Which system to collect for next?

[D-Lite]

Since I have a penchant for collecting things, I constantly have to evaluate what to collect for so I don't just start buying something of everything.

So. My question is, which system would you recommend collecting for? Now mind you, I have some criteria for what I think is a "collectable" system:

1. Playable. I will be playing the games, at least occasionally. This is what kills the Odyssey for me.

2. Reasonable. Both cost and size. I really have no interest in "collecting" the nearly 1000 or whatever Dreamcast games although I do play the system regularly. I figure 200 or so is pretty much the limit on size. As far as cost, I'm a Neo guy, so I'm not really talking about per game cost as much as entire collection expense.

3. Coolness. Tell me a complete, boxed TG16 collection isn't sweet. I think carts are much cooler than discs, so that's a factor. Slick hardware is nice as are variants of the hardware (look at all the wacky PC Engine harware out there). And no, not all the different color N64 systems or all the different color and LE Dreamcasts.

4. Challenge. You need a challenge, but not an impossible one. Magical Chase complete for the TG16 was a MAJOR challenge. No Gold NWC cart for me. Euro Kizuna Encounter for Neo Geo AES? Please, if I had $12K to spend on that I wouldn't be driving a piece of a crap car. Any worthwhile collection needs a few gems that are hardfought. Or the completeness thing, like with cardboard boxes.

Any other factors I forgot about?

Systems I currently "collect" for:
Neo Geo Pocket
Neo Geo MVS kits
Turbo Grafx HuCards and CDs

Things I have some stuff for and can't decide if I should collect for:
Wonderswan
Lynx
Jaguar
Neo Geo AES
Sega CD
N64

Lay it on me peeps. Tell me what I should do and why.[/u]

[Cauterize]

Neo Geo AES
Sega CD

IMO, these.... Some great games on these (Minus the FMV poop games on Sega Cd)
Also you cant go wrong with Neo Geo, but you said you collect for MVS already, why do both?

[vintagegamecrazy]

Jaguar is a pretty easy console to collect for. It has about 60-65 games and a few rare ones too. There is a lot of junk for it, but the good ones carry their weight in a big big way (Tempest 2000) and make the Jag worth playing all the more.

[Ed Oscuro]

Lynx seems cool; I've honestly never played a Lynx game, though (all I own are two post-Atari releases on PCB, bah).

N64 is great and affordable. AES isn't, so you can forget that one unless you want to drop lotsa money (which I sort of gathered you weren't able to do).

[Ed Oscuro]

Also you cant go wrong with Neo Geo, but you said you collect for MVS already, why do both?
Why not? You get the best of both worlds; marquees and move lists on the one hand, great manuals and box art on the other.

[Cauterize]

Also you cant go wrong with Neo Geo, but you said you collect for MVS already, why do both?
Why not? You get the best of both worlds; marquees and move lists on the one hand, great manuals and box art on the other.

True, but it would be damn expensive, which he said he didnt want...

[tholly]

you said the dreamcast has 1000 games....it doesnt (unless your getting foreign releases too), so that system might not be too hard to get complete and its a more current system, since you mentioned playability of the older systems as a problem

[imanerd0011]

What do you really expect me to say other than.....NES !!! I personally think it is by far the best system to collect for. There are alot of games (around 775) which is something you said you didn't want. So I guess that's its one downfall. Most games can be purchased for a decent price. It also has a good share of extremely rare and expensive games if you are into that.
If you aren't into NES, then I would say either Sega Genesis or SNES. Genesis games are EXTREMELY cheap, and seem to be much easier to find in complete form (if you collect complete games).
Personally I don't see the attraction to collect for weird systems. Collectiong for systems such as TG 16 or Neo Geo doesn't make much sense in my eyes.
I think that Dreamcast would also be a great choice to collect for. You said there are 1,000 games, that isn't true at all. I am pretty sure that there are much less than 500 games released for it in the U.S.
N64 doesn't sound bad either, as there are less than 300 games released. Many of the games can be found for cheap now (since it is not that old), and there are alot of classics.

[dbiersdorf]

Collect for the N64, nothing has quite become a collectable yet, but you can get quite a bit of cool stuff for it, all at a good price. You can also pick up plenty of variations of system colors too which is awesome.

[christianscott27]

vectrex, you cant top the coolness and its not gonna take up a ton of room, it doesnt even need your TV.

once you drop the initial $75 or so on the console you can get a vec-ram cart to play all the games. collecting the games themselves is somewhat costly but not insanely so, we're talking about 30 games here. above all most of the games are very playable and fun. you dont need to read a long manual or spend 30+ hours playing to fun, just fire it up and go.

not to mention that vectrex has the coolest homebrew scene going!

http://www.roachnest.com/vectrex.html

[16-bit]

1) Game & Watch.

Yeah, some of them are way rare and $$$, but they look great in a display case.

2) Genesis and Mega Drive

Fun to collect, but I've had my worst eBay experiences buying "complete" genesis games off ebay, so proceed with caution.

3) By Genre

Single Screen Action games, Run & Gun, horizontal Shooters, 16-bit Soccer Games, etc....

[Slipdeath]

Last time I checked Dreamcast had a little under 300 games released in the U.S., I use to collect for it and I got most of my games for under $10. It is a good system to collect for, although i like collecting for neglected systems (like N-Gage, NGPC)

[Ed Oscuro]

True, but it would be damn expensive, which he said he didnt want...
I already addressed that in my first post. I'm just describing the appeal, that's all.

[Porkchop]

The system for you is the Sega Master system. It has a smaller number of lower cost Carts. The 3d glasses are also cool.

[D-Lite]

Oh, I'm not saying that the games can't be somewhat costy. Average price of a Neo Geo MVS kit is about $100 complete. I just saying I don't want to collect something where a complete run involves spending $12,000 on one cart.

Also, I'm not interested in collection 500 (or really even 300) games for a system where completeness also means I need 500 nice condition cardboard boxes and manuals. That's just insane. (why is everyone getting their panties in a bunch over the approximation of Dreamcast titles being about 1000? )

Weird systems? The TG16, known as the PC Engine in Japan, had 140 or so US releases and about 1000 JP releases. Yes, these systesm aren't NES, SNES Atari, or Dreamcast or whatever. And the amount of complete schlock for those systems is immense and would make me feel I was wasting my time and money. The ratio of good games to crap for systems like Neo Geo, TG, and NGPC is really good.

[Ed Oscuro]

I've always felt that going for complete collections, unless you truly have a lot of patience with old games, is a fool's errand. Nobody's forcing you to buy bad games, DLite! Just go for the good stuff.

[le geek]

Based on your post I second going Vectrex

[PapaStu]

Personal collections I am in some state of working towards completion.

NGPC (About 10 games shy of complete)
PlayStation (Ive got a 55% collection... Slow and steady is the key)
Dreamcast (I get the stuff when I can find it)
32x (I keep starting and stopping this one, but sooner or later ill just grind down and get the missing dozen games)

I also work after my PS2, XBox and GCN games pretty regluarly.

[vincewy]

D-Lite, I would break up 2 groups of systems that are worth collecting based on total number of games (else they all meet your criteria), one for over 500, the other below but over 100, IMO, some systems are worth going for complete even though they're over 500, I've discussed this before but for some reason I can't find my old post:

Large libraries (500-+):

Japanese MegaDrive - tons of 2D shooters, platforms, and RPGs, unlike Genesis with sorry lack of shooters. edit: 400+ as some suggested.

Super Famicom/SNES - this would be an epic collection especially if you're into Super Famicom, tons of RPGs.

NES - discussed earlier

Japanese Saturn - forget US Saturn, Jp Saturn will own you.

Japanese Dreamcast - I believe there're over 500 unique titles, many same games have different editions and re-releases.

PC-Engine/CD/SCD/ACD (700+) - whatever genres Neo-Geo misses, PC-Engine complements very well, you can't compare this library with US Turbo.


Medium libraries (100-500):

US Dreamcast (247) - I have it, and it's the best money spent.

TurboGrafx HUcard/CD/SCD (combined near 150) - make sure you get Magical Chase, Dynastic Heroes, and Beyond Shadowgate complete first before starting complete collection, IMO, Hu-Card or CD only collection doesn't cut it.

N64 (200+) - Many good titles, plus easier to find copies in collector's condition since it's cart based.

US Saturn (200+) - to me not as good as N64 and Dreamcast.

Sega Master System (100+) - most are cheap to get.


Other systems have good size libraries but disproportionally high % of garbage games, I'd just get good games on those to play (I have some of those systems as well) -

3DO, PC-FX (mostly anime), CDI, Amiga CD32, Jag/CD, Sega CD (too much FMV junk)


Systems with less than 100 games but will be a good set to complete:

Atari 7800, LaserActive (games+all hardwares), Neo Geo Pocket, Neo-Geo CD


Godly collections that seem impossible to complete:

FM-Towns Marty, Atmark/Pippin

BTW, you started the same topic at NG.com and it generated dif responses, if anyone wants to read click here (http://www.neo-geo.com/forums/showthread.php?t=108516)

[jdc]

You should try collecting the N64.....for the same reasons that I collect it.

Available in completes, REALLY available if you don't mind loose carts, affordable, small library with not too many super rares, actually fun to play.

[Cranky Kong]

I'd say Pong because once you buy one BOOM 100% done. Simple.

[anagrama]

Large libraries (500+):
Japanese MegaDrive

There's only around 420 Japanese MD games. [/pedant]

[-hellvin-]

Dreamcast

Why? Most all of the time you easily find the games complete, they rarely exceed around the 25 dollar mark at most places and there's tons of great games. Excellent, excellent imports if you're into that stuff as well. It's all about King Of Fighters 2001!

[abdul]

N64 man, so many great games, very affordible ( no game will ever reach $100, even complete)

[Crush Crawfish]

I'd also go with N64. Great games and fairly cheap. Sounds good, no?

[D-Lite]

BTW, you started the same topic at NG.com and it generated dif responses, if anyone wants to read click here (http://www.neo-geo.com/forums/showthread.php?t=108516)
Yep, deliberately so. I figured I'd pit the more NES/2600 type digitpress folks vs. the more supposedly elitist NG crowd and you're right, the responses have been VERY different. And I'm enjoying both sets of responses.

I do think I'm going to work on the Marty games, which will probably drive me insane.

And with regard to the Genesis games, I'm crazy, but I'm not stupid. It's amazing to me how difficult it is to find complete Genny games in even DECENT shape. Why the hell was that system so poorly treated?

[blissfulnoise]

So. My question is, which system would you recommend collecting for? Now mind you, I have some criteria for what I think is a "collectable" system:

Things I have some stuff for and can't decide if I should collect for:
Sega CD

1. Playable. Sonic CD, Snatcher, Shining Force, Popful Mail, Lunar 1, Lunar 2, Ecco the Dolphin, Ecco: Tides of Time, Eternal Champions, Secret of Monkey Island, Time Gal, Dark Wizard, Keio Flying Squadron, Panic!, Rise of the Dragon, and the only place to get the kick arse Mortal Kombat video! O_O

2. Reasonable. 144 titles not including variants and/or non-games. I did mine in a year.

3. Coolness. Tell me that shelves of uniformly sized, blue spined, sweet Sega hard cases isn't beautiful to behold. I think carts are cool too, but when they come in such awesome packaging who can argue? You've got 4 completely different models of Sega CD systems in the US alone that are all awesome (X'Eye, CDX, model 1, model 2). No crappy color variants here.

4. Challenge. Radical Rex will break your heart. Colors of Modern Rock will make you wonder why you'd spend 50 bucks on a music CD. And you're going to pay for Keio and Snatcher. The best part though is that none of it will really break $100 bucks.

Plus, they'll look cool next to the Saturn titles you'll need to collect next!

[D-Lite]

Question is how much does Keio go for? I know it's the rarest and I've been casually looking for it. But I'm willing to shell out for that.

[anagrama]

Question is how much does Keio go for? I know it's the rarest and I've been casually looking for it. But I'm willing to shell out for that.

Euro copies are relatively cheap (£8-£15/$15-27). Of course, it'll be a bitch to play them on a US system.
NTSC copies are in the $50+ range, I think.

[D-Lite]

Question is how much does Keio go for? I know it's the rarest and I've been casually looking for it. But I'm willing to shell out for that.

Euro copies are relatively cheap (£8-£15/$15-27). Of course, it'll be a bitch to play them on a US system.
NTSC copies are in the $50+ range, I think.
Only $50? I thought the US Keio was about $100+

And play on a US system is the easy part..... (clicky (http://www.digitpress.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=49066)) ;)

[anagrama]

Actually, $100 may well be closer the mark, I'm not too clued up on NTSC games. PAL copies are still a fraction of that, though.

[blissfulnoise]

Question is how much does Keio go for? I know it's the rarest and I've been casually looking for it. But I'm willing to shell out for that.

The rarest in my experience was actually Colors of Modern Rock. Radical Rex took a very close second place.

I managed to score my very good condition Keio in a lot for around $65 US. Now I got lucky with the lot (it had like 15 games including a minty Jaguar XJ220), so your Keio may be in the range of $80 - $100 at prices right now.

Most expensive games for me:

Snatcher: $60 (BIN)
Keio: $65 (in a lot)
CoMR: $60 (in a lot w/ Lunar 1)
Radical Rex: $220 (bought it in an X'Eye lot that also landed me all the sleeved X'Eye pack-in games)
Popful Mail: $45
Shining Force: $40
Lunar 2: $45

The rest were sub $40 dollars, most being $5 - $15.

Of course, YMMV.