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My notable sega 32x finds and their stories!


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Hello everyone again!

as I mentioned in another thread I wanted to write about some of my more notable finds in my journey to obtain a full US 32x collection (i may try to find the pal and jap items too just haven’t found any leads). Ive always enjoyed the 32x even though most of the games are just terri-bad. Im pretty sure its tied to my childhood and just being fascinated at the 32x in general. I even really like how the games stand out with their yellow boxes and slightly different carts. To me it’s equivalent to enjoying a fine painting. Most of these finds have been by discovering leads across the country. So i hope you enjoy the many reads throughout 

Let’s start with the holy grail!  This all started when i got upset missing out on a cart of Spiderman off ebay and i kicked myself for the many times i had to buy other copies off ebay years back. Well i then became obsessed in trying to find another copy as that one got away and I wasn’t sure if i would find another one at a decent price again. I also saw that this title just kept climbing in price and would eventually become well out of my reach, so the time for me was NOW!

i started by calling all retro game stores in my area for any leads. Most just laughed and said good luck!  Others had no idea what a 32x was. I then expanded my calls to any game store that I could find in my state with the same result unfortunately. Frustrated at this point I started looking around the Internet to see if I could find some way of knowing game stores in each state. I found retrogamehuner.com which was a God send. From there i started calling a lot of places (starting with the stores that had rare find trophies assigned to them and then expanding). 

Nearly a week went by of calling stores with the similar responses of “yeaahhh... good luck with that.”  Or some cases were “we had one about a year ago.”  Even had some that would say “ive been doing this for 20 years now and have only seen that game once”. Others would suggest ebay would be the best chance and while they are correct ive had two problems with ebay. First, most sell there to push prices higher hopefully (which I don’t blame them). Like today, if i wanted to spend 2k i could get one. Second, a lot of them are showing some good pictures, but some of them are refusing to show pics of the circuit board claiming “I don’t want to break it”

So, just a few days before Christmas i had made one last call for the day to a store in Albony NY. The guy was about to close up for the day and was just reopening his store after being closed sown due to covid. He had told me that he actually has a copy that he had had for two years in the back and he was going to put it out beginning of the year as part of his big reopening. But him and I worked out a deal!  I couldn’t believe my timing!  Now the copy i got is cib and the only issue was someone had cut the original box to fit in a clam shell. It looks rather nice actually. I was originally looking for just a cart but instead for a little more time, effort, and money i came away with cib ... for weelllll under 2k. Hell under 1k in fact. See picture below

more stories coming!

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Next up is a twofer Pitfall and Kolibri!

If you’ve read my story from the initial post you will learn that i had been making a lot of calls. So, my desire to just find spiderman to “let’s collect the entire region set. I can officially do that since I’ve found spidy!”  The day after i found spidy i had decided to start making a list of what sega 32x games each store had as well as any they had cib. I even called back a few places that had other games but I wasn’t making my list then

with these two i had originally called asking for spiderman but the guy said, well i dont have that game and i only have two games for the 32x. He thought I wouldn’t be interested and we nearly hung up but right before I usually would hang up i had a feeling i should ask what the two games were (I wasn’t even considering cib at the time). He came back and said he had pitfall and kolibri... at the time i had only kolibri cart (which im selling now btw) so I didn’t think of getting kolibri but he had told me that both were cib and he had told me that kolibri has the original recipt from when it was bought new from Babbages on 11/02/1995!  So i bought pitfall and a few days later when they were going to ship it out i called back and bought kolibri as well. Both were shipped before Christmas and i just got them in today.

these two are nearly perfect condition cibs. It seems they might had been played once or twice and put back on a shelf after their seals were removed!  I asked the guy why he was selling these so cheap he said that cibs in his area dont sell well unless marked down!  So i got pitfall for $99 and kolibri for $149 in perfect cib condition 

More stories coming!

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8 minutes ago, Code Monkey said:

You paid almost a grand for just the cartridge and manual Spiderman?

And the box. Technically, i could take the box out of the shell and get another insert and it would be just the same as the ones you see on ebay except the one side was cut:(. And i said under 1k didn’t say how far under nor how far close;)

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42 minutes ago, Matthewnimmo said:

And the box. Technically, i could take the box out of the shell and get another insert and it would be just the same as the ones you see on ebay except the one side was cut:(. And i said under 1k didn’t say how far under nor how far close;)

The box is destroyed, it has no value. If you were to price it out, it would only equal the value of a cartridge and manual.

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5 minutes ago, Code Monkey said:

The box is destroyed, it has no value. If you were to price it out, it would only equal the value of a cartridge and manual.

This is absolutely just not true. Ive already had someone interested if i would part with the box even in its condition. It has value. Which I won’t part with unless i got a better box

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46 minutes ago, TDIRunner said:

That's a shame that someone would cut up a box to fit it in a clamshell.  I understand the desire to put 32x games in proper cases, but it would be so much simpler to just print out a new cover for the clamshell and put the original box in storage.  

I agree, but i am thankful that it looks good. Could have been a lot worse!  Btw, did your friend have anymore of those surgical strike replicas?  You’ve got me really thinking about that now

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18 minutes ago, Matthewnimmo said:

I agree, but i am thankful that it looks good. Could have been a lot worse!  Btw, did your friend have anymore of those surgical strike replicas?  You’ve got me really thinking about that now

This is the link he ordered from, but it looks like they are no longer available to order.  He mentioned that it might be worth sending a message asking if any remain.  

https://www.vgdb.com.br/?fbclid=IwAR1lU-4NZ8hb_FGB5tsIeAHc54gk6Q32vmTMEK5kMod97LmPuB_TpGJqW-0

 

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34 minutes ago, TDIRunner said:

This is the link he ordered from, but it looks like they are no longer available to order.  He mentioned that it might be worth sending a message asking if any remain.  

https://www.vgdb.com.br/?fbclid=IwAR1lU-4NZ8hb_FGB5tsIeAHc54gk6Q32vmTMEK5kMod97LmPuB_TpGJqW-0

 

Aha yes, i found this as well. I had reached out to the guy and I maybe in luck but ill keep everyone posted 

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Now it’s time for the elusive Blackthorne!

if you are just now reading these stories check out my previous ones. But as i reminder (a quick one) ive been calling across the country (literally in some cases chasing the sun on when stores open and close) in order to find the best deals on what i was looking for and learning which places would ship and places that wouldn’t... which leads me to this story 

over the years ive seen blackthorne on ebay a lot for the 32x well before i was collecting but then i even noticed it was expensive and during those times i was just looking at carts only. I would think to myself at the time “holy crap over $100 for a game!!”  Little did i know at the time. So, this particular game is what brought me here actually by accident. I was searching the Internet late at night while stores were closed so I couldn’t call in hopes to perhaps find another source of finding blackthorne besides ebay and price gouging that i now see there for the title (at the time i saw this beat to hell box, no manual, and cart selling for $220). Dont get me wrong a beatup box is better than no box. So, when searching i found @Platinumfungi‘s post in which he was still selling a cib of blackthorne! I got all sorts of excited. Learned that his original posting wasn’t that long ago and perhaps he still has it. So I think i tried communicating with him through all means except singing telegram in hopes that he would come back and check my message here on vgs as i saw that he had not logged in a while. A las, i learned that i was 2nd in line for the title and my hopes of potentially getting Blackthorne for a fair price outside of ebay was leaving me but then ...

i remembered one of my notes from a call to video game heaven in VA!  They had a beautiful cib copy of blackthorne for $169. But the only problem was they refused to ship. I even had contacted the manager and he said it was company policy across all their stores, so i had to let it go. But then i got thinking, could i find a way to have someone to pick this up?  I even had made a post here to see if anyone lived in the area. I had one guy who might have but had to stay put for a while (but was extremely thankful for his willingness!!). From there i knew that fedex and ups did offer some services about picking up packages at locations but would they pick up and package?  The short answer is no, and in VA (or at least the ups and fedex stores i called) only offer the typical services. So i had to rethink this some more

So even if i found someone i had two more problems  first, not only would video games heaven not ship they wouldn’t take payment over the phone, i had to be there i person  also ups and fedex will not take payments over the phone same story, but more understandable with the shipping companies

I then found this service!  Like ubereats, instacart, etc. that will perform tasks for you called TaskRabbit!  So, i commissioned a tasker to go to video games heaven purchase Blackthorne for me (that i had called a head and have them hold it for me. At least they were willing to do that) then drive to a local ups store and pay for them to package and ship the item. The tasker nailed it and through TaskRabbit he was reimbursed just like instcart shoppers. So now the journey has ended and i have a copy that i think is just as nice as the one (if not nicer) on ebay with a seller not budging on his/her $384 price tag. But i only paid $169 plus some shipping and a little extra for the tasker. Still well under that price 

more stories to come!

4796B454-6C92-4954-AD51-ABEC536F1F39.jpeg

Edited by Matthewnimmo
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2 hours ago, Matthewnimmo said:

Now it’s time for the elusive Blackthorne!

if you are just now reading these stories check out my previous ones. But as i reminder (a quick one) ive been calling across the country (literally in some cases chasing the sun on when stores open and close) in order to find the best deals on what i was looking for and learning which places would ship and places that wouldn’t... which leads me to this story 

over the years ive seen blackthorne on ebay a lot for the 32x well before i was collecting but then i even noticed it was expensive and during those times i was just looking at carts only. I would think to myself at the time “holy crap over $100 for a game!!”  Little did i know at the time. So, this particular game is what brought me here actually by accident. I was searching the Internet late at night while stores were closed so I couldn’t call in hopes to perhaps find another source of finding blackthorne besides ebay and price gouging that i now see there for the title (at the time i saw this beat to hell box, no manual, and cart selling for $220). Dont get me wrong a beatup box is better than no box. So, when searching i found @Platinumfungi‘s post in which he was still selling a cib of blackthorne! I got all sorts of excited. Learned that his original posting wasn’t that long ago and perhaps he still has it. So I think i tried communicating with him through all means except singing telegram in hopes that he would come back and check my message here on vgs as i saw that he had not logged in a while. A las, i learned that i was 2nd in line for the title and my hopes of potentially getting Blackthorne for a fair price outside of ebay was leaving me but then ...

i remembered one of my notes from a call to video game heaven in VA!  They had a beautiful cib copy of blackthorne for $169. But the only problem was they refused to ship. I even had contacted the manager and he said it was company policy across all their stores, so i had to let it go. But then i got thinking, could i find a way to have someone to pick this up?  I even had made a post here to see if anyone lived in the area. I had one guy who might have but had to stay put for a while (but was extremely thankful for his willingness!!). From there i knew that fedex and ups did offer some services about picking up packages at locations but would they pick up and package?  The short answer is no, and in VA (or at least the ups and fedex stores i called) only offer the typical services. So i had to rethink this some more

So even if i found someone i had two more problems  first, not only would video games heaven not ship they wouldn’t take payment over the phone, i had to be there i person  also ups and fedex will not take payments over the phone same story, but more understandable with the shipping companies

I then found this service!  Like ubereats, instacart, etc. that will perform tasks for you called TaskRabbit!  So, i commissioned a tasker to go to video games heaven purchase Blackthorne for me (that i had called a head and have them hold it for me. At least they were willing to do that) then drive to a local ups store and pay for them to package and ship the item. The tasker nailed it and through TaskRabbit he was reimbursed just like instcart shoppers. So now the journey has ended and i have a copy that i think is just as nice as the one (if not nicer) on ebay with a seller not budging on his/her $384 price tag. But i only paid $169 plus some shipping and a little extra for the tasker. Still well under that price 

more stories to come!

4796B454-6C92-4954-AD51-ABEC536F1F39.jpeg

Nice! Super smart idea to use TaskRabbit. Way to beat the system!

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World Series Baseball Starring Deion Sanders is up next!

sometime near the day i had found spiderman and had made the decision that i wanted a full set but hadn’t committed to cib yet i had made up my mind that i better start trying to find a copy of this game. Most of my initial searches had been ebay at the time as i was just starting to make calls across the country and when i would search for most 32x titles i would at least find some options... except this game and rbi Baseball (but thats another story). I happened to find a loose cart in Canada at the time so I began chatting with the seller about sending me some circuit board pics to prove it was real.   A lot of ebayers just wont do this for “reasons”. But this seller had no issues and the deal was made. I think afterwards I realized I probably over paid for the cart after shipping but i was excited to get it off the list

as time went on I started to change my desire from cart only to full on cib and i had nearly resigned myself to the possibility that id have to get a reproduction case for that cart as that game seemed almost harder to find than spiderman (at least id see copies for stupid amounts on ebay). So, i kept calling around and around and found a copy in NY (whats up with the big finds in NY?). But similar to the Blackthorne saga this place too didn’t ship and they didn’t have a firm price on it. Seemed like the two times i had called they changed the price from $300 to $350. Wouldn’t put it past them to say $380 if i called for a third time. Needless to say I wasn’t too thrilled at the situation and at this point was running low on funds (i had sold a bunch of RC stuff to fund this journey btw). So i tucked away this “option” in the event I wanted another TaskRabbit to be unleashed for another time

A few days go by and im posting replies on my initial buying thread to @Supergunabout the boxes he had sold me and then a new friend had showed up to the conversation @bronzeshield  He had expressed interest in some of the boxes too that supergun had and even though the one particular box i had dibs on i saw he had wanted it so i just decided to pull the trigger and a cib version of the game BC Racers that had shown up on ebay and told supergun to let bronzeshield have the box for his collection. Thought that was only right as he had been looking for it for a long while and his collection  was further along than mine. Well its amazing how things turn out. Bronzeshield had another cib version of wsb!  We worked out a deal and I couldn’t have been more thrilled... and thankful that I didn’t have to go through all these hoops again with TaskRabbit (even though that did work out well). Besides, id rather work deals out here than with a retailer that keeps making up a number each time. So now im in the process of selling that loose cart. Ill take a hit due to the shipping from Canada but it will work out:)

more stories to come!  Thanks again Bronzeshield!

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Edited by Matthewnimmo
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Very glad to have played some part in your journey towards a 32X set! 🙂

Not sure how many people have had two CIB copies of WSB 32X, but it was my good luck to be one of them thanks to a combination of searching and total accident. One of my copies -- I think it was the one I kept, but I've lost track of which is which! -- came from a yard sale where game collectors were circling like sharks (and frankly behaving rather badly!), seemingly unaware that the highest-value game of all was right under their noses, one of those scorned and overlooked sports titles.

I like some games on the 32X, especially Metal Head and Space Harrier. I actually had fun with Motocross too, though it's not to most tastes. I'd like to spend some quality time with DarXide too. Among the FMV CD games, Fahrenheit and Night Trap are both playable.

Sadly Blackthorne and Kolibri are wildly overrated! Kolibri has this weird flaw in its controls where if you stop, then move in a new direction, you'll often continue in the old direction. Between that and the respawning enemies and obscure stage goals, it's not nearly the game it could've been. Still, it's clearly the best hummingbird shooter on the 32X, don't let anyone tell you different...

I remain super-appreciative of your kind gesture in letting me have that B.C. Racers box from Supergun. All I need now is a Kolibri manual (which I hope to trade for someday) and Spider-Man CIB, and the latter I may never get, which is fine -- I'll just hope for another magical yard sale.

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Don’t worry! I still have plenty more stories to share and today is an extra special story as it involves my local gaming store and the owner.  i found @Trade-N-Gamesabout 3-4 years ago when I decided to start finding some of my old games that i had lost over the years. I have to say that their shop is always fun to visit as its very clean, organized, and they truly care about the hobby. They have imo an excellent online option as well and whatever they have in store is online, they keep that current. In fact, before items are sold in the store (especially high dollar ones) they do make sure an online order didn’t beat you to it if you happen to just walk in that day (which I respect that). Anyhow my story and my find

So, i had called ahead to see if they would be interested in buying or exchanging for store credit some of my extra low value 32x games. They said they would so i made the trip in (which btw, ill update my selling posting to reflect those changes) and got to chatting away with the owner about collecting especially around sega, 32x, and sega cd. The conversation some how came around to him having an extra new in the box sega 32x ... i was shocked. I had all the ntsc games and was holding off untill i found a deal with either a box or maybe a cib out in the wild, never would I thought i would find one brand new!  Last time i had seen a brand new sega 32x was Christmas of 95 when my parents had surprised me with one. So as you can imagine this brought back good memories (very few that i have of my childhood). We worked out a deal and i now have been able to repeat that childhood experience with the on difference being that i am not going to take it out of the box!

this probably is now my favorite piece of my entire collection... even tops spiderman even though spiderman is more expensive. The condition and the memories attached 

Enjoy everyone and I highly recommend if you haven’t checked out tradengames you should. And no I don’t work for them lol

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18 hours ago, Matthewnimmo said:

this probably is now my favorite piece of my entire collection... even tops spiderman even though spiderman is more expensive. The condition and the memories attached

I don't blame you at all--I've always been more attached to physical systems I'm nostalgic for than the games that play on them, even in cases such as the one you mention, with the game being multiple times more valuable.  Look at it this way--without that system, that Spider-Man game wouldn't be worth anything!  😉

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Thanks for coming in to the store. Love when a true collector finds something they have been looking for.  Just in case someone calls you out, the system was new but they never came in shrink wrap. I offered to do this for free to help protect it and it looks super nice and keeps dust and grime off of the box.

Our web site is www.tradengames.com

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