One Man's Trash: My Game Find

After watching The Game Chasers, I was inspired to look around my local thrift shop for some old games to no avail.  In fact the only product I came up with was the Sega Sports Pad, amazingly complete in box.  This was a trackball controller with two buttons for the Sega Master System.  The nice thing about early Sega controllers was that they usually could be used for Atari & Commodore consoles and computers.  I would have picked this up if it wasn't for the $15.99 price tag.  I had to double check just to make sure it wasn't an old label from another store but it was their price.

Moving on, I decided to take a look on Craigslist and sure enough I had a lead in my own town.  Someone was advertising a few random carts for $1.00 or less each.  At that price, i'll pick up just about any game cart.  He had listed; Yoshi's Cookie for NES, 4-in-1 Funpack Volume II, Daedalian Opus and Paperboy for Game Boy and last he had a Genesis game called High Seas Havoc.  Nothing jaw dropping but Yoshi's Cookie and Paperboy peaked my interest.

After a few e-mails and text messages we arrange a time and decide to meet at the Taco Bell near my house.  About two hours before were supposed to meet, I get a text and he said he found a few more games and would bring them along.

We meet up and he had a few more Game Boy titles but amongst them was a slightly larger cartridge.  Turns out he had a copy of Wario Land for the Virtual Boy.  Instantly I asked him if he had the system but he said it broke years ago.  Other notable games were Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakining and Grand Theft Auto both for Game Boy.  In the end, I walked away paying $7.00 bucks for the lot feeling completely satisfied.

When I got home I checked my games against current used retail prices on RarityGuide.com and found I really made out on the deal (See below).  As I come across more sweet deals, i'll keep you informed but you do the same.  Let me know what great deals you've come up with in the comments.  Happy hunting!

NES:
Yoshi's Cookie - Nintendo - 1993 - $5.00 Loose (Paid - $0.50)


SNES:
WWF Super Wrestlemania - LJN - 1992 - $4.00 Loose (Paid - $0.50)

Game Boy:
4-in-1 Funpack Volume II - Interplay - 1993 - $5.00 Loose (Paid - $0.75)
Daedalian Opus - Vic Tokai - 1990 - $3.00 Loose (Paid - $0.75)
Legend of Zelda: Links Awakining - Nintendo - 1993 - $24.00 Loose (Paid - $1.00)
Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves - Virgin - 1992 - $8.00 Loose (Paid - FREEBIE!)

Game Boy Color:
Chase HQ: Secret Police - Metro3D - 1999 - $10.00 Loose (Paid - $1.00)
Grand Theft Auto - Rockstar - 1999 - $8.00 Loose (Paid - $0.75)
Paperboy - Midway - 1999 - $8.00 Loose (Paid - $0.75)

Sega Genesis:
High Seas Havoc - Data East - 1993 - $7.00 Loose (Paid - $0.50)

Virtual Boy:
Wario Land - Nintendo - 1995 - $32.00 Loose (Paid - $0.50)

Memory Lane: FuncoLand... Bring Home the Fun

During the course of my travels in the web, I ran into some old FuncoLand commercials. Unlike my view of current brick & mortar video game stores, my memories of FuncoLand were far more exiting.

FuncoLand was the first store I had seen selling only video games and accessories. As a child admist the 3rd and 4th generations of gaming, it was amazing.  You could buy new and used consoles and games, sell your old ones and try out any game in the store.

Using the archive.org "Way Back Machine", I was able to find images of the FuncoLand webpage from late 1996 and early 1997.  I was intrigued to see this information with the given prespective of being a gamer in 2012.

I remember always taking these newspaper style price guides you got at the counter home with me. I would add together trade back values for the games I had made the mistake of purchasing. Even at the time you could get some really great deals on used items. Below is an image of the NES used price list from 1997.

Not bad... Power Glove for $6.99 (nowadays you can fetch one from $50.00-$200.00), Rock N Roller for $0.79 (I can't even find a current used price for that piece of crap) and a U-Force for $1.99 (which go for $50.00-$150)!

Another interesting list was for the Nintendo Virtual Boy. I never owned this system and even after trying the display at the long closed Kay-Bee Toy Store, I still wanted this eyesore.

Amazingly in 1997, you could buy their one each of their entire stock for less than $150.00.


The last list I want to talk about is for the Panasonic 3DO. I always wanted this system even though at the time, I knew little about it and had never seen one in person.

Lucienne’s Quest, with the exception of DinoPark Tycoon is the rarest US title for the 3DO. A copy of this RPG could sell for $90-$400 today depending on condition. In 1997 you could get a used copy for $19.99.


Check out the old website using the "Way Back Machine" and also check out my FuncoLand Collection on Youtube.


Do you have any fond memories of FuncoLand you would like to share?  Get a conversation started by leaving comments on the blog and over at the youtube channel.

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