The Hunt and the Haggle

The Hunt:

Once, while on a trip to the Appalachian Mountains, I stopped at a Goodwill in a small town just outside our destination. As a collector, this is a habit and the visit seemed routine because when I first walked in, I saw absolutely nothing video game related. Then, while looking at an old electric harpsichord I noticed a shoebox with a lid covering its contents. I thought this to be odd since I was in the electronics part of the store so I opened it and inspected further. Unexpectedly, it was filled with Atari 2600 carts, all recognizable except one... I pulled the cart out to take a closer look and to my surprise it was BOING! (This is a very rare Atari cart and is not usually found outside of personal collections or game conventions. Its value has climbed as high as $100. - ed.)

The Haggle:

Needless to say I took the cart to the register and was charged a measly 25 cents for it. The adrenaline rush was comparable to sex!

- Scott Leftwich, gamebot

The Hunt and the Haggle

The Hunt:

I had just moved to my home located in a small town in Virginia and while exploring the downtown area I noticed a small flea market. It was a real dump, but there was a box of toys that appeared to be fairly old, so I rummaged through it. ...I was shocked to find a Q*BERT mini-arcade machine! Although it was missing the battery cover and I wasn't sure if it worked at all, I knew by looking at this $hithole I wouldn't be charged much.

The Haggle:

Sure enough the guy running the place said..."Give me 3 dollars for it?" to which I replied..."How about 2?" Of course I got it for 2 bucks! I immediately bought some batteries for it and it worked great. I already had a working Q*BERT mini-arcade machine, and in better shape than this one, so I traded it to a guy (Joe Cody of Atari2600.com at VGXPO 2005 - ed.) for a Spitfire Attack cart and peripheral for the Atari 2600 (still in the box, as I remember - ed.) which was quite rewarding. From time to time I think back to the old guy at the flea market and wander if maybe I should have given him that extra buck. He's probably dead now.

- Scott Leftwich, gamebot

Living the High Life

Video Game Diary:

More NES today! I tried Rad Gravity and M.C. Kids, both for the first time. Rad Gravity was a side scroller that played and looked like an old PC shareware game. Starting inside the cockpit of your space ship, the player selects a planet and zooms towards it to get to the meat of the gameplay. Each planet has its own gravity where Rad uses a laser sword to defend himself while jumping across a platform-laden world. M.C. Kids plays like a simple Super Mario Bros. 3. The player can pick up blocks and throw them at enemies and there are lots of hidden items to find. Its a blast.

- Blake Leftwich, gamebot

Living the High Life

Video Game Diary:

Today Matt, Tillman, Jordan, Mary and Seth came over to play Wii Sports and NES! We played Muppet Adventure Chaos at the Carnival, Krazy Kreatures and The Three Stooges. We only played Muppet Adventure for a minute or so but Krazy Kreatures really impressed me. Krazy Kreatures is an unlicensed puzzle game released by American Video Entertainment in 1990 in which the player picks up icons inside of a grid and places them next to like icons. When three or more are touching, they disappear. Its simple fun puzzle gameplay with a unique look and a strict timer. The Three Stooges, a port of the PC game by Cinemaware (creators of Defender of the Crown), was unsettling. It was like watching a dream.

- Blake Leftwich, gamebot

The Hunt and the Haggle

The Hunt:

I wasn't looking for anything in particular and a routine trip to the normal outlets: The Goodwill, The Salvation Army, and the local pawn shops would suffice. You never know what may turn up at a pawn shop, and even though I thought I had exhausted all the possibilities, just to be thorough, I looked at the Playstation pile. I found it! A game I had wanted to own since I played a demo back in the playstation's heyday, in a pile under the usual Jet Moto, and Madden ' 97 in a nice clean uncracked case was *pause....... Intelligent Qube.

The Haggle:

The sign on the glass case read "Playstation games $5", but I had a few typical NES and Genesis games in hand (JAWS, Subterrania, etc.) and I had a rapport with the shopkeeper... A deal was in order! I asked if she could reduce the price since I was buying four or five games and she sold me the game for $3! Intelligent Qube's average value at the time was $55.00 and now goes for around $48.00, not too shabby.

- Blake Leftwich, gamebot

Living the High Life

Video Game Diary:

I am currently playing Magical Starsign for the DS in order to review it for Advanced Media, and man, I do not like RPGs!

I played Duck Tales 2 (NES) for the first time the other day with my friend Steve Smith. Great news, Capcom didn't change the formula! They took the Duck Tales engine and made a great sequel that delivers the same fun of the original with new levels. No wonder its valued at over $15 (yikes!) , its worth the price though.

We also played The Krion Conquest (NES), Alien Invaders - Plus (Odyssee 2), and K.C. Munchkin (Odyssee 2). The Krion Conquest is a Mega Man clone (seriously, I hate that term, but in this case its true), with a Ninja Gaiden style cut-scene intro and in which the player starts the game with all the weapons. Warning: very difficult and no passwords. Alien Invaders - Plus is a Space Invaders inspired shooter in which the player can survive a direct hit, run under a barrier, and turn it into a new ship at the press of a button. If that was over your head, this is a bit more down to earth: K.C. Munchkin, an a-maze-ing Pac-man style dot chomper, has moving dots, and a maze editor.

- Blake Leftwich, gamebot