Biggest Videogame Spending ERROR You've Ever Committed

[FamicomFreak]

My biggest error was probably buying a copy of world cup 2002 for the ps2 for 50 bucks only for it to be 19.99 after the world cup.....man I try not to buy 50 dollar games anymore.

[Swamperon]

I got caught up in the pre-launch hype for Super Smash Bros Brawl pretty badly and ended up importing it (I like in the UK, I wasn't waiting six months for a pal version) with a free loader for £50. The worst thing was that I was in my crappy student house at the time so the TV couldn't do 60hz, so I could only play it in black and white!

And then when Nintendo began blocking the freeloader via updates, I thought screw this and bought a pal copy for £25! And saves are not region free either... :(

Luckily I managed to sell my US copy and freeloader but still... I've managed to get much more for much less in the past!

[sebastiankirchoff]

I spent 50 bucks on Resident Evil: Umbrella Chronicles. I was so fucking dissapointed by it that I kicked myself for weeks after buying it.

[garagesaleking!!]

Mine would be,

Buying Donkey Kong 64 when it was released and then trading it in 3 days later with all of my n64 stuff for a ps1 with 2 games. I had about 15 n64 games. I had all the good ones, the pokemons, all the marios, i am somewhat pissed about it still today. I dont even have the ps1 anymore, i wish i would of kept somthing from when i was a kid.

Anyway the donkey cost about 60, and gamestop paid like 12, and thats with the expansion pack.

[tofu]

I got suckered into paying $24 for a NES dogbone controller.:(

[SegaAges]

I guess I can add to this now. I paid just under $100 for a fake copy of Alien Front and Virtua Cop for N-Gage. I am currently filing a dispute over it.

[Baloo]

My worst spending error was paying $12 for Mario learns Numbers for SNES thinking it was a good game. What a piece of crap.

[DDCecil]

My worst spending error was paying $12 for Mario learns Numbers for SNES thinking it was a good game. What a piece of crap.

Hey I thought it was $13! See Post #216 ;)

I guess mine would be buying a "sealed" Space Adventure for $Seventy-something right here on the forums. It turned out to be a re-seal.

[Ed Oscuro]

Recently (i.e. within the last few months) I've gotten a bit wet on a few purchases...bought some MD games form a fellow here, probably not a bad price, but then they all showed up at Shmups Forum considerably cheaper. Sold a Pulseman I got here for about $99 for $75 shipped ($10 S&H to New Zealand). Doesn't really qualify as a terrible blunder though, since I got a game in amazing condition at the end, which is something you often have to go through multiple copies for.

Similar deal with my Rendering Ranger, though I haven't been able to offload that first copy yet.

I looked through my old replies in this thread, and didn't mention:

-$400 Astrocade in the shipping container (at least I think I paid $400 for it, I ended up selling it some years later at a loss)

-$500 Stratovox - somewhere out there, The Collector is enjoying his Neo candy cab, and I'm stuck with this game I hate ROFL Still looking to offload it.

There have been some other pretty epic bad purchasing errors I've made, but the upshot is...usually the money goes to a good cause, or I learn something from it.

I usually make much wiser purchasing decisions when I'm broke, though. :-D

[Eightbit Allstar]

The problem I have is to be very impatient. That's why I sometime buy NES games for more money that I could have saved by waiting for a better chance.

Ufouria for the NES with the sleeve (no box, manual) for 30€. It is quite rare (DP states it is R4, I disagree with that, it's R5-almost R6) but I have found a copy of it in a flea market for 5€. Meh.

Solomon's Key 2 for 20€, again no box or manual just the cartridge and the sleeve. 2 months later I found the complete game for 20€ in a gameshop. Too bad I didn't have enough money with me and when I got back to purchase it, the game was gone.

[b1aCkDeA7h]

Getting two Akuma 360 FightPads right as they started making them again.

[sonic-boom]

Buying Mario vs. Donkey Kong 2, I never play it.

[TurboCro]

Buying a Sega CD right when it came out. I still haven't forgiven Sega...

[vivaeljason]

I've said it in other places on the forum, but I just got into the hobby of collecting and my first purchase was an SNES for $35...that doesn't work.

[Peonpiate]

Im tempted to put Gamecube down, but I bought it play Paper mario and got my money's worth out of it [id have bought a WII to if they didnt screw up its release of paper mario by ditching its rpg aspect].

Besides that - Xbox 360. I dont play it at all, im into RPGs so I should have seen it coming that that wasnt going to be its strong suit.

[TazVag]

Buying the Dreamcast when it first came out.....in Japan that is. Bought it from a local import shop. It cost me(well, my mother to be fair) like $700. And I only own a small few games for it to this day. Most of my others are downloads. Like the Sega CD guy above I still haven't forgiven Sega...

[Lasermouse]

Paid too much for a Jaguar at launch. D'oh!

- Lasermouse

[JSoup]

Getting a Wii two years ago comes to mind first. I have two physical games to this day.

Then again, I just put Homebrew on the thing, so my Wii is suddenly getting a lot of mileage.

[Tokimemofan]

My Broken PS3 60GB for $190 is beginning to look like a colossal repair job (the "Cannot read discs" that I was told about and the Cracked case + busted wires I WASN'T told about)

[Tallise]

my worst deal was when i was colllecting atari 2600 game (early 90s) and i was visiting edmonton. i checked the local buy and sell and saw a "deal" 83 atari 2600 games for 100$ sounded like a good deal. at the time i was buying peoples whole collections so when i went to pick the games up they were in a grocery bag. well i didnt look inside i figured it was this guys old collection, well when i got home it was filled with 30 space invaders 30 combat 30 yars revenge and 10 assorted very common games. :angry: :( it took me 3 yrs to slowly add them to the collections i was selling to ge rid of them all but never got my value back. then the kicker is when i moved here i found out this guy sells games at the local flea market. now i check before i buy.


Edmonton is a HORRIBLE place to find games... I have never had any luck shoping there. I always find every game so over priced ($156 for mario all star?!) and thats if you can even FIND the game first. St. Albert is worse though, they basically have 'blockbuster' and 'mission fun and games', both are filled with stuck up ***holes and never having anything really worth buying. I'm going up there in a few days fro X-mas though, hopefully it has changed somewhat.

Also after buying too many old games that don't work from various places up there ($35 cnd for used castlevania 64, didn't let me test play got it home and it glitched and freezes, no refund policy!) I demand to inspect and test play each game before buying it. If they refuse then I just walk out. I could probably find a better deal elsewhere anyway, I'm a patient person. Where I live now in texas has a cluster of game stores in high competition with eachother, but only one that will sell retro games. My favorite store has great customer service though, and will beat other prices :3

[Nebagram]

Buying DJ Hero for full price at launch. Loved the game but £30 cheaper less than a month later=ouch. :(

[Aussie2B]

I'm too careful with my money to make any really bad blunders, so mostly I just regret buying some games at their MSRPs. I spent $70 on Tetris 2 for SNES, $70 for Killer Instinct Gold, $60 for Pilotwings 64, Quest 64, and Cruis'n USA. Well, Cruis'n USA I actually got a ton of enjoyment out of when it was new, but it's kind of silly to look back on it. I guess some may consider buying the Nintendo 64 at launch a mistake (for the $200 MSRP at least; not the inflated prices at Christmas time), and there were other N64 games I bought at the MSRP. But it was the only system I ever bought on launch day, and I don't regret it because I had a blast with it and wouldn't trade those memories of first playing Super Mario 64 just to have gotten everything at a cheaper price later on.

I've also bought just about every non-Square Enix RPG released for PS2 in the last year or two, and I haven't played any of them for more than an hour or so each. I just didn't want to have to pay huge bucks later on, since games like those released in a system's twilight years often have smaller print runs and get expensive down the road. I'm not sure how well some of those purchases will work out for me. I bet the fancy box sets will be worth it, though, since I keep them so mint that they even still have the plastic around them (I use a pocket knife to cut the plastic around the flap). Not that I plan to sell any of these, but I hope my copies will eventually be valued at around what I paid for them or more otherwise it was a waste.

[Thrashdance]

Not really too many regrets to speak of. Recently I took the time to import a copy of Terranigma from australia then track down a pro action replay 2 so I could play it here in the states. Importing both of those cost me around 120 dollars, last month there was a copy of terranigma bundled with a pro action replay 3 for like 80 bucks.....shoulda waited. Killer game though!

[Platinum]

I'm usually always getting good deals like paying $100 for 57 saturn games, 4 saturns, racing wheel, 3 dreamcasts and 36 games.

Free NES toploader

But then there is the time I bought the xbox 360. I payed 150 bucks for a premium 360, with 120gb hardrive, no games, and a wireless controller. I still don't like it very much.

[Sonicwolf]

Getting a Wii two years ago comes to mind first. I have two physical games to this day.

I'm in the same boat. I only have about 4 games, only 1 of which has gotten any considerable play at all.

[JSoup]

I'm in the same boat. I only have about 4 games, only 1 of which has gotten any considerable play at all.

I'm actually feeling a bit better about the Wii now that I have Homebrew on it (although, I've only bought one physical game since the last time I posted in this thread).

[j1e]

Over $450 on an Xbox 360 plus Saint's Row. Then I bought GTA IV the day it came out. The games + the system = complete shit.

I'll stick with my SNES and other old school systems from now on.

[danny_galaga]

I'm pretty happy with almost everything i've picked up. Biggest waste of money was Mutant League Football for the megadrive. Not being american, i have no idea what's happening. That's ten bucks i'm never getting back LOL

edit: I had completely blanked Road Rash 64 out of my mind. Another $15 down the tube. I'm glad i didn't buy them back in the day...

[buzz_n64]

My biggest regret is spending like $135 for a famicom disk system that doesn't work, and buying 2 games for it. $25 each. The games were even re-written on, and relabeled. Man, I need to make that sucker work.

[Breetai]

My biggest regret is spending like $135 for a famicom disk system that doesn't work, and buying 2 games for it. $25 each. The games were even re-written on, and relabeled. Man, I need to make that sucker work.Games being re-written on and re-labeled (or not even labeled) are a fairly common thing, for better or worse.

[jerkybill]

Before I bought either of the collecting guides, I came along a VIS complete with 27 "games" 2 controllers, a few interactive books, cable and the original box for the system- all for 35 bucks. I had never heard of the VIS before, so I decided to give it a try (about this time I should add that I passed on a 5200 still IN THE BOX). I stored it for a while before I decided to try it- on the same day I recieved DPG Advance.

I feel used to this very day (but I kept it- make a decent cd player)

[Roji]

$350 for a boxed Genesis...too bad it didn't friggin' work lol

[JSoup]

Now that I think about it, buying Pokemon Snap and Kirby Squeak Squad for full price when they were new was a rather dumb idea.

[Eduardo]

On my last ebay bender i went over what i was planning to spend on this lot:

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=120582295421&ssPageName=STRK:MEWNX:IT

[BioHazardx3]

Biggest regret? Buying a Wii instead of an Xbox 360 and also pre-ordering Sonic Unleashed for the PS2.

I wish I could get that money back. ¬¬

[Casati]

My biggest videogame collection error was selling off my boxed NES, Genesis and collection of games for less than $200 back in the early 90s, but my biggest spending error was probably what I spent on CIB Atari games on Ebay this past year.

Another error was selling off my CIB Gameboy Color and CIB GBC games including Zelda about 8 years ago for about $50. My most expensive error was selling off instead of collecting from about 1992 to 2010, other than owning a GBC for a few years. Now I have to pay a premium to get used SNES, N64, Gameboy games.

[Jaruff]

The last one that I can think of is purchasing Kane & Lynch a few years ago on the basis that since the Hitman series was great, Kane & Lynch would be great too. Needless to say, I learned my lesson from buying on brand power alone.

Oh, and buying the Madden 09 Collector's Edition for $90 just for NFL Head Coach, which was $10 a month or so after. I haven't bought an EA Sports game since.

[sebastiankirchoff]

Over $450 on an Xbox 360 plus Saint's Row. Then I bought GTA IV the day it came out. The games + the system = complete shit.

I'll stick with my SNES and other old school systems from now on.

Same thing happened to me. I spent about five hundred dollars on a 360, a couple of games and the wireless adaptor (don't laugh at me, I know it was a huge ripoff but I was thirteen, stupid and had a huge hole in my pocketl). I ended up never playing online, and the adaptor was such a piece of shit and I barely used it.

[Fatalstar64]

Most definitely FFXll for the PS2 I bought the collectors edition and it sucked so bad... I spent $80 for it and traded it in within 3 days never again will I pay that much for any modern game, also the day I lost all respect for Square.

[Emperor Megas]

Most definitely FFXll for the PS2 I bought the collectors edition and it sucked so bad... I spent $80 for it and traded it in within 3 days never again will I pay that much for any modern game, also the day I lost all respect for Square.It's alright. They lost respect for you the day you spend 80 bucks on Final Fantasy XII. http://box422.bluehost.com/~videogc7/forum/images/icons/icon10.gif

[jonebone]

I remember buying Hexen on N64 brand new from Wal-mart as a kid. I remember games were typically $60 back then, and this one was $74.99!! I knew nothing of the game, but I figured "Hey, it's worth more, so it must be better!"

Boy was I wrong. I played the shit out of it still, but that is possibly the worst FPS I've ever played. I've seen better enemy sprites on the NES...

[Compute]

I have purchased many terrible games in my life, but my biggest error wasn't that big, really. Although a few brand new xbox titles sucked when I paid full price, my biggest error.. hmm

Now that's easy. I remember begging my mother for Bulls vs. Blazers for the Genesis. I hadn't played the game, but it was only $28! I wanted a new game so badly, it didn't matter how bad. Of course I sold the damn thing for pennies, but I used the proceeds to buy a game I really wanted.

I thought that maybe I had been harsh on BvB, so I fired it up in the emulator one day. That game sucks even more now.

[G-Boobie]

I paid ninety U.S. dollars to import Arcana Heart 2 when it came out on PS2. It was (and is) one of the worst hack job ports I have ever played. Utter garbage.

[Parodius Duh!]

this is kind of the opposite....I had just about every saturn import that was worth having (including radiant silvergun and D&D collection, crows, etc..) at least 40 games, all dead mint with spine cards.....sold it all to a friend for 250.00 so I could take a girl out! (and no, i didnt get laid, so it was absolutely NOT worth it!!!!) :( :( :(

[ncman071]

i guess i have a few retarded mistakes in spending....realistically i spend too much anyway on video games however, since my twin sons were born 14 months ago, the game playing and spending has long since gone way down.....however, i still play when i can..i.e. when they sleep.

back to the topic however, in Sept. 08 i traded in my ps2, ds lite, and psp all with a ton of games (easily over 20) for a PS3 80 gig system. i do not regret purchasing the ps3, however i quickly realized how much i missed the the ds lite and psp and all its games.

So, i went back to GS and re bought the ds lite, psp, and a few games that i loved that i had gotten rid of. A few weeks later i went by Play n trade and bought a slim ps2 with a few games.

My lesson learned is never get rid of any systems or games that i know i'll regret later.

I think the other "blunder" was paying $40 for a used FFVII on ps1 with a cracked case and missing instructional manual...then seeing the same game still shrink wrapped apparently at a pawn shop for $5

[FrankGarret316]

Oh man, I made my poor mother buy me that god awful Panasonic 3DO system near launch. How much was that thing? $700? $800? Oh man..

[Urzu402]

Mine would be Pre-ordering COP the Recruit and just buying Lunar Dragonsong, I thought both would be good games, but alas I was horribly wrong.

[smallfish]

you've hit upon a good one here. I recently got impulsed (i.e. suckered) into paying waaayy to much for a Sega Master System. It's compunded by the non-mint condition of the console (it does work) and the fact that I just found out that apparently the controller is missing a thumbcontrol?

[LaughingMAN.S9]

my biggest videogame spending error is also my first ever in the retro world, a few years ago, maybe like 07 i walked in to a local retro shop and let the owner talk my head up on intelligent qube for ps1, about how rare it was and how impossible it was to find bla bla bla, i ended up dropping like 90 or 95 dollars on it, lol went home, logged on to ebay and say 2 pages worth of copies for the game all averaging around the 50-60 dollar mark, lol i felt like a retard

[APE992]

FFXII Limited Edition instead of Bully Limited Edition. I never liked FFXII and I do Bully. Plus the formers "limited" nature was actually "sell as many as we can and make extra $$$" where as bully was limited IIRC.

At the very least not jumping on the Limited Edition of MGS3 was a stupid idea given eBay prices.

Or maybe spending $125.50 or so on a new in box set of 3D glasses for the SMS. Sold them a few years later for a measly $75. Or how about $120 for a Dreamcast System Disc 2? Sold it a few months later for $70.

Markets drop out when it isn't a necessity like water.

[Joe Redifer]

I spent $50+ a few years ago for RC Grand Prix for the Sega Master System. I spent $75 or so on Phantasy Star 2 when it was released (though I didn't think it was a waste). And, like a few others, I spent $700 on the original 3DO release. I still want to kill myself over that one. But all this spending experience makes me laugh when others complain about spending a paltry $45 on a game like Pier Solar.

A friend of mine spent the full $400 on the stand-alone CD-ROM attachment for his TurboGrafx-16 back when it had very few games. I also remember him spending $70+ on the Mega Drive Rastan Saga 2. I felt his pain from miles away!

[Phantar]

Spending 10 Euro on "Fifa Soccer '98" last year. Not only has this game aged horribly and brought next to nothing new to the table when compared to its PRE-predecessor... about six weeks later someone else brought me the same game AS A GIFT! Oh yeah, and I learned that in other countries they pratically give this game away for less than a buck - not in Germany where I live, though!

So not only have I spent too much money on a crappy game, I now own TWO copies of that crappy game as well!

It may not seem like much, but every time I see the games' box it kinda pisses me off.

[QuickSciFi]

The only one game I remember spending crazy money on was a $70 Disney's The Jungle Book back in the 90's when it was released for the Genesis. I was a huge fan of Disney's Aladdin and The Lion King. But those were different days back then. I think I may've been 16 (if I remember correctly, it was a late '95 U.S. release). It became one of my favorites, though; so I guess it may have been worth it.

Since then, just about the only game I've ever spent money on upon release was A Boy and His Blob for the Wii. I actually had gotten my first current gen console (Wii) that day as a gift, so it seemed that $40 for a brand new game would be ok (since I hadn't done something outrageous like that since '95, and wanted to get into the current gen hype ;)). At any rate, about a month later, it was down to half the price, $20 (just like every single game you'll see out there). Once again, it was very worth it, as it became my favorite Wii game and my favorite 2009 title overall (not that I'm much of a current gen gamer anyways :?).

[retroguy]

My biggest mistake would have to be trading in half my PS1 games to get Yugioh!: Forbidden Memories (I was a huge fan of that series at the time). They were all ones that I probably wasn't going to play again, but that still hurts in retrospect.

[theclaw]

Buying mounds of Super Famicom stuff hoping to profit.

[WelcomeToTheNextLevel]

Sonic the Hedgehog for 360... makes me want to get clubbed in the ankle and cry "Why, WHY?" There went 60 bucks... down the s***ter.

[Colorado Rockies]

700 dollars on the Japanese version of Mark of the Wolves for the AES.
Now they commonly go for 500 or less.

[APE992]

Lets see...

1) $125.50 for a new in box never used set of SMS 3D glasses. Sold them for $75
2) Dreamcast System Disc 2 bought for $125, sold for $80
3) Pre-ordered FFXII for a total of about $65 and passed on MGS3:Subsistence LE at the time. Wanna guess which one was worth ~2-3x its retail value that year and which one ate total balls?

Lesson? Buy what you need/will use purely for that purpose. If you want an investment buy something like coins, at least they are worth their face value at minimum and their value as scrap metal at worst.

[Buyatari]

The most I spent was the purchase of a large vintage collection which required the help of another member here. 72k in total or 36k each ....... OUCH !

[spongerob]

http://www.cvgames.com/sites/default/files/Wreckless%20The%20Yakuza%20Missions%20Boxshot.jpg

That hunk of shit. I was so sure it would be good. I hadn't yet developed the keen sense to know what would suck and what wouldn't yet. I was getting pretty good having lived through the PS1 shovelware era but this was a big mistake.

[ugly_monster]

The most I spent was the purchase of a large vintage collection which required the help of another member here. 72k in total or 36k each ....... OUCH !

For that much I hope it wasn't an ERROR!

I spent $60 on a Dreamcast with games. The games were disc only. I never asked. My bad. Mr Driller, Power Stone, Sonic 2 and 10 more all disc only.

[mEgAsHoT]

Earlier in the year I got the Playstation Move Sports Champions bundle ($100). I liked Sports Champions, so I got "The Shoot" shortly afterword. I played it for a few months, and was going to get a new controller for my brother to play with, but then I realized that there weren't that many games coming out. My brother wasn't so interested in it either, so I was stuck having it as a one player thing, which sucked. There are so little games coming out for the Move that it just wasn't worth keeping, so I got rid of it (traded it in to Gamestop when they were having a trade-in bonus for game controllers/accessories). However, it isn't my biggest video game spending error, due to the fact that I enjoyed it and felt it was worth the $100 dollars. But I had to let it go due to the overwhelming lack of support for it. Still was an error on my part, but it gave me a few months of enjoyment. Wish it had given me more.

[Casati]

A couple years ago, I bought an Atari Flashback console brand new directly from Amazon itself, not a third-party selling on Amazon, because a lot of online sellers are loose with their definition of new. It seemed strangely not quite new when it arrived, but I figured since it was from Amazon I shouldn't really question whether it was new. After all, it was complete in box and worked fine although many of the games were poor imitations of the original Atari games I played years ago, with flashing screens and so forth.

Then I read that there were tons of fake Atari Flashbacks being sold at Kroegers, Ebay and so forth. So I checked the 'R' and confirmed it's a fake which explains the poor quality of many of the games.

[NBaco]

I once spent 150$ on a top loader nes.

Yeah.

*sigh* And the controller didn't even work...

[retroguy]

Why is that an error? Most NES fans want the top loader because it's more reliable and works better than the original version. If you still have it, I'd hold onto it and get a couple of controllers cheap.

[Baloo]

$13 for a copy of Mario: Fun With Numbers for SNES.

[NBaco]

Why is that an error? Most NES fans want the top loader because it's more reliable and works better than the original version. If you still have it, I'd hold onto it and get a couple of controllers cheap.

...It's not an error? Oh damn, in that case never mind. A friend of mine had told me I got ripped off and I just automatically assumed I did. As for the controller, I hear the dogbones blow, so that might explain that. I got like 5 controllers so the controller issue wasn't a biggy anyway.

And yep, I still have it and use it once in awhile. My only complaint are the "Jailbars" on the screen, but with most games they're not too noticable. I have both the front loader and the top loader so I'm pretty much set for NES games.

[BetaWolf47]

Most people like the dogbone controllers. I myself have only used one, and its dpad is so stiff I can barely stand it. I don't have another dogbone to compare it to though.

Dumbest thing I've ever done is traded a GameCube Action Replay to a friend for an N64 Transfer Pak. That Action Replay now goes for $60+, while Transfer Paks are worth $5 at most...

[BlastProcessing402]

My biggest error would probably be buying a 32x. I didn't buy it at original price, I got it after it was obviously (to everyone but me) doomed and the price was dropped to get them out the door ($90 I think), and I only ever got one game for it, WWF Raw, which I already had on the SNES.

Sure the 32x had secret hidden wrestler Kwang and updated music for Lex Luger, but other than that it was inferior to the SNES version I already had. And Kwang wasn't even anything like the real Kwang anyway.

I did rent some other 32x games, but overall, waste of moolah. :oops:

[sidnotcrazy]

My #1 biggest regret is buying Final Fantasy 11 with the hard drive for my ps2 $50 (close out.) I played it a couple times, and then found that I HATE MMORPGs.

[ishashobar]

I actually bought Universal Studios for the GCN new at full retail price. (to be young and stupid again.....)

[HappehLemons]

I actually bought Universal Studios for the GCN new at full retail price. (to be young and stupid again.....)

Oh god, I did the same thing. It was after I got back from there...

[Singletriad]

I was exclusively an N64 owner back in it's early days and of course I was starving for something to play. So I bought Hexen. I paid $90 + tax which, in Ontario, came out to $103.50. Yup.

Of course the game sucks to boot so I eventually traded it in. I got so little for it I've blocked out the actual amount. Maybe $25. Maybe.

I haven't overpaid for a game since.

What? Hexen, was a great game!

[sfchakan]

My #1 biggest regret is buying Final Fantasy 11 with the hard drive for my ps2 $50 (close out.) I played it a couple times, and then found that I HATE MMORPGs.

You learned that lesson pretty cheaply, I'd say. :)

[JSoup]

What? Hexen, was a great game!

The N64 version is known for being pretty meh.