Jolt Country

I remember when the door to downloading games free of charge and thus without commitment, opened up to me: with the NES - N64 I owned maybe two or three games per system since they were $60+ per and thus I played the living bloody hells out of every title.

I obtained every single silver and gold medal in Shadows of the Empire for the N64.

Obliterated Shredder / Krang countless times in TMNT: Turtles in Time.

Mastered each stage in Double Dragon.

Somehow managed to finish Silver Surfer (for the NES... I don't actually remember how I accomplished this one).

But when I instantly had access to 5000+ titles without any financial or personal commitment, even a small glitch or annoyance pushed me to another game since the amount meant they were disposable.

A pattern I see repeating with my purchase of video game bundles: I've played maybe 10% of the games I own on Steam and purchased through sales, bundles, freebies, etc.

The best advice I received with my MAME setup was to purposely limit the number of games I place on it at any one time and then "trade" those in for another set of titles so I'd be forced to focus.

Yup.... The curses of being an adult with disposable income.

Retro

Flack wrote:I coined a phrase (but not the idea) a long time ago called the MAME Syndrome. Back when we were kids we might have only had a few Atari or NES games, and even though some of them were terrible, we played them because that was all we had. When you download every Atari 2600 and NES ROM, you tend to play the good ones because there's no reason to play the bad ones!

Actually, the phrase is "the poverty of our wealth." I came to the conclusion a long time ago that if you aren't buying some stuff that you use once and maybe don't use for a long time, or buy because you think you might need it and it sits for a long period, you're living too cautiously. I bought an ice cream maker for $30 to try one, it partially works, but I don't use it much. I also bought a $1 package of various sized Post-it notes of various sizes including arrow flags which I never use. But, when I do need office supplies I have them; it's way too much trouble to need them and not have them than to "waste" $20 or $30 on office supplies that I use once in six months because the lack of supplies can really hurt when you do need them.

because the lack of supplies can really hurt when you do need them.

Hurts like a mother-father, let me tellya.

I can clearly remember flipping through my floppies and wishing I had more games, or better yet getting that one game that I copied but doesn't work (Toy Factory). Now I scroll through the huge list of alphabetized titles and yawn. The exception being those games featured on Sprite Castle.

Perhaps mans' reach shouldn't exceed his grasp...


THE
8-BIT ARISTOTLE
AARDVARK

I distinctly remember using a disk notcher to notch the back side of some original disks (like the one that came with the disk drive) to store things on the back side when I got somewhat desperate.

When I got really desperate, I formatted those crappy "disk utility" disks and put games on them.

Were you thinking of Toy Bizarre, by chance? That one's on the short list to do along with Joust and a few others.

You're broke? HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
Our combined income was $37K last year with a family of 6. Feel better?

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA


Oh I think I feel better for laughing at that comment. Seriously. That was our income. I made our own laundry soap at one point, I have no smart phone, I have a stupid phone. It's so stupid it only works when it wants to - like me!

Flack wrote:When I got really desperate, I formatted those crappy "disk utility" disks and put games on them.

My desperation led me to horde AOL floppy discs and span games over them using Winzip (mostly Shareware such as War Wind or Duke3D). By the time AOL started distributing free coasters, files / video games had become too big to actively share on floppies anyway.

Retro

It was Toy Bizarre. Youtube longplay says I didn't miss much.

I always thought LG was independently wealthy for some reason. Of course I never asked or anything...

I can remember pilfering a ten pack of floppies from Gold Circle. The guy in the electronics department was stoned to the gills and never even knew I was there. He was too busy playing a display video game. I feel mildly guilty about it now but......Gold Circle isn't around anymore.


THE
CHAPTER 11
AARDVARK

AArdvark wrote: I always thought LG was independently wealthy for some reason. Of course I never asked or anything...

If only!

If I were independent I would be a lot more wealthy *Ba dump dump*

I'm trying to figure out how to make legitimate money while juggling la familia and all that comes with as well as my own needs! I'm awesome with finances, but things have been getting ridiculous.

AArdvark wrote:It was Toy Bizarre. Youtube longplay says I didn't miss much.

What? Toy Bizarre is a great game! I just recorded an episode of Sprite Castle dedicated to it -- look for it next week!

loafergirl wrote:I'm trying to figure out how to make legitimate money while juggling la familia and all that comes with as well as my own needs! I'm awesome with finances, but things have been getting ridiculous.

My wife has come up with the following brand new idea: buy books and DVDs at garage sales and sell them on eBay and Amazon for a profit. I tried telling her that people have been doing this since the late 90s but she didn't want to hear it and I didn't feel great about pissing on her parade so I just let her go and we'll see how it goes.

In the past two days she's bought a dozen or so DVDs from garage sales. The good news is that so far this venture has only cost us about 50 cents per video. The bad news is, until they sell, we just added a bunch of Billy Graham and "Pilates for pregnant people" videos to our home video library.

I don't want to cycle crap through my house anymore. =) Sometimes that's just how it has to be, but my trips to ANY stores and garage sales have been much more selective. I feel like it's some awful penance for all the absolute junk my mother has purchased via QVC and Home Shopping Network through the years, but how this punishment has made it's way to my home is beyond me.

The social scavengers love it when I get in a mood and toss stuff out that has no value to me but could go for a few bucks on Craigslist.

prime example: Kramer aerostar guitar, circa 1990

Purchase price: $100 (from a guy who was more interested in an 8-ball than furthering his guitar skills)

Tweaked the crap out of it over the years but could never get what I wanted out of it. Am now almost ready to strip it of all electrics and leave it out front against a tree with a sign saying 'free to good home'.

This is because I am simply tired of looking at it.


THE
PASS/FAIL TEST
AARDVARK

Have you ever used Freecycle? I dabbled around on it for a while. It's like Craigslist, except everything posted on it is for free. The last time I checked into it you had to sign up for an AOL-based mailing list. That should have been my first warning.

On Freecycle you can post things you are offering, or things you want. The things people are offering are usually things like, oh, a piece of bubble gum, a bag of compost, or something else of equal value. I just checked my local freecycle page (it's all online now, it looks like) and there are people asking for a Gazelle (the exercise equipment, not the animal), a car, and my favorite, "everything" ("my grandson is moving out and has nothing.")

The only good thing about it is the place is filled with vultures who are not tire kickers like Craigslist people. If you want something gone within the hour, post it on freecycle -- then set the timer and see how long it takes for it to show up on Craigslist, haha!

yeah Vark, I gave my Fender to my brother, it had been sitting forever. My electric still is... I tell myself "one day" and then the day never comes. =)

Freecycle is what I call the space between the sidewalk and the curb.

Objects of metal are usually gone in less than an hour.


Re: Fender

The Kramer is a knock off POS and plays like el-crapo. I'm upgrading after Xmas, hence the offloading to some lucky passer by. I don't have any wall space.


THE
UNCLUTTERED
AARDVARK

loafergirl wrote:You're broke? HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
Our combined income was $37K last year with a family of 6. Feel better?

How did you manage to survive on $37k?

And little to no sex.

AArdvark wrote: I can remember pilfering a ten pack of floppies from Gold Circle. The guy in the electronics department was stoned to the gills and never even knew I was there. He was too busy playing a display video game. I feel mildly guilty about it now but......Gold Circle isn't around anymore.

I remember stopping in a computer store when I was on a date, and I decided to buy a copy of, I think it actually was Front Page, the web page design program, plus a couple other things, I think I spent $150. Well, this was back when they used an impression embosser, you know, where they actually ran your card on a manual device? And I've heard of it happening but I never expected it to happen to me, because I figured it out later. The guy ran the charge on a credit slip instead of a charge slip, so they paid me $150 to take it. Suffice to say the next chance I got to visit that mall, that store was no longer there...

Do you have pics of you and your girl on this date? Kidding!

I have heard of the credit slip accident thing of which you speak and I congratulate you on your windfall.


THE
BANK ERROR IN
YOUR FAVOR
COLLECT $200
AARDVARK

Just watched the Toy Bizarre episode of Sprite Castle and now regret never getting a working copy of the game. I always loved two player Mario Bros. and this looks like MB on crack.

Side note: Sprite Castle is awesome because Flack explains how to play the game featured. Some of these games I have NEVER figured out (Paradroid) and thus have never enjoyed.

THE
OH, THAT HOW
TO WIN
AARDVARK