touching up carts

[+RangerG]

Sometimes I have "touched-up" my cart labels. For instance, Coleco carts tend to rub white along the front bend. I thus color in with black marker and it looks pretty good to the naked eye. Sometimes I use other colored markers to spruce up a knicked up cart's label. It actually makes them look much better, but this is probably a collecting "sin" to some/many people. What do you think? Did I ruin my carts? I like the way they look and they are my carts so I'm happy with the few I did, but I realize some people might feel differently. -- RG

[Genki]

Remind me not to buy or trade anything from you.

 

Retouching may be OK but I'd cry if you accidently slipped on a "9" or "10" cart like Quadran

[Joel D. Park]

As far as I'll go may be glueing down a loose corner on a label, but I don't think I'd touch up with marker or anything. That's kind of like repainting an valuable antique piece of furnature. Maybe not..

[Albert]

I've certainly reattached loose labels and glued down the corners of labels that were peeling up (can anyone say Parker Brothers?), but I've never taken a marker to a game. I usually try to clean games before selling or trading them, but have never tried to mask any damage. And I'm always careful to describe any when doing trades or putting games up for auction.

 

..Al

[Tempest]

I've fixed wrinkled and loose labels by gluing them down, but I don't know about marker. I've used a black marker only once, on my Silver Label Gravitar. The end label had a small tear in the lower right corner (far away from the text), and the white from the edge of the tear really showed so I used a little bit of marker on it. No biggie, but if I ever traded it I'd let the person know.

 

Actually now that you mention it, I have used a black marker on those damn Coleco carts. It really does touch them up nicely, and since they're part of my permenent collection it really doesn't matter. I never touch up stuff I trade though (other than glueing down loose labels).

 

Tempest

 

[ 10-23-2001: Message edited by: Tempest ]

[StanJr]

Dude, if it makes you happy, you can draw big yellow smilies on every single one. If you are trying to make your collection look better, no big. (when I was a kid, I put a big Ghostbuster sticker on the label of my Ghostbuster cart )

Trading is where you get into the thick of it. I'd say, if you ever traded any of them, you'd probably want to let people know about the touch-up.

Other than that, I say mark away! Wheee!

 

In need of some touch-ups myself, Stan

[videotwit]

Ben-

 

I totally agree with you -- but only in theory.

 

I'm not so sure that the Classic Video Game market is as advanced as it'd need to be for these types of things to significantly affect a carts value. This may just be my perception, but I see people buying these things tending to go for what immediately looks best. I certainly don't worry about how my collection is going to deteriorate, other than just going through the trouble of leaving stuff out of the sun and not getting it wet.

 

Maybe that's just me though. I'm not in it for the money, and maybe that's the catch point here. I don't equate any of my Atari games to any of the artwork I own. While I'd never try to personally restore my Pierre Bonnard lithograph, I don't have a problem regluing a label to a 2600 cart. That being said, I also wouldn't ever take a marker to a cart.

 

Everything affects value, and it's everyone's responsibility to decide how much of that risk they're willing to take. I just don't see much chance of a cart with a reglued label selling for an amount thats significantly less for an original with the label completely detached.

[Skatepunk60]

I do the same thing man i dont really care about the value unless its rare and i can trade it for some more fun common carts but id rather have some now worthless nice looking carts than some still not very worthful(for lack of a better word)crappy looking carts but i just collect for the fun of it i have traded three carts in my collecting lifetime (all to joel) but if i trade something its in a nice untouched condition (they can mark it up if they want).