godslabrat

I have several of my game room electronics plugged into UPSes. Mostly the roter, cable modem, DVR and cable box, because I don't want them powering off at any time. APC has a really nice 29.99 UPS which I can't reccomened at all for computer use, but is great for TV/console/stereo setups. Do you need one? Absolutely not. I use it for convenience sake, and you might enjoy it since you won't have your game crash due to a power dropout. However, realistically, I'd say you and I are the exception, not the rule.

Well, sure, it gives me all the inconvenient facts I need. but now it looks like I'm SOL. You call that HELP?!?! :-) Oh well, I could always mount a basic CRT nearby. I have a feeling they'll be cheap and plentiful for the rest of my lifetime.

Last year, I upgraded my gaming rig to include a sweet 37" LCD HDTV. Granted, it's not the best HD set there is, but it was the best I could afford. I chose LCD because, to me, it offered the best deal over CRT, DLP, and Plasma. As you can probably guess, one of my most primary concerns was how it would make my classic games look. I'm pleased to say that the results are mostly satisfactory. while there were a few unforseen side effects of scaling 20-year-old games up to 1080p, I honestly wouldn't want it any other way. That said, there is one little flaw which has kept this from being a complete success: light gun games. The LCD set does not register with my NES Zappe, and I'll bet good money it doesn't work with ROB. While this eliminates less than 15 games from my list of possibilities, I'd certainly like to correct that if possible. It is my understanding that the light gun games don't work because the refresh rate of an LCD monitor is still not quite what it would be for a CRT screen, and thus the gun doesn't see the screen properly. If true, that means this TV will never work with any Zapper games. Okay, I can live with that. However, going forward, I'll probably be replacing this set in 5 years... are there any predicted advancements in technology that would make future sets compatible with older light guns? FWIW: While DLP may be an option in the future, let's assume I won't warm up to CRT or Plasma anytime soon.

Rocket Ranger for the NES. This game pissed in my cheerios, ran over my dog, raped my mom, and got Star Trek: Enterprise cancelled. Yeah, it was that bad. Words cannot express how much I resent that anyone ever paid actual money for that game. And this is coming from someone who owns Cheetahmen II. Stuck on a desert island with only those two choices, I'd take the fuckin' Cheetahmen.

I dunno, I've been in classic gaming forums for 12ish years now, it's just that I'm new to this partucular one. Hope I haven't been noobish...

This is probably why I was so eager to jump into BluRay/HD-DVD. I hate the idea of download-only media. It's just too transient-- you pay good money, but if the service you like doesn't last, your money is still gone and you're likely to be left with nothing (ie, The Sega Channel). At least if BluRay tanks, I'll still be able to play my movies on my existing player until something else comes along. That's not really what I mean though. You'd still have the files (ala iTunes). As long as they were DRM free, you could play them on any computer that supported the file type (like mp3s do). Yeah, but judging by what the industry is indicating, I doubt any quality video will be DRM-free.

This is probably why I was so eager to jump into BluRay/HD-DVD. I hate the idea of download-only media. It's just too transient-- you pay good money, but if the service you like doesn't last, your money is still gone and you're likely to be left with nothing (ie, The Sega Channel). At least if BluRay tanks, I'll still be able to play my movies on my existing player until something else comes along. To put an on-topic spin on this: Where would the classic gaming hobby be today if all classic games were download-only? It's likely that 80% of these games, or more, would be lost forever, simply because it was no longer viable to spend the money to offer them to customers.

While I know this is a tad off-topic for this forum, I'd like to give a vote of confidence to the new HD formats. I'm a Blu-Ray user, and the boost in image quality is spectacular-- well worth the initial expense in a new TV, player, and movies. (YMMV) And although the sticker price is high on the movies, the same pricing logic that applies to DVDs applies to these movies too... wait a few months, and it'll go down. I've seen BR discs on Amazon for as little as $14... which granted is still more than $7, but that's about what you'd pay for a normal new-release DVD. Right now, I'm averaging about $22 for most new release titles, and I don't see this as being significantly different than what I was previously spending on DVDs. However, and I can't stress this enough, DO NOT buy into this if you're the kind of person who doesn't like the idea of a format war (something that never applied to DVD to any great extent). I went into this knowing there was a risk, but that's not something everyone is prepared to do.

Back in the 90s there was a big national Nintendo competition. The people who got the highest scores were given one of the carts used in the tournament. I think I still have mine somewhere.

I've heard of this, but I always factored in 20 years instead of 35...

I've got a friend who doesn't understand how I can be into gaming with such "expensive" games. I politely point out that a $50 game is much better deal than a $20 movie, since the movie will last for two hours, and the game can last for months, thus requiring you to buy less of them to keep entertained. Of course, I buy plenty of movies myself, so the argument is entirely academic. No, I'm not worried about the price of the games, just the size of my paycheck.

I actually make it a rule to play everything in my collection. Although I tend to focus more on some games than others, I'm taking the demise of my favorite systems as a chance to "catch up" on games I missed out on before. I don't want my collection to become more about the buying than the playing. I'm near the 1,000 game mark, so naturally some games see more play than others, but in the grand scheme of things, everything in this house will be played.

I agree with Lord Thag. I don't care too much for multicarts, but they do serve a few great purposes. I'm working on a few right now, actually. For the collections that mean the most to me, I want the real thing and I play the real thing. Examples of this would be my NES and Genesis collections. My Atari, OTOH, is a system I'm more inclined to use multicarts with, because I'm not quite as fanatical about it, as long as I have the ROM in some physical form. And if you want to play prototype games, you're cheating yourself if you don't get repros or multicarts.

Hi all. I've been thinking of putting together collections of certain games that I would like to have, but don't really think would be practical to collect. Cheif among these would be the Mystique titles, along with other select rarities. I'd like to have them for the novelty, but A) I can't see myself shelling out that kind of money and B) I'd hate to take them away from a collector who would treasure having the real cart. My thought has been to compile them into a multicart. It'd be easier to spend the money for one multicart than all the individual games. The question is, is it better to try and make my own cart, or have someone make one for me?

Okay, here's why I don't have a PSP: 1) Games. There are ~4 games on the PSP that really interest me, and those are all B-list titles. Nothing I'd buy a system for, but games I'd like to have if I DID have the system. 2) Price. Oh, sure, $170 is well within my budget, but I'm not so well off that I don't weigh my options. $170 gets me three Wii games, six Blu-Ray movies, a stack of paperback books, or (heaven forbid) a student loan payment. Maybe it's affordable now, but the PSP hasn't made me WANT to spend the money. 3) The Extras. Granted, this is actually an asset to the system, but I also need a new iPod for unrelated reasons. If I had almost $200 in my pocket, I'd rather put it toward a new iPod, which will be much better for video and mp3. 4) Having to "hack" a system just to get the best functionality rubs me the wrong way. 5) I really don't need another portable. The whole point behind a portable is to get a lot of use out of a very small item, ideal for travel. My travel bag is already pretty full, why add to it? Now, I admit that many of the above only apply to me, and I'm okay with that. The PSP is a slick little system and, while I've looked one over many times, I just can't talk myself into it. I just don't see a good Cost::Benefit tradeoff for me. OTOH, my DS is my constant travelling companion. I like the variety of games, and I like that I can have TWO games in the unit at the same time. That way, I can just pick up the DS, no extra games, and have at least a little variety. Granted, I'm sure there are solutions that'll let you run PSP games off a memory card, but it lacks the simlicity of just grabbing a DS and GBA game and running out the door. The DS has the games I want to play, it's a great travel tool, and the chicks seem to love it.

I know it's not exactly the best MP3 player for the money, but has anyone tried this? Link

This is pretty much my opinion. Except for big franchise titles, where there is genuine effort to make the manual enjoyable in its own right, I only check the manual AFTER I start playing. And half the time, I end up just looking up a walkthrough or something, because the information that SHOULD be in the manual isn't. Because, as you said, most manuals don't really justify their own existence anymore. When I was a kid, I had a ritual. Mom/Dad would buy me a new game, and since the store was an hour away from home, reading the manual helped me pass the long car ride home. I'd have that manual read back-to-back at least twice. Now that I have a driver's license, and UPS delivers half my games to my house anyway, this ritual has been retired.

I think it'd be an even bigger score for the insecure, anti-Nintendo community. "Nintendo is gay. Even the guy who invented Mario is gay. He even admitted it! That's why the Wii controller looks like a dick and vibrates!"

Hi all... Many moons ago, I used to frequent a really cool site that had tons of articles on gameboy, GBC, GBA, and all the different variations and limited edition systems. It was a lot like |tsr's archive, only for gameboy. The URL was something really simple, like gb32.com or dmgx.com. It was only four, maybe five letters. For the life of me, I can't remember what it was (that was several computers ago, my bookmarks have long since been lost) Does anyone have any idea what this site would be?

I'm on the south side, just a few blocks down from I-240.

Oh, crap, I remember all that. I just made the big move from PA to Ok, and the move would have been MUCH simpler had I not been hauling my whole collection. But... the reward of setting everything up in my new apartment and starting to design my dream game room made it all worthwhile. Hang in there. Moving sucks, but there's a reward in the end. The fruits of my labor

Oh, sorry. I was doing some research on the PSP and I misread that. My mistake, sorry.

The PSP was released in May of 2003, making it a good 4 years (and change) old now. Were this not a handheld system, Sony would probably be hinting at the PSP2 by now, but it seems that instead they're encouraging it to have a longer lifespan. I guess they're imitating Nintendo's handheld paradigm, trying to maximize one system for as long as possible. Unlike Nintendo, however, Sony is not constantly upgrading the system, merely lowering the price every now and then. It's only now that we've finally seen the first significant redesign of the PSP, the "Slim and Lite" series announced earlier this year. What am I getting at? Do you really think Sony is going to try and go 7+ years without making a PSP2? The PSP is hardly a failure, but it's certainly hasn't demolished the DS the way everyone thought it would (quite the opposite, in fact). Is Sony seriously going to try and take on Nintendo for another 3 years with just a small revision?

I dunno, but it seems like EVERYTHING in gamestop is in terrible conditions. Do they only take trade-ins from people with meth habits, or what?

While I completely sympathize with you wanting a non-yellowed SNES, your chances of finding one are slim. 90+% of them yellow simply due to exposure to the world.