Making the hard decision. Should I sell my video game collection?
I’ve been collecting video games for about 15 years. Rather than focus entirely on a single console, I collect just about everything. While I do have systems I focus a lot more on, like the NES, I pick up retro games for any system when I come by them at a good price.
But I’m a relatively new father now and time and space are now commodities I have to share with my daughters. Their stuff takes up a LOT of room and I don’t have the time to play all my old consoles like I used to. While this will change as my girls get older and more independent, for the next few years I’m not going to be able to dig as deep into my collection as I used to.
Hoarder or collector?
There’s a fine line between collector and hoarder and I manage to straddle that line about as tightly as humanly possible. While my game collection is nicely organized and displayed proudly, I do have a lot of duplicate consoles, totes full of cords, controllers and accessories. I’ve amassed a half-dozen PS1, Genesis and Atari consoles. This is where the hoarder in me comes in. I picked up lots of games and systems as I was building my collection and kept all the extra consoles and extra stuff in storage. We need that storage room for my girls stuff now.
What should I purge?
The easiest thing to part with is duplicate games and all of the stuff that falls into the hoarding category. So I’ve been putting together bundles of systems to put up on my sales avenue of choice, eBay.
Though I have made the much harder decision to sell off an entire part of my collection. I decided to part with most of my roughly 200 games in my Nintendo 64 collection.
Why did I choose to sell?
Selling off a huge chunk of my collection seems counter to the concept of being a collector. But I took a look at why I was collecting Nintendo 64 and decided it was time to let it go.
I always wanted to own a ‘complete set’ for a game console and Nintendo 64 is one of the easiest to complete. There were only 296 domestically released games and very few are worth more than $100. A few years ago, I realized that I already had a lot of the more expensive titles like Conker’s Bad Fur Day, so chasing a complete N64 set seemed like a fun and realistic challenge.
The first roadblock I hit was picking up the most expensive game, Clay Fighter Sculptor’s Cut. The game was around $200 when I started collecting, but I was always outbid on it and the price continued to rise to well over $300 today and I’m simply not willing to spend that much for a game that will essentially just be a shelf filler. This realization shattered my goal of acquiring a complete set.
Secondly was my realization that I had not played a single N64 game in two years. If I wasn’t actually playing these games, I was missing the point of collecting something that is designed to be interacted with. I played the N64 through college and have fond memories of the system, but most of those are multiplayer experiences like Mario Kart 64, GoldenEye and WCW World Tour. In addition, the games on this system simply have not aged well and the graphics that were impressive and cutting edge in 1997 are clunky, muddy eyesores twenty years later.
Time to cash out?
The thing that made me finally pull the trigger was the combination of rising prices of Nintendo 64 games and my desire to invest more money in cryptocurrencies. Having capped out investing what my wife was comfortable with from our savings, I chose to sell off my N64 games so we could invest more. So I finally made the decision. For the first time in 15 years, I was going to sell off a big chunk of my collection.
Sellers remorse
Will I regret selling off these games a month from now, a year from now or 5 years from now? Its hard to say. Watching the FedEx guy carry my box of games off into the sunset was a bittersweet moment. These games are only going to get harder to find and more expensive to pick up if I choose to start my collection over in the future. But for now, I’m at peace with my decision.
And I did keep about a dozen games, so I still have a collection. Its just much, much smaller now.
One of my biggest gaming regrets is selling my Nes to get a PS1, which, besides Tony Hawk, I barely played . I sold the console and twenty(ish) games, some of which are quite valuable now for £40, at the time a new PS1 went for about £140.
DONT SELL THEM !
ohh my goodness ; some of those games are currently worth a few hundred bucks already - keeping them for longer will only bring up the value .
If anything ; keep collections of games, like james bond or mario or donkey kong - or other seriese of games - and sell the rest or donate the collection as a whole - to a place where a community of children can play them ; and have the same fun that we as children grew up with .
I would LOVE to buy a large collection but i dont actually have the money for something like that .
I just recently lost my job ; and im working on my business - helping other people make money online in a few different ways .
But if i had the money i would continue to collect video games ; i miss the old school nostalgic video games - and reading about this post makes my heart hurt lol .
i wish you luck though !
While it was hard to part with them, they were just a small part of my collection. It also helps me focus on systems I have more passion for, like NES and PS2.
Wow wow wow thats an amazing collection, I for one am jealous, I could only dream of a collection like that. I would not get rid of any of my old consoles or games but then again my old console collections fit in a few boxes In the loft, far out of the way. They hold too much sentimental value, I feel like my whole childhood Is those games. My children now love playing my old consoles, especially the N64. It makes me proud to pass down my gaming knowledge to them :)
I would want to say no, don't get rid but I understand with having children myself how much space you need with kids Items taking over the house, and you have an unreal collection lol. Do what you feel Is best man, sometimes Its good to let go. Youve kept a few so you can revisit when you feel the need.
Great post, you've made me feel all nostaligic :) I've resteemed
I can see this is really hard for you.
I think you're wise to sell them. This is peak nostalgia time for these games. In 10 or 20 more years kids are not going to care about these classics, and the thought of games on physical media will probably be anathema to them. (I read a report where music studios literally could not give away CDs any more.) Get a good price for them now and invest that money in a trust for your kids education or future home.
As a minimalist who grew up around hoarders, every time I start to collect something I get neurotic about it and start giving/throwing things away. So my core impulses are very different than yours. And lord knows I'm not someone for investment advice. But if you hang on to the games you can actually see yourself playing and enjoying with your kids and let the rest go, I don't think you can go wrong.
I think there will always be interest in classic gaming, even among younger gamers. I sold a Super Pac Man arcade cabinet to a 16 year old who restores old arcade machines, for example
As a father too, I just don’t get time. And doesn’t get any easier with the years too. I now value getting the most out of my downtime with gaming and that means looking at things like Vita, Switch and iOS.
I had stacks of PS3 games and I just ditched it and embraced the clutter that kids bring!
You’ll always regret what you sell but just temper it with regretting you can’t embrace the collection as much as you wanted while you had it.
If you don't play them, and they're just filling up a shelf, probably not getting even looked at asides from'where can I get some more space', then you're certainly better off selling them at the prices you can get now. Sure, whoever buys them might decide in a decade to sell them and make money on them too, but you'll have the space you need now, and the money.
And while it might sound like a good idea to be able to show your child what the games you grew up were like, there's emulators that do a pretty good job of that without taking up storage space for a decade.
But then, I'm not very sentimental about physical stuff. Especially when I can make some money from getting rid of it!
Nop you should not