Did GameValueNow and NintendoAge shut down?

[Reed Rothchild | 9,584]

1 hour ago, Tanooki said:

Nah it was toxic, in a hive mind style of way and shades of elitism too.  You either fell in with the cliques there or you eventually had problems.  And some things, because of clear ass kissing, like the utter brown nosing of VGA in its earlier years, really split people along lines.  Some people got utterly banned for dumping on VGA or showing legit issues with it.  Others who didn't care for all the speculation, price gouging, and other abuses and called it out would get nailed for it at certain levels.  I remember a laundry list of generalized things to a few specifics, but is it really the time to be doing this or digging up old crap from a place that had some serious rot from within that got screwed and dunked by a greedy simp who runs gocollect?

Well, as someone who was perma-banned from the site, you may have a certain perspective 

[darkchylde28 | 1,546]

On 12/23/2022 at 3:31 PM, the_wizard_666 said:

Caltron was legit rare before a load showed up something like 10 years ago.  It was the last of what we called the "big 7," though it's long since lost that title.  The other 6 though, they're still right up there.

It was, but I saw far more Caltrons floating around at auction than Aladdin units before the "motherload" of Aladdin stuff was discovered and cut loose upon the world.  Then, an even larger amount of Caltron carts was found, and yet somehow the Aladdin sets have stayed static in their availability and price, and the Caltrons are once again hard to find and pricey.  Makes zero sense to me.

[darkchylde28 | 1,546]

11 hours ago, LeatherRebel5150 said:

I never understood what people meant when claiming NA was toxic or had issues or whatever. I was on there daily from 2011-end and didn’t see anything that would cause me to call out a site for. Maybe it’s just I didn’t go into threads that these things happened in. I also never received any kind of warning/reprimand/ban.

Sure there was maybe a handful of people that were annoying to me but that’s what the block button was for. If the barometer for toxic is needing to block some people then this place would qualify too ass I have 2 people on my block list here as well.

It really was toxic, and I believe a lot of it came from moderation, or lack thereof.  Sure, there were some members who were just crappy to other people who weren't part of their circle, but the issue came from moderators who acted that way, who'd throw temp bans or PM'd warnings/threats at people who simply disagreed with them strongly (without resorting to name calling, etc. that would actually violate a rule and put someone legitimately in line to receive an official warning, suspension, etc.).  I ran into that quickly as a noob-to-the-site (who had lurked for longer than some members considered well established at the time), and then again later, after having several years of membership under my belt with zero official warnings, suspensions, etc.  I even got PMs from different moderators quietly, privately telling me, "Oh, don't worry, he's just like that" when a "bad" mod would step out of line and nobody would say anything publicly to correct them.

I didn't feel the need to participate in any threads where I agreed with the discussion at hand or didn't have anything new to add, but was also discouraged from participating in threads where I might disagree with the status quo or even dare ask a question.  If someone was part of the "in" crowd, it's very possible they didn't see it, but folks who never befriended the right people absolutely did.  Many who got banned simply lost their patience with the double standards and spoke their minds, much to their detriment.

9 hours ago, Quaze said:

I think it’s being grossly exaggerated in hindsight, I wouldn’t say NA came within 100 miles of qualifying as a “toxic” environment. I would’ve called it a “pleasant/welcoming/friendly” online environment based on my years of experience there. Unless I REALLY wasn’t visiting the threads where all this was going on, I’d say we’re looking at a bit of sensationalized revisionist history.

It's really not.  Perhaps in the beginning it wasn't like that, but in the last 3-5 years?  Oh, absolutely, if you weren't part of "the old guard," then you were walking on thin ice no matter what you did until you made the right friends, joined the right clique, etc.  Some of the stuff was public, but a lot of it went on via crappy PMs that bad/toxic moderators would send, threatening people who didn't tow the party line (but technically didn't break any rules).

8 hours ago, Reed Rothchild said:

I'd say it was certainly "elitist" in many senses.  And hostile towards certain individuals (ie Pat).

But yeah, I would agree that most of the individuals that felt they were ran off made their own beds with their own behavior.

I'd say the people who got caught scamming and got thrown out made their own beds, but there were plenty of people who got banned who really didn't deserve it.  People who basically called out the wrong mod or wrong double standard that folks didn't want looked at too closely got trotted out pretty quick, sometimes even having their posts that got them thrown out edited or deleted, leaving no evidence of the wrongdoing other than the memories of the folks who had seen it go down but failed to realize the significance enough to screenshot it.

There was plenty of great info there, and plenty of great people as well.  But if the wrong folks got involved in a discussion and you disagreed with them and didn't back down, you were very quickly walking on thin ice, regardless of what the official rules/policies were.  Once someone threw the banhammer, I don't know that I ever saw an instance where it was ever second-guessed as a bad call and reversed by anyone.

[TheGameCollector | 18]

I remember one NA member was basically trying to say that if anyone ever looked at a player's guide or read a walkthrough in the past, that means that they could never say they completed the game without cheating because having gotten a piece of knowledge about a game from any other source was cheating. And then the members argued back and forth. It was the person whose profile picture was of a snake who believed this if I recall correctly.

[LeatherRebel5150 | 1,056]

@darkchylde28

Honestly can’t say I noticed any of that and I certainly didn’t belong in any clique or had any friends on there. I was no different there than I am hear. Occasionally post a couple comments, rarely start a new thread with some decent gaps in between doing those things. 

The only real difference was I bought and sold a bunch in the marketplace. The only pms I ever got were for haggling essentially 

[MrWunderful | 2,927]

@darkchylde28 I would love examples of those people that got banned for calling out the wrong mod, or double standards. 
 

While I was a mod, everyone got banned for a reason that was discussed among mods and admins, unless they did something egregious. 
 

 

[Murray | 2,449]

Skinny was the peoples mod 

[MegaMan52 | 2,461]

I don't miss NintendoAge much (and didn't care about gocollect at all). There were some interesting pictures and topics, such as Braveheart's collection of NES variants. Otherwise, NA wasn't really that great IMO. The site still looked like an early 2000's site when I joined in 2017, and the lack of reactions and responses led me to believe that almost everyone was ignoring me.

I remember I posted a topic in "The Gauntlet" on NintendoAge with this video, and captmorgandrinker complained and told me to post it in a video topic in "Everything Else" (where it was more likely to be overlooked) apparently because people didn't want the forums to be cluttered with topics containing videos. Okay, fair enough. I posted the video in that video topic in "Everything Else" and didn't complain (maybe I should've, though), even though I knew it would be overlooked there.

Later on, someone posted a topic in "The Gauntlet" (again on NintendoAge) with a video of his playthrough of Legendary Wings on NES and it was just fine (he got lots of positive comments too). Yeah, the moderators were being real fair in those days especially to longtime YouTube users like myself.

I also remember coming across at least two people who were clearly trolls, such as Loxx. The fact that he was banned here early on doesn't surprise me at all.

Edited December 28, 2022 by MegaMan52

[Reed Rothchild | 9,584]

21 minutes ago, MegaMan52 said:

I don't miss NintendoAge much (and didn't care about gocollect at all). There were some interesting pictures and topics, such as Braveheart's collection of NES variants. Otherwise, NA wasn't really that great IMO. The site still looked like an early 2000's site when I joined in 2017, and the lack of reactions and responses led me to believe that almost everyone was ignoring me.

I remember I posted a topic in "The Gauntlet" on NintendoAge with this video, and captmorgandrinker complained and told me to post it in a video topic in "Everything Else" (where it was more likely to be overlooked) apparently because people didn't want the forums to be cluttered with topics containing videos. Okay, fair enough. I posted the video in that video topic in "Everything Else" and didn't complain (maybe I should've, though), even though I knew it would be overlooked there.

Later on, someone posted a topic in "The Gauntlet" (again on NintendoAge) with a video of his playthrough of Legendary Wings on NES and it was just fine (he got lots of positive comments too). Yeah, the moderators were being real fair in those days especially to longtime YouTube users like myself.

So, the site "wasn't so great" because you were asked to put your YouTube promotion in the YouTube promotion thread?

And of the thousands of threads posted, one of them may have been a Legendary Wings topic that slipped through the cracks?

Mods are human.  Not everything can be caught, and judgments have to be made.  Perhaps if you had packaged your video with some discussion or context, it could have taken off like this LW thread did.

[MrWunderful | 2,927]

Dont forget that sites like this are run by volunteers (thank you @Gloves and mods)

and are allowed to make discretionary decisions and are not robots. In real life, people make decisions that other people may not agree with and that is OK   

[final fight cd | 187]

3 hours ago, LeatherRebel5150 said:

@darkchylde28

Honestly can’t say I noticed any of that and I certainly didn’t belong in any clique or had any friends on there. I was no different there than I am hear. Occasionally post a couple comments, rarely start a new thread with some decent gaps in between doing those things. 

The only real difference was I bought and sold a bunch in the marketplace. The only pms I ever got were for haggling essentially 

when the site went down/got taken over i think i was a member for nearly a decade.  i didn't post much, only sold/bought a handful of items, but i lurked a lot.  i never once picked up on any bullying or anybody abusing their power.  i'm not saying it didn't happen, but as MrWunderful said already, i would love to see specific examples of this along with context. 

[MegaMan52 | 2,461]

Typical Brock, biased against me and only talks to me when he wants to complain about something.

Edited December 25, 2022 by MegaMan52

[Reed Rothchild | 9,584]

44 minutes ago, MegaMan52 said:

Typical Brock, biased against me and only talks to me when he wants to complain about something.

You're playing the victim and I'm standing up for Cap.  But since I don't feel this thread is really in the spirit of the day, I'm walking away.

[MegaMan52 | 2,461]

11 minutes ago, Reed Rothchild said:

You're playing the victim and I'm standing up for Cap.  But since I don't feel this thread is really in the spirit of the day, I'm walking away.

"Whatever you say, dude." That's what you said to me once in the "good old days."

[Link | 2,727]

I don't recall seeing bad moderation on NA. Not much elitism either. I could say some of the original members were a little cranky but nothing major. 

I only started a few threads and I wouldn't consider myself popular. Basically same as here. And I wasn't old guard, that's for sure - I lurked for a year and actually joined in the beginning of 2016. By that point, Dain already hardly if ever posted, so maybe I missed the drama. 

[a3quit4s | 4,125]

11 minutes ago, Link said:

I don't recall seeing bad moderation on NA. Not much elitism either. I could say some of the original members were a little cranky but nothing major. 

I only started a few threads and I wouldn't consider myself popular. Basically same as here. And I wasn't old guard, that's for sure - I lurked for a year and actually joined in the beginning of 2016. By that point, Dain already hardly if ever posted, so maybe I missed the drama. 

I came in towards the end, there were some dicks but it was mostly a pleasant experience. 

[Link | 2,727]

Most of the people I remember being dicks led to comedy, like PolarBear or the cornball cocksuckers guy.

[MagusSmurf | 577]

4 hours ago, a3quit4s said:

I came in towards the end, there were some dicks but it was mostly a pleasant experience. 

how dare you besmirch nintendoage you subversive scumbag

[Quaze | 345]

On 12/25/2022 at 5:02 AM, LeatherRebel5150 said:

@darkchylde28

Honestly can’t say I noticed any of that and I certainly didn’t belong in any clique or had any friends on there. I was no different there than I am hear. Occasionally post a couple comments, rarely start a new thread with some decent gaps in between doing those things. 

The only real difference was I bought and sold a bunch in the marketplace. The only pms I ever got were for haggling essentially 

100% of this applies to me also ^^. I wasn’t in anyone’s clique or part of any inner circle, my presence there was just like it is here. I don’t know if I was obliviously dancing between the raindrops as all these negative things happened around me, but if that’s the case, I sure feel lucky to have come away from several years of daily visits without ever having noticed, myself.

[Penguin | 198]

I think the things I miss most from NA is the expansive collection tool and database, I liked the list format and multitude of variants that would be tracked . I was lucky to be there in the beginning and loved the site, met so many great people over there years there.  Sadly I think a lot of us outgrew the site, it got too big and then died out.  Sign of the times I guess.   I feel like forums in general are not used nearly as much as they used to be.  I’m glad we still have a place to congregate here.

[G-type | 2,523]

On 12/25/2022 at 10:36 AM, MegaMan52 said:

the lack of reactions and responses led me to believe that almost everyone was ignoring me.

vs now if my post gets no reactions, I KNOW it.

[MegaMan52 | 2,461]

1 hour ago, G-type said:

vs now if my post gets no reactions, I KNOW it.

Exactly. So people really were ignoring me in the NintendoAge days (except when they wanted to complain about something).

Edited December 27, 2022 by MegaMan52

[dr.robbie | 78]

On 12/23/2022 at 10:51 AM, the_wizard_666 said:

You're lucky.  The one I printed up was Etler's list.  Passed on some really rare shit back then in favor of much more common fare because Etler said it was rare.

That was the first list I used for a long time as well. New collectors really don't understand how wild west game collecting was in the beginning. I remember searching tirelessly for the unknown/prototype games on his list just hoping one would surface.

 

Personally, I don't remember NA being toxic at all. Though I did take a step back shortly before everything went down. I do remember the whole Joel thing being way too weird/integrated for my liking though

Edited December 27, 2022 by dr.robbie

[twiztor | 855]

i would say that my time at NA was overwhelmingly positive. i lurked for years before i signed up and started posting, just reading pages and pages of obscure facts and detailed breakdowns and variants and everything in between.

However, i remember a handful of threads where things got heated (notably the Atwood situation). Unfortunately, those discussions garnered the most eyeballs and had the biggest presence online, so that kind of became the lens through which NA was viewed. former posters like Pat amplified that, but it did seem like whenever a "high profile" discussion started, it turned into a lot of infighting. So it's not like the reputation was completely unfounded either.

[austin532 | 467]

Same, I joined later so I missed out on most of the drama. It was almost comical to see the amount of banned users though.