I'm thinking about selling all of my games and just emulating everything. Convince me why this is a good or bad idea.Long bloggy explanation:My collection is huge, estimated value according to Gameye is over $50k. I have basically every console or handheld worth owning plus a few more, and tons and tons of games. I love them, but honestly I don't play them so much these days and I'm kinda depressed about lack of space and want to declutter.From a practical standpoint, there's absolutely no reason to hang onto this stuff. I could emulate all of these games in my PC, or on a MiSTer (already have) or Analogue Pocket (already have). Or I could get rid of the games but keep the consoles themselves and use flash carts and ODE's (already have). Holding onto it is really unnecessary, and over time this stuff is going to degrade and with the recent demand this is probably THE time to sell it. Right?But I fucking love this stuff so much. I know it's retarded and unnecessary, but it's nice owning stuff that you like.But I also like the idea of being some kind of retarded nomad who has no clutter in his house and enjoys the convenience of digital stuff.And if I were to sell it all and get want it's worth I'd have $50! Combined with my cash savings I'd have $80k to invest, and with a chunk that big I'd get some good returns. I talked with my wife about it but of course she's not a gamer so her opinion is just sell it.What would you do? Sit on it and enjoy it, or sell it and invest the money and just play everything digitally? If sell, would you hang onto the consoles or would you just play on PC/MiSTer/Analogue Pocket?I know what I should do, but I like this stuff. But maybe that's just the ADHD talking. I'm worried about selling it off and then regretting it, but like I said there's also no reason to have it all.
>>12081193Sell the wife
>>12081193I don't know what you SHOULD do but I know what I would do:Divide gaming stuff into three categories, of game media (cartridges and discs and such) that I probably won't ever seriously play in the future, game media that I might (say, 35% chance or better) seriously play sometime in the future, and game-playing equipment (consoles etc.). First category gets sold, with me making at least a weak attempt to get it to people who will care about it at least a little bit (as opposed to giving it away or throwing it in the trash). Second category is kept. Third category is kept.If the collection is still too large, raise standards for judging whether games will be useful and enjoyable to me in the future, and repeat. Continue until collection is no longer too large.I see no major drawback in this. What drawback is there? You have your favorites in original format, you have your non-favorites in pirated form (still playable on original hardware OR emulator, as you prefer), you have lots of space, you have most of your alleged potential $50k. You don't have the freedom to toss it all into a van with trivial ease and go live in a swamp somewhere on a whim, but do you really need that?Emulation is great but if you've got the original consoles and controllers and whatnot, AND flashcarts etc., why give up the advantages of playing that way just for a couple extra thousand dollars or whatever? I dunno. Anyway that's my thinking. Also, you and your wife should both get in shape, probably. That's more important than any of this.
I kept my consoles and got flashcarts/ODEs. I wanted a home gym so I got it, fuck yeah.
>>12081193You'll get a lot of hate for it here, but I did exactly this 10 years ago and couldn't be happier. Emulation mogs the shit out of hardware. At least back up your saves before your plastic disintegrates.
>>12081226So heavily curating? I've thought about hanging onto favorites and just selling everything else. Unless it's super rare, because that stuff should go.>Also, you and your wife should both get in shape, probably. That's more important than any of this.We already are. I do sports and stuff.
>>12081235I have a save dumper, that's not a problem. I have basically everything. I'll probably dump my saves before I sell stuff.
>>12081193So… why don’t you keep all stuff but use your mister / pc / analogue exclusive for 6 months to one year? It’s not going to be much different and you can get more experience without committing to it right now.And OP… it’s alright to own stuff you like because you fucking want to. That’s all the reasoning you need.
>>12081240Does it make sense to you? To me the authentic experience with real hardware, though not required, is significant and valuable in various small ways. So would you want to keep the consoles (while selling most of the game media) for that reason? Emulation is never exactly the same, but maybe you're okay with that. It just seems a shame to discard authentic setups after having gone to the trouble of gathering all the equipment for them. But then, all those old wire tangles and plastic shells do get to be cumbersome. I'd still keep them though. They pack away in a closet well enough, and if they go bad they go bad.For me the main thing is that I like to keep things I might use but I don't like to keep things that I'll only look at even though they were made to be used. THAT stuff has to go. For me. It makes me sad. I guess it doesn't bother you to that extent though, or you wouldn't have a $50k collection to begin with.
>>12081263>THAT stuff has to go. For me. It makes me sad.Wording this more clearly: It makes me sad to HAVE that kind of stuff that I'm only looking at and not using it. It doesn't make me sad that it has to go. I want it to go. Then maybe somebody else will use it.
>>12081193absolutely sell. any "enjoyment" can be had through emulation, dont kid yourself. having a collection is cool and all (thats mostly just in concept), but if you arent rock hard just looking at it, then its not really worth the space. and like you said, having that much cash would be a great boon, if only just for your eventual retirement fund. also >>12081247 makes a really good suggestion to just "see what its like" and trial it. my vote is still to sell though.
I'm just not gonna sell my collection because if you sell to a physical store they rip you off and if you sell on modern ebay there's a 99% chance they're going to lie and claim they never got it then reverse charges
>>12081193>But I also like the idea of being some kind of retarded nomad who has no clutter in his house and enjoys the convenience of digital stuff.That sounds just fucking awful.
>>12081193>I'd have $50Yup
>>12081321>if you sell on modern ebay there's a 99% chance they're going to lie and claim they never got it then reverse chargesSame. I've heard there's basically nothing you can do to fight it if they claim they never got it or that it was a fake or whatever bullshit lie they go with.
>>12081247>it’s alright to own stuff you like because you fucking want toI know that, but I also want to declutter my house because I have too much stuff.
>>12081321I would be selling it online piece by piece to get the most money for it
>>12081321>>12081417I missed the part about eBay. I live in Japan, we don't use ebay here.
>>12081193I'm not gonna read all of that but I can tell you that big brains hoard sealed games and then emulate everything they want to play. This is the way.
>>12081193Sell everything that can be emulated perfectly. Hold on to everything else until it can be emulated perfectly.
>>12081445Why wouldn't you just have a sealed copy, and a cheap used copy to play so you dont need to deal with emu shit, and then have a 2nd copy you can also sell later?
You'll probably regret it but hopefully the $50k and added space and time make up for it. I sold my small collection of about 100 NES games quite a long time ago, before the prices escalated, so almost 20 years ago, and I still sometimes think about it but it's just one of those things in life there's always going to be painful memories of some form or other.As for playing games on emulator. That is correct except for a couple of cases like certain N64 games or whatever, but eventually everything will be emulated.
>>12081469Because it isn't 2011 anymore, emulation is easy and accurate for almost every console that matters, and you can do shit that wouldn't normally be possible like remapping the controls or playing splitscreen games online.
>>12081478Emulation also allows you to not beat the game by using savestates. Many such cases of savestate addiction. It's called savescumming, because they like swallowing mouthfuls of multiple saves cum.
>>12081492So don't use savestates you fucking retard.
>>12081478Anyone buying sealed games, would also have the original hardware and extra copy to play so they specifically dont need to emulate.
>>12081520I have a shit ton of sealed games but I don't keepy any of the consoles around because they're inferior to my PC for actually playing the games.
>>12081235how much was your collection worth then vs now
>>12081590I haven't paid attention to retro prices recently but I'd guess a little over $1000 today. The rarest game I sold was Pokemon Fire Red but it was used when I bought it.
>>12081193You're clearly going to regret it if you sell your collection but you've got the normie hivemind (including your wife as women are inherently normies) telling you that's what you should do because Number Go Up is the most important thing. Are you going to cave to social pressure and spend the rest of your life kicking yourself for it or will you be the master of your own will?
>>12081193your collection is already an investment, and you loving it is stopping you from selling it for scraps50k is nothing and you'll probably just burn it on retard investments and buying worthless shit
>>12081193You'll regret it. Even if you emulate everything perfectly you'll always have the loss of the artwork and other tangibles forever gone.>inb4 I'll just buy them backUnless you become rich or have your priorities seriously out of whack, you will not rebuy 99% of you collection. And their values will continue to rise regardless of how you feel today.
I've sold most of my games that I've replaced with flashcarts or ODEs.
>>12081610Idk, I'm thinking about keeping some favorites. Maybe I'll just curate it like another anon suggested, rather than selling everything. I at least want to hang onto my Virtual Boy collection and some of my Game Boy games.I guess I'll start with some stuff I literally never use or haven't played, and then move onto the overly rare and stupidly valuable stuff.
>>12081615I was going to put it into indexes. I'd start with putting some of it into NISA and iDeCo because of the tax-free stuff, and then I'd consider some other index options for the remainder.7% return is a pretty safe assumption, so the money from the games combined with my cash savings would grow to a little over $800k by the time I'm 65, and at a 7% return that would give me a full salary as my annual return by that age so I could safely retire.But even if it were just a 4% return, that's still a part time salary which would be majorly helpful to have at that age.This is the reason why selling it is so tempting.
>>12081771>you will not rebuy 99% of you collectionIf I sell it, I don't want it back. I want free space.
Savestates are cheating fuck emulation
>>12081193I basically just use my PC and sketchbooks each and every day because I'm a drawfag, if I had an opportunity to bank 50k for some crap I don't even use once a month then hell yeah, retirement funds are always appreciated. Like you said, that stuff could just rot in the future and depreciate.. and when you're dead and gone, it's just gonna be your next of kin selling it off.Consider it thoughtfully though, maybe do a trial period of putting your retro stuff away and relying only on emulation, like another anon said, before making the call.
>>12081193>But I fucking love this stuff so much. I know it's retarded and unnecessary, but it's nice owning stuff that you likeit's not retardedunnecessary, maybe. but you're not a robothumans like owning things and keeping the things they like around to look at and just know they have them. it's natural and it doesn't become this autistic trait just because it's videogamesalso, you probably enjoy games more if you physically set up the console and pick up a box with the game and put the cartridge or cd in it and commit to play it, rather than setting up one of those emulation machines with infinite libraries you just sample for a few minutes until you're bored
>>12081193I despise how /vr/ is also the "im a merchant, evaluate my wares" board as well.
>>12081193>But I fucking love this stuff so much.To me this says a lot. How long have you been thinking about this? Was wanting more space and to be like a "retarded nomad" a recent desire? If it's been a week or so, I'd wait a month or two longer just to see if the desire to sell everything will pass. Maybe even wait a whole year. You might not want to take my word for it because I don't follow retro game prices or anything, but from what I've seen people here say, prices never really come down. Demand goes up, and it stays there or gets even higher. I think you'll have plenty of time to think about it, and don't have to worry about your collection losing value. But what do I knowAlso you're weighing the pros and cons of having the money and space vs stuff with a lot of sentimental value, but have you put in the same level of thought towards your financial planning? I know next to nothing about investing so this may be a stupid question, but are you certain your plan to handle the ~$50,000 is a good one? And on that note, is Gameye's assessment accurate? I've never heard of it so I wouldn't know. I mean I'm sure you're sitting on a pile of money regardless, but if you go through with this, get much less than you expect, and then don't handle the money as efficiently as you otherwise could've, you may regret it more than you think.Of course if you do go through with it, I too would recommend a trial period, but that may be hard because you'll know in the back of your head that stuff is still there, so it won't feel the same as when it's actually gone. And of course I'd also recommend holding onto some of the collection anyway. Maybe check to see if you have any games that are particularly difficult to emulate, and hold onto those, at least until emulation for them gets better. It'd be frustrating to suddenly want to play a game you had in your collection, but can't because it barely starts on an emulator. Though I guess with $50,000 you could just re-buy it.
>>12081902>I guess I'll start with some stuff I literally never use or haven't played,This is just the weirdest thing to me. Why do you have such things? Were you planning to play them eventually? But how could you accumulate $50k worth of stuff without realizing you weren't ever gonna play all of it because there's way too much? So I guess you must be buying things just to have them and not use them. Do you really not see a huge, obvious distinction between selling things you don't use and selling things you do use? Do you truly love those two kinds of items equally? I'm not trashtalking you, just mystified as ever by the mentality of a pure collector.
>>12081986>So I guess you must be buying things just to have them and not use them.Not OP, but I think you made a lot of assumptions. He said he'll start selling stuff he doesn't use or has never used, and somewhere along the way you turned that into his $50,000 collection being made up mostly or entirely of stuff he's never touched because he's just a mindless coomlector. He's implied he's used a lot of it in the past, and we don't how much or how little of it he's barely touched. I wouldn't be surprised if he got a lot of his collection like a decade and a half ago when the obscure shit was extremely cheap. Hell, even now you can get a lot of shit for free. I have quite a lot of hardware that friends, family, coworkers, and whoever else have just given to me because they were going to throw it out. Not saying this is how OP got his shit, just that there's other explanations for him having some things he hasn't used.
>>12081193I have a sizable old school AD&D collection and I'm at an age where it's pretty unlikely I'll really play or run a campaign again, and the stuff is worth thousands of dollars, but it has so much sentimental value that I'd only consider selling it if I was in some kind of emergency. part of it is just that those old school box sets and books are pure soul and modern D&D could never recreate any of it. part of it is the hope that I'll get to use them again someday.keep it. you've already expressed that it has great value to you personally and getting rid of it would probably be a mistake that would bother you for some time. besides, I think the retro market is going to go even higher desu so now wouldn't be the time anyway
>>12081193sell it now and re-buy it at 4x the price in few years
>>12081193It's up to you, I was a record collector/dj 20 years ago, I had around 2000 12" records. I downsized, kept my 300 favourites out of them and sold the rest. I would do something like that if I were you, start from the bottom and start making lists of what you actually enjoy in your collection, those you keep. Then you continue like that, you can also make lists like "maybe keep" and "why do I even have this shit?". You don't have to sell everything at once and then regret it, have it like a 50 year project.
>>12081193do you know what a fucking pain in the ass it would be to sell all that shit and deal with stupid fucking buyers trying to nickel and dime you
>>12081193SNES
>>12081193If I were you OP, I'd go down 2 of the different roads. Keep the systems, buy Everdrives/ODEs, and go on about your life. The other is just straight emulation. Both are the only sane options at this point.
>>12081906That's what you say now. And your reason is the DUMBEST reason ever to possibly part with a video game collection. You can make more space easily. Either you want attention from anons here or you're about to make a huge mistake.You sound 30 years old maximum. Old enough to *think* you know what you're doing, but when you get older, you'll hate yourself for being so impulsive.
>>12081193I would keep it all, personally. Don't listen to your wife. She doesn't understand.
>>12081193Yo OP I’m willing to pay like 90% of what your shit’s worth, any way I can help you get rid of your stuff?
>>12081193>And if I were to sell it all and get want it's worth I'd have $50Is your house still mortgaged? Do you have no comfortable investments? Do you have kids that are going to increase your expenses, eg college? If not, sell up and emulate, you can't afford a huge valuable childrens toy collection.>What would you do? Sit on it and enjoy it, or sell it and invest the money and just play everything digitally?I sold or threw away every console/physical game when I no longer played it, even as a kid. I've rarely regretted it, and i've been unencumbered by lugging around a trailer load of toys and sentimental items for the past 2 decades of adult life. The physical games/music/movies/backups/etc I own can fit in a shoe box.Even if I wasn't still paying off my house, I would never want to be one of these pseudo-hoarders that own cupboards full of crap that rarely gets used, due to sentiment.
>>12082268>You sound 30 years old maximum. Old enough to *think* you know what you're doing, but when you get older, you'll hate yourself for being so impulsive.Sounds like hoarder or forever-NEET logic. Healthy adults aren't in mental anguish because they got rid of their childhood toys or stamp collections.
>>12081226This, OP. Don't commit to a full sale, just a part of it. >>12082079The cash he would get out of it compensates itThat being said OP actually invest the money. Don't go around buying a corvette (well shit, can you even get a vette for 50k these days) or keeping it in cash
>>12081193It's clear that you want to keep a lot of this stuff. If you really want to declutter, I would start by getting rid of items that you have multiple copies of, then get rid of stuff that you don't really think about. If you're having serious doubts about getting rid of something, then don't cause you'll probably regret it later.
