darkchylde28

I always found it laughable that the same folks who are trying to put up their Christmas trees before Halloween also had some big opinions on my mother's family traditions of putting up the Christmas tree as a family on Christmas Eve then leaving it up until New Year's, taking it down on the 1st. Not sure where the tradition came from, but most folks I knew put their trees up a bit earlier (a week or two before Christmas, maybe when kids got out for Christmas break?) but took them down immediately after Christmas.

This made me snicker, as it immediately made me think of those Halloween/horror movies where someone is running around in a "normal" mask, but when they take it off what's underneat is really monster.

I get why folks are taking it that way, but I'm conflicted about trying to lay the bulk of blame at Dain's feet. My take on it was that while he wanted out (and likely had to keep the deal under wraps during negotiations and until it was officially completed, if not being gagged for longer as part of the contract), he intended to let everybody know, but Jeff beat him to the punch and there wasn't really any way to gracefully pick up the pieces after that happened. The damage was done from that moment, and I can understand finding it difficult to say much after that other than confirming that it happened, as it would end up being a lot of apologies for all the secrecy and a bunch of drama over the deal (which happened) as well as the manner in which it happened (which definitely happened). I'm not saying he's totally without blame (especially since there were others who were ready to buy the place as-is who apparently weren't made aware it was being shopped around), just that it's kind of understandable the way he stepped out in the way that he did and that there'd potentially be less hard feelings had the transition happened in a proper manner (Dain announcing the sale, introducing everybody to Jeff, then having Jeff come in, etc.). It was such a shocking change and so poorly executed that everybody's immediate reactions were denial and anger (which continued for many through the formation of VGS & shuttering of the NA domain) instead of acceptance of a changing of the guard and anticipation of more changes to come.

Remember when you didn't really see any Christmas stuff or hear the first Christmas carol/music until the day after Thanksgiving (Black Friday)? I really miss those days. I don't have anything against Christmas or the season, but I imagine all the early celebrators would totally lose their minds if I started hanging up Halloween decorations and running around in costumes starting in June/July. Let every holiday have its own space, quit trying to overrun everything and trying to shove Christmas down everyone's throats before it's time.

Kind of a sad day. I'm mostly done with collecting anything from Nintendo, but I did get really good deals on the copies of DK Jr Math, Dragon Fighter, Robo Demons & Sword Master I picked up a few years back. Plus, I got to spend Amazon bucks that I had which would otherwise have likely sat and done nothing.

At my parents' house, it was the living room up until I managed to get a TV of my own (first a 10-12" modern B&W job I wore out playing 2600 on, then toward the time I moved out, a 19" color CRT I got for $20 off a friend I worked with), at which point it was usually my bedroom. At my house, it's always been the living room for consoles, although there have been brief moments of PC gaming in the bedroom.

As I always seem to miss out whenever these crop up (and are generally immediately sold) on eBay, I thought I'd post a thread here to throw a line out. I'm looking for a copy to play, so it doesn't need to be sealed, CIB, etc. PM me if you've got a copy you'd like to or are willing to let go and what you're asking. Fingers crossed I'll finally get my hands on a copy and get to play this gem!

We went to one for a friend's mom on Tuesday. Ended up having to leave toward the end of the wake part, before the actual ceremony, as the baby just kept getting louder and louder and wouldn't be silenced (until we were back in the car, at which point she quieted right down). Before that, it was my grandfather's in February of last year. Unfortunately, my best friend's dad was right when he told us a few years ago that it was time to buy a nice suit, as we were of the age when funerals were just going to get more and more common for us.

I'm in one bracket right now, but passing into another one next month. Should I reserve my vote until then?

I thought the sale was the other way around? I thought GoCollect wanted to buy NA for the data contained therein (which is more in line with their current business) and instead got all of the physical gaming items as well, since it was for everything video game related.

I don't recall any old school ones specifically, but I do clearly remember that nearly all of them started out with, "My uncle works for Nintendo and he says..." Not sure how that revered gem hadn't turned up here yet!

Addams Family & Funhouse for me, although I've had a lot of fun with other cabinets as well, just not spent nearly the money on anything else combined as compared to those two. Fun fact: When I was working my first call center job, they had a small "arcade" for people to relax in and blow of some steam while on break/lunch/etc. Not only did it have those two machines, but also two of my all time top arcade cabinets--Ms. Pacman (with the speed mod done--didn't realize the machine didn't normally run that fast until well into adulthood, always thought the "arcade accurate" home ports were done poorly prior to that) & Galaga! Every week or two, I'd stop by the bank specifically to get a roll of quarters to dump in that place--and not always during my shift!

I like them for the fact that, new or old, they put out copies that are DRM/copy protection free, meaning that when I buy something and keep a local backup copy, I don't have to worry about them going belly up and never being able to enjoy it again. I have bought a decent number of things on Steam, but they're mostly new, multi-player affairs that I picked up specifically to play with friends/family and unavailable elsewhere (on GoG, etc.). The fact that they give away copies of paid games randomly doesn't hurt in the least as well!

I was about to say the same thing. I don't know where Ferris is, but KHan has been doing the front page announcements/news for the last ~month or so, so I took that as a sign of him deciding to stay firmly on that side of the proverbial fence.

Awesome tip! I'll have to try this should I run into any carts that are in need of a good deep cleaning. I'd say this would be ok if used on the top of a laminated label, but would still damage the label if you just poured it on top, willy nilly, as it would likely soak into the label around the edges, lamination or not.

Congratulations! Glad to see a happy ending on this one!

(raises hand) The couple of cartridges that I picked up late in collecting life, after this method came to exist and became common knowledge, stood up and laughed heartily at this method. Repeatedly pooling a little 97% rubbing alcohol on the plastic for a couple of minutes and gently wiping it away with a q-tip did the trick after a couple of tries while the marker removed exactly nothing. I think the effectiveness really depends on the age of the marks you're trying to pick up. If it's still anywhere near fresh and not "set," sure, dry erase will pick it up without an issue. However, if you've got something where it's been "set" for a decade or more (likely the case in my instance), you're not going to see as much success, at least in the case of textured cartridges.

Hey, I don't go out of my way to push my two-space opinion on anybody else. In literally every discussion I've ever had on the subject, it's been the one-space crowd insisting on dropping "kn0w13d93" on me versus the other way around. In regard to your last point, that is until someone or something (converters, translators, etc.) missing some punctuation. Then, there's often an issue where people (which I can testify to) have to go back and read something (sometimes a couple of times) to understand what's being said and figure out what happened (oh, missing [period, question mark, etc.]) and be able to proceed. Hey, you know what they say, happy wife, happy life, right?

...you realize that I was disputing your claim that it was never two spaces, right (specifically bolded in my quote to point this out)? Not that it's not the current/modern norm for many people, but your claim that such a standard never existed. I don't have access to my old textbook while at work, but here you go, a solid source talking about what was standard (for years and years) and what is now moving to be standard. https://www.instructionalsolutions.com/blog/one-space-vs-two-after-period Pay up. I feel ya man. Might seem undemocratic, but I don't think somebody who can't obey the rules of grammar that aren't being disputed by anyone gets to weigh in in any real way on those that are, lol. He kind of torpedoes your side, as it makes it appear as "whatever each person wants to do is fine...except two spaces" versus true support to the one space argument.

I was typing on PCs in high school and it was still two spaces at that point (late 90s). Not sure when the teaching started to change over, but I've seen and heard of examples of both still being present in various schools today. I expect that two spaces will fade over time (so long as modern fonts and such remain in usage), but at present is still considered acceptable/correct. You must have had some forward-thinking teachers at your school, as I'm only a couple of years older than you and had textbooks (current, modern ones, even) that specifically taught it as two spaces. For you to have only ever learned one space makes me wonder if it wasn't your teacher making up the curriculum in its entirety versus relying on a supporting textbook.

Amen. I've never run into another weapon that had as much use or that I liked as much as the Metal Blade. Fantastic weapon power economy, can be fired in any direction, and kills 99% of everything (as well as activating alternate reactions in some enemies not visible using any other weapon--hit the rolling crabs in Bubble Man's level with one to see it in action).

Would you like to take a bet on that one? I'd have to do some digging to find it, but I should still have the professional typing textbook that I learned from that specifically references this. As @Gloves pointed out above, it was two spaces for certain in the era of typewriters and old, monospace fonts.

This is a discussion/argument that I and a friend who worked in and was really involved in printing get into every so often. I understand the reasoning for one space, as modern fonts on modern systems don't require it. However, not everyone is using a modern system, plain text can (and frequently is) be ported to multiple systems which don't necessarily use modern fonts, and there's the point that @RH made above regarding a period being missed. Reading a lot of text that's converted from one format or another to be read on a modern e-ink device, that last one sticks with me, as when the converter screws up the punctuation, it's a lot easier to keep reading coherently when the double space is present versus everything running all together, getting confused, and having to go back and re-read that section to figure out what's going on. At present, last I checked, they're both accepted practices, with neither being considered "incorrect." That last bit is one of the primary points that my friend and I disagree on--just because something isn't universally necessary anymore doesn't automatically make it incorrect.

I'm not quite at that point, but as a non-insider, I can definitely understand that feeling. With that said, my suspicions have been up since the beginning, with Jeff jumping the gun to plant his flag and try to lull everybody with corporate-smacking doubletalk before Dain even had a chance to make an announcement to anybody. The lack of response directly to members and the reports by the former (and present) staff continued to color my opinion of them. I really want to give them the benefit of the doubt, but the more time passes, the harder and harder it becomes to do, especially since everything that actually does come out has such a high level of polish on it (whether well done or not) that it's seems like they could be answering questions much more frequently and doing more caretaking of the place, they just aren't. Balance that against posts asking honest, but sometimes critical questions disappearing without a word and it's not too hard to reach the conclusion that they just don't care. I wouldn't say that's a totally foregone conclusion at this point (as they did step in yesterday to put their foot down about folks spamming about this place, which is a fair point and reaction), but where there's smoke...

Definitely. I've had a handful of other games that I've loved and will always go back to at one point or another (River City Ransom, Arcade TMNT/TMNT 2, Pool of Radiance series, etc.), but nothing hits home the way that Mega Man 2 did. It was the first of only two games that I asked for the year that my parents finally got me an NES. Prior to that I'd wanted the system so I could play the various games, but nothing captured my attention the way MM2 did. My parents were initially upset when I played all the way through and beat the game on Christmas morning, just after finishing opening all my presents and getting my NES set up for the first time. That reaction faded when I started it back up and played through again before proceeding to the other game I'd asked for and gotten that morning (Strider, for the curious). Definitely. The others weren't bad, but I don't think they offered quite the perfect balance of difficulty and fun that the second game hit on. I've been disappointed when I've screwed up in that game (mostly as a kid, learning to play through it when we'd rent it at a friends house before getting my own system and copy of the game), but never exasperated, upset, or angry with it the way it would happen with other games on occasion.