EnjoyVideoGaming!

Black Label Games: Donkey Kong Jr.

2010-11-19T19:39:00.000-08:00

What is a Black Label Game, you ask? Well, they're the first several games released by Nintendo for the NES. They're described as the Black Label Games because the label's are black, and the pictures are pixelated images of the game. Here is what Donkey Kong Jr. looks like:

Donkey Kong Jr. is a great game. It was released in 06/1986. It's not too complicated, but it gets pretty hard. At the beginning it's pretty easy to dodge enemies, but as the levels progress they get much harder. I used to think I was pretty good at this game, but I've been shown that I can't last nearly as some as others. That's okay though, with practice I could get that good! Just you watch! Each level has different enemies and progressively get crazier. You'll have to excuse the pictures. When you pause the game all the people disappear. Guess that prevents you from cheating!

Stage one is pretty easy. There's some Snapjaw's that Mario releases from the top of the screen to crawl down the vines to get you. Those Snapjaw's always make me think of aligators or crocodiles. You can make the fruit fall down to get points and get even more points if they fall on a bad guy. All you have to do it get to the platform above Mario and you continue to the next stage.

Stage two, to me, is the worst stage. If you time it just right, you can hit that spring on that bottom left platform to land on a platorm that is floating in the air. If you don't, you have to get over to the bottom right platform, climb up the chain, and attempt to jump on the floating platform. There are chains that move back and forth as well as up and down going across that line that you have to take to get to the left again. Mario is releasing birds at the same time that fly around and drop eggs on you. Again, all you have to do is get to the platform above Mario to pass the stage.

I like the third stage. Watch out for the Sparks all around the stage. There is one going around each platform, but Mario also releases one that travels all around that you have to dodge as well. This stage is easy to point scab on by just hanging out on the top platform and jumping over the Sparks without dying.

This stage is also great. In Stage Four, Mario is releaing birds again but these ones don't drop eggs on you. They just go back and forth across the stage and you have to watch out. At the same time, Slapjaw's are coming down the chains to get you. While you're dodging all that, you got to get all the keys up to the top to rescue Donkey Kong.

Now you can play this game on the NES. Either you can play it on the original Donkey Kong Jr. cart or you can play it on the Donkey Kong Classics cart. I always wondered why it was called Donkey Kong Classics when you only play Donkey Kong and Donkey Kong Jr. It didn't come out before Donkey Kong 3, so did they think it wasn't worth it to put it on there? Who knows. Either way, play it. It's awesome.

Cooking Mama Cook Off for Wii

2010-11-18T19:18:00.000-08:00

This was the first game I owned for the Wii. In fact, I got this game before I even owned a Wii. My Mom bought the game because I recommended it, and she hated it so much she gave it to me. I recommended it because I have the game for the DS and I like it. But this game isn't as good as the DS version. Maybe it's just the motion control that makes it not as good. I don't know. I still like it though.

The basis of the game is simple. You get a bunch of recipes to pick from to make. As you complete recipes, you unlock more.

As you see here, you do a little bit of each recipe to make it. You can chop, grate, crack eggs, mix ingredients, and so forth. Obviously you have to move your controller in different motions to do each thing. Now I don't have a horribly steady arm, so some of the "preparing" can be a pain. Like peeling, you have to move your controller up and down across the food on the screen and you're timed. It's crazy.

After each "preparation", you get graded based on how quickly you passed it and how "correct" you did it. Like when your cracking eggs, if you did it before time was up and you didn't break any of them before getting it all over the place, you'd get a gold medal. As you can see above, I didn't get a gold medal cause I broke a few eggs, but managed to get the amount I needed within the time limit.
And that's that. Rinse and repeat. It's fun, but others would consider it work. And it's not too far from the truth.

Rolling Thunder for NES

2010-11-17T19:36:00.000-08:00

Rolling Thunder is a fun, yet hard game. If you have ever played this game before you already understand how frustrating it is. It teases you into thinking that it's going to be a simple side scrolling shooter game, but it is so easy to die it's unbelievable. Those guys dance around the screen and punch the air. It's funny to watch.

You attack these goofy looking guys with hoods on their heads. This guy is red and he only takes one shot. There are blue guys that take two hits (most of the time). I've also come across guys that are all white that either shoot at you or throw grenades at you. Those guys suck.

There are a billion doors along your mission, but most of them do nothing. You have limited ammo, but there are doors along the way that give you ammo. There are also doors that give you upgraded weapons. It helps. There are random doors you can go in that I've gotten extra time in, but they weren't marked.

If you get a game over, this guy laughs at you. How rude.

5 games from my wishlist

2010-11-16T19:47:00.000-08:00

I don't have a fancy separate page to post my wishlist. That will have to wait until I get my domain after Thanksgiving. Until now I'll just list a few games that I want with some photos that I'll have to steal cause obviously I don't own them to photograph them myself.

1. Bart's Nightmare for SNES or Genesis

I know that I've played this game before. I'm pretty sure it was the SNES version, but I'm sure they're pretty much the same game. I remember this game being ridiculously hard, but I'd love to give it a shot now that I'm a bit older. This game usually goes for around $10. After the holidays I will probably start up my Ebay saved search for this game again so I can try and find it cheap.

2. Mega Man 5 and 6 for NES

I'm terrible at any Mega Man game except 2, but I would love to complete my NES collection of Mega Man games. Eventually I will start on other systems, but for now my hope is to get this one done eventually. These two usually go for a lot, so finding them cheap may prove to be a challenge. I'll have to be patient.

3. Contra III for SNES

This game is so much fun even if I am terrible at it. I loved playing this game with my brother cause he would help keep me alive. I love the different areas and the different points of view you could have. It can really throw you off, but it is done quite well in my opinion. Last time I played it was a few months ago and it wasn't as hard as I remember, but that could be cause I'm a bit older now.

4. Super Castlevania 4 for SNES

Castlevania is just awesome in my eyes, and I find this one to be the best one that I've played (which I guess isn't saying much since I've only played this one and the first one). I love how you can whip all around and the control seems so much better. I got to borrow this game for awhile and it was great. I wish I had played it more.

5. Venture for Atari 2600

I remember playing this game when I was younger. This game was incredibly simple. You're a little happy face that shoots arrows. You go into each room and collect a treasure and try not to get attacked by the enemies in the room. You can avoid them or shoot them. But don't stick around for too long or esle a green ghost comes in the room, along with some freaky music, to come and get you. That used to scare the bejesus out of me. I'm sure it would be fun now.

These aren't in any paticular order, but there you have it.

Castlevania for NES

2010-11-15T19:45:00.000-08:00

This game is awesome. I'm terrible at it, but I love it. The game has a simple concept (although somewhat awkward controls) and has awesome music. I like the music so much that it is my ringtone for my phone!

The basis of the game is pretty simple. Get to Dracula's castle and defeat him. Along the way you fight hoards of other nasty beasts, but you get to use a whip on them!

You can get some powerups by whipping candles. You can get a special weapon or points. The special weapons each have their own effectiveness, but my favorite so far is the cross.

In order to use your special weapons, you need to collect hearts. The hearts give you ammo (for lack of a better word). Kind of weird, isn't it? Usually hearts give you health, but not in this game! In this game you find porkchops in the wall that regenerate your health. Let me say that again: porkchops in the wall. Sounds like tasty life, right? You can also find Roman numerals in the walls that allow you to shoot your special weapon more than once before they disappear. I hope that makes sense. Anyway, hearts either give you one or five, uh, uses of your weapon.

This is the part that always gets me. It usually takes me quite a few tries before I get through it. Those stupid Medusa heads get me each time! I know this isn't very far into the game, but what can I say? I'm not very good at games like this. I want to practice more and get better at it, but I always seem to get wrapped up in other games. Castlevania defintely deserves more attention from me.

Passwords and Continues

2010-11-14T17:48:00.000-08:00

My original idea for this post was to discuss how using passwords and continues are for wusses. But I think I'm going to change my opinion about that.

I've always thought that if you're going to beat a game, you got to be hard core and beat it on one run! If you can't do it, you might as well give up. Continuing from a saved game is different since usually those games are freakin' long! I don't have the patience to sit through a long game in one sitting. But I've been trying to beat Tiny Toon Adventures and Dino City on one run and I haven't been able to do it! I'm getting to the point now that I might be able to do it for Tiny Toon Adventures, but since I hardly get to the last stage in Dino City, I'm so shocked that I fail!

So I guess I'll change the theme of my post to discuss the different types of password screens. I only have three cause they're the only three I can think of.

This one is for Dino City:

Not too complicated to enter it, but there are some weird symbols. Like the "O" is a triangle, and the "Y" is some odd shape, goodness knows what it's supposed to be. This password will start you off at Stage 5 with 9+ lives. I say 9+ because I don't know how many it starts you with, but the counter only goes to 9.

Next is Punch Out!!!:

I love the sound it makes when you pick a number. It's the same sound it makes when a character in the game talks. This is a nice example of a simple password screen. Nothing complicated and it's not too long.

Last is Mega Man 3:

Talk about complicated! Not only do you have to keep track of which ball goes where, but you have to keep track of the color too! I remember when I was younger, my Brother would draw a graph and keep track of the passwords. Thinking about that now makes it seem so silly, but it worked for him back then! Seriously, though. Is there really any reason to make it so complicated? If the game developers didn't want you to continue, then don't have a password screen! (BTW: This password will start you at Wily's Castle with every weapon and like 9 energy tanks)

I'm just messing. It's not that serious. Hope you enjoyed my simple post.

My Collection to date

2010-11-13T18:45:00.000-08:00

Not much to say. Here's all my stuff. Enjoy it's beauty.

Three random SNES titles

2010-11-12T19:41:00.000-08:00

Two of the three games pictured above I have actually had for a little while, just never blogged about. Those would be Alien3 and some Madden football game. I got Donkey Kong Country earlier this week. They all are in great shape. Alien3 and the football game looked like they had never been played. On the other hand, Donkey Kong Country needed some serious cleaning. I haven't tested it yet, but I'm sure it'll work fine. I'll go into more detail about these games at a later time I'm sure (except for the football game, which I'll probably never play).

You haven't won yet. :)

Metal Gear for NES

2010-11-11T18:54:00.000-08:00

I got this game in the mail a few days ago along with another game I didn't hold on to a few days ago. I won them for a decent price. It looks good, as you can see, and just needs a bit of cleaning.

I honestly don't really have an opinion of the game. I've never played too much of it and I hear that it's nothing special. But this is one of the few games that I actually remember my first exposure to.

Back in 2001, Metal Gear Solid 2 came out for the PS2. I was seeing a boy at the time that was a fanatic about the series. He would always proclaim that he had been a fan of Metal Gear since the original. He had a gym bag packed with NES games that he never really touched, but once Metal Gear Solid 2 game out, he dusted off his NES and pulled out this game. I remember thinking that the game didn't even compare to Metal Gear Solid 2 (not that I was interested in that game). The PS2 game was much more enjoyable to watch. Funny, now that I think about it, this game and the MGS2 were the only two Metal Gear games that he owned. Quite the fanatic.

I know that's not a very exciting story, but hey. It's my memory of this game.

WarioWare Smooth Moves!

2010-11-10T06:21:00.000-08:00

I remember way back when, before I owned a Wii, I used to see this game ALL OVER THE PLACE. I swear, Wal-Mart would have, like, 40 copies of this game sitting on the shelf. After I finally got a Wii, this game was nowhere to be found. I knew what this game was about and I wanted it, but I couldn't find it.

Looking around on Ebay and such, I saw this game was worth quite a bit. Like most Wii titles released by Nintendo, this game has not depreciated in value. Videogamepriceguides.com has the average price of this game at around $30. I didn't think I was ever going to get this game for a reasonable price.

That was until I was randomly searching Craigslist. I was browsing the Video Game section and I saw this. I quickly opened up the ad and saw the person was selling it for $10! And to make a long story short, I now own it.

It's a quirky mini-game based title. You do a bunch of random things on the spot. I really like it. It's simple and you look like a dork doing it. This would be lots of fun to play with others. I recommend picking it up if you don't own it already.

Why would a seller lie? Pt. 2

2010-11-06T13:27:00.000-07:00

Dear Ebay Buyer,

Sorry about that. I thought my description was fair, but I will give you a full refund. I tested the game and it worked fine. I have no idea about the label and what it shoud look like.

- Ignornat Ebay Seller

And there you have it. I got my refund. I don't believe this seller didn't realize it was a glued on piece of paper and that it was supposed to be that way. I also don't believe that the game is tested because it is in terrible shape. I opened it and the case broke (in a way I can't describe without possibly giving the item away), but it will still work if it does in fact work after I clean it. It will require some comet and some thumb rubbing. Hopefully it will work, although it doesn't really matter. I guess I'll keep it, but I'll want a different one for my personal collection. At least this seller didn't give me any trouble like my first poor experience with Ebay and Mega Man 2. You can read about all my bad Ebay experiences by clicking here.

Time to win that game again!

Why would a seller lie?

2010-11-05T15:05:00.000-07:00

Dear Seller,

The condition of this item is completely unacceptable. Nowhere in your description does it say that the label is just a print out that is glued or taped onto the cartridge. Acceptable implies that the label is intact and may have a scuff or minor wear to it, not that the label does not exist. This item is supposed to be a gift and there is no way I would give out something of this poor quality to anyone. I demand a refund of the item and have no issue returning the item to you, but I must be compensated for the return shipping. If you do not wish to pay for return shipping, then I will keep the item and I will still require a full refund of the item. I refuse to eat any cost for this item because of the lack of accurate description. If I do not get a reply from you within 3 days I will be filing a report with Ebay and Paypal. I would appreciate your cooperation.

- Me

This is what I get from buying from a seller with a very little sales on Ebay. I am so disappointed and mad right now, I don't know what else to say.

Spelunker, what a game!

2010-10-29T18:56:00.000-07:00

I'm surprised I haven't blogged about this other than when I got it. Spelunker is a fun but hard (and irritating) game. When you first look at it, you think "oh this looks like a kids game!", but I'm sure if you have a young child and they try to play, they wont last more than 15 seconds.

My guess is that the creator of this game wants to make it as realistic as possible, minus the graphics. You cannot jump from far, you cannot jump off things, and you have to avoid touching stuff...

Like steam...

Bats...

And more steam. I personally dislike this part mostly because it takes forever to navigate and you have to be spot on or else you're brown bread. Here's another part I really don't like:

If you don't jump this just right, you're going to hit that, uh, mound and it's going to kill you. I normally just avoid the coin altogether. All it does it give you points anyway.

I like the catchy tune when you get to this part. This happy music plays like it's congratulating you!

I found a jewel in the wall!

Anyway, I'm working on beating this game, but I haven't gotten that far yet. I swear, the jump button works when it wants to in this game, so I end up dying at stupid parts because the character doesn't jump when I hit jump. But I'm getting there. Wish me luck.

Gauntlet 1 & 2

2010-10-28T18:22:00.000-07:00

I won these together on Ebay for $4.99. They both look pretty good, just a bit dirty on the outside.

The original Gauntlet is great. It's fast, fun, and has excellent music. It's a much better game playing with two players.

Gauntlet II, on the other hand, is not as good as its predecesor. It's incredibly slow. Sure your character in Gauntlet is fast, but in Gauntlet II, they are SLOW. The cool music is missing. The graphics are pretty bad too. Oh well.

Something I forgot to blog about

2010-10-25T20:15:00.000-07:00

I won these in the beginning of the month, but just kinda forgot about them. In case you can't see which titles they are, it includes Super Columns, The Lion King, and Sonic and Chaos for the Game Gear. I won them all for $0.99 plus $3.00 shipping. Not bad, paying just a little over $1.00 a game. They are all in decent shape. The only flaw is that the labels seem to be coming up a bit, which I'm sure is just something that happens after time. Other than that, look good.

That's all.

Finally beat Ren & Stimpy Space Cadets!

2010-10-18T20:15:00.000-07:00

That's right, I finally beat it! By the time I realized I took this picture with flash, it was back to the intro screen. Basically you have to climb to the top of this alien building to get to Stimpy's litterbox. They say eachother's name back and forth, and then Ren starts slapping the crap out of Stimpy and calling him an idiot (that's what's happening in this picture).

But I did it. Thank goodness. I've had this game for several years and I finally sat down to beat it. I kept falling down holes in the ground on this last stage and getting hit by alien debris or rocks, but I did it. One more to mark of of the "beat" list!

Super Mario Land for Game Boy

2010-10-07T19:19:00.000-07:00

I got this game in the mail yesterday. I won it for $5.49 with the shipping which was a bit more than I wanted to pay, but oh well. It looks great and wasn't very dirty on the inside at all. I have never played it before, but I have always wanted to. It looks like a cute game, one that doesn't follow the normal Mario format.

It gave me the opportunity to bust out my Game Boy Advance SP and play in bed. It has a blue tint to it that looks really neat. I played for a bit and was doing pretty sucky just because I wasn't paying attention. I'm sure after a few more plays of it I could beat it easily. I just need to actually try. :)

Sonic The HedgeHog 2 for Game Gear

2010-10-01T17:11:00.000-07:00

I got this in the mail today. It was purchased for $3. Looks really good. I cleaned it up with some sand paper and it works great. I played it for a bit, but I've never been too great at Sonic games. One more game added to my Game Gear collection! There's an acution I'm keeping my eye on that ends this evening that has 3 Game Gear games included in it for cheap. We'll see how that goes.

What I got with $5

2010-09-30T19:31:00.000-07:00

I was browsing Craigslist today and happened to come across a broken NES system for $5.

It is in beautiful shape. It does have a bit of dirt on it like any 20+ year old system would be expected to have, but it doesn't have any blemishes that I can see! It does turn on, but the description of it's broken-ness was that it blinks a red light when trying to play a game. That normally means that the pin connector (or game you're trying to play) is dirty. I've gotten those replaced on other systems before, and I will more than likely be donating this to someone who does have a pin connecter. But how can you pass up a system that can easily be fixed?!

But that's not all. Without warning, the person who was selling this broken $5 NES system brought along this:

The guy was like "I just found this lying around, do you want it?" I was like "heck yes I do!". That's how I acquired my first NES advantage controller! It's like the NES with it's expected dirt. I haven't tested it yet, but even if it doesn't work I'm sure there will be some use for it. Pretty cool, huh?

Letter to Nintendo

2010-09-20T17:55:00.000-07:00

Dear Nintendo,

Thank you for making awesome products that seem to last forever. I have an Original NES that I found near a dumpster around seven years ago that has does not give me any trouble unless I try to play a game that isn't cleaned first. I have a Game Boy Advance that was purchased when it was first released and it still works beautifully. The only trouble my Wii gives me is when I have to change the batteries in the Wiimote because I use it too much. I own more Nintendo systems than these listed above, but I believe that I have given the true meaning of this letter.

Games that have come out on your systems have been highly enjoyable, and many people must agree with me. Your systems have great libraries that are full of games that fun and not too complicated to play on the first try. Your games are not full of first person shooters and other boring games that I'm not interesting in playing.

Lately I have been trying other "modern" gaming systems only to learn that they will only let me down and not work correctly or be too complicated to use. I can always turn on any of your systems and use them the way I want to use them and have no trouble other than the issues I mentioned above.

Please continue to make your quality products and games. I will always buy your stuff.

Love always,
- Me

P.S. Feel free to send me free stuff.

Retrogen!

2010-09-08T19:58:00.000-07:00

Yeah! I ordered this last Thursday and it was in town yesterday. Unfortnately I got too many packages in the mail at once and had to go pick it up at the post office. But look at this box! It just screams awesomeness! The box has velcro holding the flap closed and it's so fancy when you open it.

It comes with AV cables so you can hook up the system to the TV (which seems pretty pointless if you already have a Genesis) and a USB cable which is used to charge your Retrogen. The buttons look like their metal but I don't think they are. They feel really nice when you push them. And look at the screen...

Beautiful. The sound is not so great though. I can live with poor sounds though. I bought it from this site: http://www.gogamer.com/. And what do you know? They're on sale through that site! I paid a bit less than $30 for it including shipping. Most other sites sell it for $49.99 not including the shipping.

GO GET ONE!!!!!! NOWWWWW!!!!!

Choplifter for Sega Master System

2010-09-07T19:21:00.000-07:00

Just look at that game case. A helicopter with bright headlights flying towards some barbed wire. When I first saw this, I was like "what the heck does that have to do with anything?" After I took some time to think about it, it makes total sense. Here's what I imagine in my mind: This helicopter is definitely looking for something. Of course in the game you are going to rescue hostages. And barbed wire? That usually indicates that you are going somewhere you aren't supposed to be going. And in the game you're in enemy territory blowing up buildings or whatnot to get to those hostages! So yeah, the cover certainly does do the game justice.

The intro screen, on the other hand, is a little misleading. Why do the people not have any legs? Why is the chopper shooting at the people? Who knows, but it's still cool.

Now I don't have any game footage because there were just major scan lines in the photos I took. But the game is pretty much perfect. All you do is dodge objects and get the hostages. I'm terrible at it. I can't even pass the second stage, but I've only recently played this game. I've never even heard of it until recently! And what a terrible thing. This game is great. It's great for the imagination. I mean look at what I thought of when I saw the game case! The music in this game is awesome. It fits the game perfectly. I feel the shooting sound effect is weird, but everything else is good. Too bad it doesn't have the talking and the screaming like the arcade version has.

All in all, you should certainly try this game if you haven't. And if you don't have a Master System, get a power base converter. But the Master System is so cool!

What's with this fake game?!

2010-09-04T19:59:00.000-07:00

This is a game I found at Goodwill along with my previous goodies. It's Turok: Battle of the Bionosaurs for the Game Boy. But do you notice anything weird about it?

Seriously, how could a company make this and think that people out there would not notice that it's fake?! When I saw it at the store I noticed right away at the top it just says GAME instead of GAME BOY. It is extremely light too. And that is that up in the corner?

I know it's not a great picture, but I can't figure out how to get a better one with my camera. Sorry. But it says COLOR GAME BOY with some writing below it. I know I've seen this on other knock-off games but I can't recall which games and I'm having a hard time finding anything online about it. I found out what the lable on the game is supposed to look like:

I couldn't find a good image online, but remove the GAME BOY on the side and that's what the label looks like on the actual game. But what is the label that's on it now actually from? It's from the N64 game Turok: Dinosaur Hunter.

Weird, huh? I thought so. In looking through a gameplay video of this game, it looks identical to what I have. I was thinking maybe it was one of those strange multi-game carts that have multiple games in that are called other things, but no luck. So strange. I hope someone out there finds this post and can provide any information that may lead to this fake game's origin. I'm curious.

Master System and others

2010-09-03T21:06:00.000-07:00

I did a bit of thrifting today and got a few goodies.

A Master System! Unfortunately it was just the system. No controllers or adaptor or anything else. Thankfully I can use my Genesis controller and AV cables as well as my adaptor that powers my NES and SNES. The original NES adaptor powered the system, but apparently not enough to make it work correctly (kinda like when I was trying to power my NES with my Yobo adaptor, it's not strong enough). Maybe I'll find a real adaptor someday as well as the controllers. We'll see.

Kind of funny how I find Game Gear games after I finally get one. I didn't find this game at the same store that I found the Game Gear game, but it was still a Goodwill. I guess it could be from the same person that donated the system, but who knows. It looks great. It has the case too.

I found one more item, but I will be saving that for my next post. I want to try and do more research on it first... Look for it tomorrow!

The past two weeks...

2010-09-03T10:19:00.000-07:00

I've been terrible at blogging my thrift finds for the past two weeks. So here they are:

A couple Genesis games. Shining Force is missing the manual, but that Maximum Carnage is. Shining Force is apparently worth a bit. Whoo! I paid $3.99 for each of them.

From the same thift store. Starfox, Super Mario World, Buster Busts Loose, Bugs Bunny Birthday Blowout for Gameboy, and Kirby's Pinball Land. The Kirby game looked familiar when I saw it but I wasn't sure if I had played it before or not. When I tested it after I got home I recognized it instantly! It's always fun when I find games that I don't recognize at first but remember when I start to play it. I have a terrible memory, it just needs help sometimes! The SNES games were $3.99 each and the Gameboy games were $2.99. Good times.

Who knows if I'll thrift this weekend. We'll see.

Weekend Adventures P4

2010-08-27T19:16:00.000-07:00

Now that it's the start of this weekend, I need to finish my adventures of last weekend! After buying my first Game Gear game without the system, I finally found a Game Gear!

It came with the system and the charger for $15! I was so excited to find one! It looks and works great, but the screen was a bit scratched up.

I used some scratch remover that is intended for cars and voaila!

I've been told that I can get all the scratches off if I continue to do it, so we'll see.

Well that's it. I didn't find anything else last weekend!

Weekend Adventures P3

2010-08-25T20:25:00.000-07:00

So Saturday was the last day to thrift in California for me. Went to a few places, did not have much luck. The first thrift store of the day was here:

This thrift store was quite big. It was a furniture store up until recently. There was a ton of stuff, but not too many videogame related things. I found some weird controller called the Dream Gear. I didn't know what it was so I had it researched as I walked around the store more. I found out later that it was something you got back in the day for signing up with come credit card company and that the 50 games programmed into it were garbage. Good thing I passed on that. There were some PS1 controllers that I don't need, a PS, and one of those Plug-n-Play controllers that had Atari games on it. I kind of wish I picked it up, but I didn't. Boo. Here's what I got though:

A Dreamcast controller and a NES controller. Got them for $7 combined. They are both in pretty good shape. The Dreamcast controller doesn't have too many scuffs on it and no yellowing on it. The NES controller does have some yellowing but the buttons feel pretty good. I have plenty of both of these controller, but you can never have too many controllers! Especially if you decide to sell them later..

Although I didn't have any luck at any other thrift stores, I did visit a thrift store that deserves an honorable mention:

Sorry for the lame picture that was shot from the car, but I decided at the last second to take the picture. This thrift store was HUGE. I swear it was a converted Wal-Mart or something cause it was massive inside. And there was so much stuff packed in there! It was also the hip place to be because there were a ton of people there! There was videogame stuff there, including PlayStations, PS1's, XBox systems, lots of Guitar Hero accessories, one N64 sports game, a few Gamecubes, and so on. But I didn't want any of it so I got nothing from here. I would love to go back here another time when it isn't so hectic inside and check it out some more. It was impressive.

That's all for my thrifting back in my hometown. Next post will be about what I found when I got home. It's good stuff.

Weekend Adventures P2

2010-08-23T21:07:00.000-07:00

So here's one of the thrift stores I visited that I actually got stuff from (cause I visited a lot of different thrift stores):

You can tell it's awesome by the missing "a" in "deals" and the "e" in "store" But yeah, Great Deals Thrift Store. This thrift store was somewhat big. It didn't have a whole lot of game stuff and the stuff that they did have was hidden behind their glass display case. There was two small bins with some games, so I digged through it and got these:

Both Great Basketball for the Master System and NBA Jam for the Game Gear were $0.55 a piece. Even though I don't have a Game Gear, who could pass that up? The game probably isn't even worth that much, but it's still a deal! Quarth for the Game Boy was $4.98. I believe this game is worth about $8, so not a bad price. Thinking that it was all I was going to find, I went to go stand in the long line. Since there was a bookcase with some DVD's and such I decided to take a look and I found...

Great Baseball for the Master System and Wheel of Fortune for the Genesis! It sometimes pays to look through DVD's and VHS tapes. The case for Great Baseball is kinda messed up and is missing the manual, but it was only $2.98. Wheel of Fortune, on the other hand, is in much better condition. It has the manual and there aren't too many defects of the case. It was marked down to $1.99.

I visited a few other stores that day and had no luck. Goodwill in California is very sucky. Hole in the wall places are much better. I was originally going to post pictures of every store I visited, but what's the point if I didn't find anything?! I'll post another find tomorrow. I bet you all can hardly wait!

Weekend Adventures P1

2010-08-22T21:14:00.000-07:00

Yes, I know. I haven't blogged in awhile. I can give you all the reasons (or excuses) as to why I haven't been blogging lately, but the reasons don't really matter. I have a few things to blog about since I've been away. But I'll make it a several part post. Here is the first part!

In a trip to California I went to quite a few places after I took a night to recover from having my wisdom tooth pulled. The first place I went to was the Upland Mini-Mall. Now I have no idea if it is actually called that anymore since the building was just painted and had no text, but it's just like any other indoor swap meet. There's vendors with their own booths and they sell stuff. The only one I cared about was the one that sold games, which they called themselves Game Station. Most of their stuff was spot on with their prices, but I did come across some goodies:

I got Baseball Stars for around $5, Pirates! for around $7, and Baseball for free. That's right, for free. See, it's funny when you're a female that buys games and actually knows what they're talking about. I picked up more items than this but they were traded for other items, so I actually spent a bit of money with this guy. I looked in their case with my printed price guide and picked out the goodies. Baseball Stars didn't have a price so I asked the guy how much he wanted and that I would pay $5 for it. He agreed. I tried the same with Baseball asking how much he wanted without stating a price and he said $5. I told him no thanks and went on my way paying for the rest of the items. After I paid for it all the guy put the Baseball game in my bag and told me since I was a collecter he would throw it in for me. Isn't that nice?

Both Baseball and Baseball Stars were in fine condition. No real blemshes, just needed a bit of cleaning (inside and out). Pirates!, on the other hand, had so may stickers on it it was unbelievable! You can't tell in the picture cause I did my best to clean them off, but I need to try out the WD-40 trick to get the residue off. I'm serious though, there was a magnetic strip on the front and back of the cartridge as well as INSIDE the case!! There was also a video store sticker on either side of the case and of course when you remove those you get the stupid reside with the word "void" through it. So I haven't cleaned it up too well, but enough so you all wouldn't have to see all the stupid stickers on it.

So there you have it, my first post of a several part post of my adventures from this weekend. Stay tuned!

Batman & Batman Returns on EBAY

2010-08-08T17:10:00.000-07:00

I won this on Ebay for $5.00 free shipping. According to the price guides, these are worth $8.33 and $6.62, respectfully. I already have a copy of Batman but not of Batman Returns. Maybe this copy of Batman will be better than the one I already have. If not, I'll find something to do with it.

I haven't been looking too much at Ebay lately, but I have been going to the thrift store lately. I haven't found anything I have to have (except for what I found in my last post), but I'm continuing to look. I'm going out to visit my family this coming weekend and I hope to go thrifting out there. Maybe I'll find the motherload out there!!!! :)

One day nothing, then the next day...

2010-08-05T18:37:00.000-07:00

... you find some stuff.

All the items above were only $1.99 a piece. Here's what I got:

- Cyborg Hunter for Master System (which I thought was a Genesis game when I bought it)

- Cyborg Justice for Genesis

- Bart Vs. The Space Mutants for Genesis

- Quartet for Master System

- Altered Beast for Genesis

Unfortunately Quartet and Altered Beast are not in great shape. I was trying to get the "CUCO" off the Quartet label and the red of the label started coming off. That stupid "CUCO" is written on the back of the game as well in blue pen or whatever it is. I have no clue if I can get that off. Altered Beast has label and cartridge damage. They both have nice gashes. I guess in the heat of excitement I wasn't picky. No big deal, it's not like I spent a ton on any of it.

Classic Gaming Expo Weekend!!

2010-08-04T20:07:00.000-07:00

Oh yeah! Finally they have the expo out in Las Vegas again! I honestly had no idea what to expect when I arrived to walk around. I was happy with what it turned out to be. I got to play a few arcade and console games and see all sorts of goodies. There were some vendors/sponsors as well:

I did pick up some goodies. The stuff below is from day one. Tiny Toon Adventures 2: Trouble in Wackyland, Pipe Dream, Stinger, and Space Channel 5. They all are in good shape and didn't require much cleaning (except Stinger, that had some idiot's name written on it).

Day two I got Rambo III, Boulder Dash, and Silk Worm. All these are also in great shape. All the titles including the ones above came from the same vendor. That vendor had a TON of stuff in a tiny booth. They probably had the most next to the Atari2600 stand. Certainly the biggest variety of titles and consoles. It was good stuff.

There was also a videogame musem (which I saw the first day and forgot to bring my camera, d'oh). There was stuff from all sorts of video game era's, different prototype items, and just neat stuff. I wish I didn't forget my camera that day cause I would have taken lots of photos of it. Oh well.

All in all, it was a great time. I hope they do it again next year cause I'll be there!

Bart Vs. The Space Mutants on NES

2010-07-30T13:56:00.000-07:00

This was one of my favorite games growing up. I loved The Simpsons and who could forget The Simpsons arcade game? I used to watch this game get played a lot. I was never very good at it, but I still enjoy it. The concept of the game is pretty easy. Each stage has a different goal. The first stage is to paint or cover everything that is purple to red.

You can do random things like this part where you drop towels over some purple items or..

Spray paint a cop. For the most part you just spray stationary items like trashcans or birdbaths or whatnot. Throughout the levels you can pick up Krusty heads that are extra lives and coins which you can use to buy stuff. I have never found any other reason to use these coins other than in the first level, but I believe if you collect enough you can get extra lives as well. You can also get your family to help you out by jumping on top of the humans that have aliens on top of their head..

And picking up your "proof" to get your family to help. That's what the manual says! I just assumed it was letters to activate your family member to help. The photo above is part of the second stage. The second stage you go around collecting hats. You find them lying around or you can jump to get them off of other characters heads. Here's one of the hardest parts of this level..

Jumping across the stupid cement! Also, you have to watch for those stupid lollipops and make sure they are vertical or else you fall down. And that's instant death. This is normally what takes a bunch of my lives and wasn't able to pass this stage. But I finally passed this stage!

I had to take a picture as fast as I could cause I didn't know how far I would get! This third stage is a carnival and you have to collect balloons. I swear I thought you could play carnival games too, but I couldn't figure out how to do it and I didn't get too far anyway to be able to figure it out. There's these clowns that jump around and their pattern is irregular so I lost my lives on that. You can get a slingshot in this stage but I didn't get it in the short amount of time I played this stage.

The biggest problem with this game is the controls. In order for you to run you have to jump first, then hold down the button to run. Also, you can do some sort of super jump by hitting A and B at the same time. If you have spray paint (or probably any other weapon equipped) you use a little bit of it. Quite weird. Also, you slide around when you try to stop. This makes jumping parts very hard to control.

Anyway, there are 5 or 6 stages, so I have a long way to go before I beat this game...

Dino City for SNES

2010-07-26T20:11:00.000-07:00

Dino City for the SNES. I remember playing this game as a kid with my Brother and it really used to make us mad. I don't remember getting very far before turning of the game. Now that I'm older, I can actually get to the last stage before the final boss.

The silly plot of this game is this: Timmy and his friend (or sister, it doesn't really explain who she is or even her name) want to watch a movie on a big TV. So you go down to Timmy's father's lab and try to watch it on a big screen TV, but it ends up sucking you into this land inside the TV. You need to get through all six stages (each stage has 3 levels and a boss stage) to defeat Rockey's gang so that you can get some part to repair the machine to return you back to home.

There are two different dinosaur characters to play as, but I always pick Tops because the other one does this retarded punch, but Tops shoots arrows or spears or whatever it may be. You can also get your little character off the back of the dinosaur to freeze enemies.

You get three hits before you bite the dust. You can collect hearts to fill up your contaners that are pretty easy to come across throughout most of the stages. It is quite easy to earn a lot of lives in this game as well. There are eggs you collect throughout each level and also some bonus stages. After you collect 50 eggs you get an extra life. There are also 1-up's scattered throughout as well. The life counter maxes out a 9 lives, but you can continue to earn them. Your counter will stay at 9 until you actually get less than 9 lives.

In order to get to the bonus stages, you need to go through at least two "orange" doors. When you get to the end of a stage, it will normally lead you to two different doors: a "yellow" door and an "orange" door. The orange door is usually harder to get to, hence why they lead you to the bonus stages.

It also seems easy to "cheat" on the bonus stages. I don't know if it's really cheating or not, but since you can jump off the dinosaur you can cover more ground and get more stuff. It's certainly easier than trying to jump all around.

A lot of the levels repeat in style and most of them are not too hard. There are two different levels that give me trouble. One type of stage is when you're riding on a rollercoaster. Another is when you're riding on this giant wheel. The level of difficulty isn't necessarily why they are hard, but there is serious slowdown in these stages and it makes it hard to control.

Once you complete a stage, you get a silly screen that has your two characters marching along the bottom, along with your score (that you only see on this stage complete screen) and a password. The password is pretty cool. It saves how many lives you have no matter if you turn the system off and enter it later. So I have a password for the start of Stage 5 with 9 lives! (NOTE: That is not what the password below is).

All in all, this game is a lot of fun and not too challenging. Stage 6 gets really hard really fast, but other than that the rest of the game is pretty easy. I was trying to record gameplay for this post, but I didn't have any luck getting a clear recording, so I'll save it for a future post. Be sure to check out this game if you get a chance.

New addition to the console family

2010-07-24T09:59:00.000-07:00

That's right, I took another step out of retro gaming. But I didn't purchase this console, it was given to me. It's an 80gig system that is not backwards compatible. I currently have two games for it: SingStar (which I don't have any mics to play it with) and LittleBigPlanet. I put in LittleBigPlanet knowing that it was going to take awhile to install to the system, but it took an hour to! I had to download an update, then install game data to the system! Dang.. With my NES, all I have to do is put in the game and it plays. Even with my Wii, all the game has to do is load for a little bit! I also decided to download the free rental for Godzilla 2000 that was on the PlayStation Store and that stupid thing took 2 hours to download! It's a good thing I wasn't actually waiting to watch it.

All in all, I really don't know how often I'll play this thing. I had borrowed one before from my work and played the Sega Genesis Collection and I loved it! But it kind of defeats the purpose of getting this "new age" system only to play Genesis games on it. I can just use my Genesis!

Eventually I'll get more games or download some from the PlayStation Store, but for now I'm saving my monies for other, more exciting things! Yaaay!

Goodies

2010-07-09T20:00:00.000-07:00

Three games real low cheap! All three of them were pretty dirty, but I cleaned them up real nice. They are all in pretty decent shape for games from a thrift store. Heavy Shreddin' and Tecmo Baseball both have a little gash at the top of the label, but otherwise they are all fine.

Tecmo Baseball reminds me a lot of RBI Baseball. When you're doing the batting at pitching, you see full sized (yet goofy) looking characters, but once you get to the full view of the field, the little guys look like RBI guys. The batting is pretty awkward, but it's a fun game. I'd suggest looking it up.

Heavy Shreddin' reminds me of Slalom. The controls are weird and I didn't make it too far. It's hard to tell what you can and can't touch, and when you get to areas where you need to avoid people they seem to get in your way on purpose. Booo. The graphics are nothing special. A lot of white.

I had no idea what I was doing really when I played Hoops. You just play basketball, but I don't know how to aim for the stupid basket so I missed every shot. Oh well. One of those games to just say I own it.

Some exciting news though, it seems that I have figured out how to make it so the scan lines aren't so bad with my digital camera. Unfortunately the battery is dead at the moment, but once I get it nice and charged I will try to record some gameplay for my next post. Whoo hoo!

OMG it's Gauntlet!

2010-06-25T15:52:00.000-07:00

Such an epic opening!

In all honesty, I'm not very good at this game. I never have been. I love the music in this game. There are a few different songs in this came that all sound very neat. Even the music when you're close to dying is awesome! But I'm not very good at just running around avoid (or just running into) enemies. I always want to kill everything in sight but that's not how you're supposed to play this game.

But I digress, it's still a good game. I remember trying to play this in the arcade and sucking at it as well. I love to watch this game played as a stream. I like watching live streams of games. It's been awhile.

My Thriftstore Stuff

2010-06-20T15:53:00.000-07:00

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Fall of the Footclan, Qix, Unreal Tournament, and a NES controller. I walked away with all this stuff and only paid about $7 for it. How did this happen?

I don't know, really. The Game Boy games were supposed to be $4.99 a piece, but somehow I got them at half price each, so I paid $4.99 for both. Unreal Tournament was $1.99 but I got it for $0.99. Last but not least, the NES controller was $0.99 but I got it for $0.50. I don't know, maybe everything was half off today. Who knows.

What am I going to do with an extra copy of Qix? I guess I'll have to throw it away...

The thrift store I went to had all sorts of systems too. N64, 2 Super Nintendos, 2 PlayStations, XBox, 1st and 2nd generation Sega Genesis, and a Gamecube. The Super Nintendos were $8.99 if I recall correctly, but they were very yellow. I didn't check the prices of the rest, but I didn't need any of them! Maybe someday I'll buy a Gamecube just to say I own one, but not now.

I was going to go to another thrift store, but I ended up turning in the wrong direction and didn't feel like turning around again. I miss doing this on Fridays.

Unreal Tournament is a game that I used to play when I was younger. I was alright at it. I don't know how to describe it other than compare it to other games. It's like Quake. Old school, I know. You just run around and shoot people. No story to it really. You play until everyone is dead from what I recall. If my computer can't handle running this game, I have a serious problem. :(

How to clean a Game Boy game

2010-06-14T21:02:00.000-07:00

I have never opened a Game Boy game before, and since I just won a lot of a few titles, I figured it needed to be attempted.

Step One: Completely remove the screw from the back. Unfortunately it does not work like the NES where you can unscrew it all the way but leave the screw in. If you don't take it all the way out, you can't continue.

Step Two: Turn the game over and push the top panel downwards as pictured above. Then you will lift the top of the game off.

Step Three: Clean as you would your NES with a pink eraser. As you can see, this game does not require any cleaning as it looks like it's never been used. Thankfully pretty much all the Game Boy games I got were like that.

As you can see, you do not need to turn it over and clean the other side like a NES game as there are no pins on the other side.

Step Four: Put the game back together, and you're complete!

So above are the games I won from ebay. It includes NES Play Action Football, Battletoads, Duck Tales, Godzilla, Gargoyles Quest, Mega Man: Dr. Wiley's Revenge, and Tetris. I paid a little less than $15.00 for the bunch including shipping. I have played Mega Man: Dr. Wiley's Revenge as a kid and I'm pretty sure most people who ever played a Game Boy has played Tetris on it. The rest of the games I have never played before. I looked at Godzilla only because I've seen a revew of it, but that's it! They all are in really nice condition. Time to play them all!

Marker trick?

2010-06-13T19:20:00.000-07:00

In an effort to never have an issue with dirty games again, I'm going through each game that I haven't gotten recently and making sure it's clean. I came across this game, Codename: Viper. Poor poor cartridge with writing on it. I've gone over this thing at least four times and it still isn't off yet. It is getting lighter each time, but geez! I haven't had this much trouble with writing in quite awhile.

Whoever "Latham" is, I want to smack them. Why write your name in permanent marker on a NES game?! Why couldn't you just use a sticker or something? I shake my fist at you!

Super Mario Land 2

2010-06-05T20:40:00.000-07:00

This game has been conqured. Unfortunately I couldn't take a picture of the last screen because I was playing on the SP and it was impossible to get a clear picture. I played it off and on today from the start and it took me forever to get through the last stage (Wario's castle). I found myself doing that stupid spin attack when I wasn't trying to and it ended up killing me off a lot. Thankfully I had gone into the 999 coin pipe and won myself 50 extra lives, so dying a billion times didn't matter.

It's funny how many memories this game brings back to me. When I was younger, my brother and I used to pass this game back and forth and we probably beat it a bunch of times. I remember when we used to record our daily lives on cassette tape and this was the theme of one of those tapes. The music, us getting mad at the game, ect, was all in that tape. Good times.

So there you have it, one more game I've finally beaten. Who knows what will be next.

Pac Man & SP

2010-06-04T21:11:00.000-07:00

These are my goodies for the day. Pac-Man arrived in the mail today and it has minor wear on the label. I picked up this Advance SP for $30 from a game store. I've been told that it's worth more, but Ebay has prices for this all over the place. I saw one for only $10, but it still had a few days before it ended. Either way, I think it's cool and I'm glad to have it. I just need to get myself a charger for it since the store didn't have one and my DS lite charger doesn't fit it. I hear that if I had the original DS it would work... Oh well.

Review of Tiny Toon Adventures

2010-06-02T20:54:00.000-07:00

Yes, I have talked about this game before, but not in detail. The story beind the game is that Montana Max has kidnapped Babs Bunny and Buster Bunny decides to rescue her. There are 6 different stages with three sub-stages in each (except 5 and probably 6 which are only one stage each). Before the start of each main stage, you get to pick a character from the three below:

Plucky Duck, Dizzy Devil, and Furball (I remembered all but Furball). Shirley the Loon tells you to pick a character and they will help you on your way. Each character has their own advantages.

Plucky Duck flies, kinda like the princess from Super Mario Bros. 2. I use this character for all the stages except three and six. Being able to fly, especially on stage five, is very helpful.

Furball can climb up walls, which is very helpful when you're about to fall down a crack. I use this character on stage three to climb up all the trees as shown above.

Dizzy Devil spins around for a brief period of time, killing anything in sight. The only time I find this character useful is in stage six. Mind you, I have never beaten this game, but in stage six there are a ton of spikes to go through and I can't imagine using any other character to get through them.

This game overall is fairly simple. Stage four gives me some trouble and I cannot pass stage six, but the rest of the stages I can breeze through without trouble. In fact, at the end of stage one I can be maxed out on lives (which unfortunately is only nine, but the game has unlimited continues). I have attempted to beat this game on several occasions, but stage six gets me so angry that I can only continue so many times before I throw my controller.

The second part of each stage you have to go up against Elmyra. All you need to do is avoid touching her and wait for the exit to appear. You run around different platforms and such, with each time you going against her getting more difficult. They are pretty easy though.

I came across this bonus stage once when dying on Elmyra's stage on accident. I have only seen it this one time and did not pass it. You have to jump on those Storm Trooper looking guys to jump on the Darth Vader looking Montana Max (which is conventiently names Duck Vader). I'm not too sure what happens if you beat this, but according to Wikipedia you will gain three lives, which would be useless if you already have the maximum amount of lives.

Through most of the stages you can collect carrots. During the stages you can find a random door that will take you a "bonus" stage. If you enter that door with multiples of thirty carrots on hand, Hampton will give you an extra life.

And yes, I have seen this screen waaaay too many times thanks to stage six being ridiculously hard for me. Someday I will pass this game, but for now it needs to go on the shelf before I destroy it, literally.

$2 Pac Man?

2010-06-01T19:56:00.001-07:00

That's right. Buy it now for $1 with $1 shipping. Isn't that an incredible price? Too bad I wasn't the one who found it.

It was said to be shipped today, so hopefully I will see it by the end of the week or beginning of next week. Should this count towards my NES collection even though it's an unlicensed Tengen game? It's not on my game list since it's not a licensed game, but who knows. I'll have fun playing it anyway.

Gun.Smoke

2010-05-20T20:50:00.000-07:00

Gun.Smoke. I love arcade version of this game, and the NES version proves to be a worthwhile port of the title. The gameplay is very similar with a few added features. When I first heard about the added features I thought that it would ruin the gameplay, but it works out just fine.

In order to pass the level you need to collect the wanted poster for the boss of the stage. You can do this by finding it hidden in the stage or purchasing it from one of the townspeople.

Outside of purchasing the wanted sign from the townsfolk, you can also upgrade your gun with the money you collect throughout the level. You can get a shotgun, magnum, napalm bomb (which I have never used) and machine gun.

There are different power-ups in this game that you didn't have before. Enemies drop money bags and bullets that you will need. You can also collect a temporary invincibility and bonus cash. You also find the normal items that make you move faster and shoot your bullets faster. But watch out for those skulls, they'll take away those power-ups.

All in all, I really do enjoy this game. To me it's simpler than the arcade version (which isn't a bad thing), but still really fun to play. You get tons of stages that somewhat follow the arcade levels, you can shoot all over the place, and at the end of each stage you get the classic bullet holes in the wanted signs. Too cool.

The Adventures of Dino Riki

2010-05-20T20:21:00.000-07:00

I happened to come across this game on my DS when trying out random games. I had heard of if, but I had never tried it before. I happened to be able to pick this game out of a lot and here it is. This game reminds me a lot of Adventure Island, and righfully so since it's made by the same company.

Basically all you do is run around a shto stuff without getting hit. There's power-ups to get by shooting the flowers in this first stage. What I think is silly is that the power-ups, whether they're the flower or the item it turns into (such as that heart you see above), it blocks your bullets! So if there's an enemy slightly above the power-up you're kind of screwed since you can't shoot it until you get the power-up and getting the power-up will probably cause you to get hit!

You start with puny bullets, then work your way up to a tomahawk, boomerang, and a heat sinking flame. There may be more after that, but I haven't gotten that far. Actually, I haven't even passed the first stage!

(For some reason I cannot get this stupid photo to center, no matter what I do)

There's these lilly pads that you jump on, but it's very hard to do without dying. That's what always gets me. There's a section that you have to keep jumping across them, but your character is constantly moving. You can't stand still to gather your wits, so you have to pay close attention to what you're doing or else you'll fall into the instant death of the water.

I'd like to spend more time on this game in order to get further than the first stage! But alas, it is not near the top of my list of games that I'd like to complete. Eventually I'll get there.

Mega Man

2010-05-20T19:52:00.000-07:00

Mega Man came into my posession after it was found for a very good price. I have played this game quite a few times, but I still cannot get through all the boss stages. My brother, who I consider a Mega Man expert, has never beaten this game. To me that sounds like I'll have to play quite a bit to get even close to that point. Gutsman's stage is ridiculously hard right at the beginning of the stage. There's platforms that drop you down into the abyss before you even get a chance to think! (It's hard to photograph a moving platform when you can't take the photo while the game is paused!_

The controls on this game are awkward compared to Mega Man 2. You don't stop right when you release the left or right direction, making you slide a bit. There's also a point system which doesn't seem to really matter. There is quite a few items to collect, like little blue or red pellets that only give you more points, including bonus points at the end of the stage.

There is no Item-1 or Rush Jet, but is a power-up in Electric Man's (Elecman) stage that shoots out a platform that you can stand on. Before most of the bosses there is this huge robot that's called "Big Eye". This robot takes a ton of shot before you destroy it, and it's not very easy to dodge. Be prepared to be crafty or fight the boss with less than full health.

At the end of the stage you collect a power chip then get stage clear points. Again, points that don't seem to matter.

If you haven't looked at the manua before, be sure you check it out. The back story to Mega Man is pretty funny, as well as Dr. Light being called Dr. Wright.

Air Fortress and it's awesomeness

2010-05-16T18:43:00.000-07:00

I discovered this game while messing around with the Game 'n' Music card I have for my DS. I was just picking random titles to try out (which a few ended up being Japanese titles that made no sense since I can't read it ) . I had heard of this game, of course, but had never seen it or played it. So I tried it out and loved it. It's a fairly simple game, but also a pain.

When you're outside riding your ship or whatever you want to call it, you only have one hit and your dead. You can't touch ANYTHING. The ground, the floating rocks, enemies, nothing. You can collect some power-ups that help you when you're inside the Air Fortress, but better watch out for the baddies. And some of the enemies look really weird. Some look like Jacks (the childrens game where you bounce the ball and grab a certain number of jacks), some look like washers (those things that usually go between a screw and another surface), and others are just random spinning squares.

Once inside the Air Fortress, the game ends up being very simple. Your energy level is fairly high and the enemies are pretty easy to either destroy or avoid altogether. Standing still raises your energy level and you can usually find more energy throughout the level. Your goal is to go in and destroy a huge red ball (which is believed to be the central core) and find your ship again to escape the destroyed Air Fortress. The levels do end up getting more difficult, but the most difficult part is finding your ship after destroying the central core.

There's 8 different Air fortresses to destroy, so the game ends up taking a bit of time. I have yet to beat this title, but I haven't sat down and actually tried to play through its entirety. My suggestion is to at least try it out cause I think it's pretty fun.

Who's knocking on my window?

2010-05-06T17:57:00.000-07:00

It just happens to be the person who actually got my game in the mail instead of me. That's right, the post office delivered the package to the wrong mailbox. The person who lives above me got it. They explained that they had been on vacation for about 9 days and could hardly get their mail out because the package. Needless to say, I was greatful that the gentleman brought it to my door instead of taking a sneaky-peek beforehand, or not bringing it at all.

But the game looks great. The label is in perfect condition, and the rest of it has zero imperfections. I suppose I should leave feedback for the seller now that I got it..

Cleaning The Super Nintendo Pt. 2

2010-05-05T19:29:00.000-07:00

You can read the first part here.

After getting the bit I needed for the SNES, it was time to open that baby up...

Look at this poor thing! Thankfully I got it all nice and cleaned up. Also, I found out that it wasn't my system that was broken, but in fact the game I was trying to play was dirty. So I cleaned that up too...

I have never seen the inside of a SNES game. It's so tiny! I wonder if games that have the save feature have bigger boards than that. If not, seems like a big waste of plastic.

So now it seems to be working in fine condition. That's awesome.

Stay tuned for a post about Mega Man in the near furture!

TMNT and SNES Bit

2010-05-03T20:07:00.000-07:00

'Nuff said. That's what I have.

Not sure if you can tell, but theirs a slight gash at the top of the label. No big deal though.

The one on the right is the SNES Bit. As you can tell, it's a little bigger than the NES bit. It got here extremely quick.

The post office called me today to tell me my package (DK Jr.) was delivered April 28th. I was ready to get irate, but I calmy explained that it never arrived in my box and that I have had no issues receiving packages before or after this incident. The supervisor, Gilbert, proceeded to ask me if I had recieved packages before... now I can see why consumers get irritated when they call my work. Supposedly I'm supposed to get a call back after he talks to the person who delivered the mail that day to figure out what happened. I'm just considering it a lost cause. And the stupid seller hasn't even responded to my question about verifying the address they sent it to. I don't think I can dispute it with Paypal, so I'm just pretty much going to drop it. No use in beating a dead horse, right? Right.

The good and the bad

2010-04-30T11:10:00.000-07:00

We'll start off the with bad. The bad is that Donkey Kong Jr. may have been lost by the Post Office. It said it was delivered two days ago, but has not arrived in my mailbox. I had to call the Post Office and open a case or claim or whatever the heck its called, and I should be getting a phone call within two business days (today being the first one). I honestly have no idea what is going to happen from this point. Guess we'll have to wait and see what happens.

Here's the good:

Yep, games in the mail. I actually got Qix a little while ago, but never blogged about it. I haven't tried out either of them yet, but they both are in great condition. I'm kind of shocked that I got GI Joe before Ninja Turtles, but oh well. I also ordered a bit so I can open my SNES since it appears to be broken. The picture only stays on if you have the system in just the right position. I'm told it can be fixed, so hopefully soon it will be. I might have my other game in the mail today, so I will post if I do.

The fun wasn't over just yet!

2010-04-25T21:15:00.000-07:00

Yay for Skykid! Is it one word or two? Who knows. But anyway, the game doesn't look too great in this photo, but it does look in good shape in person. I got it for $2.99 locally.

Also, out of pure randomness and luck I happened to bid on a G.I. Joe: The Atlantis Factor in the last few minutes of the aution, thinking I wasn't going to win. Although there were no bids at the time, I figured someone was watching it to get it for the low low price of $9.99 plus $2.99 shipping. I just bid the $9.99 and walked away. After I checked on it a little while later (way later than the auction ended), I saw that I had won. This game is said to be worth $31 on http://www.videogamepriceguides.com/ ! Watch out now!

I also didn't mention in my last post that I had won Donkey Kong Jr. for $10.00 even. So here I am with five games for the weekend. Looks like I'm ahead of schedule for my goal of 200 games by the end of the year. Right now I'm at 169, which leaves me to get about 4 games each month until December. This is quite possible!

Next month or two may be slow months in the gaming realm for I have quite a few car issues to take care of, such as registering and tune-up. But we'll see how it goes. In the meantime, I will do my best to get some gameplay footage up somehow.

The end of my weekend...

2010-04-24T12:34:00.000-07:00

So there you have it, that's what I got for this weekend (well, today). Freedom Force is worth $9.50 and Space Shuttle Projcet is worth $11. Why two copies of Space Shuttle Project? Cause I can. And why a second copy of Gyromite? Well, here's why:

That beauty! That is an adaptor that will allow Famicom games to be played on a NES! Oh yeah! I hope to come across more in the future, but this is the only one I found today out of at least 10 other copies of Gyromite I came across. I hope to get Circus Charlie or the first Goonies game someday. They are both really fun. But for now it will remain Gyromite.

Tomorrow I get a few bucks for selling a Dreamcast, then I might check out Game Haven by my work to see if maybe they have more Gyromites. I'm too lazy to go all that way today. Last night I won the copy of TMNT III, so I'm happy about that.

Today's adventures

2010-04-23T18:30:00.000-07:00

So I did actually go out and thrift a bit. I didn't have a whole lot of luck, and the things I did get I ended up not keeping, so in reality the only thing I got was an AC adaptor for a 1st Gen. Sega Genesis. I also got a Sega Dreamcast controller, but that is going to someone I'm selling a Dreamcast to.

On Ebay I won Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles III for $7.00, so I'm excited about that. I haven't played it before, but that leaves me with only one TMNT game to get: Tournament Fighters. I also have a few games in the calendar still, so game shopping is not done for this weekend. Tomorrow I plan on stopping by Game Haven since I haven't been there for awhile. I doubt they'll have anything fantastic, but I'm hoping they'll still have that copy of Space Shuttle Project that I keep eyeballing cause I will get it.

Anyway, hope everyone else has had a better gaming weeking. We'll see how my luck is tomorrow.

My Opinion Of Felix The Cat

2010-04-17T22:06:00.000-07:00

I got this game recently, and finally sat down to beat it. Here's the ending:

This is structured weird. I had more than one life left. And is Kitty referring to herself in the third person? Who knows.

Felix and Kitty fly off into space... for God knows what reason.

There's my high score. I didn't really play this game for a score, so that's not very good. TwinGalaxies.Com has the world record at 854,830. The fastest speed run is 25 minutes.

All in all, the game was not bad. It was fairly easy (except for a few of the end bosses gave me some trouble) and kinda long. I'd play it again though. It's very simple to get lives and to power-up without problem. I suppose if I could get that score with my first time playing it I could probably get to that world record after a few attempts.

If you don't have this game, get it. It's worth it.

I took a few pictures of some of the things I thought was funny throughout the game. Enjoy!

A cat riding a dolphin.. that's awesome.

Even better, a cat scuba diving on a turtle's back. And the turtle burps on things!

Felix swimming around inside a Felix head. Weird.

In a space ship, attacking Hersey's Kisses (or yogurt, which was my first thought when I saw those things).

Not only does that not look like Felix, but that grin is hilarous! Ha ha ha!

M.C. Kids

2010-04-17T09:04:00.000-07:00

This game finally came in the mail. The cartridge looks really good, but the pins were a disaster when I opened it up. It took more than a rub-down with the eraser to get those suckers clean. But after that it worked just fine.

Unfortunately this game is not too creative. It looks very similar to Super Mario Bros. 2. Even the opening cut scene gives you false hope that the graphics are going to be outstanding. First you see a tent outside at night, with lights reflecting off of buildings 'n such:

Then you look inside the tent to see the horribleness (if that's even a word) of what the rest of the game is going to be:

I mean, look at that? The neat reflection effect they had in the first scene turned into it looking like someone is pushing in the sides of the tent! And the kids don't have eyes! And why is there only one sleeping bag for two kids?! The zipper isn't even right..

Anyway, I haven't played the game too much, but it's nothing special. You go around collecting arch cards in these weird levels and you go into a zipper to end the stage. It's alright, I guess. I'd rather play Super Mario Bros. 2.

Snake Rattle 'N Roll

2010-04-12T16:52:00.000-07:00

Game looks good. Still have no idea what it's about.

I watched the video below to try and get an idea of what the concept of the game was, and I'm still not so sure about what it's all about. It looks like you're collecting parts of your body by hitting special spots in the level and avoiding weird enemies.

I may need to read up on the manual to make sure. Looks odd. But hey, I got it cheap, so no complaints here!

Ebay this morning

2010-04-09T08:43:00.000-07:00

Just a quick update:

I was looking around on the price guides and added some things to the calendar. I've won Snake Rattle 'N Roll for $2.03 (before my Ebay Bucks it was $3.15) and M.C. Kids for $4.99. More auctions are in the calendar for the day including: Princess Tomato in the Salad Kingdom, North and South, A Boy and His Blob, and Star Wars. Who knows what I'll bid on next!

Adventure Island Here At Last

2010-04-07T15:02:00.000-07:00

Doesn't it look pretty? Wait until you see the back of it...

Why would you need to write "Nintendo" on the back of a NINTENDO game?! Who knows.

I have not had the opportunity to clean it and test it, but I'm sure it's fine. Getting the marker off will take some time, but I'm sure it will come off without too much issue. I've been under the weather for a little while now, so I haven't been playing too many games or worrying much about anything other than sleep.

This morning, though, I did play a game of RBI Baseball and actually won! But I think the team I was playing wasn't trying too hard. It was still nice to say I won for once, but I think it will be a victory short-lived. I'm not sure when the 7 game world series is going to happen, but I better keep practicing!

Anyway, I'm off to nap after a long day at work. Maybe I'll dream of something good while I do..

Thrifting with my Momma

2010-04-04T09:03:00.000-07:00

This is what I found:

Included is Robin Hood for the NES, Alien 3 for the Geneis, A complete 1st generation Sega Genesis, and Sonic the Hedgehog 2 (that my cat is so graciously covering). The Genesis came with a power suppy, RF switch, one normal controller, and one licensed six-button controller. It works great, looks pretty good, and everything else works fine. Alien 3 kinda reminds me of Codename: Viper, but it kinda sucks. Sonic 2 is good. Robin Hood is just terrible. What am I going to do with another Sega Genesis? Who knows. They seem to be easy to come across.

Here's something else I got as a gift from my parents:

That's right, Mario Kart Wii. My Mom's Wii broke, and she insisted that we play this game this weekend even though her disc is stuck in her system at home. So she just decided to buy me a copy and she'll get her system fixed. I'm so spoiled sometimes.

I was mistaken and though the Goodwill stores were having an everything 75% off sale today, but its only for Easter stuff. I got myself all types of excited to go buy more stuff today, but looks like thats probably not going to happen. In a way, I'm kind of glad cause I'm not feeling very good. I could use the day to rest since I have to work tomorrow. My sinuses are all messed up so I'm pretty tired.

Anyway, Happy Easter to all and hope you feel better than I do! (I'm happy though, I'm having Ham!)

What did I get in the mail today?

2010-03-29T17:51:00.000-07:00

Look at those packages. All three of them were crammed into my tiny mailbox, but thankfully nothing was hurt in the process. That little red one looks funny..

The first yellow package was RBI Baseball. The game looks good, only minor label wear. The little red one was Dino City. The person decided to just wrap the game in some, uh, I can't think of what the stuff is called (we'll just call it plastic wrap) and put the label over it. Interesting and cheap way to ship it. That last yellow package is the mystery item! I will unveil what it is sometime before Thursday when it goes to the person it is for. I'll probably give in and give it away before then, which is fine by me!

Now I have to get my RBI gameplay on since I have a world series coming up! Wish me luck!

150

2010-03-28T06:04:00.000-07:00

That's right, I've reached 150 NES games. I only have 50 more games to reach my goal of 200 by the end of the year. That might prove a bit difficult considering now I've gotten into collecting more than just NES games, but it only requires me to purchase 6.25 games a month. We'll see how it goes.

Stuff from this weekend

2010-03-27T09:37:00.000-07:00

Only one thing from the thrift store: that lovely fishing controller for the PS1. It goes with the game Bass Landing, which I just happen to own. Looks like the controller is woth about $30 and I bought it for $5. I haven't tested it yet.

Midway Arcade Treasures 2 and Trauma Center Second Opinon are obviously from Game Stop. Nothing special, I just happend to walk in and find them. I've been searching for one of the two Trauma Centers that are out in anticipation for the new one that is coming out in May: Trauma Team. I've never played it before, but it looks like a pain in the butt like Cooking Mama. And Midway Arcade Treasures 2 is a compilation of several arcade games, but now I have all three of them.

Toki came in the mail a few days ago, but I didn't have the opportunity to blog about it until recently. This game looks really neat compared to the NES version. They are both fun games, although I'm not too great with the Genesis version.

I've won a few things on Ebay this weekend as well. First would be Dino City for the SNES. My brother let me borrow this game and I just had to get a copy of my own. It's a fun little game that I used to play in my childhood, but I die at the same spot every time I play. I will certainly get past it, I just haven't sat down and played past getting the game over screen (I'm not one to use continues). I also got RBI Baseball for the NES. This is going to be in prep for a 7 game world series I'll be participating in. I got one last thing, but it's a surprise.

Next weekend my parents will be coming out, so I don't know how much game shopping I'll be doing, but my Mom wants to go thrifting, so we'll see how it goes.

I got one last thing that I'm really excited about:

No more plugging every game system into my VCR! FINALLY. Now I have to just get off my lazy butt and hook it up. :P

Thrift Store Weekend

2010-03-21T17:43:00.000-07:00

I got lots of goodies at the thrift store this weekend. Here I'll show off my first find:

That's right, a Sega Dreamcast IN THE BOX. I only paid $25 for this nice gem. It looks brand new. Obvously it wasn't since the cords were loose in the box and there was no manual, but it's nice and fancy looking. And with all the cables that came with this system, I was able to test the other system I had that did not have the cords with it and it works great too! It was like a two-for-one type deal!

Onto my next finds:

These were at a thrift store that had TONS of games, the most I have ever seen in a thrift store at once! I got all this stuff for $16, which is the cost of Kickle Cubicle alone! The NES games look brand new, the Genesis games look just fine (not brand new, but not chewed up). Unfortunately the Genesis games did not come with manuals and the Aladdin case is a little funky, but they work just fine.

Anyway, that was it. There was more out there, but these were the only items I was interested in (and not overpriced). Lets hope I have more luck in the future.

About those six games..

2010-03-18T19:57:00.000-07:00

So I finally cleaned up and tested my new six games, and here's what my first impression was of them:

- Top Gun: Second Mission was only played for about a minute. Not having the game in reverse axis or whatever its called so hitting up actually goes down and vice versa totally threw me off. I'm not much for those type of games anyhow.

- Captain Skyhawk was kind of fun. It feels like a 3D Zaxxon. This is a game I will probably play a bit more in the future.

- Tecmo NBA Basketball lasted about 5 seconds. I basically made sure it turned on and the players could run around and stuff. I really don't have much interest in this game other than now it's part of my collection.

- Baseball Stars II was such a pain in the butt to figure out how to get a game started! I originally accidently picked only the computer to play, so I just kept watching games. Then, after I realized what I did, I finally got a chance to play. Baseball games are hard on the NES. That ball goes flying and you don't know where your players are in the outfield! I can see why RBI is so frustrating. The sounds they had to replace voices were pretty interesting.

- Duck Tales was fun. I suck at it, but obviously I'm going to when it's the first time I'm playing. It reminds me of Tiny Toon Adventures. I definitely will play it some more.

- Mickey Mousecapades (or just Mickey Mouse like it says on the title screen) sucked majorly. I can't believe how poorly it was made. I was warned, but I'm still shocked. It could have been so good. Here's what really got me mad: The first door you see has a bubble that says KEY. So when I find the first key, I go back to that door and nothing happens. Apparently the FIRST KEY YOU FIND isn't the correct key. What a rip-off! And why does Minnie follow you around, but it doesn't matter if she gets hit or not? I was running around trying to try to avoid both of the characters from getting hit, but Minnie is apparently invinsible because it doesn't matter if she gets hurt! Sheesh..

So there you have it. Eventually I will try to get my camera to record appropriately and get some game play up for you all. Until then, this is what you get! Ranting!

Lookie lookie!

2010-03-17T17:28:00.000-07:00

Yeah, aren't they pretty? They look really good. I don't notice any flaws in the labels or any other types of ick on them. Tecmo NBA Basketball has a bit of a rattle in it, but that probably just requires me to open it up and get it out. I haven't tested these bad boys yet, but I'm sure I will soon enough.

Aren't you jealous of my Baseball Stars II?!

It arrived already

2010-03-15T18:00:00.000-07:00

Yep, it sure did. The game is in great shape, just needs a little cleaning up. It took me awhile to figure out what I was doing (I frogot how to play the game), but even when I did, I still sucked. I'm no good with games that require you to use the little joystick with your thumb. But hey, it's here. Now I need a rumble pak so I can save my games! :)

Tracking Numbers

2010-03-15T04:34:00.000-07:00

Over the weekend, I ended up winning Buck Bumble for $5 with free shipping. I also won a lot of 6 games that includes: Top Gun: Second Mission, Baseball Stars II, Time Lord, Duck Tales, Mickey Mousecapades, and Tecmo NBA Basketball. I won this lot for $14.49 (including shipping). I received tracking numbers for both. So far, Buck Bumble has been processed through Sort Facility in CT, and my lot does not have any information yet. Here are the tracking numbers if you're interested in looking for yourself:

(Mostly) Genesis weekend

2010-03-12T17:30:00.000-08:00

Here's what I got. All locally. Not bad prices. :)

Little Ebay Luck Today

2010-03-11T17:19:00.000-08:00

It's been awhile since I posted, so I thought I would share with you my attempt at winning some stuff. Here's what I've done so far:

- Won Buck Bumble (N64) for $5 and free shipping.
- Best offers on Virtual Bart (Genesis) and Toki (Genesis), but found out later that these games already had some pending offers. I've pretty much given up on hearing back from these.
- Best offer on Boulder Dash (NES), but haven't heard anything back from it. I'm not expecting to since this seller has the game listed for $15 and I offered $1.. ha ha ha.
- Bid on StarTropics $0.99 with $2.50 shipping, but lost. Last time I checked it, the auction had four minutes left, and I went to do other things and came back to an outbid screen. Oh well.

I plan to do a little bit of game shopping this weekend. I plan on purchasing another Wii remote (PINK) and another SNES controller. I'll probably check out some more games on the price guide tonight and go from there.

Other than that, I want to try recording some gameplay of Ren & Stimpy on GB, but I'm not too sure if I want to try fighting with it again. I tried recording earlier in the week and I couldn't get the picture to come out clear. We'll see...

Twisted Metal for PlayStation

2010-03-06T14:57:00.000-08:00

Sometimes trips to the thrift store can have you come across interesting things. I came across the above: Twisted Metal for the PlayStation. It's in a long, weird looking case. Apparently some games came like this. It's complete with manual and the disc looks almost perfect. The case is coming up in some spots and just needs to be glued back down.

I got this game for $2. I'm not too sure how much it's actually worth, but it's definitely worth more than $2. Games on VideoGamePriceGuides.Com were ranging from $6 - $30, so it's hard to say. I'll guess in the middle and say $15. Will I ever play this game? Probably not. But it looks cool.

The end of Donkey Kong on Gameboy...

2010-03-03T16:02:00.000-08:00

Stage 9-9, you think "Yay, I saved that Pauline bitch finally!" There's a nice little heart and...

Oh shit, a big-ass Donkey Kong comes to try and smash you with his fists! That's okay, throw 6 different barrels at him as they come down the screen and he's toast.

Mario get's a mushroom that makes him grow in probably more areas than one. He picks up Donkey Kong and gives him the smack down (not really). Pauline is all types of hot for Mario now.

What?! They're one big happy family and that's the end? And only on Stage 9? I thought there were 12 stages?! I guess the FAQ's I read were wrong.

There you have it. Another title beaten. This game was not too difficult, but long. Only two different stages that I can think of gave me trouble. I had the right idea while playing them, but I just needed to tweak my technique to pass those stages. I'll probably play this game again just to see if I can do it without dying or something to that effect. Who knows. But for now, this game will go on the shelf. Bye bye, Donkey Kong!

Gaming stuff for the weekend!

2010-02-27T16:15:00.000-08:00

OH YEAH, DATA EAST COLLECTION!

Thanks to Twitter, I got to pick up that last copy of the Data East Collection at Frys. I called Gamestop to see if any stores around had it and.... NOPE. On a side note, I asked how much SingStar ABBA for the PS3 would be worth as a trade-in, and it's only worth $0.85! I laughed and told the guy I wasn't surprised. Good thing I wasn't going to attempt to use it as a trade-in!

The other two games are Little Nemo and Hydlide. Neither of these were outstanding deals, but I didn't want to leave the store empty handed and I really wanted to try out Little Nemo. The guy at the Game Haven I went to hadn't even heard of the Data East Collection, but was impressed with my 140 NES game collection. He watched me look at my price list (that needs to be re-printed). I wish that copy of Guardian Legend was still there cause I would have bought that in a heartbeat.

And I got this nightshirt at Wal-Mart for $5:

I don't think the "READY!" really fits, but I just had to get it cause it was Pac-Man. It can go along with my other Pac-Man PJ's!

My one-day weekend hasn't allowed me to do much of any gaming. I was hoping to play more Donkey Kong or maybe try out some more of Sonic. But now with the Data East Collection, I'll be playing some Magical Drop and some Burgertime! But before I do that, gotta make some food.

$2.99 Sega Genesis

2010-02-26T20:58:00.000-08:00

I came across one of those this evening and I just had to swoop it up. I mean, $3?! I can sell it for much more! There's one problem though. It doesn't seem to work.

The system will power on, but it doesn't get a picture. I have a guess as to why it's not working, but it's only a guess. Check out this photo:

Notice any differences? I do. The one that has the AC adaptor plugged in is my system that works just fine. Obviously that means the other one is the $3 system. My system's RF port is red, where as the other system is not. They don't feel the same when you plug the cord in. Also, this other system has an extention port for whatever that my system doesn't. I have no idea what that is for but I'm sure I learn soon enough. I may try the other RF adaptor that I have to see if maybe it has to do with that, but I'm too lazy tonight to do it. If that doesn't work, I may need to try some AV cables to see if maybe just the port is broken. Now if AV cables don't work.. we have a bigger problem. Let's hope it doesn't come to that.

Did Lukie pull through?

2010-02-23T16:00:00.000-08:00

Yes they did! FINALLY! This ordeal took way too long, but at least they sent me an OUTSTANDING copy. This baby looks brand new. I'm so glad that I got a good copy. I was almost expecting another poor copy.

Unfortunately, the game play is total garbage. But that's not the point! The point is that this game arrived LOOKING bad, so now the replacement copy looks gud. :)

DJ Boy and Secret Scroll

2010-02-20T12:06:00.000-08:00

I happened to come across this inexpensive copy of DJ Boy for the Genesis. I honestly don't really know anything about this game other than what I've read and heard, but I've been told that it is normally considered a very crappy game. I don't like to judge games by what other people say cause, frankly, other people's opinions are not necessarily going to match mine.

I won this game for $5.00 on Feb. 18th, the game was marked as shipped on the 19th with a tracking number, and the package seems to have already left Redding, CA! At this rate, it may be possible to have this game by Monday or Tuesday! If so, this seller may have other items that I will consider purchasing.

Lukie Games did actually email me a tracking number for my long-lost Secret Scroll. That tracking number does not have any status yet.

To all of you who think that I've forgotten about my NES or other systems, I have not. I've just never really played a Genesis before, so I want to try new things!

Great find: Wizards and Warriors III

2010-02-18T16:42:00.000-08:00

This game is said to be worth $15.15 at VideoGamePriceGuides.Com, and I happened to come across it for $4.99 locally! I found out that there was a fairly new game store in town and I happened to find it there while checking it out.

I don't really know much about this game. I played it briefly and was amused by it. The graphics are fun to look at, and messing around with your character is pretty entertaining. He squats down funny and waves his sword around like a fool. I want to take more time on this game and see what it's all about.

Reply from Lukie Games...

2010-02-18T15:17:00.000-08:00

"Sorry about that, we were expecting some more copies in which we just received and one of those looks really nice, so I’ll have that sent out tomorrow. We’ll email you the tracking tomorrow.

Thanks and sorry again for the delay."

Yeah, what a load a crap. I bet they just forgot. So we'll see if they follow through with the tracking number.

Letter to Lukie Games

2010-02-17T15:38:00.000-08:00

Dear Lukie Games,

On February 1st, I sent the following message:

"I was hoping if you could let me know if you had received my copy of The Secret Scroll Flying Dragon for exchange? I'm sorry I did not get a tracking number so I could track the package myself."

I received this reply on February 2nd:

"Hi, Yes I show that we’ve received it and we it will be processed in our next batch. If we don’t currently have a better looking copy we’ll let you know. Thanks"

Today is February 17th, and I have not received a game or word of issues with replacing this title.

This is not my first time purchasing games from your company, and my other purchase has gone without any issue. I am a little embarassed that this time around it has not been as pleasant as my past exeriences.

I'm hoping that I will be able to get some clarification as to what the status of this return is, whether it is that it has been shipped, not been shipped, or that you have not been able to find an acceptable replacement copy of the title.

I hope you understand my frustration, but I believe that it is unacceptable for 15 days to pass without the game arriving or information about any issues. Please let me know what I can to to help this process along.

Thank you.

Retro Gaming is cooler than modern

2010-02-13T16:28:00.000-08:00

Why is is that when I go to a store such as Hot Topic, that carries a range of interesting things, do I find a bunch of retro stuff, but not modern? I took a picture of a few things I saw at this store:

1-Up Belt Buckle

Atari Candy Container

Nintendo Controller Business Card Holder

Pac-Man Energy Drink

There were some other cool things, like t-shirts, messenger bags/backpacks, and jewelry. I don't see any X-Box controller candies, or PS3 backpacks! BUT I do have a Wii candy thing. It just goes to show you that people may not be as into the high-tech gaming as the simplicity of older generation consoles. Now mind you, this is not an original idea from me, but it does make total sense. It took a lot of self control to not buy all these items, but maybe I'll come across them again when I haven't already spent a bunch of money! :)

We have...

2010-02-13T14:30:00.000-08:00

...a fuzzy Sonic the Hedgehog!

At least I know the system works. I messed around with it for awhile, but the fuzziness is very distracting. All the buttons on the controller seem to work (they all do the same thing in this game apparently). I'm assuing the fuzziness is from the RF adapter. I tried to find the stuff I needed to get me some AV cables, but I didn't have any luck finding it. This will require another trip to Frys, I suppose.

*** UPDATE***
After testing the system with different hook-ups, I found out that the RF adapter was a hunk of junk. My NES adapter hooked up to it just fine. Looks like the game store is a bunch of idiots. Grrr!! Oh well, at least it's now working.

Sega Genesis, Baby!

2010-02-12T16:05:00.000-08:00

That's right, I finally got one! At a pretty good price too. I was able to get the system and some games for $40. It cleaned up real nice.

I don't really know anything about Genesis. I've never owned one, and if I've ever played on one it was a very long time ago. I believe the Sonic games started on this system and that's probably one of the few games I know. In the system is Ghosts N Goblins that I apparently got for a good price because it's considered rare and expensive. I have no idea what that Socket game is. That one that says 6-Pak has six different games on it: Golden Axe, Sonic the Hedgehog, Streets of Rage, Revenge of Shinobi, Columns, and Super Hang-On. So it's like I got 8 games!

So does it work? It turns on. I don't know if the rest of it works. Here's what happens when I hook it up to both of my TV's:

Snow and a terribly loud buzzing. Last time this happened to me it was with my Nintendo. And I found out my power adapter was not the right voltage or watts or whatever it was that was wrong. If that's the case I'm going to be pretty upset. This is the adapter that the store I bought it from bundled it with, so if it's wrong then they suck. Then again, this is the only thing I've ever tried to hook up with an RF adapter. Maybe I'm doing it wrong. Who knows. I'm sure I'll find out soon enough what I'm doing wrong. I was looking foward to trying out my games, too... Boooo....

No Secret Scroll?!

2010-02-09T15:08:00.000-08:00

Nope, it's still not here. I was told Feb. 2nd that it would be shipped in the next batch (whatever that means). How long do I wait until I email again and say it's not here? It's been a week since I was given the previous information. We'll see how long it will take.

This has been a poor experience. By far it's not the worst I've had, but it's not what I expected from a top Ebay seller. Granted they were nice enough to exchange the game even though I had left positive feedback already, but still! I shouldn't have to be going through this in the first place if the condition was "Very Good" as the description said it to be.

It's fair to say that this will probably be my last transaction with LukieGames. I'm sorry it had to come down to this, but maybe I should give her competitor a try... :(

I don't like Bugs Bunny Birthday Blowout on the NES

2010-02-07T14:55:00.000-08:00

This game is too long, not horribly challenging, and doesn't have the song in it I thought it did. I have no idea what game it would be in, but I swore "Cliffs of Dover" was in this game somewhere. After playing this game for the longest I have ever played it, a few unusual events happened:

First, I got 50 lives after the first freakin' bonus stage!

My lives were in the 90 at the start of stage 4, but finally official hit 99 after the bonus stage at the end of Stage 5 Round 4! I was not too careful with my lives since I had so many.

And finally.... I beat the darn game! How long did it take? I didn't count the exact time, but I'm sure it was around two hours! I don't know if I'll ever play this game again...

Anyway, there you have it. Another game to add to the list of "BEATEN"! Maybe if I ever play it again I'll try to beat it as fast as I can. Currently there is no record at TwinGalaxies.Com. I COULD BE THE FIRST! Probably not. I only really had trouble with two different stages. One was Stage 5 Round 3. I kept getting stuck right at the beginning. There's this part where you have to jump on a tree branch, and if you don't do it just right, you're screwed. You'll just have to kill yourself cause there doesn't appear to be any other way around it. Another part was the last stage, fighting Tazmanian Devil. He throws these pink footballs at you, and you have to hit them back at him. I kept dying cause I was waiting too long to hit them and they'd hit me first. And seriously, you have to hit, like, 6 of them at him before you beat him.

I'm off to take a break from video games. My hands need a rest!

99 lives, not red balloons

2010-02-06T14:16:00.000-08:00

Look at how many lives I have going into stage 6!

There's something on the walls

2010-02-05T17:52:00.000-08:00

This was on a tree stage, so I don't think it's blubber... Maybe tree sap?

It has arrived...

2010-02-04T17:46:00.000-08:00

Yaaaay! The game looks pretty good. There is some fading on the top of the label, but otherwise nice. It even came with one of those Gameboy game holders, which I was not expecting. The weird thing was that it was just sent in just a regular mailing envelope. Thank goodness it didn't get damaged!

I have not played any games yet this evening, but I will certainly play some tomorrow. I'm too lazy and tired for excitement tonight...

Fun stuff for the day

2010-01-29T15:47:00.000-08:00

So here's what I got:

- Midway's Greatest Arcade Hits Vol. 1 for the N64 ( $9.99)

- Wizardry: Proving Grounds of the Mad Overlord for NES ( $2.99, worth $10.49 according to VGPG.COM)

- N64 Controller (which had GUM in the rumble pak port.. grr...)

- Sega Genesis Controller (that'll just have to go in the garbage since I don't have a Genesis).

I finally got a chance to play the N64 which works great. Playing Root Beer Tapper on it though was quite weird. It was slow. Trying to play Spy Hunter was weird as well. The, uh, "C" pad doesn't feel right, so I may need to consult my expert video game repair person to open it and fix it.

That Wizardry game was very weird. It was like playing Dragon Warrior with much less graphics and absolutely no sound. I got bored real fast.

I'm not having much luck with Ebay these past few days. Offers have been left ignored or just flat out denied without a counter offer. I've added a few other titles to the calendar that I'll keep my eye one, but this isn't really the best paycheck to be spending lots of money on games since rent is due...

I just bought a copy of Super Mario Land 2: 6 Golden Coins for $9.98. Lets hope that offer I put in for the other copy doesn't go through... although I doubt it will.. I can't wait for this game to come!!

We'll see if I have any luck in the next few days with any more games.

Lukie Games pulls through!

2010-01-23T15:23:00.000-08:00

I received a response from Lukie Games. And what you know, they're willing to exchange the game for me! Whooo!!

I'll be getting an envelope and mail that game out on Monday! Yay!

Afterthoughts of Lukie Games purchases

2010-01-23T10:01:00.000-08:00

After thinking abou the purchases made from Lukie Games, I'm pretty disappointed. My first experience with Lukie Games was back when I purchased Castelain. The shipping was extremely quick and the game was in excellent condition (minus some dust on the cart). I was very pleased and was looking foward to making another purchase from them.

Finally I made another puchase from Lukie Games, this time multiple games. The shipping took much longer than the previous purchase, but it wasn't Lukie's fault. I was irritated, but they arrived. To my disappointment, one of the games was NOT satisfactory:

I mean, look at this game! This is not Very Good as it was listed on the auction page. This is after I cleaned the game. The label is faded, it looks like something was spilled on it, and the label is literally coming off. All those nicks in the label are PART OF THE LABEL MISSING. Half of the top if the label is gone. To me, this is not acceptable from a top Ebay seller, especially without any warning.

When I opened Excitebike, it seemed like something was spilled on the inside of the game. The contacts were kind of sticky. It did come off and the game works just fine.

Boulder Dash had writing on the back of it. Whoever "Snyder" is should be slapped. Who writes their name on a game?! And in green?! It took a few tries with the whiteboard marker to get the writing off but it did come off.

The other games really had no issues. ALL THE GAMES needed to be opened and cleaned. The contacts were filthy. What happened to them being cleaned, as stated in their generic information on ALL their acution pages?

I have emailed Lukie Games and told them about the condition of Secret Scroll (even though I already gave them positive feedback). I told them how disappointed I was in the condition and asked if another purchase was made if they would verify the label was not as torn up as this one was. The hope is that instead of saying "sure, purchase another copy and we'll make sure it's in *cough* Very Good condition *cough*", that they'll replace my copy. I don't care if I have to pay for return shipping to get a better copy, I would just like a better one. My assuption is that this is not going to go my way, in which I will not purchase from them anymore. I hate for it to go that way, but I deserve to be happy!

On a side note, when I opened Laser Invasion, I was shocked to see such a huge board on the inside:

Look at that monster! It's, like, half the size of the game! And there isn't a battery for a save feature. So why the heck would it need to be so darn big? Who knows. Maybe it will make sense once I actually play the game.

Anyway, I will make sure to post any type of reply I get from Lukie Games and what I plan on doing from there.

FINALLY!

2010-01-22T19:04:00.000-08:00

My games have arrived!

All but one are in good shape. Poor, poor Secret Scroll...

Is USPS Broken?

2010-01-22T14:34:00.000-08:00

Where are my Lukie Games?!

It was dropped off at the post office on Jan 16 from Hollywood, FL and it just arrived in Las Vegas today! But why aren't they in my mailbox?! Are they really being that slow? Has my mail not been delivered yet today? Why did it take 6 days to get here?We shall know soon enough...

Thrift store hunting and Ebay goodies!

2010-01-15T19:12:00.000-08:00

Here's what I found in my endeavours today: Nintendo 64 ($15), V Rally '99 for N64($1.50), and Sonic the Hedgehog for Sega Genesis ($2.99). I know, I know, I don't own a Sega Genesis. That doesn't mean I can't get games before the system! It's kind of neat because this is the first Genesis thing I've ever owned in my life! It's a milestone! Both the system and the games look really good, like they've hardly been used. I need to invest in a controller for the N64, but that's not an immediate thing.

Onto the Ebay winnings! I decided to order a few items from Lukie Games off of ebay (in hopes of getting a 15% discount with an exclusive code that didn't end up working). What I ended up with was Excitebike, Laser Invasion, Boulder Dash, The Secret Scroll, and Spy Vs. Spy. All the games were $1.95 and the total for shipping was $10.75. I also used my $1.68 in Ebay Bucks, so a bit less there.

That's it for today. I'm looking at a Super Mario Land 1 and 2 lot for GameBoy on Ebay that is going for about $10. It ends sometime tomorrow. I'm also looking at a Final Fantasy Adventure for GameBoy that is mislabeled as Pokemon Blue that is going for about $6 that also ends tomorrow. We'll see how it goes, but I'm not too concerned if I don't get either.

Ice Climber and the quirky NES controller

2010-01-10T16:19:00.000-08:00

First, Ice Climber. This game finally showed up in my mailbox yesterday. According to the tracking number, the package only took THREE days to get here once it was received at the post office. What the heck? So I waited 4 days for the seller to print the label, then another 3 days to take it to the post office? Why? How annoying. But anyway, the game looks fine, needed some desparate cleaning, but works great.

Now for the quirky controller...

I bought a controller at Play-N-Trade here in town last Sunday. I didn't bother to try it out until yesterday, and to my discovery the buttons did not work. So I go back to the store and exchange it for another controller (and was told that he couldn't test the controller cause he didn't have a system, liar). I bring it home... and it doesn't work. Now before any one gets all upset, it SORTA works. I plug it into the Yobo and only the B button works. Different from the last controller, which only the directional pad worked. But with this controller, I plug it into my Nintendo in the living room (licensed, mind you) and it works just fine. Is there some sort of issue out there that I don't know about? I have never had this problem before. Weird.

I'm off to try and beat Super Mario Bros. 3.. again. Lets hope this doesn't end up like the last two times I tried where I went through the first 3 worlds and got NO LEAF items. How unlucky is that?!

Donkey Kong Gameboy Gameplay! Yeah!

2010-01-07T19:47:00.000-08:00

Here is the opening title screen:

As you can see here, the first few levels are taken from the original Donkey Kong arcade game:

Here a few screens from the game after the original levels:

I like how that last screen looks like Donkey Kong Junior. It's one of the "boss" stages.

Here is the first "boss" stage:

Here are videos of the two bonus stages. You get these by collecting all 3 items that are in a level (umbrella, hat, and whatever that third thing is):

My Donkey Kong has arrived!

2010-01-07T15:28:00.000-08:00

Yes, it finally came. Looks great. I've never attempted to clean a Game Boy game contacts, but then again they have never NOT worked before. The game does need a bit of a wipe-down since it's dusty, but other than that it looks great. I have not tested it yet, but I'm sure it will work fine. I need to rest for a bit after a long week at work, but then I will get down to trying it out!

Where is Ice Climber? I won it before I won this game! According to my tracking number, it just got proccessed through PENNSYLVANIA today. That jerk didn't bother to attempt to ship it until 7 days after I won the acution. Guess who's going to be getting a neutral rating? That loser. The aution page says estimated delivery date of 3 - 6 business days, not 7 days before they're even going to drop it in the mail....

Donkey Kong for Game Boy

2010-01-02T18:01:00.000-08:00

I happened to win this title on eBay.

My brother was out for the weekend, and he was mighty impressed with my NES collection. He talked about games of the past and brought this title up. I didn't recall it when he first mentioned it, but after watching a video of if on Youtube, I instantly remembered the game.

You basically go around these weird levels collecting a key to open a door in another part of the level. There are some enemies, some unusual contraptions, and several other things getting in your way. I remember playing this game a lot with my brother and I hope it continues to be enjoyable after I receive it.

Ice Climber!

2010-01-01T12:16:00.000-08:00

Game value: $11.45
Purchased for: $6.98!

This was brought to my attention yesterday, and it was a deal I could not pass up. Getting that game for about half it's value is pretty sweet!

That leaves me with 5 more games to purchase this month to keep on track for my 2010 goal!

I am looking at a few game lots, but depending on how pricey they get, I may end up waiting until next time I get paid to purchase anything else. We will see though.

What is that?!

2010-01-01T08:41:00.000-08:00

I was playing City Connection this morning, passing the time before I went to work, and this random thing came up in the top corner of the game:

Once I unpaused the game after taking the photo, I tried to get up to the top level to get it, but it disappeared. Not disappeared like off the screen cause I went to far, but just disappeared for no explainable reason!

I have no idea what it is. I've never seen it before in the game (and I've played it quite a bit), and there is nothing in the manual that describes something like this. It looks like a hot air balloon to me, but maybe it's supposed to be the heart that is described in the manual that is appears on the Paris stage. I was on the first stage, which is certainly not Paris...

What do you think it is?