Your favorite non-monetarily-valuable find

[Dahne]

You know what I mean. The kind of thing that won't get you a cent on Ebay, but that you love having found.

A while ago, while I was browsing through a thrift store in a little Northern California town, I ran across a boxed and complete copy of a Link to the Past. Since it's one of my favorite games, I picked it up, even though I already had the loose cart (I always threw those cardboard SNES game boxes away as a child, le sigh). I like to get any boxed games I find, if they're reasonably priced, just because I like to have the maps and all that extra stuff. Besides, an extra copy of a good game is always nice.

Anyway, I open it up to look at all the goodies, and what do I find but a little piece of white paper, like a letter. It turns out to be a handwritten list of every item and piece of heart the original owner had found.

Thinking back to the days before GameFAQs, when the way to find everything was to search out the entire map and scribble it down...it just warms my little heart, and reminds me of watching my cousin play this very game and shouting "no, no! Go THAT way!"

[Kroogah]

I love all the old game lists I've made during hours of boredom in school....favorites lists, want lists, HAVE lists....I still have pretty much every collection picture I've taken with my digital camera too.

[Nesmaster]

yeah, like a list i made a while ago, of all my nes games and how much i paid for them. worthless to anyone but me. i love it :D

[swlovinist]

Upon finding Wizzardry V for the PC, someone had painstakingly mapped out every dungon on grid paper........oh my gosh that had to take a while......it made me have to boot up the game and play. So far, I have not found an error. It goes to show you some people are HARDCORE!

[TNTPLUST]

Well mine isn't a list. Awhile ago on Ebay I purchased a Track Ball for my TI-994/a. When I received the box I found an extra goody. A previous owner had made a lap board for the Track Ball. It was well made...smoothed and varnished. The middle of the board was cut out at a 90 degree angle and lined with felt to cradle the Track ball controller. It was very well designed but I doubt if you could find a buyer for it anywhere....then again.

[briskbc]

Upon finding Wizzardry V for the PC, someone had painstakingly mapped out every dungon on grid paper........oh my gosh that had to take a while......it made me have to boot up the game and play. So far, I have not found an error. It goes to show you some people are HARDCORE!

I found the exact same thing for 4 different AD&D Commodore 64 games. I sold the games on eBay with the had drawn maps and write up from the original owner. I don't think It contributed to the end value.

One thing I found at a garage sale was a stuffed Opus doll (Bloom County). It's about 6 inches tall. I usually do NOT buy stuffed toys from garages sales due to a fear of some dog or kid whizzing on it at some point in the past. But I picked this up for 2 bucks, washed it and put it on my game shelf. It's been there for 6 years.

[grimbal]

Once while working at a video game store we got a shipment of items from a vendor. Included with what we had order were several dozen of empty boxes for a Tekken 3 + Dual Shock package. Under the the PSX logo was NTSC | J

We never stocked these box sets in our store and I've never seen them up on Ebay. I guess it was something that was just done in Japan. Box isn't worth anything, but I thought it was cool looking. ;)

[o2william]

For some time now, I've been collecting video game ads I find in otherwise worthless mags and comic books. I cut out the ads and put them in sheet protectors in a 3-ring binder (which just happens to have an Atari Home Computers logo on it).

I know a handful of people sell video game ads on eBay, but despite that, they don't really have monetary value. Still, I love finding new ads and it gives me something to look for at the thrifts if there are no games to be found. So far, I've found "rare" ads for overstocked Video Brain consoles, 2600 Glib and an old, old classified for a Pong console.

[Crush Crawfish]

Well, my favorite non-valuable item would be my horrendous condition earthbound players guide. It's missing tons of pages, all the pages are worn, and it's in horrible condition. but it just goes to show how much I loved that game. I must have read that guide a thousand times. I've more or less memorized earthbound because of that, and yet I still love it.

[davidleeroth]

I was once browsing through some classic car mags when a pink piece of paper slipped through the pages. It turned out to be a G&W battery and LCD warning note. I then committed a crime and put it in my pocket and walked away whistling. :eek 2:

[MarioAllStar2600]

As I said in the LORE sections it would have to be my DP guide given to me by Joe. That book just means so much to me. Besides that it is probably all my common genesis games I dont even play but cant find the heart to part with them.

[-hellvin-]

Basically classic pc games. I've found Secret Of Monkey Island and ZELIARD for the PC, as well as KINGS BOUNTY for the c64 which are basically worth nothing except to me.

[mizarkgram]

I once was over drinking at my brother's buddy's place, and after about 4 hours of drinking... we all started to talk about old school games and such (whooo what a party eh???)

Well, the guy goes to his basement, and brings up 4 HUGE boxes and starts taking out the contents. The first thing he takes out is a C-64 Computer, complete with printer and all, then an old Tandy 1000 and then a bucketload of games for both computers. He shoved them off to the side and pulled out a Heavy Sixer 2600 and tried to set it up.

Once I saw what it was... my heart started pounding (this was back in my very early collecting days when I only had my PSX, NES and N64). Eventaully we got it running and we burned out on Golf till the sun came up.

That morning, I called the old man to come pick me up, and my bros friend tells me that I can have the two computers and the Atari with all the games, cuz he figured he wouldnt want em anymore

Best Free stuff I ever got, and after rummaging through it, I found a book with page upon page filled with HANDWRITTEN walkthrough notes and hints for virtually all the games..... I was flabberghasted

<End real long story>