What happened to nintendoage?

[RegularGuyGamer | 2,013]

48 minutes ago, oops said:

no idea, I still have mine with a replacement label

I sold mine last year for like $300 instantly. 

[oops | 85]

5 minutes ago, RegularGuyGamer said:

I sold mine last year for like $300 instantly. 

damn, must be a-lot of cornball cocksuckers out there. Probably this whole forum

[T-Pac | 7,552]

15 hours ago, Gloves said:

Very few people have been banned who weren't straight up spambots. Like, less than 5 pretty sure. 

All the more reason to give hammer privileges to the Graphics Team.

Gotta get those Ban Counts up, boss...

-CasualCart

(no offense here @phart010 - you just happen to be VGS's favorite "fake troll" haha)

[Hammerfestus | 3,847]

16 hours ago, Gloves said:

Very few people have been banned who weren't straight up spambots. Like, less than 5 pretty sure. 

Crazy stalker guy?

[Hammerfestus | 3,847]

15 hours ago, Tulpa said:

Was that Loxx? I got along with him pretty well on NA, but he definitely had some issues. Like, lots of issues. Hope his life is sorted out.

There was also the guy who got an eyeroll smiley from I think Hammerfestus, and proceeded to go on a jihad about it. Like, went into people's profiles and spammed eyerolls on their last dozen posts if they said one word about what he was doing. He was given like twenty chances to let it go in the thread, and he just wouldn't stop. Some people are just outright psychos.

edit: Nice one, @OptOut

I think he went after @Code Monkeytoo at one point.  I can’t even remember what started it in the first place exactly.  I think he posted some preachy load and I reacted and it was like immediately 0-60.

[phart010 | 1,707]

2 hours ago, CasualCart said:

All the more reason to give hammer privileges to the Graphics Team.

Gotta get those Ban Counts up, boss...

-CasualCart

(no offense here @phart010 - you just happen to be VGS's favorite "fake troll" haha)

No offense taken. Rather, I am honored to be featured in one of your legendary graphics!

[Tulpa | 3,506]

10 hours ago, Hammerfestus said:

I think he went after @Code Monkeytoo at one point.  I can’t even remember what started it in the first place exactly.  I think he posted some preachy load and I reacted and it was like immediately 0-60.

Yeah, something like that. Didn't he PM you as well?

If a simple eyeroll set that guy off, can't imagine what he's like in 3D. Probably has his face punched on the regular.

Sorry @phart010, @OptOutbeat you to it.

Edited February 6, 2023 by Tulpa

[RegularGuyGamer | 2,013]

1 hour ago, Tulpa said:

Yeah, something like that. Didn't he PM you as well?

If a simple eyeroll set that guy off, can't imagine what he's like in 3D. Probably has his face punched on the regular.

Can't get punched if you never leave th basement

[Tabonga | 2,318]

1 hour ago, Tulpa said:

 

If a simple eyeroll set that guy off, can't imagine what he's like in 3D. Probably has his face punched on the regular.

 

[Hammerfestus | 3,847]

3 hours ago, Tulpa said:

Yeah, something like that. Didn't he PM you as well?

If a simple eyeroll set that guy off, can't imagine what he's like in 3D. Probably has his face punched on the regular.

Oh yeah.  Lol that’s where it got kicked up a notch.  PM’d me mad about the eye roll.  Yadda yadda something about wanting a nes variant list and whining when one wasn’t provided to him.  Got big mad at me.  It spilled back over into the thread from there I believe.

[Gloves | 11,783]

1 hour ago, RegularGuyGamer said:

Can't get punched if you never leave th basement

That's my approach! 

[YOURTURN | 1,256]

21 hours ago, Tulpa said:

There was also the guy who got an eyeroll smiley from I think Hammerfestus, and proceeded to go on a jihad about it. Like, went into people's profiles and spammed eyerolls on their last dozen posts if they said one word about what he was doing. He was given like twenty chances to let it go in the thread, and he just wouldn't stop. Some people are just outright psychos.

Yeah. That guy got to me. And before I was about to tell him off, @Gloves swooped right in and gave him the boot.

Here is a reenactment of that moment in VGS history.

[goldenpp72 | 1,234]

On 2/4/2023 at 4:22 AM, Armageddon Potato said:

I just realized there was a lot of speculation in this thread of what happened with Dain and NintendoAge. I found out he did not actually get "that" much for NintendoAge and his collection. Honestly by today's value based on what I believe he had in his collection he barely got 10 to 15% of what it would be worth today, let alone speculation of the sites value. NintendoAge itself may as well of just been a freebie throw-in. Once he found out what they did to the site, and his collection he deeply regretted it. I would guess he saw himself as entering his 50s and basically thought it was time for him to personally move on or his personal interest waned. Dain never meant for any of this to happen, or for people to be mad at him for doing so since he thought the site was going to be reasonably well taken care of. I know I don't blame him for anything since he gave us so many great years and such a great site.

If anything we can observe this as a lesson. Be very careful when you make big life milestone decisions.

I might be remembering wrong, but wasn't there quite a bit of civil unrest specifically due to the fact the new owner was kind of known to be no good? Maybe I'm letting hate memories get to me, but I recall the discourse being pretty unfavorable beyond the 'I don't like new things' sorts. 

I resent the hell out of it though, not because this isn't a cool place, but I feel it removed any desire for people to catalog in a public space the bounty of information that would be known there, everyone just assumes 'it'll get bought and my work stolen anyways' it feels like. Losing NA and resources like it has made collecting much more difficult I feel, and I feel that was done on purpose. I'm still grateful to this day to have used the database and forums to the extent I did before all of that happened, as it was pivotal to curating my collection the way I have.

[fcgamer | 4,725]

I remember when Dain, aka Giskard, started asking folks for help scanning stuff for the database way back on Martin's forums. 

Even worse than stealing and selling the work, he stole our time and our innocence, smashing the fingers of his volunteers under the heavy boots of greed. 

Yeah, eff Dain, if he were a thoughtful person he would have acted in a much better manner than how he did.

[Armageddon Potato | 124]

5 hours ago, goldenpp72 said:

I might be remembering wrong, but wasn't there quite a bit of civil unrest specifically due to the fact the new owner was kind of known to be no good? Maybe I'm letting hate memories get to me, but I recall the discourse being pretty unfavorable beyond the 'I don't like new things' sorts. 

I resent the hell out of it though, not because this isn't a cool place, but I feel it removed any desire for people to catalog in a public space the bounty of information that would be known there, everyone just assumes 'it'll get bought and my work stolen anyways' it feels like. Losing NA and resources like it has made collecting much more difficult I feel, and I feel that was done on purpose. I'm still grateful to this day to have used the database and forums to the extent I did before all of that happened, as it was pivotal to curating my collection the way I have.

Many were skeptical and some visibly worried, but the would-be buyer popped in on a fresh account and seemed passionate and well intended at first appearance. He told us he'd leave the site as-is and was just very interested in the scene and all we do. As soon as GoCollectJim showed up that other account never posted again, and the site immediately fell into despair as the old server needed to replaced with a new one, and the transition was very slow and rocky. After the server transition nothing was very functional and the site looked like bare bones. GoCollectJim made a few empty promises as people flung insults and he promptly vanished fulfilling nothing he promised. No other GoCollect people ever posted or said anything. The database would never return.

We should still make a database in my opinion, but this time make sure it isn't owned or controlled by any one person. Something that can be copied and replicated for free anywhere. I'm still down to contribute!

[goldenpp72 | 1,234]

12 minutes ago, Armageddon Potato said:

Many were skeptical and some visibly worried, but the would-be buyer popped in on a fresh account and seemed passionate and well intended at first appearance. He told us he'd leave the site as-is and was just very interested in the scene and all we do. As soon as GoCollectJim showed up that other account never posted again, and the site immediately fell into despair as the old server needed to replaced with a new one, and the transition was very slow and rocky. After the server transition nothing was very functional and the site looked like bare bones. GoCollectJim made a few empty promises as people flung insults and he promptly vanished fulfilling nothing he promised. No other GoCollect people ever posted or said anything. The database would never return.

We should still make a database in my opinion, but this time make sure it isn't owned or controlled by any one person. Something that can be copied and replicated for free anywhere. I'm still down to contribute!

I agree that if it's financially plausible that a database should be made. As someone who utilized the original database, and someone who is slowly exiting the actual collecting phase, I'd more than happily take time to aid in ways I could within reason. That said it is difficult to get everyone on board with such an idea just because the rights most likely go down to one owner regardless, but being able to keep copies of the information would be a good step.

Sadly, not much of a web designer over here, so I don't know how plausible it is to implement such things. I do feel that while this site is my favorite collecting community due to the type of discourse and heritage left, it not having a way to grow the foundation at all means there isn't much room for it to grow either. I think things like a database, means to have imagery, information, etc, would likely aid in driving some new users and keep the forum interesting over time.

Once again though, this might all be technically or financially not feasible, but I doubt most of us would care if there were a few ads thrown into the database section if it meant keeping the site cost balanced out. Either way, I'll keep visiting the site as is, but I think part of what still makes people long a bit for NA is that we all still lost quite a bit just beyond history during the move. 

I do also think that this site has more potential to be a collector grove for people who collect beyond Nintendo like myself, even if Nintendo is my bread and butter, I'm well versed in Sega, Xbox and PS as well, with a light dash of the pre Nintendo era consoles, and I know for sure there are others with a breadth of information beyond the sorts of things I'm interested in too.

Then again, I never learned the moral concept that revenge is bad, so I'd likely want to help just to make sure it became the best DB ever, and hope that it never got bought up by the same sort of jackasses again. I think the community is at its best when information is shared rather than withheld though, which isn't how everyone feels. 

Edited February 6, 2023 by goldenpp72

[Link | 2,713]

2 hours ago, goldenpp72 said:

and hope that it never got bought up by the same sort of jackasses again.

@Gloves has been very clear on this point, that the community of this site must be maintained on a collective basis above all else, and it doesn't belong to anyone for purposes of sale or anything like that. Even though he so graciously steers the place and makes it happen, with the assistance of all of the wonderful staff members, and neither he nor others personally receive any money from the endeavor. And if or when he moves on it will be given over to the community, never to such mercenary hands.

[spacepup | 2,404]

10 minutes ago, Link said:

@Gloves has been very clear on this point, that the community of this site must be maintained on a collective basis above all else, and it doesn't belong to anyone for purposes of sale or anything like that. Even though he so graciously steers the place and makes it happen, with the assistance of all of the wonderful staff members, and neither he nor others personally receive any money from the endeavor. And if or when he moves on it will be given over to the community, never to such mercenary hands.

Also,

I know where he lives, and if he EVER betrays me, I will do the worst thing imaginable...

He will receive weekly 'glitter-bomb' packages delivered full of confetti and glitter, rigged to shoot said glitter and confetti everywhere the moment the box is opened.  I will disguise them as normal shipments from places like Amazon and popular stores.  

Surely this threat is harsh enough that he would never ever EVER dare defy our promise to make this place for the community!

Also - on a serious note - I also pledge our intentions as shared above, to the community here.  Trust me - I personally invested MANY hours of my own free time into the NA database.  I was personally impacted as well, so it is very important to me that we do this the right way, for our community.

[Link | 2,713]

6 minutes ago, spacepup said:

Also,

↑ When the nicest and most conciliatory person in the world is driven to make such a vicious threat, you know this is for real!!

[Only_None | 8]

I had a fairly old account. 2007. I joined NA for the Ezine they were putting out. I didn’t post but I consumed lots of information. I gravitated more towards the hardware side of things. As a RetroUSB fan boy I enjoyed that NA was the place for their customer support.

[Enternal | 15]

On 2/6/2023 at 6:31 AM, goldenpp72 said:

I agree that if it's financially plausible that a database should be made. As someone who utilized the original database, and someone who is slowly exiting the actual collecting phase, I'd more than happily take time to aid in ways I could within reason. That said it is difficult to get everyone on board with such an idea just because the rights most likely go down to one owner regardless, but being able to keep copies of the information would be a good step.

 

I thoroughly used the DB, had my whole cart collection across multiple systems there, what I paid. And woke up one day to find it all gone, and the community scattered. I miss the place, miss the community. I used to be very active in the yearly NintendoAge group completion of the nes library. At least we have VGS and what remains of the community here.

From my end, it seemed there was a synergy to all the events. NA goes to GoCollect, alternative physical investors start to come in to buy games, meanwhile longtime collectors start to leave the hobby. Game stores, flea markets, start to dwindle, physical carts become harder to find in the wild. Youtubers drop, or move on to other things. Feels like Thanos snapped his fingers and half the world just poofed. And since we can't travel back in time and take out GoCollect, or snap everything back to how it was, I'm on board for rebuilding it.

I might possibly have captures of most of the NES DB and the rarities assigned to each cart. Can the internet archive / wayback machine be used to pull in stuff that we need.?

[Teh_Lurv | 254]

46 minutes ago, Enternal said:

I might possibly have captures of most of the NES DB and the rarities assigned to each cart. Can the internet archive / wayback machine be used to pull in stuff that we need.?

I tried using IA/Wayback awhile ago to look up the old NA NES database, however big chunks of it are missing. Even if the IA did have the whole database saved, GoCollect owns the data which I believe makes using it to build a new database legally fraught. 

It'd be better in the long run for a new user-contributed database to be built from scratch.

 

[Tulpa | 3,506]

Plus, the rarity ratings were always subject to disputes and revisions. Sure, the commons were pretty accurate, but I've seen fights break out on NA over how rare the rares were.

Be better to just build it from scratch.

[Enternal | 15]

Ah, yeah that makes sense to rebuild from scratch. Maybe to stop fights and disputes could just have Common, Uncommon, Rare. Instead of going on a larger individual 7-10 point scale.

While that might make things like Jimmy Connor's Tennis and Caltron 6-1 have the same blanketed rarity. It would stop people saying arguing something like Sculptor's Cut should be a 6 and Super Bowling should be a 7.

IMO i took the NA DB as an estimate of rarity. 

[Link | 2,713]

How about, rather than ranking rarity by adjective, document the number produced or sold. That would give a true scale that also works with relativity to the rest of the platform. All quantities won't be known, but it removes a lot of motivation for dispute there.