What's the Primary Source of Your Collection?

[Crabmaster2000]

A lot of my buying is from online forums like this. My best bet locally has been kijiji, followed by one particular pawn shop. Didn't get to many chance to go garage sale-ing this year, but when I do get to go its usually pretty good.

[BumbleChump]

Edit: Woops, I didn't see this thread.



I only find stuff in flea markets. I've had no luck at all at garage sales, and everytime I go to a thrift store, someone steals all the discs from their cases! Craigslist is completely worthless for games. It's mostly ads for online stores, modding services, and terrible deals. $50 for a yellow SNES with no cables anyone?

My area is strange. There are absolutely no resellers at flea markets, but that's because there aren't enough people selling games around here to make reselling worth it. Or it could be that everyone here has more important things to do in Los Angeles county. But when I do find games, it's usually something pretty spectacular. $50 R.O.B. mint in deluxe box, $15 Time Gal, $10 Sega Saturn, that kind of thing.

[flojocabron]

Wayyyyy Back then fleamarkets and yard sales.

Now: Fleamarkets and Gamestop (but less and less now)

Most of my collection was started back in the early 2000's. I still buy stuff now. But from the two fleamarkets near me. There are a few thrifts stores but games dont come by too often.

I have yet to buy from ebay. I have an account but honestly, I've never used it.

I am not a hardcore CIB man. I buy damaged cases with games in them. As long as the cart label is good and the price is nice, then it's soon mine.

I still pick up the occasional game from GS. Mostly now PSP and DS games. If the price is right some Wii and PS3 games. No 360 yet. As soon as I get a 360 that should be my next project.

[flojocabron]

I live on the border. The southern most city in California.

The town of Calexico.

Here there are two fleamarkets: Santo Tomas and Las Palmas.

Both are open every day. But the only good day for las palmas is on wednesday. Wednesday has the best deals and most of the sellers come from Los Angeles or farther north. I am getting your games Bubble Chump.

Santo Tomas has some thing different every day. Different sellers bring their stuff all week and some that didn't make it on wednesday for Las Palmas then move to this one to keep selling what they have left.

Since we are at a border town. Resellers know that the stuff they bring will get sold. Every wednesday there is a mass exodus from Mexicali (city on mexico's side) just to come to the fleamarket. Everyone gets charged a Dollar. and the fleamarket gets thousands on this day.

There are some sellers that all they bring is electronics and other random crap. They fill up their U-Haul and head down this way. They have everything in cardboard barrels and or boxes. Everything is dumped on the ground and we dig through it. I've gotten a little bit of every system here and there in the past couple of years. Lots of other electronics are mixed in too.

Gamewise though, its been less and less. Wherever the sellers get their merchandise games dont come as much. Theres a couple here and there. But not as much as in the past.

I'm finding controlers and loose cart games, some games in CD or DVD cases. It's pretty random.

Some of the stuff that the resellers get come from "goodwill auctions" The merch is labeled from some thrift stores from a few months back. So there are games that have labels and barcodes from stores up in the San Jose Area.

So my best guess is that some of the stuff comes from thrift stores getting rid of old stock that didn't sell at a certain store.

Everything ends up somewhere else sooner or later.

[AppleQueso]

Everything ends up somewhere else sooner or later.

Makes you wonder just how far some of your own stuff has traveled, huh?

[pankakes123]

Local flea market, local retro game store, and Amazon.

[BoringSupreez]

Used: Mainly from thrift stores, followed by online, then local retailers. In the past I used to spend a lot more money on used games locally, but now I just wait for what I want to eventually get donated. When buying online, I typically get it off Half.com.

New: Walmart mostly, then other local retailers, then online. Walmart has always bee my main source as there's always been one nearby. Lately, Hastings has been my #2. Most of my online stuff comes from Amazon.

[Menegrothx]

NTSC games, exotic hardware and all games for more exotic/rare consoles come from eBay + online retro game stores. I only buy from local merchants (and my national eBay copy cat) when I'm buying common stuff, used 360, Xbox and PS2 games and so on. Though if it's a more sought after/rare PS1/PS2/Xbox/Gamecube/Wii/PC game then I usually buy from ebay.co.uk or some other place like that since it's easier to find games and cheaper that way.

[prfsnl_gmr]

I have always enjoyed hunting games "in the wild"; so, most of my collection comes from flea markets, thrift stores, and pawn shops. We have a Goodwill computer works here in Charlotte that always has a fresh supply of reasonably priced games (and - before they started checking videogamepricecharts - incredibly proced games). The pawn shops and resale shops in the eastern part of the state - and, particularly the shops near military bases - have a ridiculous amount of video games, and I have picked up a lot of games frm that part of the state.

I used to get games on Craigslist, but I cannot remember the last time I found a deal on there. I think that there are just too many resellers at the moment. That said, whenever I start a new collection, it is usually because I purchased a massive lot of games on Craigslist. (I started collecting SMS games by purchasing a system, two controllers, a light phaser, 3D glasses and 25 complete games for $60. Who could resist that?) I have never had any luck with yard sales.

I use online sources occasionally, but I enjoy the thrill of "finding" something (and I have more games than I could ever play). Accordingly, I only rarely get things off eBay or Amazon (and mostly "parts" such as instruction manuals, cases, etc. to complete games that I found locally). I do enjoy trading with other Racketboy members, however.

Finally, I almost never purchase new games. As I mentioned earlier, I have more games than I could ever complete, and I feel like my money would be better spent buying more games for my collection. (Why get one new game for $60 when I could 20 old ones? Or, one really, really rare one?) If I do receive a new game, it is usually as a gift.

[BoneSnapDeez]

I mostly purchase used retro games. In order of how often I shop there, my sources are:

- Record stores - especially Bull Moose Music (local ME/NH chain), which will buy and sell almost anything game related. A lot of their retro games are sold at a flat rate too, which is nice.
- Local retro gaming stores - mainly Video Game Exchange (Augusta/Waterville, ME).
- Online stores - I mostly use eStarland, Amazon, JJGames, and Game of Japan. I rarely use eBay: I don't care for the stress of auctions and most BIN prices seem outrageous. Once in a while I'll use the site to buy things from Japanese sellers though.
- Thrift stores - Goodwill keeps getting worse though, as they're now putting some of their video game stock behind glass and using eBay to price. I can still find decent prices on PC titles though (usually mixed in with CDs).
- Retail stores. A few times a year I'll pick up new games at GameStop or Target. Usually I just end up browsing the retail stores and then find a better deal online.
- craigslist. I seem to find a good deal every two months or so. The annoying thing is that Maine isn't divided into regions on CL (it's just "maine"), so I'm constantly finding sweet deals that turn out to be several hours away.
- Flea markets - I've had little luck with the local ones.

I've never really looked for games at pawn shops, perhaps I should start. I should also look into using the Racketboy B/S/T board some more. I think I've used it... once.