Manitoba is a Big Province...

That means that there's a lot of games here that need to be rescued from the dust bins of obscurity and given a proper home in our game collections. I think you know how the rest goes, but game chasing really is a way of life.

As of writing this I own 1087 video games for a variety of consoles old and new. Have I played them all? Nope. Do I plan to buy more as soon as I can? Yep.

I'm a video game collector and the weekly (daily?) pursuit of video games is probably my favorite thing to do. Would I openly admit that chasing the games and finding a great deal in the wild is just as exciting as playing the games? I think I would...

A large part of collecting is related to trying to recapture moments from your childhood as nostalgia is a wonderful drug that brings back those feelings of excitement and innocence as you recall the activities and items that shaped your interests and influenced your future personality. Whether you collect comics, toys, music, magazines, cards, video games, or something far more weird, you probably started doing it to recapture a important memory or to surround yourself with a favorite interest.

Me? I'm also crazy cheap. I loathe paying retail price for anything and I'll scour second hand listings on Kijiji, dig through garage sales, flea markets, pawn shops, and second hand stores to save as much money as I can. I'd much rather buy ten video games at $5.00 each from a pawn shop that smells like urine and cigar smoke, than pay $50.00 for one game from the squeaky clean shelves of a Game Stop.

My love of games started in probably around 1983 when the family purchased a Coleco Gemini system, which was an Atari 2600 clone. We hooked it up to the old wooden cabinet TV in the basement and my mind was blown. I used to make forts out of cardboard boxes in the basement, play with our old organ, or mess around with plaster and chemistry sets, but I was a pixel junkie as soon as we got the Gemini. My sister used to make plastic model cars in the basement too and I'm pretty sure being 5-6 years old and high as shit on model airplane glue also made Atari look even more awesome. Poorly ventilated dark basements, plus brain damaging fumes = lifelong addiction to games. 

I still have my original Coleco Gemini.

Mouse Trap, Donkey Kong, River Raid, SwordQuest: Earthworld, Laser Blast, Air/Sea Battle and too many other games to name filled my days. I crossed the rivers of poo logs in SwordQuest. My older brother set a world record score in Laser Blast and sent a picture of the TV to Activision, but we never heard back. My sister and I found all the items in Earthworld, but still had no idea what we were doing. I also remember nearly peeing my pants in excitement when we drove to K-Mart to buy our copy of E.T. I played the shit out of E.T. When you are a kid, you don't even realize when a game is bad, you just keep playing it till you get good at it. 

Crossing The River of Poo...

I was obsessed with Pac-Man and would listen to the Pac-Man vinyl records where he sounded like he was on Quaaludes all the time. I had Pac-Man stuffed animals, TV Trays, Pajamas, and my sister would cut a wedge out of sugar cookies and we would ice them to all look like Pac-Man. Each cookie would have one of the those fucking tooth-shattering silver balls for an eye, too.

Mellow Yellow

When the Red River Ex would come to town, I would wander through the Arcade Tents drinking in the sights and sounds. I also owned a Coleco Pac-Man mini arcade and would play it till my ears nearly bled from the screeching "BEE-YOO BEE-YOO BEE-YOO" noise that it made all the time.

Yeah, I loved games. This is even pre-Nintendo days, so you can imagine the brain-gasm I had when I finally saw the NES. Wow. That story is for another blog entirely.

The reason why we are doing this blog is to share our views on gaming past and present and to highlight the adventures we have scouring the city (and country?) for deals on games. I hope that anyone who reads it will get a laugh or two, and also learn a few things about techniques for saving dollars on their gaming budgets. As long as they don't live here and try to compete with us!

So make sure you have a full tank of gas, a wallet full of cash, and a box of alcohol swabs to get the old price tags and boogers off those pawn shop treasures, and join us in the River City as we build our memories..and our collections. It's not hoarding if you alphabetize...

Super Robot Tyson       

See my collection at GameFaqs under user name "espinz".