A Little of This A Little of That…

This week has been great for mynintendodimension.  I’ve made many acquisitions for the display cases.  I purchased 36 NES games from a dude named Flavio… perhaps the coolest name I’ve heard in quite some time… I may even name my gold fish after him?!  The other two fish in the tank are Cory and Trevor of Trailer Park Boys fame.  Notable titles that I picked up are The Terminator, Bubble Bobble, Journey to Silus (which apparently was originally supposed to be a Terminator game of which the company lost the license for… the last boss looks exactly like a CSM-101), and Punch out… I already have Mike Tyson’s Punch Out, but not this variation of the same game… probably the best sports game made on the NES… I usually hate sports games.

I also made my way to Peterborough/Lakefield area last weekend and made a major score.  For $40 I got my hands on a great copy of Phantasy Star IV.  Obviously not a Nintendo game, but one of the greatest Sega Genesis games of all time… which was a relief because part III was bloody awful… I still want it though:(

Also purchased from the Lakefield flea market where a copy of Terminator 2, Castelian, Kickle Cubicle, Pinball Quest and Rock ‘n Ball for the NES… the last three of which were thrown in for free as I was buying several games.  Fred (the owner of the booth) is awesome like that and I love doing business with him and hope he stays around for a good long while! I also got a copy of Blazeon for the SNES from him. At $28 it is a lot of money, but not when you consider it is usually listed at $36.  While Fred had two other rare games (Metal Storm, and Mighty Final Fight), I just couldn’t justify spending what he wanted for them… close to $250.  My wife would kill me if I spent this much on two games… even if they are rare and great!

From a store in Peterborough called Chumleighs I managed to score a copy of the elusive Thunder Spirits (which is basically just Thunder Force III on the SNES with two additional levels) which I’m rather excited about.  And at the  Value Village I bought complete copies of Conduit I & II for the Wii… yay!

Yes I’ve been spending a lot of money lately… but I’ve also been selling some stuff for a profit… or loss depending on how you look at it as I reinvest it into my Nintendo display in my basement.  At Value Village my wife found a mini arcade version of Donkey Kong for $25.  I sold it on Kijiji to a guy for $75 which seems to be the going rate.  I’ve also gotten a few bites on an extra N64 I’m trying to get rid of.  It works great and comes with the memory expansion… and is priced at $65 which is far cheaper than any other ad on Kijiji for the same thing.  It isn’t moving though… perhaps people just aren’t interested in the 64… Not that I blame them as the system is my least favourite of all Nintendo consoles.

In other news, I’ve finished modifying all 200 cases and cut out all the covers for my NES games.  This puts me approximately half way finished with my collection to date.  It’s a ton of work, and while not expensive per case (approx. $2 including printing costs) does add up when you are doing so many.  I’ve been trying to do 5 cases a day for the last while, and it is amazing how fast time flies!  After I get some shelving to put all my games on I’ll make another post.

Sega Corner:  There has been a little bit of additions to the honorary Sega department.  The infamous Sega Dude gave me a really good copy of Phantasy Star for the Sega Master System.  Unfortunately I have to hook up my SMS in order to play it and I’m just to darn lazy.  I’ll wait until I get the Power Base Converter for my Retron 5… I’m told this will be expensive though so I may have to rethink my strategy.  I may end up wrapping Phantasy Star up and giving it to myself as a Christmas present from Santa… Somehow he always knows what to give me!  Also purchased from Flavio (the guy mentioned above) was a great copy of the SMS game Golvellius: Valley of Doom, and Fantazy Zone II… both games of which are awesome and I can’t wait to play.

Speaking of Fantasy Zone, I was watching a youtube video of a guy playing the arcade version… and remembered why I didn’t like it much as a kid.  The arcade is WAY more difficult than the Master System version!  You can check it out here at Fantasy Zone and Fantasy Zone II.  I must take my hat off to this guy as clearly he has some major talent!

Until next time,

Nintendo Joe

Garage Sale Victory!

The date was Saturday May 31st, 2014 when the Sega Dude made his big find (well to be more precise, the Sega Dude’s lovely, beautiful, adoring, caring, sympathetic, honourable, outgoing, and awesome wife found this)  Holy crap!  For a mere $40 he picked up a red N64, a regular N64, and around 15 or so games which included both Zelda’s Ocarina of Time (gold edition), and Majora’s Mask.  The best part… and really painful for me to accept was that what the package also included a copy of the Super Smash Bros.  To add salt to the already festering wound, there was the memory expansion pack hidden away.  I just couldn’t handle it.  Letting the Super Smash Bros. slip through my fingers for the third time was just not an option.  In as polite a way as possible I informed the Sega Dude that “I’m taking this”… and he let me!  Not even a single punch was thrown (just so we’re clear he could beat me to a pulp… yeah, he works out!).  I couldn’t believe it… finally in my possession was a copy of a game that has eluded me for the past two years.  The best part was that the condition of the label was mint.  Honestly I was worried for a bit as there was some rusting on the contacts, but you’ll be happy to know that with a little elbow grease I was able to clean it up… and it worked!  Oh the joy… finally I could play as Samus and kick Link’s ass… something I’ve been wanting to do for a long time.  That should teach him to not have such a complicated and nearly impossible to decipher story/timeline! Honestly this is something I still don’t completely understand (the Zelda timeline that is).  Perhaps a blog topic for another date as this will require some study.

Check out this sweet N64 box that the Sega Dude gave me.  Oh he gave me quite a lot last Saturday.  Included with the Super Smash Bros. was the memory expansion (I can now finally play my Majora’s Mask, Donkey Kong 64, and Command & Conquer with all the extras), and a yellow controller.  He even offered me the red one, but I couldn’t accept that as it belongs with the red N64 for which he should get a fair price on Kijiji.  I suggested that he bundle it with both Zelda games for $150.  Do you think this is a fair price, or too high/low?  Within less than 24 hours he already received the typical low ball offers of less than half what he was asking.  I think $150 is a good ball park price, but perhaps I am mistaken.

The Sega Dude’s latest contribution to the Nintendo Museum

Well now onto my finds…. though they seem rather pathetic compared to what I’ve already described.

I also picked up a pink Nintendo DS lite with a charger (only to later to find out that the charger belonged to the DSi… why would they make it different?  I guess I’m on the look out for a DS lite charger now).  On the other hand I could keep it as I don’t have a DS lite and technically don’t have all the hand helds besides the Advance Pocket and 3DS.  I can see myself buying a 3DS down the road, but I figure I’ll have to bite the bullet and probably pay full price for a Pocket.

So here it is, the N64 collection thus far.  To be honest I’m not sure that I want to collect much more from this console as all the titles I have are the ones I’ve wanted.  I think I should focus more on NES and SNES  as they were Nintendo’s hay-day.  That said I won’t pass up a bargain for anything Nintendo with the intention to trade it.

Good luck to you Sega Dude with your sale.  Not that many people read this blog, but you never know.  Click here for the link to his ad.  I think it is a more than fair price, but what do I know?!

 

 

NES Advantage

I was digging around my basement last summer I came upon many loose X-Men figures, and six mint in box.  I have way too many collections on the go and have come to the conclusion that I must consolidate.  There is just no room for the X-Men figures, and to be honest, I forgot I had them.  I posted them on Craigslist and Kijiji and was able to sell a few of them for $40, however the post was up for months and they just weren’t selling.

There is a store in Peterborough called Things From Mom’s Basement that sells all sorts of retro toys.  If you were ever a kid who liked toys, you will definitely find something that you like here!  He had a few NES titles so I asked him if he would like to do a trade.  He gave me $110 for my X-Men figures plus $50 of store credit so that I could pick up the NES games I didn’t have.  There are two titles that stick out in my mind.  The first game is Cobra Triangle which was released by RARE Games in 1988.  While I did not have this title when I was a kid, it feels like a decent game.  People often compare it to RC Pro AM (also released by RARE Games) and with reasonable cause.  The games are nearly identical in that they are both racing type of games where you upgrade your vehicle.  I don’t think RC Pro Am had any boss battles though, so this is one thing Cobra Triangle has going for it.

The second game that is worthy of mention is Dick Tracy.  This game had a lot of potential, but was a complete bust… much like the movie released around the same time!  The Angry Video Game Nerd (while annoying) on youtube hit the nail on the head.  The driving sequences were brutal in terms of controls.  Also, it just wasn’t’ fun driving around town when people are shooting at you for no apparent reason from the roof tops.  It’s as if every building had it’s own sniper.  The side scrolling action wasn’t much better than the driving parts.  The game itself was probably only released do to the hype of the movie, but this enthusiasm quickly evaporated when people realized the movie sucked big time!

But I digress… the real find that I’ve added to my collection was an NES Advantage joystick controller.  This was one of the first controllers that allowed you to speed up, or slow down a game… and when you consider that most NES games were nearly impossible to beat, the name Advantage really hits home.  It is made with a combo metal and plastic base which gives it a nice heavy feel to it.  The only problem I have with is that I’m not used to using a joystick anymore.  I’m too used to the gamepads so this puts me at an NES Disadvantage… did you see what I did there… the humour never stops here at my nintendo dimension!