Have you ever had to downsize your collection?

[bluejay]

I see a lot of people on AA these days selling a mountain of stuff for super cheap to downsize their collection. Maybe you might have bought way to much stuff and you lost interest or you just can't fit everything in your house/apartment/whatever. So have you ever had to downsize your collection at one point or the other? I sure haven't. All my systems fit on a single(big) desk with a bit of stacking, and all my games fit into a drawer and 4 shoeboxes(one for the 2600, one for a bit more 2600 with some Colecovision and Nintendo stuff, one for my VIC-20, CoCo, more Nintendo and some controllers, and one for my game boxes and 5200, and the drawer for my PS1, PS2, Switch, DS, 3DS, Gameboy, etc.). I'm one of those people who need to "upsize":)

[Eltigro]

My ex-wife made me get rid of some stuff one time.  I had two Saturns and got rid of one.  Later I got rid the wife.

[+cvga]

I've been collecting for about 30 years and have accumulated a ton of stuff. I sorta have room for it but it wouldn't hurt to downside somewhat. I just don't have the time.

[ClassicGMR]

I had a massive collection that spanned an entire apartment. My mother didn't want to rent out the upstairs apartment anymore so my wife and I took it - we were already renting the downstairs. I turned on the heat and electric and turned it into a gaming hangout. The kitchen was where we played our board/card/miniatures games. The double parlor was split between classic and current systems. One bedroom was set up as a PC LAN party room. The other bedroom was my library. I owned almost 1000 cartridges, discs and PC games at the high point of my collecting.

 

When I got divorced my mother wanted to sell the house. I had to move but didn't mind at that point. It did cause me to put almost everything up for sale. I never went back to massive collections. I honestly never had the desire to do it again.

 

I now literally have own system, one cart (or loader) except for my PS3 and Switch. I have:

Intellivision System Changer with Harmony cart (Hyperkin RetroN 77 incoming)

Intellivision II with LTO Flash and System Changer

Nintendo NES with Everdrive N8 (RetroUSB AVS system incoming)

Pound Technology Challenger system SNES with Super Everdrive

Nintendo 64 with Everdrive 64 v2.5

Sega Genesis 2 (incoming) with Everdrive (incoming)

Panasonic 3DO with MNemo loader

Sega Dreamcast with GDEmu

Sony Playstation with PSIO

Sony Playstation 2 with Free McBoot and HDD

Sony Playstation 3 w/ 45 games

Nintendo Switch with 22 games

Multiple RetroPie 3B+ setups

 

I'm currently working on HDMI solutions for the older systems. AV Converters and HDMI adapters and such.

Edited April 19, 2020 by ClassicGMR
clarification

[0078265317]

4 hours ago, Eltigro said:

Later I got rid the wife.

Smart choice?

Edited April 20, 2020 by 0078265317

[spacecadet]

When I started with this hobby, I had the idea that I was going to open a museum - this would have been a novel idea at the time, because it was still back when retro or classic video game stuff was just considered "old". People were still throwing it out. So I took it as a mission to preserve as much of it as I could, and eventually I would somehow display it for the public. My goal at the time was a physical museum, because the internet wasn't even really big yet then.

 

I ended up with a really large collection of mostly boxed systems, and I lived in a small New York apartment. It gradually grew to where it was occupying space in every room. When my wife and I moved to a house, a lot of it went into the attic, some to the basement... and still, somehow every other room in the house had some of it too. At around that same time, I realized that this museum thing was never going to happen. Not only had my life goals just become a little more realistic, but a bunch of other people by then had had that same idea and some had even actually done it. So what was I still doing with all this stuff, most of which I never touched? It was just hoarding at that point.

 

So I sold a bunch of systems and the games I had for them; most I don't regret, but a few I do. But I mean, I still have something like 32 game systems and classic computers, plus the physical games to go with most (a few I just have either multicarts or SD cards/floppy emulators). I still feel like that's kind of crazy for one guy, and I've still been selling things here and there. Of those systems, though, I'd say 25 or so are systems I know I'd regret getting rid of if I ever did. So that's probably about the right number for me. 25 systems and a good assortment of games for each. Any more than that is too much; any less and I feel like I'd be on Ebay looking to replace something I felt empty without.

[Steven Pendleton]

No. My collection is going to get bigger by one game today. I have an online meeting today here in 16 minutes and then I am going to Akiba. Hopefully I can find what I am looking for and that the stores are not all closed.

[turboxray]

I left a bunch of stuff in boxes when I moved last year. It was last minute, so I couldn't take it with me (last minute job offer). Two saturns with cords and gamepads and a couple of games, pcfx, like 5 genesis systems and some loose games + my flashcart, a master system with one or two games. Tons of cables, controllers, etc. I bet someone was happy to find that box haha. I think I had a bunch of nes manuals and some nes boxes.

Edited April 20, 2020 by turboxray

[HoshiChiri]

I've never had to, no- I've voluntarily gotten rid of things here & there, and my non-gaming collections have had massive purges. It's always been by choice though- sort of a 'between shelf space & having this DVD set, I choose shelf space'.

 

For games it's not been an issue as, by the time I could afford to really amass stuff quickly, I was already at the point of finding the space first, then getting the new thing. I think having a Steel Battalion controller would be neat, but I've nowhere to put that behemoth, so I don't buy one. As a result, my game collection's grown much more slowly- the higher costs help too. I may find myself downsizing in the near future, but I don't see much coming out of the game collection, quite frankly.

[Tanooki]

Willingly, no.  Forced to by situation of money and well no money or too little coming in between 04-05.  Nothing like a very slowly pulled off bandaid one mm at a time.

 

Ever since I've been different.  I don't care to have a thousand plus items or even half that, nor do I keep around dead weight.  I'm fine dumping stuff, at first I'd take it too far, but finding balance has taken time and while probably never attainable it's closer than ever.

[Keatah]

I wanted to open a museum at one time. This back in the 1990's. Some of the stuff I had was already 15-20 years old. And I kept accumulating more, 2 or 3 20x20 storage lockers worth of every cart and disk and every console ever make. I even thought about inviting Jobs & Woz over to personally endorse my collection, and then I'd become famous and make a million by just letting peeps over to see my stuff. And I eventually I had to do a small warehouse to contain the ever-growing mound of half-working arcade games that I got from defunct arcades liquidating their dilapidated crap. Rotting wood. de-converged monitors with 1 beam at half-output, noisy power supplies, intermittent and sloppy joysticks. It was garbage.

 

There came a point when I couldn't enjoy any of it. None of it. All of it was becoming burdensome and expensive just to keep clustered in "offsite" storage. So I started downsizing. Dumped the warehouse. Took a few things to the house and ultimately filled 2 garages. Dumped the storage lockers and "saved" about a garage's worth from that.

 

And even that was too much. It overran the house and was worse than any kind of hoarding. Had stuff stacked behind the toilet, in the rafters, behind the appliances, everywhere!

 

During the past few years I got the house cleaned out. Got most of the garages emptied. Most went for scrap. Sold a few select pieces and rarities for good profit and that was that. There's still some left here and there.

 

But my "keep stuff" is a reasonable cache of PC parts and a few working examples + Apple II and III stuff. Most all the III stuff is gone though.

 

Was a crazy and heady time. And I gave up on the notion of having Jobs and Woz pay a visit. It was all trash anyways.

 

[Keatah]

Don't be sad about it. It's like a renewal celebration. I enjoy my II series machines and vintage PC with an enthusiasm that was not possible when buried under all that junk. Really. Just having the time available and not having to move things around just to set something else up is a blessing. Never again will I have more than 1/2 room of electronic & computing stuff for hobbies.

 

In fact I might pull out my IIgs material and get it rolling. I'm afraid to look at those batteries though.

 

Edited April 23, 2020 by Keatah

[Atari2008]

I've downsized if I've needed more money or ran out of space, in my experience with the exception of rare items, like something hard to find from back in the day or a homebrew that was released in limited numbers, I found I haven't missed things I've sold. Though sometimes I'll sell a console only to buy the same one again a few years down the road lol. I would say I have found I haven't missed the stuff as much as I thought I would, the extra space can be nice, besides it's not long until I add another classic console to my collection to take its place. I say if it's something you can get again down the road if you miss it, downsizing won't be a big deal.

[bluejay]

9 hours ago, Keatah said:

Don't be sad about it. It's like a renewal celebration. I enjoy my II series machines and vintage PC with an enthusiasm that was not possible when buried under all that junk. Really. Just having the time available and not having to move things around just to set something else up is a blessing. Never again will I have more than 1/2 room of electronic & computing stuff for hobbies.

 

In fact I might pull out my IIgs material and get it rolling. I'm afraid to look at those batteries though.

 

I'm sad that vintage games and computers ended up in the dump.

[Keatah]

Oh. That. Running auctions and selling stuff resulted in too much lollygagging and dilly-dallying. Not interested in setting meeting times and dealing with no-shows or endless arguments for 50% off.

[Atari2008]

Selling things really becomes time consuming and a job in and of itself and sometimes for very little return, it's part of the reason why I end up with stuff in the closet as sometimes I just don't want to deal with the tediousness.

[Two-in-the-Belfry]

I'm considering selling my 2600 carts and getting a Harmony cart, but I'm torn as to whether or not I'll go through with it.

[Keatah]

IMHO I'd just stick with Atari/Sears, Activision, Imagic, 20th Century Fox, and Data Age. Maybe Tigervision, CBS and Coleco. Anything less is filler material. And copycat material.

 

Keep those, and use Harmony to pick up all the rest.

[Razzie.P]

I've never "had to" downsize, but I'm always feeling like I "need to," if that makes sense.

[Magmavision2000]

I'm going to repeat what Razzie.P said. So far, I haven't had a need to downsize, but there are some things I either want to sell, but have some sort of sentimental value to the items, or stuff I just don't need but isn't valuable (and I don't want to trash anything). Although I do want to expand my collection (mainly either 70s systems, or early Japanese systems), but if I do, somethings going.

 

I want to focus more on getting games for my 10 systems (the only one that has a decent collection is my 2600 with 65 or so games) so no new consoles for me in the meantime.

 

 

TL;DR: No, but I do (and do not) want to.

Edited April 24, 2020 by Magmavision2000

[joeatari1]

I was never forced to downsize but when I was about 18 I chose to sell my NES and three 2600s.  I had about 40 games for my NES, and 150 2600 games.  The three 2600s were a heavy sixer, light sixer and 4 switch.  I regretted selling them after a few months.  But hey, car stereos are expensive too!  Sold it all for about $200.00.  Not enough.

[Keatah]

If ever there was a waste it's car stereos.

 

It simply becomes impractical and annoying listening at those loud volume levels you paid ohh-so-much money for. It's a novelty that's gone in a week. I mean the stuff that's stock and standard is more than good enough. Dub rides are all too stereotypical too!

 

 

[Two-in-the-Belfry]

On 4/23/2020 at 5:28 PM, Keatah said:

IMHO I'd just stick with Atari/Sears, Activision, Imagic, 20th Century Fox, and Data Age. Maybe Tigervision, CBS and Coleco. Anything less is filler material. And copycat material.

 

Keep those, and use Harmony to pick up all the rest.

That's not a bad idea! I've definitely got some games I really don't need. I'll probably go physical on homebrews, too.

[Keatah]

There's sub-genres in homebrew too. Do you want all the SpiceWare games? Do you want all the ChampGames games? Do you want all the bb games?

 

[Newsdee]

I don't like to get rid of things, and being aware of that helps me think twice before I buy something.

 

I do agree that original stuff from some companies is more worth keeping than others (in my eyes at least) so I could prioritize if I had to.

I also own flash carts for almost every system I have (if it exists) and I have FPGAs that are as good as the real thing in terms of timing.

 

That helps me put things in perspective, e.g. am I keeping something just to play the games? (in that case it may not be needed anymore),

or do I really care about it as a historical artifact? (for any reason, could be sentimental value or I feel it's neat to have on the shelf, etc.).