I cringe to use the word permanent) marker below the label that I am hoping can be taken care of with a magic eraser and some elbow grease. Despite this flaw I was excited to put this steampile of  "Ahnold" goodness into my collection.

Next game pickup blog should see me hit another mini-milestone in my collection.

I currently sit at 449 carts and 55% of the overall collection. Thanks for reading and if you do happen to see this please feel free to comment me on twitter via the hashtag:   #8bitbobby

Nes pickups September 18th, 2014

For a change of pace this week my wife and I drove one town over to visit the thrift stores, pawn shops etc. in search of games for me and the usual knick knacks that strike her fancy.  She was on a mission as well to find fabric for our kids' halloween costumes and the latest round of handmade dolls that she creates.  [inserting shameless plug]  If you'd like to check out some of her work she can be found at the link below:

Boopsiedaisy on Etsy

After visiting several second hand stores in the area and coming up empty handed I finally picked up a copy of Lego Batman for the PC (lego games have become one of my guilty pleasures of late).  Then at the local comic book and collectibles store, Ebenezer's, I found a few games that tickled my fancy (and separated me from some dollars).

From the name sake of Mr. Scrooge himself I found an employee, who couldn't have been further from that persona, to help me out by opening up the NES display case so I could take a closer look.  I found about a half dozen games that I still need to put into my collection but for today I picked up.... Rollergames (which I believe is an arcade port) and Joshua & the Battle of Jericho (an unlicensed game by Wisdom Tree and manufactured by Color Dreams).

The most humourous feature of this game is the esoteric instructions they give you on the front label;  ** TO START GAME: Please wait up to 9 flashes on TV screen.  ** POWER ON:  Please wait 7 seconds between Power OFF and ON.

Well that's clear as mud (as is the shield on the right side of the picture that tells you that this is designed for use with the nintendo entertainment system... if you didn't know you would need a magnifying glass to read it).  Couple that with the normal blinking of the power button at the best of times and you have the recipe for awesome!

Even though they aren't legit games by Nintendo's standards I have a soft spot for these few that fall outside of the grayish color pallete popularized by the NES.  The Colordreams blue and black carts, the Camerica Gold carts, and the Tengen black carts are all personal favorites.  So it was really a no brainer when I was able to add Joshua to my lineup for less than what my app valued the game at. These two additions put my NES cartridge count up to: 436.  Until next time!  Happy collecting.