xelement5x

Up until 2019 or so I used to do really well at Gamestop for just some of my time.  I'd follow the CAG thread about deals and flips for trade ins, and I could literally go from one to the next in a loop buying stuff, trading it in, and coming out with additional funds since there were 8 Gamestops in my nearby area. 

I turned maybe a $250 initial investment into thousands in trade credit over time, it was nuts that it worked. Plus none of the employees really cared because I would rate well and buy the occasional GPGs to help them out.  

15 hours ago, Link said:

Sounds great.

At that price does it deal with deductions or income streams besides just W-2 wages/salary? Do you need to know about deductions or does it tell you? I might spend $5-10K on a construction contract for my multi-unit home, would it find credits for something like that? Green energy installs? 

My own taxes are "relatively" simple.  Mainly W2s, various 1099s, investments, schedule C, and deductions around kids.  I don't know how good it is about finding credits, especially on a local/state level, but as I went through it basically asks you a ton of questions about your year and if it pertains to you if you want.  

And btw, I agree it is ridiculous how complex they make this in general when they are clearly lobbied by interests to keep it too obtuse for general people.

3 hours ago, avatar! said:

Wait... are you saying video game collector's actually go to GameStop

Man, I probably got over 80% of my Wii U collection, and at least half of my Vita collection from Gamestop.  Plus plenty of other stuff over the years when they were doing clearance sales.  I bought so much Wii junk from them one time too, it was disgusting looking back on it.  

54 minutes ago, wongojack said:

Yeah, maybe the $100s covers your filing?  I don't know.  That would be cheaper for sure.  Perhaps @xelement5x can tell us if a filing fee is still required when using the client app.

So when I paid for the TurboTax software I get the physical CD (lol how fitting for this forum, maybe I can sending it to WATA for CIB grading later), then install it in my PC.  I does a whole walkthrough of how and what to fill out with the application, then saves your return as a specific file that's read by the software.  Also if you used it previously when you start up you can point it to last years return and it'll import all your basic info about your family and businesses from last year.

Filing for the Federal side is free, I had to pay $25 to file with my state, but buying it from Costco in the physical form they give you a $10 "credit" of sorts so I really only paid $15 to file my state taxes.  Actually just got my state refund the other day, now to spend it again at Costco

Looks awesome!  I have a love hate relationship with those Justifier boxes.  They are so cool but man are they massive to store.

When I was big into PSP this and I think MegaMan were really difficult to locate correctly because they had that weird double-UMD case for both games.

Just posting here as a box guy with some shelves that is valiantly working towards trying to be a shelf guy.  I bought like 8 new Billy bookcases when I was able to get free Ikea shipping earlier this year.  I've already got a couple, but the whole room will look drastically different once I'm done in the next month or so.

On 4/15/2024 at 7:38 PM, Link said:

American tax system sucks. 

Yeah taxes are never fun to deal with, mine seem to get more complex every year as well but I've gotten better at it.  If you think you're going use TurboTax next year Costco normally sells home and business (which sounds like what you need) for about $100 and they give you a $10 credit for state filing.  I've been using it for years.  

I always figured Winston wasn't in the court scene because he wasn't one of the people digging the hole in the middle of the street or arrested.  The judge, like so many others in the GB universe at the time, just forgot he existed.  

Got this recently from Japan, the Ys Special Collection - All About Falcom: Promotional VHS with Flyer from 1993. This release was presumably mainly  for rental and then for sale later as the marking on the tape show.  It's mainly promoting Ys but there is some Popful Mail footage on there as well, which is why I picked it up.

https://www.instagram.com/p/C5rHN6gRNUm/?utm_source=ig_web_button_share_sheet&igsh=MzRlODBiNWFlZA==

Put GB II as an 8, but it could also be a 7.5 to me.

A lot of weird moments in 2 that bring it down compared to the first but the best parts still make it shine to me.  It had a lot of great one liners and they hold the movie together when it starts to come apart sometimes.

Some of my favorite parts:
Statue of Liberty down main street, Titanic appearing at the dock, Venkmenn's "photo" shoot with Vigo, and of course the courtroom scene when they save the judge. "Do!, Re! Egon!"

But some weird character development too, I was always confused if Egon had a thing for Dana after this movie.  

I was a big fan of the cartoon growing up as well, and my parents still have my original proton pack hiding in the basement.  

Regarding Ghostbusters 2016 I watched it much later, but it also had some good parts.  A bit too crass than I would have wanted to see, but the parts where it shined was fun.  Testing new weapons, the silly bickering in the beginning, but the final ghost battle was so much fun as well, especially with the remixed GB theme.  Where GB2 overly sanitized the franchise, GB 2016 was a bit too raunchy.

My Ranking:
GB1 > Afterlife > GB2 >= Frozen Empire > GB2016 
(I enjoyed Frozen Empire but I think it had too much going and that hurt it a bit)

On 4/4/2024 at 3:47 AM, Sumez said:

Devil May Cry Trilogy on Switch. I bought a physical copy because I wanted to own the game, and a real copy of especially the Switch port of DMC3, which by most fans is regarded the ultimate version of that game.
What I didn't realise at the time, is that the physical release only includes the first game, and the other two are download codes. Completely useless garbage.

 

I got burned the same way with Resident Evil Origins Collection on Switch. RE 1 is a code and RE0 is actually on cart.  Just went ahead and got the PS4 version instead which actually has all the content on disc.

8 hours ago, Seppatoni said:

Pirates! is one of my favorite games on the NES. But I only own the black and white map which was included here in Europe. 

There is also a colorized version, but I haven't found a clean scan of it. Does anyone have a scan of this map?

 

Just saw this pop up and thought of you, I would guess they have the Pirates! one in there but I'm not sure.

1 hour ago, Mega Tank said:

He IS the seller 

Not sure what all 5 would be, but one would be this copy of Jurassic Park for the Sega Genesis I got for my birthday in 1994. Over 30 years of good memories.  

Played the snot out of the game, wrote down the passcodes as I beat Grant and the Raptor on pieces of paper and tucked them in the case, even recently played it with my kids.

Rarely have I had stuff get pulled from a lot, but I get sales on ebay cancelled frequently since I'm watching for items near constantly and will pounce on them if it's something I need.  At this point I just take it as part of doing business with a faceless entity, and there is literally nothing you can do about it except get salty and/or complain, which is a waste of both breath and salt. 

Forum and marketplace transactions are a different beast though. As long as money hasn't changed hands yet, I am fine if a seller needs to back out because they didn't research or something.  But once money has changed hands, I think it's a dick move to try and back out and refund.  I've only really had issues on Facebook though which is (despite the name) also another clearing house for faceless entities at this point it seems like.

18 hours ago, DefaultGen said:

Yeah it's a 16' lane. There's one singular spot in my house it fits, and I have to open the garage to be able to work on it from the back

Gotta agree this is amazing, looks like you were able to get it fully working again as well.

Is that a pachinko machine on the left next to the homer bucket as well?

On 3/27/2024 at 8:11 AM, LeatherRebel5150 said:

Oh my mail lady would give me some real side eye back in the day. Especially around 2012-2013 I would have days with 6 or 10 padded envelops with games getting delivered and packed into my mailbox.

I worked at an office for maybe 8 years or so and my managers and co-workers never minded when I shipped stuff there instead of my house, a lot of people did that.  But when I was full bore collecting I got A LOT of packages each week and became known as the "package guy".  I always made sure to treat our office managers and front desk people to lunch occasionally and nice Christmas gifts because I felt like they helped me out so much. 

But man there were those days when I'd get a slow boat boxes from Japan though, they'd just ring me and be like "I can't move this box, you're going to have to help me" 

Normally my immediate regret is if I've jumped on a BIN or something that came up quickly and it looks like a great deal but is more damaged than I first saw in the pictures or the like.  In person I used to have regret all the time, I'd go to the thrift and if it was cheap enough I'd buy it, get home and be like why did I buy this and where am I going to put it.  Breaking the FOMO cycle with collecting is hard, but watching my space dwindle has also made it easier to be more selective.  I always ask three questions before I buy.

1) How much is it?
2) How much space is it going to take up?
3) Is this going toward my defined collecting goals right now?

If it doesn't fit all three I'll normally pass, but sometimes if is a really cheap price and it's smaller I will still pick it up to trade or sell toward items for point #3.

On 3/24/2024 at 8:25 PM, CT said:

Some stickers I will remove, some I will keep. It really depends on what type of sticker and where it is located. The few that stick out  are my Top Loader with the local Game Xchange sticker on the bottom, and a Star Wars cartridge with another local game store on the side (one of those security stickers).

For those folks wanting to remove stickers, a hair dryer on low setting works magic but be careful!

This is how I feel too, if the sticker isn't in an obnoxious place then I am fine keeping it, but stuff where it's covering large parts of the label or the insert I'm going to try and pull off.  

What really gets me, is crappy sticker removal attempts.  I got a Genesis game recently with no less than 3 different stickers on the cart label, and if the person had never tried to remove them before I would have pulled them off with it looking close to mint, but alas they had attempted it and ripped/lifted parts of the label already.  Came out very well every place I did removal, but the spots where the previous owner had tried to pick them off and ripped the label are a bit of an eyesore.  

I also use heat a lot of times, or lighter fluid to loosen solvent.  I actually use my hot air station on a very low setting with pretty good results, a hair dryer or space heater has worked as well though.

Yeah, I put a follow on it when I saw this thread, it looked reasonable until right near the end and then KABOOM!  Hopefully the seller puts that extra cheese to good use.

12 hours ago, Link said:

Kricfalusi as has been mentioned, unfortunately turned out to be a creep. Also as some people have said, it's a little hard to watch now and/or as an adult.

But it does have several things to recommend it. In short, it was truly groundbreaking.

It was a breakout role for Billy West. It was a real labor of love for John K, in that it pushed boundaries in scatological ways; paid homage to methods and many influential giants of classic animation and MCM culture and was quite influential itself; and displayed true artistry in the painted backgrounds, even as they may be (for example) disgusting displays of dental decay á la Basil Wolverton, or a cat's litterbox full of turds and why the hell not, boogers too. 

I loved it in its heyday - I was the target audience. It gets an extra boost for me because seeing it was a special treat. We didn't have cable in my house so I only experienced it at sleepovers at my best friend's house.

The original 6 episodes, if left as a miniseries with nothing more, would be even more cult classic than the overall show generally is. 

voted Seen it, like it. I just made a social media gif reference to it yesterday. It doesn't hold up great, but it is better than some contemporaries.  

I agree with pretty much everything you say in this post.  It was a product of the time which was unique and different for a young kid to watch compared to most other cartoons out there, and helped more "edgy" cartoons to get made.

Yeah in the 90s to aughts many forums came with policies to discourage trolling or useless posting to protect the community from discussions that had been hashed out a lot already.  Minimum post count to start a new thread (replies were fine), and/or a wait period as well.  

I think now a person has so many options to find content (for good or for ill) that forum etiquette is no longer a thing in many places.  I don't think any person is intentionally trying to discourage a new participant, but the disposability of discussion with platforms like Facebook or Twitter makes really good conversations much harder to have.