When ever any collector of Retro Games is asked how to they build up their collection, they tend to always say "Car Boot Fairs". For those who don't know, theses are gatherings that are typically held on Sunday mornings. Originally, people with goods to sell would go to a field, open their boots and people would buy what they wanted from it. It has evolved over time, into a far more civilized gathering, with most sellers putting their goods on tables in front of their cars. As the summer progresses, the number of people at these events greatly increases, which means more sellers, more buyers and annoyingly more traders. These stalls are not there to shift their "old junk", they are instead trying to sell goods bought specifically for the car boot with profit in mind.
However while these Car Boot Sales used to be regarded as the best place to get bargain games, now everyone seems to be a Retro Game valuer. eBay is used to determine price, often giving the false impression that anything old is worth a small fortune. To get anything, below the going rate on eBay, you need to get to the fair before the doors have even opened to the public and then you are racing the dreaded "re-seller".
If you would like to know why re-selers divide the Retro Collecting community, I've recently written an article for Retro Collect. But alas, it seems that the gold mine has run dry; Car Boot sales are no longer the go to place for Retro Game deals.
This is all very true but I think they 'Golden Age' passed us by a long time ago. I do recall in around 2001 seeing literally boxes of Megadrive games at a pound each but this was long before EBay really took off and people did not all have smart phones with Inet connections. This is just how it goes. I think it is mostly, for better or worse, mostly online these days and EBay played a large part in 'becoming the standard'. I thought that you collected Japanese games mostly so you are still not going to find that many Japanese titles at a car boot sale I would say. I know some real fools who get up at the crack of dawn every Sunday 'just in case' they find the find of a life time :D All rather silly I would say.
ReplyDeleteIt goes into far greater depth on the Retro Collect site .
ReplyDeleteI have big mix of regions in my collection but yes a lot of Japanese titles as so few were released in the West
Thanks for taking time to comment :)