Thrift Store Thread 2012

[quote name='IAmTheCheapestGamer']The top loaders weren't that rare to me back in 2000 or so, though at that time I was in my 'I don't wanna waste money to end up sitting on the items' mode(like I am now). I passed up on at least TWELVE new/sealed top loaders that a Walmart store that had moved into a temporary location down the road from me while their new store was built had put on an endcap to clearance out.....at $15 each.:shock::whistle2:#:whistle2:#:whistle2:#:whistle2:##-o[/QUOTE]

I had a similar situation around that same time frame with a Wal-Mart here that was closing out a dozen or so brand new Super Nintendo consoles, but they were that wacky redesign from 1996, for $20 each. Now those things go for $400, but oh well, I guess that's like saying that you'd be a billionaire if you invested in Apple 10 years ago, who knew?
 
[quote name='spmahn']I had a similar situation around that same time frame with a Wal-Mart here that was closing out a dozen or so brand new Super Nintendo consoles, but they were that wacky redesign from 1996, for $20 each. Now those things go for $400, but oh well, I guess that's like saying that you'd be a billionaire if you invested in Apple 10 years ago, who knew?[/QUOTE]
Speaking of stocks, I kept bugging my one relative who invests in the stock market to grab some Google stock when they launched it, since I believe it started at $100 a share. It's now $606 a share and was higher than that, I think. Meanwhile he invested in some other stock and lost about $25k.:whistle2:#
 
[quote name='spmahn']Nintendo had a program about 10 years ago where you could send them your top loader and they would mod it to have a multi out port. The top loader was never sold in the US with a multi out port, only RF, so if you see one witha multi out port, it was either modified, or it's really a top loading Famicom (they look almost identical).[/QUOTE]

Well its hard to get solid information on this. Its possible there were 101's with the multi out in the last released shipments, or maybe they were only from returns. But at least we can say there are top loader Nintendos that came from Nintendo with the multi out with 1994 revised boards as shown in this video, which is different from Joe Gamer doing an AV mod.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LB-5qlmTM7k&feature=related
 
[quote name='spmahn']I had a similar situation around that same time frame with a Wal-Mart here that was closing out a dozen or so brand new Super Nintendo consoles, but they were that wacky redesign from 1996, for $20 each. Now those things go for $400, but oh well, I guess that's like saying that you'd be a billionaire if you invested in Apple 10 years ago, who knew?[/QUOTE]

I passed on a bunch of sealed Suikoden II's...for 15, this is when they were going for 80 before games were being graded and games were collecting a premium. I didn't know it was rare at the time..someone is asking 799.99 for one on ebay right now
A Bin of sealed castlevania SNES games at 3.99 each.
A rental store that I used to go to had bubble bath babes (nes) available when they were going out of business.

Whats worse is I'm a fan of both Suikoden, Castlevania, and Boobs... I passed them up because I was all about some ps2 and xbox.
 
[quote name='IAmTheCheapestGamer']Speaking of stocks, I kept bugging my one relative who invests in the stock market to grab some Google stock when they launched it, since I believe it started at $100 a share. It's now $606 a share and was higher than that, I think. Meanwhile he invested in some other stock and lost about $25k.:whistle2:#[/QUOTE]

My mom asked me who I'd invest in back in the mid-2000s. I said Google and Amazon. She regretted not listening to me.
 
[quote name='Theenternal']Well its hard to get solid information on this. Its possible there were 101's with the multi out in the last released shipments, or maybe they were only from returns. But at least we can say there are top loader Nintendos that came from Nintendo with the multi out with 1994 revised boards as shown in this video, which is different from Joe Gamer doing an AV mod[/QUOTE]

Not sure, but I only made it about a minute into the video before my ears started bleeding and I shut it off. When did this hipster BS of pronouncing NES and SNES as though they are words start? It's N-E-S and S-N-E-S, they's initialisms not acronyms. Just hearing this guy say s-nes makes me want to choke somebody.
 
[quote name='elessar123']My mom asked me who I'd invest in back in the mid-2000s. I said Google and Amazon. She regretted not listening to me.[/QUOTE]

I said to my parents to buy Berkshire Hathaway stocks in 1988. I believe they were at 480 per share. That 1 share would be worth $118,000 today. I used to track stock prices daily because I wanted to be a stock broker...I was a weird kid.
 
[quote name='elessar123']My mom asked me who I'd invest in back in the mid-2000s. I said Google and Amazon. She regretted not listening to me.[/QUOTE]

I was ALL about CMG at the Ipo ( it was in 2005 IIRC). It's weird, I almost never am wrong on this stuff, but am too scared/poor to actually invest.
 
I bet nintendo could make a lot of money re-manufacturing those toploaders with standard AV outs and selling them at $50-$75 exclusively through their website even today. With the market for NES/SNES systems so in demand on resale shops, I don't know why they don't still manufacture and sell them on a limited basis through their online store.

Imagine if they had a premium model for $100 or so that included upscalilng hardware to make that old 240i signal crystal clear on a modern HDTV.. hmm.

My old style NES that i added new pins to has no problems playing games (ones that are cleaned, anyway) but my SNES and N64 do have trouble loading games these days. I think the only reason those toploaders are really any more reliable is that the majority of them never saw much real use.

The sideloading spring mechanism of the original NES was certainly poorly designed and prone to failure though. I had a toploader as a kid and even then noticed how much worse the games looked on RF compared to my original one that crapped out on me.
 
[quote name='jer7583']I bet nintendo could make a lot of money re-manufacturing those toploaders with standard AV outs and selling them at $50-$75 exclusively through their website even today.

Could probably be manufactured for $20 material cost tops.

My old style NES that i added new pins to has no problems playing games (ones that are cleaned, anyway) but my SNES and N64 do have trouble loading games these days. I think the only reason those toploaders are really any more reliable is that the majority of them never saw much real use.

The sideloading spring mechanism of the original NES was certainly poorly designed and prone to failure though. I had a toploader as a kid and even then noticed how much worse the games looked on RF compared to my original one that crapped out on me.[/QUOTE]

I was looking into it, and you can mod a regular toploader to have AV out. I was thinking about doing it. Maybe I should do it and sell/trade them here too.
 
[quote name='slowdive21']I used to track stock prices daily because I wanted to be a stock broker...I was a weird kid.[/QUOTE]
I used to do the same because of the Ticker Tape Rally that we did in junior high. I invested my play money in Disney, Toys R Us, and McDonald's and ended up having the largest profit out of all participating schools in the county.
 
i have stock in hasbro right now because of MLP FIM. I am happy with my purchase of my top loader console and it is in great shape I have a friend buying my old grey box NES for 20$ and the scans dont bother me too much since Im more on being able to enjoy the game for what its worth on the convince of a reliable system.
 
[quote name='200STM']i have stock in hasbro right now because of MLP FIM. I am happy with my purchase of my top loader console and it is in great shape I have a friend buying my old grey box NES for 20$ and the scans dont bother me too much since Im more on being able to enjoy the game for what its worth on the convince of a reliable system.[/QUOTE]
​

Just for the record, I wasn't saying it was a bad buy if it came off that way. You can always recoup what you paid.

As far as socks go, I only have Cisco, AMCC (which is total crap. My broker convinced me to take a risk on it 12 years ago instead of paypal which he hadn't heard of.), and Tesla motors right now. I used to have marvel before they went bankrupt so I lost all my money on that one. Now marvel is a great stock.

​
 
I finally acquired something I've wanted for a very long time:

BuKF1.jpg


$50-some-odd shipped from eBay and included Mario World. He was asking $60 but gave me a great deal at $45. And he wrapped it in what looked to be an entire box of seran wrap and a whole newspaper, and the game was in a separate bubble mailer inside the package so he obviously gave a crap, which is nice, too. Then the cat started rubbing his face on it.
 
Willow, Disney Adventures In The Magic Kingdom, Legacy Of The Wizard, Iron Sword Wizard And Warriors 2, and Wrath Of The Black Manta all cartridge only for NES- $4 apiece.

ToeJam and Earl In Panic On Funkotron for Genesis- game, case, booklet. Everything looks great except the case which looks like a dog chewed on it. Will put the artwork and stuff in another case when I get one. $4

Saw Contra, Mario3, Tetris 1 and 2, and Battletoads...........with 8 and 12 dollar stickers! Never will I play more than $4 for a cartridge at Goodwill unless I know I can double my money if I dont need it for my collection.
 
Finally went to the Thrifty Thrift mentioned previously by 200STM and picked up Breakout, Combat, and Pac-Man for $1. I also got a hard drive enclosure that unfortunately was empty (you wouldn't know by its weight), but I can use it with one of my old hard drives.
 
Its small right ZombieToast? I asked the owner if he ever gets any retro games to shoot me a text so I can go check em out.
 
Yeah, that place is tiny. It's actually kinda cool, though. I wanted to buy all of the super old electronics that I have absolutely no use for. Ha.

I was also tempted to buy the $5 Gamecubes, but I'm pretty sure there isn't much profit to be had there.
 
[quote name='juangrande386']Willow, Disney Adventures In The Magic Kingdom, Legacy Of The Wizard, Iron Sword Wizard And Warriors 2, and Wrath Of The Black Manta all cartridge only for NES- $4 apiece.

ToeJam and Earl In Panic On Funkotron for Genesis- game, case, booklet. Everything looks great except the case which looks like a dog chewed on it. Will put the artwork and stuff in another case when I get one. $4

Saw Contra, Mario3, Tetris 1 and 2, and Battletoads...........with 8 and 12 dollar stickers! Never will I play more than $4 for a cartridge at Goodwill unless I know I can double my money if I dont need it for my collection.[/QUOTE]

How ludicrous, if Goodwill wants to charge the retail market price from the Amazon Marketplace, then they should just cut the BS and list them online and quit jerking around their customers. Plenty of Goodwill chapters do this already, so if that's how they want to run their business, just make it a company wide mandate. Even the NES games you did buy were way overpriced IMHO, but as long as you enjoy them, that's all that matters.
 
[quote name='spmahn']How ludicrous, if Goodwill wants to charge the retail market price from the Amazon Marketplace, then they should just cut the BS and list them online and quit jerking around their customers. Plenty of Goodwill chapters do this already, so if that's how they want to run their business, just make it a company wide mandate. Even the NES games you did buy were way overpriced IMHO, but as long as you enjoy them, that's all that matters.[/QUOTE]

It only gets worse. The other day, I was in a GW by my house and saw a boxed Atari behind the counter. I asked the lady at the register about the price. $75!! Not the worst price I've seen for a boxed Atari, but then it hit me: that was donated to them! I know there's overhead to consider, but that was absolutely ridiculous.

But I guess that's Naperville, IL for you.
 
Saw a pink GBA SP at an indy thrift store for 10 but it wouldn't power on so I wasn't sure if it'd work or not. I was too far from home to go back to grab my own adapter so I passed. Wasn't in the best of shape either.

Second one I found a copy of the Volume 1 Pokemon Heart Gold/Soul Silver Pokedex guide and a Star Wars Young Jedi Knights novel. Both were half off and came up to 2.10 in total so I'm pleased as peach.
 
I met a guy to buy his old atari 2600 games which he sold for a flat 40 dollars which was paid and got some good deals. The rare games was H.E.R.O., and double ender (Chuck Norris/Artillery Duel) in addition to other ordinary games (qbert, and etc...)

I also stopped by a flea market where most of the people usually price the retro game at rock bottom price since got Plaque Attack for Atari 2600 for $5.00 In addition, I stopped by other thrift store to buy read aloud books by disney for 7 dollars each (good conditions). I do see that people need to make quick cash as possible so they don't really care how much the items will be sold for online.

I have decided to become a part-time flea market hunter/trader.


Long live the Retro Games,

Mike
 
Don't know if this is decent or not, but I got a Dr. Mario for NES in box with manual and slipcover in like new condition for $12
 
[quote name='spmahn']How ludicrous, if Goodwill wants to charge the retail market price from the Amazon Marketplace, then they should just cut the BS and list them online and quit jerking around their customers. Plenty of Goodwill chapters do this already, so if that's how they want to run their business, just make it a company wide mandate. Even the NES games you did buy were way overpriced IMHO, but as long as you enjoy them, that's all that matters.[/QUOTE]

Yeah, the ones I got were some of the collection only games. I played them about 15mins each and onto the shelf they went.
 
[quote name='atarifreak0073']I met a guy to buy his old atari 2600 games which he sold for a flat 40 dollars which was paid and got some good deals. The rare games was H.E.R.O., and double ender (Chuck Norris/Artillery Duel) in addition to other ordinary games (qbert, and etc...)

I also stopped by a flea market where most of the people usually price the retro game at rock bottom price since got Plaque Attack for Atari 2600 for $5.00 In addition, I stopped by other thrift store to buy read aloud books by disney for 7 dollars each (good conditions). I do see that people need to make quick cash as possible so they don't really care how much the items will be sold for online.

I have decided to become a part-time flea market hunter/trader.


Long live the Retro Games,


Mike[/QUOTE]

May I ask what flea market that was at?
 
[quote name='Techman16']Don't know if this is decent or not, but I got a Dr. Mario for NES in box with manual and slipcover in like new condition for $12[/QUOTE]

From a collecting standpoint you did fine. Bad if you're trying to resell ):
 
[quote name='Porpoise King']From a collecting standpoint you did fine. Bad if you're trying to resell ):[/QUOTE]
Im actually thinking about getting a nes (top loader), I've always wanted one just never got around to looking
 
I grabbed the following from a couple thrift stores down the line from me today.

First store(lil neighborhood one):

All PS1 games, all game disc and manuals only in slimline CD cases, most are in good/very good shape:


Cardinal Syn
Classic Games For the Intellivision
Running Wild
Sim City 2000
Vampire Hunter D

I also grabbed the manual for NamcoMuseum Volume 1 as they couldn't find the disc to go with it. A copy of Pong for PS1 was in the slot for that game unfortunately.

All of the above for $12.51 total though($2.36 a game before tax cuz today was 40% off white stickers, which all of the games had;)).

Second store:

They had a bunch of games and CD's/DVD's, but my real score was getting an HP 2159m monitor for $19.99. I'm using it right now. It's kinda weird seeing CAG in widescreen, but the picture is absolutely amazing on this. The volume on it is so-so, but I don't do much video streaming on here. It has HDMI, DVI and VGA ports on it and is 1080p I believe.

It's THIS monitor: http://www.amazon.com/HP-2159M-21-5-Inch-LCD-Monitor/dp/B001UHOX2I/ref=cm_cr_pr_product_top
 
^I think your letting this HD thing go to your head. :lol:

Anyway, I decided to do a little thirfting yesterday. I went to a local Savers, and it was packed. I didn't know they were running some President's Day sale. Hell, I forgot it was President's Day. Did a quick peek and didn't see anything I really wanted. They had a PS2 network adapter in a taped up clamshell for $6 but I have absolutely no use for it. They also had a NIB Radica version of the Golden Tee plug-n-play for $15. Kind of wanted it but I already have the new Jakks version which is apparently better.

Then I decided to check one out that someone showed me years ago. Haven't been there since. Drove by the area where it was and didn't see it, but i did see a bunch of cars parked outside of another store a few spots down. Ended up they moved to a much larger lot. Went in, they had a lot of stuff. Had a bunch of old consoles in a galss cabinent. Most of them looked to be in good shape, except for one N64 that looked like it had blue acid poured on it, but they were all a bit too rich for my blood. The fact the the acid N64 was the same price as the other was also ridiculous. I do like that all their controllers are $3 though. Thats why i remember them. Last time I was there, I grabbed a black N64 controller. This time, they only had a bunch of third party ones, NES ones, and an original PSX one. Anyway, doing a little more searching, I end up finding a GunCon 2 and a GC3 off near some computer and plug-n-play stuff. $5 each. I snapped them up in a heartbeat since I love light gun games. Sadly neither of them had the video/sensor cable. Already had a GC3, and I can use 2 guns on one sensor. For the GC2, I ended up buying an adapter on eBay for $4. Overall, I'm happy with my find. :)
 
[quote name='Chronis']^I think your letting this HD thing go to your head. :lol:[/QUOTE]
Yeah. Maybe I am just a lil bit.:razz:

Anyway, I just looked up two of the games I left behind during my thrift store run today and as usual I grabbed the nearly worthless ones while leaving behind the ones that might be worth a damn.

I left behind:

:xbox:Godzilla: Save The Earth(disc was in ok shape but it was missing the manual)
:gc:Super Mario Sunshine(didn't bother checking condition)

Both were $5 at the next to last Salvation Army store I hit.:cry: This is the same store I grabbed the Transformers G1 "official bootleg" DVD set from about six months ago.
 
I dropped into one my non-regular GW's today and found Pokemon Gold and Pokemon Special Pikachu Edition for $3/ea. A nice end to a rather lackluster week.
 
The other day I went to the Goodwill store, and I found:

You Don't Know jack Vol 1-2, Movies, Sports edition. (Were not pricemarked but the counter guy gave me 1.99 for them each)

Animaniacs music cd for $1.99
CC Sabathia Jersey for $7
NJ Devils Practice Jersey for 4.99
Johan Santana jersey for 4.99
 
[quote name='TheHeef']It only gets worse. The other day, I was in a GW by my house and saw a boxed Atari behind the counter. I asked the lady at the register about the price. $75!! Not the worst price I've seen for a boxed Atari, but then it hit me: that was donated to them! I know there's overhead to consider, but that was absolutely ridiculous.[/QUOTE]

The people who work at a Goodwill don't have a clue what it's worth. They don't hire video game experts, they hire people nobody else will hire. That's why it's OK to pay them a little more.
 
good find today:

Xbox original console only with Crash Bandicoot Nitro Kart disc in it for $8

I plugged it in and it works and found the Crash game in the disc drive, it's also got 20 discs worth of music on it the hard drive, about half of which i would listen too.
 
[quote name='Survivalism']The people who work at a Goodwill don't have a clue what it's worth. They don't hire video game experts, they hire people nobody else will hire. That's why it's OK to pay them a little more.[/QUOTE]

Or an employee who went on eBay and priced it according to what they feel its worth.
 
[quote name='Survivalism']The people who work at a Goodwill don't have a clue what it's worth. They don't hire video game experts, they hire people nobody else will hire. That's why it's OK to pay them a little more.[/QUOTE]

Actually my Goodwills have hired people who used to work at Gamestop, which really wacks out the value on some items (even at 50% of what GS used to charge). These are the guys who mark GB Pokemons at $12 a pop and consider it "a deal."
 
[quote name='Indigo_Streetlight']Actually my Goodwills have hired people who used to work at Gamestop, which really wacks out the value on some items (even at 50% of what GS used to charge). These are the guys who mark GB Pokemons at $12 a pop and consider it "a deal."[/QUOTE]
Personally if I worked at a thrift store I'd underprice stuff but make sure my friends were coming in to grab it for me.;)
 
Brand new Goodwill distribution center just opened up the road from me. Went there with the girlfriend today and I got..

Croc 2 for PS1
LucasArts Full Throttle for PC. The disc seriously looks like it's never been used.
Blood for PC. I guess it's the game Blood with all the expansions on the disc.

Not sure if there is much here to sell but at 50 cents each I figured what the hell. I'll be heading to this Goodwill quite a bit now.
 
Walked into a GW near my mother's house and saw a Sega CDX behind the case. $100. Wanted so badly to grab it, but I don't have that kind of cash to throw. Thought about getting it to flip, but not at that price.
 
$100 for CDX at a GW????!!! I wouldve literally asked for the manager and said "GET THE F*** OUTTA HERE!" HA then they probably wouldve told me the exact same thing.

Todays finds-
Aliens Infestation for DS- $5 complete
Dream Trigger 3D for 3DS- $5 complete

Todays non finds/redickness- $13 hdmi cable in a plastic bag
$8 cartridge only Tetris, Tetris 2, TMNT for NES
 
Not too many games yesterday, but I did find Sniper Elite (PS2), Resident Evil Outbreak File 2 (PS2) and Buster Bros Collection (PS1) for $4 each at a GW.
 
[quote name='Miami_13']Brand new Goodwill distribution center just opened up the road from me. Went there with the girlfriend today and I got..

Croc 2 for PS1
LucasArts Full Throttle for PC. The disc seriously looks like it's never been used.
Blood for PC. I guess it's the game Blood with all the expansions on the disc.

Not sure if there is much here to sell but at 50 cents each I figured what the hell. I'll be heading to this Goodwill quite a bit now.[/QUOTE]

Blood is one of my favorite games conceptually, though be warned if it's older software you may need to figure out a bunch of soundcard emulation / keyboard mapping stuff.
 
[quote name='TheHeef']Walked into a GW near my mother's house and saw a Sega CDX behind the case. $100. Wanted so badly to grab it, but I don't have that kind of cash to throw. Thought about getting it to flip, but not at that price.[/QUOTE]
Why would you want to flip something for LESS than what you paid?
 
[quote name='ZombieToast']Why would you want to flip something for LESS than what you paid?[/QUOTE]

I sold my $15 Goodwill CDX with 1 controller and no games for $156 on ebay a month ago.
 
[quote name='ZombieToast']Why would you want to flip something for LESS than what you paid?[/QUOTE]

Most of the listings I've seen have closed for above 100...somewhere between 115 and 130. Not enough to convince me to grab it. Sadly, I almost grabbed it anyway. I'd never seen one in the wild before. Eh, sour grapes. Bet it didn't work.
 
Found a Gamecube with attached Gameboy Player and SSX3 inside with no cables for $5, a PS One with attached screen for $5, Dreamcast Controller with VMU for 99 cents, and Max Payne 2 PS2 - Complete for 99 cents over the weekend.

Spent a little over 10 bucks on cables and everything works great.

Haven't done thrift store shopping in a long time.

Also saw a perfect condition copy of Syphon Filter 3 for 2.98 at a store, but passed because I didn't think I needed it. Any thoughts?
 
[quote name='faa8146']I sold my $15 Goodwill CDX with 1 controller and no games for $156 on ebay a month ago.[/QUOTE]


[quote name='TheHeef']Most of the listings I've seen have closed for above 100...somewhere between 115 and 130. Not enough to convince me to grab it. Sadly, I almost grabbed it anyway. I'd never seen one in the wild before. Eh, sour grapes. Bet it didn't work.[/QUOTE]

I guess the folks I saw on eBay must've been damn lucky then because I saw one or two auctions end around $60 the other night (which is why I made my previous comment). But I currently see a couple going for quite a bit more, so I shall reluctantly withdraw my comment for now.
 
You would be really screwing yourself if that CDX didn't work..

Also I realized the problem with goodwill here, most GW's are located near independent game stores, so its completely obvious to me that they are sending employees over every morning to pick up everything good to sell at those stores. Sometimes there is less than a block between the 2 stores. Our independent stores here are so bad with pricing its not even funny. Perhaps they locate themselves by goodwill and thrifts on purpose!
 
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