The upside of limited options

[Tanooki | 4,932]

Mine are all out loaded to the max of whatever set is out there, usually whatever the rolling smokemonster setup or latest no-intro drops list.  Anything missing, at this rate if I want it, I just add it such as like when Sim City came out or the Super Mario AllStars 5in1 MMC5 hack.  I know it's overkill, but for laziness sake, don't have to keep re-dumping loads of stuff to the SD card as it's ready broken into multiple A-Z style directories of decent size.

[inasuma | 1,203]

Can confirm. Whenever I find my options limited, especially if I have no internet, I take massive deep dives into games and it’s always a blast. I did that last year with breath of the wild when comcast went down due to a storm, and I sincerely can’t believe I spent so long NOT playing that game. Absolute masterpiece (imo). Have beaten it several times and explored it to no end since.

When I was younger I did the same on my gameboy. Pokémon, Metroid, mega man… all because I was a kid with broke parents and could only ever get one game every several months. So of course I had hundreds of hours in each game, and often went back to play them later.

[Estil | 1,264]

Well I still maintain that having the options is better than not having the options.  And honestly setting up my consoles/systems/Everdrives/etc can be just as if not more fun than playing the games themselves.  Kinda like how for classic car people, it's can be more fun to work on and restore vehicles than driving them.

I mean I'm proud of my gaming/computer/consoles setup...though it's rather modest and "plain Jane" compared to most of the others I've seen!!

[Kguillemette | 1,544]

My kids definitely have their favorite games that get hours and hours of play. I'll tell you what, they can construct a house in Minecraft faster than I ever will be able to! They certainly have abundance by sheer access to my collection and if a game doesn't grab them right away it's off to the discard pile.

Games are cheap these days anyway. What's a $50 brand new title worth in 1988 dollars? What's that, close to $200 adjusted for inflation? Your average family can afford 4 times the games, more if you figure most games cost less than $50. On the other hand they don't have to suffer from "you are going to play Alex Kidd in Miracle World and you are gonna like it!"

[Brickman | 3,983]

Another plug for Reed's backlog challenge helping stay focused on completing games.

Doing it has really helped me focus on completing games and not getting too overwhelmed with all the choices out there these days. I've strayed off the list for a few games, because I didn't really make concessions for that on my list (lesson learnt).

I also put way too many games and RPG's, so I won't finish my list this year, but I have learnt the lesson for next year and will be better prepared.

[Estil | 1,264]

9 hours ago, Kguillemette said:

What's a $50 brand new title worth in 1988 dollars? What's that, close to $200 adjusted for inflation? Your average family can afford 4 times the games, more if you figure most games cost less than $50. On the other hand they don't have to suffer from "you are going to play Alex Kidd in Miracle World and you are gonna like it!"

$117 to be exact, according to usinflationcalculator.com.  Yeah I guess that would be about what you'd pay for to get a new copy of say, Mario 2 or Zelda 2.  That much would get you two new blue chip games today (going rate is $60 I think?).

As Virginia Slims used to say, we've come a long way, baby.

PS: For those of you who like Dr. Quinn or Little House on the Prairie, figure that a dollar back then would be about $25ish in today's money.

Edited November 12, 2021 by Estil

[Kguillemette | 1,544]

Another point, TVs are much cheaper comparitively to that time. I know there was one in the living room and one in my parents room. And if my dad wanted to watch Andy Griffith and Gomer Pyle reruns on TV land in the living room, there were no Nintendo tapes getting played that day. Had to make the most of your gaming time then.

Edited November 12, 2021 by Kguillemette

[guillavoie | 1,208]

Having Legacy of the Wizard as a limited option definitely made you a better person in the long run!

[Estil | 1,264]

8 hours ago, Kguillemette said:

Another point, TVs are much cheaper comparitively to that time. I know there was one in the living room and one in my parents room.

Of course if you were REALLY rich, you could save up $7000-$8000ish of your nickels and dimes to see this in all its full color glory back in 1958-59  

Can you imagine the SUPER lucky kids/adults who got to be one of the early (late 50s/early 60s) color TV households?