Why do you collect?

[SasoriSoren]

This question has been asked time and time again in various threads it never belongs in, but it is a good topic of discussion, especially with a bunch of enthusiasts like us!

Why are we collecting? Is it to have the Pokemon mentality of "Gotta catch em all"? Is it nostalgia? Is it resale of a massive collection?

Or is it for something simpler like to have just the games you always wanted to play and didn't? Or to just own the ones you had as a kid to pass on to the next generation?

Or maybe a mixture of all these things?

For me, it's a combination of my own nostalgia and the addition of that I only grew up on three consoles, NES, Genesis and PS2, and thus I never owned most of the games I always wanted, so now I get to go back and grab them and share that with my daughter, who also loves these old "daddy games" as she calls them. It's fun and I like having them. When I complete my collection of what I want, I may switch gears to completing one collection or another, or getting into eccentricities like the Virtual Boy. but for now I have a goal, and I will be satisfied just doing that one goal.

[shenske]

Honestly, I collect mostly for how the games look on the shelf.

If i wasn't making covers I likely wouldn't collect. 
I love being creative and using photoshop. This is my outlet for my creativity. 

[Mick Dundee]

My parents always only had systems for a few weeks...then the bills were due and they would have to sell off the fun new toys....only to do it again at a later time....SNES...Sega...TG-16.  They played RPG. I collect and Play RPG, Action, Adventure and anything that mixes those in a fun way.

 I remember them playing Secret of Mana, Secret Evermore, Earthbound, Chrono Trigger, Phantasy Star 4,  Landstalker, Albert Odyssey, Dark Savior and Alundra. After that they didn't play much. That generation of systems and newer were for us and didn't get sold off.

 I think that's why I have a fish tank too. My parents always had fish....never anything bigger than a 55 Gal though. Probably why I like having a 75 Gallon.

  I think its a subconscious thing to prove to myself that I'm not like my parents, and lets face it, a wall of games looks bad ass.

[madrocsz]

Im in it for the bitches

[xaostic]

I consider myself a gamer first and a collector second. I started out just getting games back I had from my youth that I wanted to play again and that evolved into playing/collecting titles that I never had the chance to play. I think the whole printing covers/display process brings back the nostalgia of going to a rental store as a kid and picking out a game to try out. I know you can still rent modern titles but its just not the same experience with all the advancement in media and how information gets out these days. Back then you bought/rented by box art, magazines like nintendo power, or based on what your friends had.

[segamer]

I'm an older gamer. I've been gaming since the 80's. Back when the Genesis and SNES where at their peak, I had a unit called a Super Wildcard. It would record games on floppy disk. I was a teen and couldn't afford to buy games in volume. However, after acquiring this unit for $600, I eventually had all Genesis and SNES games on floppy disc but they weren't real.

When I was old enough, I started buying the real roms. I eventually open my own video game store with I ran for years. There came a point where I had amassed a gigantic collection which included 20 arcade machines. To make a long story short, a few years ago, My home was burglarized and my entire game collection was taken. I had to start my game collection all over from scratch. Why do I collect? I only collect games that have meaning to me, and for the fun of having the real roms. One day, when I pass away, I expect my daughter to sell my collection but while I'm on Earth, I'll enjoy them.

[Megatron]

I started collecting to play games that I never got around to when I was younger.  I had an NES and eventually a Genesis.  Neighbor had a SNES but I didn't buy one until I finished high school.  So I started getting all the great games I played briefly but could never devote lots of time to (mostly RPGs).  That was 12 years ago and I've since just kept going.  It kind of died off for a little while, but with the discovery of the cover project 6 months ago I have renewed my interest, mostly in getting what I feel belongs on my shelf (for instance, I had Double Dragon I and II, but no III, it just looked wrong).  I have almost all the major systems of the past and try to find some iconic and memorable games for each.  Some months I pick up more than others.

I never liked emulators and digital downloads are ok, but I like having the game on my shelf or in my hands.  Feels right.

[Nacho3]

I never had the newest system as a kid, got NES after SNES came out etc. Until I had a job and bought a Dreamcast for myself and pretty much every system since. But, I still didn't collect them, most of them were given away or traded for very little money. I really started collecting about a year ago when I felt like playing some N64 games that were not available on Virtual Console so I bought an N64 and so many game systems since then. Some, like the Saturn I recently bought, I did not even play as a kid. I have gotten pretty good at buying low and selling high so I can afford the stuff I want to keep for my collection, especially with the N64. I can pretty much tell how much every N64 game is worth and then go from there. I really love collecting to be able to play the games but it is actually way more fun to me to find something at a good price then sell it for a profit. Since none of my friends care about collecting, this community lets me "show off" what I have and that keeps me going too.

[JDavis]

I'm 26 years old.

I was a toddler during the NES days, but played it at relatives' houses.

I grew up on the Gameboy and SNES, but with a fairly limited selection of mostly first party platformers and licensed games.

The N64 started to open my eyes to the bigger world of gaming, and got me starting to read Nintendo Power.

In 1998 I played my first Zelda (A Link to the Past, though Ocarina was already out) and first RPGs (Pokemon and Pokemon)

In 1999 I began to dive head first into all I had missed in the NES and SNES days... Megaman, Castlevania, Final Fantasy, Metroid, etc., etc.... mostly through emulation, but I did obtain my NES and a handful of cartridges that year as well.

In 2005 I graduated Highschool and headed to college, where I was receiving enough scholarship money to end up with one to two thousand dollars in my pocket each semester; still living at home with parents so next to no expenses. I began to re-rediscover retro gaming through actually buying the games.

At the end of 2009 I graduated college and after a couple false starts I've got a full time job... as a customer service manager at a retail entertainment store. Not the most glamorous of ends, and certainly not using my CS/Art degree, but with no significant other or kids and living in low-cost-of-living Oklahoma, I've got my share of expendable income to feed my gaming habit.

Why do I collect?

I collect to play the games (though I admit there's plenty of games on my shelves that I've barely touched, if at all)

I collect to relive old memories

I collect to experience great games that I missed out on through youth, ignorance, or just not owning the system

I collect to amass a library (a term I prefer to use over collection) of good games that I can plug in and play whenever the mood strikes me (the sort of experience that emulation spoiled me to)

I do not collect for value, though I've got some decently valuable games on my shelves, and will always buy a game if I find it at significantly less than market value (Super Turrican 2 for $20? Absolutely!)

I do not collect to sell, though I'll trade a game in towards other games if I don't feel like it's work keeping

I do not collect for collection's sake or to work toward any sort of "complete" state.

I collect, but I'm not a collector. I'm a gamer. A gamer with more spare money than spare time.

[Moviefan2k4]

I don't consider myself a "collector" of anything, as in having something for its own sake. Almost everything I enjoy has some kind of other purpose. I'm not the kind of person to buy a game, and leave it sitting on a shelf for years on end. If I buy it, that sucker's getting played; the same is true for my movies, music, books, and film memorabilia. I have a book of autographed 8x10s, and most of them were received in person. Some of my favorites are from Christopher Lloyd, Sarah Douglas, and John Wesley Shipp.

[satoshi_matrix]

Im in it for the bitches

This.

[TyrannicalFascist]

Well I can answer by pretty much saying what I collect, as it's self explanatory:

-Games I had growing up
-Games I liked, but never had (Star Fox, Paper Mario, Sonic CD, etc)
-Games I never tried but always heard I should (A Link to the Past, Perfect Dark, DuckTales NES,...I have Classic Game Room and you guys to thank for these )
-Gaming oddities, particularly licensed Nintendo or related (SGB Commander, GCN Hori GB Player Controller, Virtual Boy, SupaBoy, GCN Keyboard controller, Wisdom Tree GB games,...)
-Misc things (Sega Nomad, Nintendo Power Issues, Nintendo Mini Classics, Mario Knex mini figures, Nintendo BD&A beanbag characters, WOTC-era Pokemon cards,...)
-I also more or less collect games from these series: Mario & related (Yoshi, Wario, etc), Sonic, Star Wars, Rareware

So I guess it's part nostalgia and part a mixture of other things. There's no real hard and fast rule for what I collect. Strangely enough, I must admit, I don't have a lot of interest in collecting NES games. Currently I have 6 of them. Maybe it's because I've seen ahoy monstrous that library is via the AVGN and others. But more likely it's because I'm 25 and my first real system was SNES, so NES was a little before my time, personally speaking. Same with the Master System. My dad and I played Atari 2600 and 7800 a long time ago, which he sold, and he has a Flashback 2 and several of those plug and play games that we played, but I'm content playing them on my phone or elsewhere (though I may get Mario Bros. and Donkey Kong in cart form).

I currently own and get things for SNES, N64, GCN, Wii, WiiU, GEN, Sega CD, 32X, SAT, GB, GBC, GBA, VB, DS, 3DS, GG, and PC. I own a PSOne, though I don't currently track down games for it yet. Same for Xbox/360. I may get a Dreamcast one day, once I've filled out my recent retro systems like Sega Saturn. I only own one choice version of a system or handheld (not counting upgrades like DS Lite or Sega CDX) with 1 exception - my 2nd GBA, backlit by wiggy.

My collection is pretty modest compared to most on this site, but it's a selection of games, systems and accessories that I enjoy. 85-90% of my collection I play or have played, and the rest are just because I have a little of that completist attitude and have to get Mario is Missing and Sonic Labyrinth.

Some day I'll post my collection, when I feel it's in a presentable state.

[kaysow]

played way too much back in the NES-days, my parents never would've got me one if they'd known.
then got a genesis, and tho they were fun games it just felt like more of the same. had no clue about the SNES stuff i was missing out on. so i kinda grew out of it around that era, only to be pulled back in middleschool when the PSX started to generate a bunch of hype in the schoolyard. having 3d games like tekken and tomb raider and resident evil looked awesome, and a mag i picked up strongly hyped up FFVII, to be released a year and a half later. from that point on i've had at least two consoles every gen.

but i never bothered to keep games. along the years stuff was sold off, lent away forever, or just ruined. also, i was content with roms and hardmodded machines running burned discs. that was until 2009 when my brother picked up God Hand for my birthday, a cult title which i hadn't considered buying for myself. at that point, i had like 10 old carts left in the attic, a couple of PSX and PS2 games (FF, MGS, Suikoden, that sorta timeless stuff) + a handful for the PS3. it was a pretty pathetic amassment when you looked at it, and i thought it'd be sweet to have more interesting stuff ready and available, to play at my fancy, and to lend out on recommendation.

so (like jdavis above) i'm more about building a respectable "library" than any complete "sets". i pick up
* the very best titles, personal favorites, 10/10. doesn't matter what suiko2 costs me (circa $100 actually, not too bad)
* titles with universal acclaim or historical significance, even if i only sorta like some of them (like DMC and pokemon)
* a few with universal disdain like superman 64
* oddities like chulip and tingle
* cult stuff that i keep hearing about. the importance of this category can't be understated. without it you'd easily miss out on stuff like drakengard/nier and the persona series (everyone loves #4 now, but back in 2007/08 you'd never have known)

also, reluctantly; a few that i don't really care for but can't ignore. like halo and gears of war. not call of duty tho, that goes nowhere near my collection. i need to draw a line somewhere, which would be at the kinect and spunkgargleweewee.

evoking the memory of a rental store offering is awesome, with everything lined up by title and system for easy access, so custom shelves is a must.
i can peruse this library at my own leisure, picking off games that i never got around to (ace combat, wild arms) or just the stuff i need to catch up with (walking dead, virtue's last reward). there's no hurry either, cuz i don't have the slightest problem with outdated graphics, altho outdated 2D looks better than outdated 3D. and i'm positive that the term "nostalgia goggles" is applied way too liberally in reference to old vidya. played suikoden 2 (1999) in 2006, and it instantly jumped to spot #1 on my list of favorite videogames. more recently, i've successfully enjoyed the pokemon and ace combat series.

[Beastman1975]

I've always enjoyed movies and gameing but never planned on "collecting" such a large quantity of either, i guess the short answer is i refuse to trade in games/movies for a fraction of what i paid for them.   even when i worked for gamestop i didnt like how we'd give about 20-25 bucks in trade for a new release  and then turn around and sell it for 5 bucks less than brand new. i understand they want to make a profit on it but still made me feel dirty lol.

[Lambadelta]

I was born around the time the SNES was released and was lucky enough to experience it because my older brother passed it down to me. Then years later i lost most of my stuff and only played modern games. I suddenly then realised most new games are boring, uninnovative or just repetitive. I then decided to buy a Super Famicom and collect for it. I want to collect all its games but not just to sit on a shelf. I want to collect them to play them ^^

I plan to collect for the N64, Sega Master System and Sega Megadrive. Maybe a Sega Saturn. I plan to also buy a Famicom system.

I find retro games a goldmine of unexplored creativity that the world seems to just forget. I say death to games like CoD and all hail the retro game era XD