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Hey everyone for my birthday today Bill (Engel762) and I decided to do some shopping as I had Gamers hold a complete (not boxed) Sega Master System 1 for him. So after a decent night at work I am exhausted now as I write this (sleep the rest of my bday away I bet lol haha). Today was a great birthday and a great day to go hunting for Bill and I. First off we head to our usual place HPB and Bill picked up some great stuff a lot more than me but it was all cheap he got some Warcraft Manga and some other pretty sweet stuff! I picked up two Manga Disgaea and Disgaea 2 Vol. 1, Bill bought me some Garfield Fat Cat 3 Pack Books (love Garfield lol for Gas) and for trade for a SMS Light Gun he bought me CIB/Mint Beauty & The Beast Roar of the Beast. Then we were off to Gamers and as I mentioned before our main reason to going there today was to pick up his very own SMS 1 system which he has been trying to find complete for a while~well he got one in pretty good shape too. While we were there the ASM whom which is awesome let us dig through a box of games that they had sitting in back. Well there were a ton of NES games, a broken Coleco cord, a dirty ColecoVision and a bunch of other stuff then I saw Three Dirty Dwarves!!! I was stoked as I have been wanting to get this game for a while then we dug through the box some more found a Made In Hong Kong - Basic Version of Mario Bros. on Atari 7800, Pitfall 2 Atari 2600 - I bought that for Bill, Omega Race for Coleco (Previous blog a few weeks ago I picked up Omega Race for Atari 2600). I also picked up Blades of Vengeance - CIB, Captain America and the Avengers -CIB. Also picked up in part of a trade (which I was actually planning on buying myself on Friday - Thanks again Bill!) Romance III - CIB very minty. Also the ASM gave me a bag of manuals mostly SNES free. Then we were off to another Gamers where I got my birthday present from Bill Nosferatu still in the original shrink wrap but opened!!! The Gamers guy wanted to rip it off I am like no don't! But he did start to tear it so I taped it back up NO I DIDN"T CATCH ANY OF THE BOX! But this game is so mint it is practically brand new! This is probably my best bday present in a long long time! Thank a lot Bill!! Then we were off to Game Vault were Bill picked up his first Boxed N64 game at a good price but I will let him tell you his side of the day. But here is the run down! and then Pictures. Please Comment!!!
*HPB -
-Disgaea 1 Manga - $1.00
-Disgaea 2 - V1 - Manga - $1.00
*Beauty & The Beast: Roar of the Beast - Genesis - (Trade) $4.00
*Gamers #1 -
-Three Dirty Dwarves (Partial Trade) - CIB - Sega Saturn - $4.95
-Mario Bros - Atari 7800 - Made in Hong Kong - $1.95
-Omega Race - ColecoVision - $1.95
-Blades of Vengeance - Genesis - CIB - $4.95
-Captain America and the Avengers - Genesis - CIB - $4.95
-Romance of the Three Kingdoms III - Genesis - CIB - (Trade) - $9.95
-N64 Game Storage Case - $0.95 (needs a lot of work)
*Gamers 2 -
-Nosferatu - CIB - SNES - MINT - $34.95 - Birthday Present
Pictures
[img width=700 height=526]http://i861.photobucket.com/albums/ab172/niceguy1283/December2012GameHunt1-MyBirthday.jpg[/img]
[img width=700 height=526]http://i861.photobucket.com/albums/ab172/niceguy1283/NosferatuFront.jpg[/img]
[img width=700 height=526]http://i861.photobucket.com/albums/ab172/niceguy1283/Nosferatu-Back.jpg[/img]
Hey now, everybody!
A big thanks to everyone who participated in this year's give-away!
As of this posting, all but three of the claims have been shipped.
Happy winter solstice celebration, everybody!
-'Late
I enjoy messing around with numbers and stats, and I recently found a great new project that would combine doing that with game collecting. I had a lot of fun doing it, so I decided to share the results.
Not long ago, I passed the 500-cart mark in my NES collection. As of this writing, I am currently up to 526. This is about the point where it's said that NES collecting gets a lot more difficult. Hard-to-find, expensive titles become all that's left, and while that's rather exciting in its own right, it's an interesting and sometimes frustrating turning point. In my case, I couldn't help but wonder - is that really the case? Are there really just expensive games from here on out? Did I miss some common titles without realizing it? I came up with a good way to find out.
I somewhat arbitrarily decided to go with the list and rarity guide on NintendoAge for this, though any thorough list would certainly work just fine. That list puts the 'complete' NES set at 768 games and rates each game's rarity on a scale from 1 to 10. The 'complete set' total doesn't seem to be universally agreed upon, but this list seems to be as good as any to me. I then split NintendoAge's list up by rarity and counted the number of games at each level. I then checked my collection against each of those to determine where the games I'm missing fall within the different rarities. The results weren't too far from what I expected but still quite interesting:
[img width=606 height=240]http://i.imgur.com/7C6yl.png[/img]
I knew I didn't have much (any, really) of the really high-end rarities but a decent number of semi-rare titles. As expected, the percentage keeps going up as the rarity goes down, including no missing titles in the 2 or 1 range. Not a lot of surprises, really.
It wasn't a total waste, though. The most interesting information I found was the higher-than-expected totals of 3's and 4's I didn't have. There are 43 games between the two, including quite a few games I've seen and passed on dozens of times. I've somehow never picked up Rocket Ranger, All-Pro Basketball, Yo Noid or Digger T Rock after all these years. In those instances, I think that I simply assumed I'd bought them a long time ago and never gave it a second thought.
Thanks to all this number-crunching, I've learned that I can likely reach 550 without as much trouble as I'd feared. 600 and beyond will be quite the challenge, but I'm feeling up for it. If your NES collection is in this range, I recommend taking stock by rarity to see what easy finds you may have missed.
[img width=516 height=450]http://www.rfgeneration.com/images/games/U-071/bf/U-071-S-01160-A.jpg[/img]
What just happened? That's pretty much how most rounds of Mars Matrix left me feeling.
The Racketboy forums have a Shmup Of The Month Club which I've participated in over the last year. It's generally a great way to expose yourself to new shmups which you may have been putting off for one reason or another. Perhaps more importantly, it's justification -- that is it gives you an excuse to buy some expensive shmup that you might have avoided otherwise. While I've been into collecting Sega stuff for a good part of the year now, certainly my Dreamcast collection has been my highest priority focus. So I was pleased as punch to have a specific reason why I should pick up a Dreamcast exclusive (outside the arcade) shmup.
[img width=640 height=480]http://image.gamespotcdn.net/gamespot/images/screenshots/dc/marsmatrix/marsmatrix_0319_screen018.jpg[/img] [img width=336 height=252]http://image.gamespotcdn.net/gamespot/images/screenshots/dc/marsmatrix/marsmatrix_012601_screen005.jpg[/img]
Mars Matrix is an odd one. Published my Capcom -- who showed the shmup community tons of support on the Dreamcast -- it is presented in a horizontal screen mode, much like the Giga Wing games. This means that it looks pretty fantastic on a widescreen monitor. I actually have a monitor that can rotate, but it's nice to have shmups that are meant to be played on a default monitor.
However the resolution isn't the oddest thing about Mars Matrix -- it's the default controls. You see the game is meant to be played with a single button. Or rather two. But only one button actually shoots and the second will switch shots. It's very confusing to me and I can honestly say that I'd have no chance playing this game if I encountered it in the arcade. Luckily the Dreamcast port offers full customization of controls, so I could set each attack to a separate button.
[img width=635 height=417]http://image.gamespotcdn.net/gamespot/images/screenshots/dc/marsmatrix/marsmatrix_0329_screen005.jpg[/img] [img width=640 height=480]http://image.gamespotcdn.net/gamespot/images/screenshots/dc/marsmatrix/marsmatrix_0319_screen010.jpg[/img]
But none of this really matters because I had immense trouble wrapping my head around the game mechanics. So much of Mars Matrix revolves around using a shield to absorb and deflect bullets. The problem is the shield needs to recharge and I just was never able to understand how to properly manage this. Ultimately my high score was about 700 Million which is pitiful compared to some of the scores posted in that thread which were in the Tens of Billions! While I can say that Mars Matrix is an impressive and interesting game, it's just not one that I'm any good at. So I can find it fun in small bursts -- and probably more fun to try to play for survival. But playing for score is pretty out of the question for me unfortunately.
Another month and more additions!
[img width=700 height=933]http://i.imgur.com/7Qt9g.jpg[/img]
A couple Sega CD games... I've wanted to play Eternal Champions since it was released on the Genesis, so it was awesome to score the expanded SCD edition. Trivial Pursuit I'm pretty excited about. I love the board game. I'm a trivia fan. That one was a toss-in as part of trade with WildBil.
[img width=700 height=525]http://i.imgur.com/kDd5j.jpg[/img]
And holy crap! A friend of mine hooked me up with the SCD backup cart at an outstanding price! This is from the same dude I got Eternal Champs from.
[img width=700 height=933]http://i.imgur.com/sbjxW.jpg[/img]
Saturn games! All of these acquired via trade on this very site. Some notable stuff like Duke 3D, Fighters Megamix, Bubble Bobble and... a shmup! Galactic Attack!
[img width=700 height=933]http://i.imgur.com/dmEgg.jpg[/img]
And a new Saturn. My Model 2 late October, so a friend of mine came through and sent me a Model 1 for $10 plus shipping. Unreal. I put a new battery in it and it's in even better shape than my first system.
[img width=700 height=933]http://i.imgur.com/vlRWg.jpg[/img]
Dreamcast commons I got either via trade or a few for peanuts at my local retro shop.
[img width=700 height=525]http://i.imgur.com/5PuJz.jpg[/img]
GrayGhost81 managed to find me both DC Generator discs!
[img width=700 height=933]http://i.imgur.com/ldtsW.jpg[/img]
My same buddy who hooked me up with the Saturn also sent me Street Fighter Alpha 3 as part of a trade we're working on.
[img width=700 height=525]http://i.imgur.com/OkEhu.jpg[/img]
And finally a blue VMU for which I already had a cap for.
All in all, a pretty solid month of collecting!
Hey everyone!! I know it's only been a couple of days since my last post BUT today my brother and I went and did some more shopping on my only day off this week!!! Today I got rid of more movies to purchase more games and my brother just flat out bought a few games! Yes he is back well kind of but not over abundantly like he used to do a while ago. I am the heavy purchaser now but I am a thrifty guy so I usually go for cheap stuff or trade with Bill as he has been wanting stuff of mine that I have for trade and sale. But anyways on to today's hunt we started off by going to CD Tradepost (yes it pretty much as the same path as last time haha) and I traded in some more movies to get some cash. Well the other day I put Super Mario Bros. Deluxe and Wario Land 3 both CIB on hold and today my brother purchased them BUT he also picked up Gunstar Heroes CB (Need a manual anyone have one for $10 to $15.00???) But the box and game are pretty good condition. Then we were off to Ben's Gaming and I traded some more movies for more cash (movies CD Tradepost wouldn't take) we looked around a bit found some decent stuff but I decided I didn't want to buy anything there. Then we were off to good ole HPB (again love this place until I die). There they had a few more things added to the cheap section and a few more Sega Genesis games arrived (you missed out on this one pwcody) we looked at the game guides for a bit I picked up Pokemon Colosseum Limited Edition Guide complete mint with the poster intact, Granstream Saga, Brave Fencer Musashi, and Guinness World Records Gamer's Edition 2011. BUT in the cabinet of games there was a Dreamcast game (Illbleed i think it was) I looked behind it and what did I see Aerobiz so I went over to one of the workers and asked to get into the case I was crossing my fingers hoping it was going to be cheap and well what do you know Aerobiz was $3.99 COMPLETE IN BOX!!! I was like Yoink!!! The other game I was interested in was Chester Cheetah Oh To cool but it was complete and well it was $2.00 more that Aerobiz!!! Oh yeah and I picked up Maze Mania Sears Telegames edition of Maze Craze. Then we were off to our final place (well game place) Gamers and I picked up Shenmue, Shenmue II Manual (For Free). The Shenmue DC is complete 100% minty almost as if it wasn't played and looks brand new, I also picked up minty CIB N64 Rush 2, even has the poster, and my brother picked up Ultimate Card Games on DS. That was all she wrote we went to my favorite baseball card store and purchased my Christmas Presents. So here is the run down:
CD Tradepost -
*Super Mario Deluxe GBC - CIB - $10.00
*Wario Land 3 - GBC - CIB - $5.00
*Gunstar Heroes - Genesis - CB - $25.00
Half Price Books:
*Pokemon Colosseum Limited Edition Guide (Quiet Zag heard you like Pokemon stuff haha so don't go pokeing fun at me lol) - Minty - Complete - $7.00
*Granstream Saga - $2.00
*Brave Fencer Musashi - $2.00
*Guinness World Records - Gamer's Edition - $3.00
*Aerobiz - Genesis - CIB - MINTY - $4.00!!!!
*Maze Mania - Sears Atari 2600 - $3.00
Gamers:
*Shenmue - DC - CIB - MINTY - $20.00 (not happy with the price but happy with the game and condition)
*Rush 2 - N64 - Minty - CIB - $8.00
*Ultimate Card Games - DS - CIB - $25.00
Here is the picture hope you all enjoy!!! Please comment
[img width=700 height=526]http://i861.photobucket.com/albums/ab172/niceguy1283/GameHuntNovemberPart7.jpg[/img]
Coming in at #7 on my Top 10 list is Williams' Diner. In the mid-80's, Williams made some of the most incredible System-11, original concept pinball machines ever created. I might be biased, since these are the machines I played during my late childhood/young adult years, but I guess every list is biased to some degree. Diner is a restaurant themed pin where the object of the game is to wait on, some fairly non-PC by today's standards, customers. Customer's call out their dishes (an appetizer & an entree) and they are served by hitting the two banks of drop targets in the center of the machine, which are located in the middle and to the right. Once you have served all 5 customers, the "Dine Time" jackpot is activated and you must make the release shot and collect the value on the backbox clock, which can be up to 12 million points (increased during the game by continually ripping the left ramp)!
[img width=700 height=525]http://www.arcadecrusade.com/gallery/d/29192-1/Diner+-+Backglass-JR.png[/img]
The backbox area is one of the most innovative and fun features of this game. The artwork is great and depicts a classic streamline diner. The customers located on the playfield that you are serving, also appear in the diner windows and actually bounce around as the machine moves. They are actually plastics on springs that are located behind the backglass and help to give the backbox a sort of 3-D effect. As previously mentioned, the clock plays a big role in scoring for this game and is also a prominent and fun feature on the backbox.
Another great feature in the game is the cup and saucer shot located at the back of the playfield. If you are able to spell out D-I-N-E-R by shooting the right ramp multiple times, a timed cup shot activates for the right ramp. During this time, a ramp diverter moves and instead of your ball traveling around the ramp in it's normal fashion, the ball spins out in the cup for a big score. (**See 2:25 of video)
[img width=700 height=540]http://pinball.org/videos/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/IMG_0001.jpg[/img]
Multi-ball is another fun and high scoring feature of Diner. For multi-ball, you must also complete D-I-N-E-R via the right ramp shot to light the LOCK. What is really interesting is that completing D-I-N-E-R gives the player the option to either lock a ball, or shot the cup shot depending on preference; once you active one of the features, the other one disappears. After lighting the LOCK, the left ramp raises and ball must be shot beneath the ramp in order to capture it. After plunging your second ball, the object is to start multi-ball by making the release shot to the left of the right ramp. During multi-ball, make the Rush 1 (same as release shot) to light Rush 2 (located at the kickout hole to the right of the right ramp). Making both Rush shots results in a super scoring bonus.
The left ramp can be shot multiple times for cash register bonuses and to light the extra ball. Many tournament players will continually rip this shot, since it is fairly simple to make and provides decent points and very low-risk shot.
Not only is Diner a fun machine to play, but the artwork and stunning incorporation of the theme really pull it together as a complete package. Diner is a great machine that after much careful consideration, deserves a spot on this Top 10 List. It is an older machine, but if you can find one, PLAY. IT......or better yet, BUY. IT. You won't be disappointed.
"Order Up!"
I used to have a bunch of toy Crash Dummies! Oh man I have so many ideas of how to make this a good game, but where to start? Oh screw it, let's just jump right in and see if this game is everything I hope it could be!
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Hey everyone today I decided to sell of some more DVD's to pick up some games I had on hold at Gamers but made a couple of other stops along the way. Today I started off by going to CD Tradepost where I traded my movies. Then I went onto Good Bytes and picked up a Boxed PC which is J.R.R. Tolkein's War in Middle Earth - kind of funny since the Hobbit comes out in a couple of weeks! This thing is 100% complete all 3 floppies and even the map and product guide I mean it has everything!!! Got it dirt cheap too. Then I went to Half Price Books they didn't have much wonder why. But I looked in the case and picked up quite a few Commodore 64 Carts to add to my collection of growing C64/128 stuff. Then off to Gamers to pick up my on hold games and some other nice games I picked up. The games I had on hold were Skies of Arcadia & Stubbs the Zombie on Xbox which I have been looking for forever! Lollipop Lollipop now the damn trailer song is stuck in my head again! But I also picked up Resident Evil Long Box PS1, Action Fighter & Out Run SMS Boxed Complete, and Samurai Showdown on Genesis Complete. Here is the run down and picture to follow!
Good Bytes:
*War In Middle Earth - So Complete - $2.00
Half Price Books: -- All prices are marked at what I would of paid BUT I had a 15% discount off total purchase there!!! So you can all figure it out.
*Jupiter Lander - C64 Cart (all of the C64 Stuff are Carts to follow) - $4.00
*Omega Race - $4.00
*Speed/Bingo Math - $4.00
*Tooth Invaders - $4.00
*Visible Solar System - $4.00
Gamers: - Had a huge discount there as well
*Skies of Arcadia - $40.00 but I got it for $30.00
*Resident Evil PS1 Long Box - $18.00
*Stubbs: The Zombie - $25.00 but got it for $15.00
*Action Fighter - SMS - CIB - $4.00
*Out Run - SMS - CIB - $4.00
*Samurai Shodown - Genesis - $5.00
That is all folks!
Here is the Picture:
[img width=700 height=526]http://i861.photobucket.com/albums/ab172/niceguy1283/GameHuntNovember2012Part6.jpg[/img]
Ive been doing some thinking lately and have been wanting to make more text reviews. Why Did I Play This started as text based blog posts before I started doing videos. Im not planning on ending the videos just moving to a schedule where I will post a new video every 2 weeks and between the videos do some text based review, whether a full on Why Did I Play This, or bringing back a spinoff I tried early Why Didnt I Play This Sooner, mixing all of these with more traditional reviews.
Any thoughts or other ideas from my small community of readers?
I last left off with my restore the weekend before Thanksgiving. I had some "me" time on Sunday, so I decided to take off the legs to sand and spray paint them with a nice flat black textured finish from Rust-o-leum. They turned out as good as expected, which is often pretty rare for paint. After a few days of letting the legs dry, I received another parts order in the mail. The wife was kind enough to take over the nightly duties with the kids on Tuesday (kind in that we hosted her entire entire family for Thanksgiving from Wednesday to Sunday) and I was able to knock out a few hours working on my machine.
I had ordered a new set of levelers for the legs, since the others were a bit rusted out. Getting your game level is essential for good play, so spending the $10 or so it costs for new levelers is a no-brainer; I replace the levelers on every pin I get, unless they are already very nice. I also ordered some cabinet protectors, which not only keep the legs from digging into the wood of the cabinet, but also look fantastic. I went with yellow for this machine, but I might switch them out with green or light blue the next time I put in an order. You will notice from the picture, that I also put on a new Bally sticker on the coin door, the color on the previous one had completely faded to gray.
[img width=700 height=393]http://i1029.photobucket.com/albums/y359/necrom99/Fathom/coindoor.jpg[/img]
I purchased some chrome polish/rust remover a few days earlier at an auto parts store and shined up several of the ball throughs on the playfield, the chrome which holds the glass, coin door, lock down bar, and side rails. The majority of the night was spent installing some new white flipper bats. Since the flippers were playing pretty strong, I decided not to do an entire rebuild for this machine. Instead, I replaced the coil sleeves and plastic bushings that house the flipper rods on all three flippers. These parts tend to mushroom, bend, and muck up, and for less than $15, I was able to replace the bats and get them operating smoothly. With new flippers, new rubbers, balls, levelers, and a waxed playfield, I could already tell that the game was playing completely different than before; shots that were more difficult earlier, became a lot easier to make, the ball bounced better off of slings and posts, and raising the pitch made for a faster and less "floaty" game. **Sorry, not picture of the flippers. I'll try to include one next time**
Though it was getting late, I pushed through and decided to install the new topper. While not a part of the original machine, I thought that the 3-D topper (which came with my plastics order) was so well done, that I decided to use it. It really goes well with the theme of the machine and basically plays off the backglass. The artwork for the topper is actually original to the machine and can be found above the rollover lanes. I think it really adds to the experiece and I might rig up some way to light it up in the future.
[img width=700 height=393]http://i1029.photobucket.com/albums/y359/necrom99/Fathom/topper.jpg[/img]
Well.................I did manage to fudge during my wife's familys visit and sneak out to my machine to put on the spinner decals that arrived in the mail on Friday.
[img width=700 height=393]http://i1029.photobucket.com/albums/y359/necrom99/Fathom/spinner.jpg[/img]
After a long and arduous Thanksgiving, I decided that I would like to go ahead and tackle the drop targets that I had been dreading. I called my buddy over and we decided to tackle those tonight (Monday). It wasn't quite the major pain in the ass that I was expecting. but it still took us a few hours to dismantle some of the mechanisms and ensure that they were working properly. Completely worth the effort:
BEFORE
[img width=700 height=496]http://i1029.photobucket.com/albums/y359/necrom99/Fathom/olddrops.jpg[/img]
and.........AFTER
[img width=700 height=393]http://i1029.photobucket.com/albums/y359/necrom99/Fathom/drop1.jpg[/img]
[img width=700 height=393]http://i1029.photobucket.com/albums/y359/necrom99/Fathom/drop2.jpg[/img]
It seems that the game is playing top notch now and that the only thing left are a few minor repair issues (replace knocker coil), cosmetic addtions (new pop bumper caps, black leg bolts), and install some brighter and more efficient LED lights to really make it pop. I have sunk a few hundred additional dollars into this machine to get it in great playing and physical condition. I was reassured on my investment after I followed this listing on eBay: http://www.ebay.com/itm/1..._trksid=p3984.m1423.l2649. Though this lisitng included a new reproduction playfield, if I ever decided to sell this machine, I feel confident that I could at least triple my investment. Not bad. 
[img width=450 height=640]http://www.rfgeneration.com/images/games/U-027/bf/U-027-S-01790-A.jpg[/img]
First let me say that Die Hard is a Christmas movie so the picture makes sense. Also, finding the NES game complete would require a Christmas miracle so it's doubly appropriate.
Several users have still not returned their completed forms to Santa. If Santa doesn't get the completed form in time, you simply can't be matched up. THE CUTOFF DATE IS NOV 30th. If your letter is not received by Santa by Nov 30th, Santa cannot guarantee that you will be able to participate.
IT'S NOT TOO LATE TO SIGN UP AS LONG AS YOU RETURN THE COMPLETED FORM BY NOV 30th!!!! Send an email to rfgensanta@gmail.com requesting the sign up form and check out complete details on the Secret Santa thread http://www.rfgeneration.c...10624.msg153376#msg153376
[img width=494 height=450]http://www.rfgeneration.com/images/games/U-071/bf/U-071-S-01340-A.jpg[/img]
Ah, basketball: The one sport I actually care about in real life. Even in my earliest video game-playing years I was a fan of basketball games. Be it Double Dribble or NBA Jam, I always seemed to have at least one go-to basketball game per system. When I started getting into really collecting games five or so years back, I realized I needed a way to limit which basketball games I'd pick up since sports games are so cheap and abundant for yesteryear's hardware. So the obvious thing was this: if there's a Celtics uniform on the cover, I'll buy it. And this led me adding NBA 2K9 to my Christmas list after the C's won the 2008 Championship, landing Kevin Garnett on the cover. Really at the time I could differentiate between any of the modern NBA series, but that all changed with NBA 2k9. My wife got me the game for PS2 and it pretty much blew my mind just how far basketball games had come. There was so much realism, so much control. It felt like I was a coach watching and directing my team rather than just playing a game.
[img width=580 height=435]http://image.gamespotcdn.net/gamespot/images/screenshots/3/198053/nba2k_screen002.jpg[/img] [img width=552 height=480]http://image.gamespotcdn.net/gamespot/images/screenshots/3/198053/nba2k_screen038.jpg[/img]
By the time NBA 2K12 was released with Larry Bird as one of the three cover players, I had a PS3 to play it on. And though there were tweaks to the 2K9 formula (and of course now I was playing it in HD) really the game had been perfected already. But certainly it should be no surprise that a game series could refine itself so much over a dozen iterations.
I picked up NBA 2K for around two dollars while eagerly collecting Dreamcast games a few months back. This was the first game in the series -- and one born out of necessity. When the Dreamcast launched EA wanted nothing to do with Sega or their new console. Of course this hurt far more on the football front, as it meant Madden would not be the DC. But this was really a blessing in disguise as Sega launched their Sega Sports line of games and starting supplying gamers with the top-notch 2K franchises.
[img width=640 height=480]http://image.gamespotcdn.net/gamespot/images/screenshots/3/198053/nba2k_screen046.jpg[/img] [img width=552 height=480]http://image.gamespotcdn.net/gamespot/images/screenshots/3/198053/nba2k_screen035.jpg[/img]
What I find so impressive is that NBA 2K -- the first game in the series -- is completely solid. This new NBA game, built from the ground up, is already near-perfect. And certainly at the time it would have blown its competition out of the water. Even now that I own newer, revised editions of the 2K series, I can have so much fun playing the original and really not feel that I'm stuck with an inferior version. That's saying a lot for a two dollar sports game that's over a decade old.
So much about 2K was brilliant right out of the gate. The visual presentation is that of watching a game on ESPN. The players move realistically, even when the ball isn't in play. The commentators make sense (even if they will get a bit repetitive). The sound is there. The AI is (mostly) believable. Your players have their legit strengths based on their real life counterparts. It's all just so amazing how much effort Sega Sports put into making this a basketball game that felt like basketball rather than just another basketball video game.
Ultimately any of my complaints are nit-picky. Shooting free throws in this game can be a total drag if you're not using a player who's great at them. In order to shoot a free throw you have to apply just the right amount of pressure to the left and right triggers which can be really difficult, especially if beer is involved. Also later iterations of the series let you choose between a horizontal or vertical view of the court. Unless this option is buried in a menu I haven't found yet, it seems that only a vertical view is offered in this initial game which is not my preferred perspective. Again, these are tiny flaws in my book. Far from game-breaking. In fact if this was the only basketball game I owned, I'd still be more than happy to march my team through a full season.
[img align=right]http://www.rfgeneration.com/images/repository/9072870000.jpg[/img]
For those of you who don't keep a constant eye on our DB's statistics, we now have over 70,000 games in our little database. I guess it ain't so little any more. Now, if you're like me, you probably want to know what the 70,000th game added to the DB was. Well, I can't tell you. Not because I don't want you to know, but because I wasn't paying close enough attention to the DB stats and let us go 150 games passed 70,000. I'll blame it on you guys though, you're the ones who added 150+ games in the last day, before the stats on the front page could update. So you all better know that I've got my eye on you and your sneaky submitting ways, we're only 78 hardware items away from 5,000 and I'm going to watch it like a hawk, so don't even try and sneak 79 passed me.
Anywho, congratulations to RFGeneration on having 70,000 games. And thank you to every one who has helped to add those 70,000 games.
We're also really close on a few other milestones, let's see how many we can reach by the end of the year!
- 45,000 screenshots - 151 to go
- 90,000 scans - 2308 to go
- 3000 Collectors on our site (the number of people who have something listed in their collection) - 146 to go
- 5000 members (number of people actively registered on the site/forum) - 49 to go
This last week I added another Odyssey^2 game to my collection. Monkeyshines!
I paid a buy it now price on ebay of $8.30 plus $3.50 shipping. It's CIB and in fairly nice condition.
[img width=700 height=525]http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8341/8214448954_de1f8dd4cb_c.jpg[/img]
This game leaves me with 6 to go for the complete US set. How many did I have left before this Monkeyshines!? I had been telling everyone 7, which makes sense right? In actuality it was 6. So I went from having 6 left to 6 left.
In my odyssey to get a complete set I had figured I should keep track of what games there were, what games I had and which ones there were left to go. Makes sense right? Fortunately there is some website on the internets helping me out with that. What was its name again....
More than half of my Odyssey^2 collection is loose but not much more than half. I've been kinda lucky getting as many boxed games as I have. Even my O^2 console came with the box. Collecting cardboard isn't super exciting to me, sure, I have my fair share of boxed game stuff but I collect to play and boxes aren't required.
So I had printed off this neat checklist of O^2 games to help me keep track of the games I needed. Adding new games to that one website I do with all games that come in but for quick reference I kept the printed O^2 checklist nearby. As time went on I would add games in by hand to the list as well as notes on how much I saw other games sell for and how much I paid for games I got. At one point I highlighted the games I didn't yet own. This piece of paper has been well used over the last year.
Somewhere along the line I bought a lot of several boxes and manuals. Now you're calling me out on whether I collect CIB or loose. Well, yeah, maybe I was confused with what I was doing but this lot was too good of a deal to pass up. It was, for the most part, boxes and manuals for games I only had loose and a couple I had yet to get. And was super cheap to boot. One of the manuals was for Monkeyshines! (remember this was earlier than the Monkeyshines! I just got) so I marked down on that checklist for one manual on Monkeyshines!
I think that catches us up to a week ago.
So I had it in my mind and on the checklist paper as still needing Monkeyshines! although the manual was in my possession. I saw one on ebay for a nice CIB one and did the buy it now thing. Then I checked that one website (RFGen of course). The website said I owned Monkeyshines!, game and manual though my head and checklist did not. So then I had to go to the source, the Odyssey^2 collection. Fortunately with the US collection only being 49 games it doesn't take long to go through. Sure enough, I already owned Monkeyshines!! How did this happen? I think I just bought it with several other games and forgot to mark it down on my sheet.
So now we are caught up on that story.
I guess the lesson is to keep track of your collection to avoid buying the same game twice. But I was doing that! See, I have a list! Clear as mud, right?
[img width=658 height=800]http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8345/8214465286_23287989d1_c.jpg[/img]
Were do I go from here? There are now (as there had been, haha) 6 games left for me to get. Here is a quick rundown:
Atlantis and Power Lords! - These two are the spendy ones. The O^2 doesn't really have rare games, but we call these two "rare" compared to the rest. These two come up several times a year on ebay and other places. They range in price from $60 loose for Atlantis to ambitious $150 buy-it-now's for CIB Power Lords! I'm not going to spend that much, so unless there is a garage sale find, I'm content with not owning these two. The other option is to get these games from a different region then the US, they don't show up as often but are a little cheaper.
Killer Bees! - This one is all over the place on price. I've seen it for $9 loose and about $60 for a boxed copy. It's regularly available for $30ish CIB on ebay. I'm just waiting on a good deal.
The Great Wall Street Fortune Hunt! - Also regularly available, but for more than I want to spend. This game is only a couple of dollars loose but is one of three O^2 games you need to get CIB because it is also played in conjunction with a board game. I've seen a very nice copy sell for $10 plus $4 shipping. I'm waiting for that sort of price again.
PT Barnum's Acrobats! and Keyboard Creations! - These two are only worth a couple of dollars. Even CIB they don't sell for much. Less than $10 or even around $5. The weird thing is they are just not showing up lately unless it's exorbitant buy it now prices. Actually, Keyboard Creations! hasn't come up much at all. I see it in lots on ebay and picture-less on amazon for too much $. Keyboard Creations! is one of the least valuable games, loose I wouldn't be surprised to see it for $1.
So those six games are what I have left. I'll probably try to get the cheaper four CIB, just because the price won't be that much difference. In the case of Keyboard Creations! I don't really want to pay $4 shipping on a $1 game. So now it's really just a waiting game.
Here is a picture of nearly all the Odyssey^2 games I own (four more are waiting to be scanned and entered into the DB). They are stacked two deep and there are some O^2 games from other regions as well:
[img width=700 height=525]http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8480/8214448780_0f08866445_c.jpg[/img]
Why collect for the Odyssey^2 instead of putting that time and effort into a more prestigious system like the NES, Vectrex or Casio Loopy?
Price. This could be the cheapest console to acquire all the games for. Nearly all the games are only worth a couple of dollars loose. Even if you want to go CIB the cost isn't too bad as long as you have patience.
It's unusual. Everyone that reads this is already in that small fraction of the population who considers themselves "game collectors" Why not be part of an even smaller group as well? You could imagine having conversations like this:
O^2 collector - "Nice to meet you. What do you like to do?"
Regular person - "Oh, you know, watch TV, play with the dog. How about you?"
O^2 - "Well, I like to collect old video games."
RP - "I used to have a Nintendo Cube. I gave it to my nephews."
O^2 - "Yeah that's a good system."
RP - "So you collect old games? Like for the Nintendo and Playstation?"
O^2 - "Well, yeah, but I also like collecting for the Odyssey 2."
RP - "Odyssey 2? Never heard of it"
O^2 - "It's pretty old, it came out in the late 70's"
RP - "We had an Atari when I was a kid."
O^2 - "Oh yeah? The Odyssey 2 was a contemporary of the Atari"
RP - "....was it called Intellivision?"
O^2 - ".....yes.....it was called the Intellivision."
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We are a community of collectors, gamers and the likes, and some of us enjoy to let the world know what is on our mind. For those members, we have the community blogs, a place where they can publish their thoughts and feelings regarding life, universe, and everything. Some of those members might even choose to write about gaming and collecting! Whatever they write about, you can find it on their blog. You can either see the latest community blog entries in the feed you see to the left, or you can browse for your favorite blog using the menu above. Interested in having your own blog hosted on RF Generation? It's rather simple, first be a registered member, and then click the "My Blog" link that you see in the navigation above. Following those two steps will certainly get you on your way to blogging.
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