My Games Room (The Museum of Gaming Goodness)

CiDeRmAn

Here are a few pictures of my gamesroom, it's in my converted attic and I don't spend as much time as I should there!
Most of my systems are there, although the PS3, 360, Wii, Megadrive, NeoGeo CD and Nuon are downstairs by the big TV, and the PSP and DSi are in my car, most of the time.
The only thing I'm really missing are an Atari/Sears Pong console and a decent 29" HD LCD, I'll get there one way or another on both counts.
However if anyone has such a console and wants to swap for, say, my Vader 2600, I'll consider it!

I have just done a big clean out of the room, lots of rubbish built up, and there is plenty more to do, so excuse the state of it at the mo. My games are, by and large, tucked away in various cabinets, although I hope to do a bit of Ikea shopping and get some matching units to display my stuff.

Feel free to comment on it or leave pictures of your own rooms of bliss!

CiDeRmAn

Here are some shots of my games collection, the PS and PS2 stuff, I've about 110 for the PS and 150 odd for the PS2, thus far.

CiDeRmAn

Here are my Megadrive games, a modest selection, but with important stuff like Sonic/2/3/& Knuckles, also Road Rash/2/3 and Skitchin and Lotus Turbo Challenge, not to mention Thunderforce 3 and 4 and also my fave Biohazard Battle.
Here also are my N64 games, I have pretty much everything I ever wanted on it.
And my Atari 2600/7800 games, not too many, but just enough!

And last but by no means least my controller for Steel Batallion, awesome isn't it?

Myrddin

Sweet setup cider - respect. Quick one, how do you deal with all the tv inputs/scarts/rf's? Have you a control box or do you do things manually?

CiDeRmAn

Essentially behind it all are three cables running along the wall, attached at several points to self made AV boards, consisting of 2 3 socket phono input plates, these then turn into 2 AV inputs per board, and so I have around 12 AV inputs around the room all plugged in, at the end, to the Scart on the TV.
Now I know this is not ideal, and the picture quality is sometimes less than stellar but, overall it works quite well.
The RF based consoles are, up to now just hooked into the TVs RF via a bunch of splitters, again not the Highest Fi I guess but servicable, most of these RFs have been replaced by shiny new AV cables but these, in turn now need new AV ports, so I have to get cracking and fit them into the room, this will be done along with an overhaul of the console placements in the room, the PS2 titles take up too much space and so will be going into a cabinet, as soon as Ikea have one to suit!

noodler

Does everything still work? There must be some amount of cleaning dust-wise?

I thknk I would love to spend an hour rooting through all that.

You make me sick!

CiDeRmAn

Well, thanks for saying I make you sick, hmm....
Dusting is an ongoing problem, and several large spiders have been evicted from behind the 3DO only to ring the doorbell and move right back in!
I will be dismantling most of it and giving the place a real good polish in the coming months.
Yes, everything works, bar my NES that has given up the ghost and started the flashy thing, it has a new edge connector so it's something else entirely...

Retr0gamer

No Gunstar Heroes?

CiDeRmAn

You know what Retro, and I know you won't tell anyone, and you'll keep it between us, but I don't like Gunstar Heroes and never knew what the attraction was, can't figure it out.

But, now that you mention it, a collection of english Treasure releases for the Megadrive would be a nice thing to have, hmm...
Pretty affordable too I reckon.

Must stay away from eBay!
Credit card off limits!

Dozen Wicked Words

I would like to buy your room, I have this much money.....

Is that a Virtual Boy you have? Does it give you headaches? I had a loan of one once and its the only time I have ever suffered with migraines!!

A great set-up anyway.

Retr0gamer

Nice set up you have there. I've got all my consoles in crates now taking up all the room in my tiny bedroom after I got kicked out of the games room that I took over I need my own place.

Red Sleeping Beauty

Bastard
I want all of that.

Especially the Atari 2600 Jr :
https://us.v-cdn.net/6034073/uploads/attachments/35420/78919.jpg

Gummy Panda

That's a massive collection, but what's the worse game in your collection

TinCool

No Commodore 64 ?

papajimsmooth

Have you played all them games? Thats an amazing collection though how many years did it take to gather it all, or are they all your consoles as you grew up?

thealltimelow

we must find that house

CiDeRmAn

I sold as I went along, upgrading from gen to gen until the Dreamcast era, I had sold my Jap DC to fund a launch PS2 when the guy I was selling it to said he didn't have the money, so he gave less cash but an N64 and a Saturn instead, and that was that, I bought a PS2 alright but then bought back all the consoles I ever had before then, and bought every console I ever wanted, all the shile keeping up to date with the new gen stuff.

The way I collect is the way anyone can collect, slowly but surely over the last 8 years, not being too fussy about perfect packaging or instruction manuals, and most importantly treating them properly and playing them, not just leaving them in dust jackets, on shelves, lonely!

The worst game in my collection is....
Not sure, I only really own stuff I like,
Probably PacMan on the Atari 2600, the worst arcade conversion ever.

Main reason for no C64 is I never owned one, only the Speccy, sorry!


As for where my house is, I ain't telling!!!

Retr0gamer

I'm not fussy about packaging either. I buy the games because I mean to play them, even if I don't get around to most of them.

Any Turbografx stuff?

o1s1n

You're such a jammy git! I'd kill to have a converted attic to set up all my stuff like that. Currently it's all split between my folks house and my apartment

Not fussy about aquiring boxes. I'll take stuff without. (Bar Megadrive games, but that's just because their clamshell cases are so lovely)

Saying that, if I do have a box, I'll make sure it's kept in good coniditon.

CiDeRmAn

I've got a few bits and pieces, Renegade is fun, Spatterhouse, Alien Crush and a couple of others.
My best collection is the Virtual Boy stuff, 10 titles in all, including Mario Clash, Wario World, the excellent Galactic Pinball and Red Alarm, also got V Tetris amongst others.
I have the best of all though, a flashcart for the Virtual Boy, a rare beast made by the guy who makes my Vectrex cart, very nice thing indeed, only holds one game at a time, but now I can play 3D Tetris without havingto mortgage my house for the privilege!

And no, it doesn't give me a headache.

I did however attempt to show it to a friend of my brothers who, through misadventure, lost an eye, before realising that the selling point of the Virtual Boy may well be lost on him, he did see the funny side!


But why oh why were Ninty boxes so crap?
Blasted cardboard, falls apart!
So now I have feck all Snes, Nes, N64 and GB boxes, arse!

Not that english territories box art was ever a patch on Jap box art, shudder!

Retr0gamer

I just hope you don't rate alien hominid higher than gunstar heroes.

I hear you on the nintendo boxes, they suck. All of mine got destroyed as well but that was my own stupid fault and an embarassing story

Red Sleeping Beauty

Mega Drive boxes on the other hand, were great

James Howlett

I noticed the "Shadow of the Colossus" and "ICO" posters - a sure sign of a good gamer! (as if additional proof was needed!)

Did you buy most of this stuff new or second hand? Either way it must have cost you a fortune. I got afew bargains myself last year (Metal Gear Solid 2 PS2 new and sealed in tesco for 5euro, all 3 Devil May Cry's PS2 in gamestop for 16euro).

Heres a better question; are there any games that you don't have in your collection and want but are having trouble tracking down?

Red Sleeping Beauty

James Howlett wrote: »

Heres a better question; are there any games that you don't have in your collection and want but are having trouble tracking down?

Why ? Are ye sellin' :pac:

James Howlett

Doubt I'd have any games that aren't in there!

I imagine that most of us are looking at the collection and thinking that its a perfect collection of games. So that got me thinking; do you look at it and think "yeah it is... but if only I had..."

CiDeRmAn

Truth be told, very few of my games are new, most are from Gamestop/Gamesworld, I had a sweet deal there after having several years of working there part time back in the late 90's, they allowed me to keep my employee's discount and I put it to really good use!
Also Bookmart and Gamexchange were a regular haunt of mine back in 98-01 so I got plenty of stuff then to.
Seems that the time to bolster a collection for a particular gen is about 3 years after the new one has emerged, generally the previous gen games are sold off for a song and that certainly seems the case now with the PS2, most of which are less than a tenner in gamestop preowned.
Of course the more generations of consoles between you and the stuff you want the harder it gets to buy them, especially in a bricks and mortar shop, online is the only way to go for Atari, Sega and Nintendo it seems, the premature death of the Xbox also makes it's games hard to locate, although Adverts.ie seems to be of help in this respect.

I got the Ico and SOTC posters in Gamestop around the time of the SOTC launch, they had re-released Ico as well and there was a few bits of promo material, which I natch begged for!

Stuff I don't have but want?
Intellivision,
Looping for the Colecovision
Tons of MVS Neo Geo stuff, of course
An NTSC PS2
An Atari Pong console, C-100
A NES that won't break down!
There remains a bunch of PS2 games I don't yet own, but am waiting til they come down a smidge more, Rogue Galaxy, and a bunch of others.
I'd like to get the Xcom titles for the PS, hard to find though!

And a nice new TV for up there, although I'll have to keep a CRT on standby, so I can play VirtuaCop, House of the Dead/2 and the Time Crisis games, not mention Duck Hunt and Wild Gunman.

Retr0gamer

Couldn't you get the PS2 chipped or are you completely against that?

CiDeRmAn

I'd be all for it, but I have a launch PS2 and not sure how long I have before it breaks, given that folk seem to have probs with them after a while.
May just pick up a cheap slimline one and chip it, now sure, might find one already done, save me the trouble.
Not too guilty about it given all the money I've given Sony over the years!

James Howlett

I'd imagine an NTSC PS2 is still fairly easy to get over the interweb.
I too used to enjoy the benefits of a staff discount on games but not anymore. Thankfully new releases can be purchased fairly cheap in xtra-vision (Street Fighter 4 €40!).

So have you played them all or are there a bunch you bought just to boost your shelves?

Retr0gamer

CiDeRmAn wrote: »

I'd be all for it, but I have a launch PS2 and not sure how long I have before it breaks, given that folk seem to have probs with them after a while.
May just pick up a cheap slimline one and chip it, now sure, might find one already done, save me the trouble.
Not too guilty about it given all the money I've given Sony over the years!

Have you considered the HD exploit? I got it done to my PS2 after my second one failed (thanks KdjaC). Basically with a PS2 network adapter you can boot up a loader that allows you to load PS2 games from a 120 GB max hard disk. You can play NTSC games off it as well. You can copy the games on to the hard disk from the PS2, although there's still region protection, or copy them using a PC if you hook up the hard disk with an IDE. The advantages are that it eliminates laser wear, loading times are massively reduced (I probably would have given up on Odin Sphere after I saw the loading times on youtube), and in streaming games like GTA texture pop-in is eliminated. Only small problem is that PS1 games can't be played off it but you really shouldn't play them on a PS2 since they usually cause laser wear much quicker (not that it stops me tempting faith, damn NTSC PS3 that I have).

Crowman

CiDeRmAn wrote: »

There remains a bunch of PS2 games I don't yet own, but am waiting til they come down a smidge more, Rogue Galaxy, and a bunch of others.

Ciderman, I saw Rougue Galaxy in smyths carrickmines yesterday for 4.99.
If your'e not able to get out this way I'd be happy to pick it up for you?

CCCP^

Retr0gamer wrote: »

Only small problem is that PS1 games can't be played off it but you really shouldn't play them on a PS2 since they usually cause laser wear much quicker (not that it stops me tempting faith, damn NTSC PS3 that I have).

Are you saying that the laser in the console will eventually wear off the layer of the disc? ffs...

appleidog

CiDeRmAn wrote: »

But why oh why were Ninty boxes so crap?
Blasted cardboard, falls apart!
So now I have feck all Snes, Nes, N64 and GB boxes, arse!

Not that english territories box art was ever a patch on Jap box art, shudder!

Because they knew they would be rare so they made them in cardboard boxes, and thought that the parents would throw out the boxes, so then nintendo have a market for selling all the boxed ones they keep in there warehouse for loads of money on the E-BAY.

but to be honest the japanese box art was fantastic compared to England

CiDeRmAn

Nope, laser wear is what happens to the moving parts of the laser assembly inside a console if it has to skip and jump a lot during use, as happens when you play games not formatted especially for that console, so DC copies do it, you can here the drive doing the fandango when playing some games, or so I am told, same with the PSone and "backups".

Ideally I'd want a modded PS and a modded PS2, so I can play all those games from overseas that I really can no longer afford to buy, like Thunderforce VI or Einhander, that's the plan, a chipped PSone was ten to a penny a couple of years ago, but a tad harder to track down these days.

As for collection being padding, or at least some of the games bought as such, well, truth be told there is little chance of playing everything in my collection in a year if I played 2 games a session for the next 12 months, but I have put in plenty of time in each game over the years and sometimes it's enough to know that if the need arises and I, or a mate, simply must have a blast of Burnout 2, Rollcage or Blastcorp, I can put my hand on it and be playing it within 3 minutes of the request, that's kinda nice.

I know it's rather pretentious but I kinda see my games room as a museum or library rather than a collection, the games in there can all be played almost instantly the thought occurs, and there are enough of all the things we all played to death in the 80's, 90's and 00's to sate anyones appetite.

Only problem is getting the time to play them at all, the PS3/Wii/360 offer a serious temptation, and the desire to play Fallout 3, GTAIV and the rest is often more seductive than a quick blast of Pilotwings on the Snes.

CiDeRmAn

Crowman wrote: »

Ciderman, I saw Rougue Galaxy in smyths carrickmines yesterday for 4.99.
If your'e not able to get out this way I'd be happy to pick it up for you?

I may check out my local Smyths man, not even sure where carrickmines is, and if you're living next to it, you're just as inaccessible!
I promised myself no more travelling for games anymore, the wife will catch on and some day the gamesroom will be empty and the smell of burning plastic will fill the air, don't believe she wouldn't, quite a formidable lady my missus!

Retr0gamer

CiDeRmAn wrote: »

Ideally I'd want a modded PS and a modded PS2, so I can play all those games from overseas that I really can no longer afford to buy, like Thunderforce VI or Einhander, that's the plan, a chipped PSone was ten to a penny a couple of years ago, but a tad harder to track down these days.

Thunderforce VI is only okay but Einhander is stupidly good. May I suggest G Darius as well. It's got some of the longest most intense and over the top boss fights ever.

CCCP^

CiDeRmAn wrote: »

Nope, laser wear is what happens to the moving parts of the laser assembly inside a console if it has to skip and jump a lot during use, as happens when you play games not formatted especially for that console, so DC copies do it, you can here the drive doing the fandango when playing some games, or so I am told, same with the PSone and "backups".

My DC has been making some horrible sounds as of late especially while playing House of the Dead 2. Feck.

Red Sleeping Beauty

CiDeRmAn wrote: »

Truth be told, very few of my games are new, most are from Gamestop/Gamesworld, I had a sweet deal there after having several years of working there part time back in the late 90's, they allowed me to keep my employee's discount and I put it to really good use!
Also Bookmart and Gamexchange were a regular haunt of mine back in 98-01 so I got plenty of stuff then to.
Seems that the time to bolster a collection for a particular gen is about 3 years after the new one has emerged, generally the previous gen games are sold off for a song and that certainly seems the case now with the PS2, most of which are less than a tenner in gamestop preowned.
Of course the more generations of consoles between you and the stuff you want the harder it gets to buy them, especially in a bricks and mortar shop, online is the only way to go for Atari, Sega and Nintendo it seems, the premature death of the Xbox also makes it's games hard to locate, although Adverts.ie seems to be of help in this respect.

I'm wondering when PS2 games will be retro

appleidog

Speaking of PS2 games i just purchased REZ

CiDeRmAn

Well done appleidog, now be prepared for the legion of Sega fans to tell you the DC version is better, and for XBLA fanboys to say that the HD edition is superior.

Unfortunately, the XBLA edition is probably the definitive version, but, all Rez games are really equal, they are all genius, and we are lucky to be able to play them, Amen..

I have all three and there isn't much between them, aside from the lovely crisp vectors on the 360, they are basically the same.

Wasn't the vibration pack for the DC version subverted into a sex toy?
Better be careful buying one on eBay, you really may not want to know where it has been, or inserted for that matter, and that's why I can pass on getting one of those!

Retr0gamer

CiDeRmAn wrote: »

Wasn't the vibration pack for the DC version subverted into a sex toy?
Better be careful buying one on eBay, you really may not want to know where it has been, or inserted for that matter, and that's why I can pass on getting one of those!

It's not hard to see why it was used as a sex toy. I'd be weary of anyone selling one on ebay, could be a bit fishy.

CiDeRmAn

Yeah, could be a bit "tacky" too, you know *mimes thumb and index fingers being sticky*

My fave peripheral, best of the lot, and the one controller, aside from the default one, I could not part with is my NegCon, that thing is pure genius, and I wish there was a PS3 version.
Made by Namco it provides true analogue steering, throttle and brake all in the space of a standard controller, on the PS and it was released nearly 15 years ago, with nothing to compete since, awesome!
Even Namco's own follow up to it, the JogCon wasn't as good, in fact it sucked, and still does, I've got one of those too!

Sadly I think the Analog and Dual Shock controllers killed the NegCon off, sadly, because it was beautiful, I played and finished the PS RidgeRacers and Wipeout with it, fantastic!

KeRbDoG

CiDeRmAn wrote: »

I'd be all for it, but I have a launch PS2 and not sure how long I have before it breaks, given that folk seem to have probs with them after a while.
May just pick up a cheap slimline one and chip it, now sure, might find one already done, save me the trouble.
Not too guilty about it given all the money I've given Sony over the years!

Maybe you could offer me something for my 'TEST' PS2 debug console and my LAN adapter?

Myrddin

kerbdog wrote: »

Maybe you could offer me something for my 'TEST' PS2 debug console and my LAN adapter?

More info please...

KeRbDoG

EnterNow wrote: »

More info please...

A simple Google search of "ps2 test debug" pops up:
http://content.techrepublic.com.com/2346-10878_11-3069-21.html

Plays everything, just like a chipped console but CD/DVD-R media needs to be patched by a special tool - or yea can just throw stuff on the LAN/HDD adapter like was mentioned before, but, not all games work from the LAN/HDD adapter

Myrddin

That HAS to be worth a few quid....where may I ask did you come across this rare find

CiDeRmAn

Hey Kerbdog, PM me a price and I'll see what I can do.
I understood that it wasn't for sale!!

Also, you guys out there I'm missing any systems or games I really should have, bearing in mind my hatred of JRPGs, RTS and anything, ANYTHING with random battles!

tifosi 1

Ciderman the room looks pretty cool in those photos. Doesn't matter how many times i've seen your Steel Battion Controller it still looks awesome(crap game though). You do need a HDTV up there or a PC monitor for the DC games.

Have you catalogued all the games you have? You'd have to discount all those blank discs you use on that little white console you have. You know the one i'm talking about.:)

CiDeRmAn

I'm shocked!!!
Actually I have a lot of DC games, but, sadly I also have a few dodgy ones, always replace them, where possible, with originals, but where on earth to get them?

Sadly the Steel Batallion controller is starting to suffer from some sun damage, the eject flick down safety cover is starting to yellow, if you have one, you'll know what I mean.
But I've nowhere else to put the blessed thing! And as for the game itself, well, it's a pretty tough mech game alright, and not one of the pick up and play kind, much more of a sim and the rule of losing the whole save game if you don't eject is pretty harsh, but then, it's supposed to be immersive.
I have a feeling, if MS hadn't of condemned the Xbox to an early death we might have seen some other mech titles released on the console, aside from Steel Batallion and it's online only sequel Line of Fire, which I own but never played, boo hoo!

tifosi 1

CiDeRmAn wrote: »

I'm shocked!!!
Actually I have a lot of DC games, but, sadly I also have a few dodgy ones, always replace them, where possible, with originals, but where on earth to get them?

Sadly the Steel Batallion controller is starting to suffer from some sun damage, the eject flick down safety cover is starting to yellow, if you have one, you'll know what I mean.
But I've nowhere else to put the blessed thing! And as for the game itself, well, it's a pretty tough mech game alright, and not one of the pick up and play kind, much more of a sim and the rule of losing the whole save game if you don't eject is pretty harsh, but then, it's supposed to be immersive.
I have a feeling, if MS hadn't of condemned the Xbox to an early death we might have seen some other mech titles released on the console, aside from Steel Batallion and it's online only sequel Line of Fire, which I own but never played, boo hoo!

Funnily enough the little white console I was refering to wasn't the DC. Don't worry Cider's there's no Gstop employee's on here on ex employee's lol. Did your copy of MSR turn up yet?

CiDeRmAn

Now I'm puzzled, little white console, well there's the PSone, and I don't have any backups for that, and the DSi and that doesn't use disks, the Snes is kinda greyish white but all I have for that are carts, hmm....

The MSR is still on the missing presumed lent and thieved, I know it wasn't you so don't worry if your room is broken into and all your games rifled through, if definitely won't be me!

Never the less, what would make my gamesroom better?
The last time I asked a question like that, a couple of months ago, I ended up buying an MVS motherboard, SupergunIII and a load of MVS carts, cost me a fortune.

Are there any gaming essentials I'm missing?

Nothing that takes ages to load, so out you go C64 and Amstrad CPC 464.