Having a very relaxing weekend and playing SS4 with a buddy, we came to dicuss the collectibilty of video games. While I consider my self a gamer first and foremost, I am a collector too. We got into a discussion that games this generation and the previous, just don't seem to have that collectible mystique. Lets go back to the beginning and progress until today.
The very first games are very collectible of course. Pong, Space Wars, Asteriods, the goodies. These are collectible mainly because they were first and have so much history attached to them. Its like having a vintage car from the 1920's. Then lets move too the arcade boom. Games like Space Invaders, Donkey Kong, Pac Man/Ms. Pac Man, Galaga, Centipede, Joust, Robotron, and so many other games are collectible. The were so revolutionary in bringing electronic games to a larger audience. Japan had a shortage of 100 yen coins because of Space Invaders!!! Arcade games start popping up everywhere, even in funeral homes! Now this generation did have its garbage games, but at least it has games when you say 1980's arcade, the aforementioned games come to mind for those who lived the era.
Now shifting focus to the homeconsole market. The multiple incarnations of the Atari, Intellivision/Colecovision. These systems have some of that collectible mystique. They are true groundbreakers of the home console market, but the games themselves not to highly collectible. Most of the games where forgettable except to the most hardcore gamers and most games are readily available, but in a loose formate, no packaging. I consider it not to be that collectible, but much more so than the recent generation of games.
Now we move to the impact of Nintendo. A huge sucess with the Famicom/NES. Nintendo sucess was so influential that Mario became synomyus with Mickey Mouse. The NES does have its fair share of forgettable games, but like the Atari its impact in history is what makes it collectible. Along with the Famicom/NES, we have the Sega Master System. The SMS seems more collectible because it seems to be more of niche market and has its fair share of memorable games, namely bringing another big gaming mascot into the mix named Sonic the Hedge Hog.
Now we go to what I consider the greatest era of gaming and collectibilty, the 16-bit era. Arcades had a huge resurgence behind Capcom, Midway/Williams, Namco, SNK and others. On the homeconsole front NEC, Nintendo, and Sega all had consoles in Japan and North America. There was so much selection and companies were trying to out do each other with fun and orginal games. The PC Engine was dominating in Japan (unforunately not so much for its North American counter part, Turbo Grafx), the Mega Drive/Gensis came out shortly there after and Nintendo unleashed the Super Famicom/SNES, and our lovable SNK brought the NEO GEO to the home market to the hardest hardcore gamers (the system that I love). Gamers gobbled these games, placing Sega as the company that could go blow for blow with Nintendo on the other side of the Pacific and surprisingly NEC made great games along with other electronic devices. So many good games, so many games and consoles that were well taken care of, makes this generation in my opinion with the most collectible games.
Now we move toward the 32-bit generation, or the generation of the polygon. The Atari Jaguar and the 3DO tried to jump the competition but fell flat on their faces, and because of this the have a somewhat collectible black mark, because they were so bad, they are cool to collect (I personally don't get it). Sega released its Saturn, Sony entered the fray with its Playstation, and Nintendo revealed the N64. Now there were some great games and Sony helped make video games mainstream, which is good and bad. The good is that more money is going into video games keeping them alive, but the bad is many companies try to turn a quick buck churning out average and crappy games that are very forgettable and do not seem to have any collectible value. Sega stuck by their guns and still produced many hardcore gamer oriented games for the Saturn, Nintendo still catered to the younger crowd with the N64, and Sony took the role of Sega of the 16-bit era bringing games to a bigger "older" audience. I only really consider Saturn games collectible because of their hardcore edge. Most PSX and N64 titles are very forgettable and hold no real value. Oh, but let us not forget that SNK was still pushing right along with the NEO GEO, the system that refused to change
Now we come to the current generation. Sega leaped in first with the awesome gamer oriented Dreamcast. A fun system that died way too early. The Dreamcast in the future years will become collectible just like the 16-bit era games. Now we have the PS2, the Xbox, and Gamecube. When I think of these systems, only thing of two games. Halo and Grand Theft Auto, and the sad thing is GTA is a running series that started on the PC. There has been good games in this era so far, but nothing nearly as fun as the Dreamcast and the 16-bit days. The market has become flooded with so many average games and people keep snatching them. There is very little orginality, sequel after sequel, and even recent SNKP releases for our beloved NEO GEO feel less than collectible.
Well thanks for reading. I'm sorry I didn't include any handhelds, not really my area of interest, well except for NGPC. If you got something to add, chime in
EDIT: GRAMMAZ! ie misspellings, missing words, because I'm an engineer
The very first games are very collectible of course. Pong, Space Wars, Asteriods, the goodies. These are collectible mainly because they were first and have so much history attached to them. Its like having a vintage car from the 1920's. Then lets move too the arcade boom. Games like Space Invaders, Donkey Kong, Pac Man/Ms. Pac Man, Galaga, Centipede, Joust, Robotron, and so many other games are collectible. The were so revolutionary in bringing electronic games to a larger audience. Japan had a shortage of 100 yen coins because of Space Invaders!!! Arcade games start popping up everywhere, even in funeral homes! Now this generation did have its garbage games, but at least it has games when you say 1980's arcade, the aforementioned games come to mind for those who lived the era.
Now shifting focus to the homeconsole market. The multiple incarnations of the Atari, Intellivision/Colecovision. These systems have some of that collectible mystique. They are true groundbreakers of the home console market, but the games themselves not to highly collectible. Most of the games where forgettable except to the most hardcore gamers and most games are readily available, but in a loose formate, no packaging. I consider it not to be that collectible, but much more so than the recent generation of games.
Now we move to the impact of Nintendo. A huge sucess with the Famicom/NES. Nintendo sucess was so influential that Mario became synomyus with Mickey Mouse. The NES does have its fair share of forgettable games, but like the Atari its impact in history is what makes it collectible. Along with the Famicom/NES, we have the Sega Master System. The SMS seems more collectible because it seems to be more of niche market and has its fair share of memorable games, namely bringing another big gaming mascot into the mix named Sonic the Hedge Hog.
Now we go to what I consider the greatest era of gaming and collectibilty, the 16-bit era. Arcades had a huge resurgence behind Capcom, Midway/Williams, Namco, SNK and others. On the homeconsole front NEC, Nintendo, and Sega all had consoles in Japan and North America. There was so much selection and companies were trying to out do each other with fun and orginal games. The PC Engine was dominating in Japan (unforunately not so much for its North American counter part, Turbo Grafx), the Mega Drive/Gensis came out shortly there after and Nintendo unleashed the Super Famicom/SNES, and our lovable SNK brought the NEO GEO to the home market to the hardest hardcore gamers (the system that I love). Gamers gobbled these games, placing Sega as the company that could go blow for blow with Nintendo on the other side of the Pacific and surprisingly NEC made great games along with other electronic devices. So many good games, so many games and consoles that were well taken care of, makes this generation in my opinion with the most collectible games.
Now we move toward the 32-bit generation, or the generation of the polygon. The Atari Jaguar and the 3DO tried to jump the competition but fell flat on their faces, and because of this the have a somewhat collectible black mark, because they were so bad, they are cool to collect (I personally don't get it). Sega released its Saturn, Sony entered the fray with its Playstation, and Nintendo revealed the N64. Now there were some great games and Sony helped make video games mainstream, which is good and bad. The good is that more money is going into video games keeping them alive, but the bad is many companies try to turn a quick buck churning out average and crappy games that are very forgettable and do not seem to have any collectible value. Sega stuck by their guns and still produced many hardcore gamer oriented games for the Saturn, Nintendo still catered to the younger crowd with the N64, and Sony took the role of Sega of the 16-bit era bringing games to a bigger "older" audience. I only really consider Saturn games collectible because of their hardcore edge. Most PSX and N64 titles are very forgettable and hold no real value. Oh, but let us not forget that SNK was still pushing right along with the NEO GEO, the system that refused to change
Now we come to the current generation. Sega leaped in first with the awesome gamer oriented Dreamcast. A fun system that died way too early. The Dreamcast in the future years will become collectible just like the 16-bit era games. Now we have the PS2, the Xbox, and Gamecube. When I think of these systems, only thing of two games. Halo and Grand Theft Auto, and the sad thing is GTA is a running series that started on the PC. There has been good games in this era so far, but nothing nearly as fun as the Dreamcast and the 16-bit days. The market has become flooded with so many average games and people keep snatching them. There is very little orginality, sequel after sequel, and even recent SNKP releases for our beloved NEO GEO feel less than collectible.
Well thanks for reading. I'm sorry I didn't include any handhelds, not really my area of interest, well except for NGPC. If you got something to add, chime in
EDIT: GRAMMAZ! ie misspellings, missing words, because I'm an engineer
Last edited:
That game is going to be mega collectible.
Plus I still can never find the spare cash. Oh well, I still love to play the game.
