Poll - How Many Physical Games are in Your Collection?

[ElkinFencer10]

Dang it, y'all have me wanting to do a spreadsheet now...

You should see the spreadsheet I've spent six or seven hours making on and off over the past week and a half...

[Anayo]

I used VG Collect to count most of my stuff and came up with 381 physical games. I think I'm OK with that amount for a few reasons:

1) If a game costs too much I don't want to buy it ($100 for a single game doesn't enthuse me. I'm more likely to emulate in this case.)
2) I don't like owning stuff I'll never play. (I want to experience my games, not use them as decorations. It's actually pretty overwhelming to manage my time to even play what I have.)
3) Some systems I don't care about (vintage computing, pre-NES 8-bit systems, pre-Saturn and PSX 32-bit consoles, pre-Nintendo DS lite and PSP handhelds).
4) Some systems I love more than others (for example I'll sell good Playstation games I find at thrift stores in order to get more Sega Genesis stuff).

[Anapan]

I guess I rank as shameful outcast - I do not have many games. Physical are rare and few. I try to solidify the quality titles into a tight collection. My main goal is to force the hardware to play the games I enjoyed as a youth to be able to be enjoyed again, but at an impossible quality. I force the old hardware to conform to an old, but "perfect" standard (15khz RGB) but that is not enough - the noise in the signal must be shielded, and the clarity I want is mostly unattainable. I have a collection of the games I played many years ago and I've been trying to make those few games function at a standard that is just out of reach. I have a lot of other games in physical form, but according to this scale I am as I stated earlier, an outcast that depends on digital services and other means to enjoy games outside of my small physical collection.
I might get a high score on a poll of how many displays are currently capable of playing your games.

[Erik_Twice]

When I first saw the poll I thought "man this poll is so poorly made, everyone is going to be at the <200 category". Guess I was wrong.

[Jagosaurus]

When I first saw the poll I thought "man this poll is so poorly made, everyone is going to be at the <200 category". Guess I was wrong.

58% over 500!

I wanted to break down under 200 into increments of 50 but it only let's you pick 10 categories for vote. Looking back, would've only broke up 5 votes down in that range, 1 of them mine

I looked on a few DVD/BD forums after posting this and even many casual movie collectors had 300+ movies with several members well over 1K so we're not that odd

[Exhuminator]

well over 1K so we're not that odd

A lot of members here are in our thirties/forties and have been collecting video games for nearly two decades. It's not hard to go over a thousand in a collection given persistent pursuing over that amount of time.

[Sarge]

well over 1K so we're not that odd

A lot of members here are in our thirties/forties and have been collecting video games for nearly two decades. It's not hard to go over a thousand in a collection given persistent pursuing over that amount of time.

Very much this. I'd never be able to put together what I have if I had to do it from scratch.

[Jagosaurus]

Yeah, I turn 30 in a couple weeks so I remember buying $.50 to $1 NES games when I was in high school. A decent amount (1/4 or so) of my current games are mine or my buddies' NES & SNES games from when we were kids. Those are ones I'd never sell off or trade. Something about knowing those are the actual copies I grew up with is awesome. My copy of Super Mario Bros/Duck Hunt is the same cart that my dad brought home in '88 with our NES console. It's like a family heirloom .

Same is true for people who have owned the same copy of most games for 15+ years. I understand that piece. The others that are copies of games I had repurchased later or am interested in, I could let go off easier.

I got to just uder 500 games last year without really trying (before my big sell off began) in only about 6 years of moderate (and budget!) "collecting." Add a decade to that at same speed & better prices and I would've been well over 1K.

[flojocabron]

I checked my Google docs since that's where I keep my games list.

Currently I have about 4,010 unique physical games. But I still think that number is off by 20 or so that have slipped down the cracks. And probably another 100 or so doubles and triples that I save up for reselling at the Mexican cons I go to.

[Jmustang1968]

Mine was a bit of the opposite. We either sold or gifted most of our cart based games. I did find a few of our old Gen and SNES carts but not all of them. However, I had started a fairly meager PS1 and PS2 collection through college. I'd say in 2008/2009 I had about 100ish games, mostly PS1/PS2 and 360/PS3. I never owned many games growing up, I mostly rented them, so I didnt have much to hang on to. Stumbling into a local game store and grabbing a few items there really kick-started my interest in collecting more, and not just playing via emulators.

So I was then on a mission to buy old favorites growing up, and to learn more, and grab games and consoles I had never played or owned before. Most of my collection has been from finding and buying other collections locally back in the "good ole days" of finds 5+ years ago. My rate of collecting has since stalled, as I have all but stopped browsing local ads and ebay or anything. I will occasionally see something pop up here or on Facebook retro groups, or when I go to a retro convention and pick a few things up.