How did you discover RF Generation?

[Izret101]

On or about July 05, 2004, 01:14:49 AM i was chatting with my cousin (danvx6) on AIM and for whatever reason started looking up information about RF Switches/Shielding and stumbled across the site.

Pure crazy dumb luck lead me to be (AFAIK though i would love for one of the other old timers to prove me wrong) the first person to actually register to the site. I believe the previous 44 had already been carried over or informed about it before/during the splinter from and then collapse of VGB.

I had actually been to DP (T&Ts Collectors Closet let me know there were other people besides me collecting games...) but i don't think i joined until after signing up here and driving everyone crazy with my short lived average of 40+ posts a day for the first couple days. Down to a measley 5.798 per day average now.

[bombatomba]

I found RFG after purchasing the Video Game Bible and researching for the next volume (that would contain handheld systems or something).  I didn't dig in immediately but rather bookmarked it for alter consumption (as was my custom at the time).  Now I cannot pinpoint the exact date, but it was likely 2006-2007.  A few years later I ended up doing the same amount of research (this time by following one of the authors, Michael Collins) and re-discovered RFG, but this time I decided to stay.

[bickman2k]

Allow me to expand upon my story that I had in the blog.

At the time when I only had a couple of hundred games, it was fairly easy to remember what games I had, what I was missing, and what I wanted. Once this got out of hand, I began to look for a utility that would let me keep track of everything that I had.

I tried Excel, Access, Collectorz Game Collector, Cart Commander, and IGN (of course). IGN lasted the longest because it was online and I didn't have to worry about losing anything with a format. Everything went well with my GCN games. Even back to the NES, I had no issues. It wasn't until I started to go back to the Intellivision when I had issues. I remember the game even that caused me to start looking for a new tool. It was Racquetball by Apollo. That game became the litmus test.

Excel sucks for larger collections unless you begin with it while you have a small collection. Access just sucks.

The Collectorz tool was and still is too expensive, especially for only having (in my mind) a decent amount of information. Cart Commander I walked in to knowing that it was going to be a full manual entry. It was okay, but tedious and slow and I had a growing collection to enter.

Leaving the collection tool aside, I had sort of been looking for a new place to discuss games with fellow gamers and collectors. I had a good time back in college posting on the GameFAQs boards, but the areas I frequented had quickly lost the crew that was usually there and I felt that I needed a different place to go. I knew of Digital Press, but in a few times of posting there, I really felt lost in a very established community. I had asked there what people were using and it was actually Kevincal who recommended RF Generation. I had used it maybe a time or two before, but that was only during a time of trying everything out.

I came back and began entering my collection. Racquetball was there! Hey, it's Super Mario Bros.! Oh... it's 5 different versions of Super Mario Bros... Guess I better start paying more attention to carts.

I also began posting. I had questions for staff and they answered. I read blogs. I read posts and commented. I jumped in to the IRC! And I felt like I was really contributing to a community in a way that I hadn't before. I was hooked!

Since then, a lot has happened. I became a director, helping with the server side of things to take some load off of the folks helping out with programming and database work. I have had times of outbursts of posts and plenty of times of going without posting. But even if I don't say anything, I still load up a tab with RF Generation every time I launch a browser. I even recommended setting up Tapatalk for easier mobile browsing before I had the ability to just do it. I wanted to be able to easily get to this community everywhere I was.

I try to be accessible to anyone that wants to talk, new or old. I remember what it was like when I was new both here and other places. I'm an introvert and a shy person around new people. There's a reason that my contact information is public in my profile. I enjoy communicating with folks who share a similar interest, no matter the method. I've even been fortunate enough to have had phone calls with a couple of people, hosted a podcast with a member here without ever having met him, and even had a meetup face to face with 3 members.

Honestly, with my family schedule and work schedule, I don't have time to go out and meet a bunch of people myself or with my family. I've met a ton of friends through RF Generation though and I hope to make it more.

[blcklblskt]

Sometime in 2008 I began looking for a way to track my growing Virtual Boy collection, and I found RFG with a Google search.  After playing around with the collection tools, I became a member.  It's been my favorite sight ever since.

[NES_Rules]

Back in early 2006, I was driving home from High School, and stopped at a garage sale just for heck of it. They had a box of NES games (something I hadn't seen since my originals were packed away years earlier) for $10, so I bought them so I had a reason to drag out my old NES. A few of the games I had never heard of (actually it was probably all of them since the only NES games I knew of as a kid were the ones I owned or played at friends/family's houses). I figured the best place to research these old games was from the source, the Nintendo website.
That's where I found the NSider forums, specifically the Legacy Systems board. That's where I started getting into collecting and pretty much lived on that board, even if there were only 1-2 new posts each day. It was also there that I learned about Digital Press, either from the forum itself, or the resident moderator, TERRISUS1.
I browsed DP for a while, but I just never felt at home there and only posted a handful of times. But I did read a lot of the topics, specifically one of those "how do you track your collection?" topics. I kept seeing RFGeneration listed so I figured it must be the best and I was right. Ever since I slowly spending more time on RFGeneration and less time on DP and NSider.
And as so many people have found, once you find something missing from the DB, you just feel compelled to add it, just to be a part of something so great. After Tynstar told me all my submissions were wrong, I started making better submissions, and they started to get approved.
After a couple years of making submissions and blog entries, I was made a Blog Contributor, then a DB Contributor, then DB Editor and finally, a Director.
Its hard to believe I've been here almost 8 years, but I'm so glad I did find this place, aside from the collection tools, its really become my online family.

[nupoile]

Reading though the posts so far it's surprising how many people are mentioning Digital Press. I too learned of this site from there.

It was back in 2004, I was enjoying my growing NES collection and trying to find somewhere online that shared this love of games, not just old games or new games but all of them.....recently I was listening to a podcast were the people were asking each other what their first console was and when it was finally "retired" from being hooked up to the TV. I thought, that's weird, why would you stop having a console hooked up? Seriously, my NES has always been hooked up. It followed me to college in the late 90's even.....it's just always been there. But I've also always liked current games too, I have no age-bias when it comes to games, if a game is fun, who cares if its old or new or retro or cutting edge or popular or graphically challenged?

So back to 2003-4, I was lurking on a few sites, learning more and more about older games, Digital Press was one of the main ones for me for sure but there were others. At the time, my collection was small enough I could remember everything I had, it was all PC and NES at the time, but I could see it was going to start becoming a problem to keep track of. I was using a printed out NES rarity guide, the one that used letter grades for rarity, checking off games as I bought them. A thread came up on Digital Press announcing the launch of RFGeneration. It sounded like my kind of thing. I started lurking on DP and RFG. I lurked for about a year. I'm not one to take committing to joining a group lightly    Finally, on June 14, 2005 I joined, about a year and a week after RFG was founded.

I've since tried to go back and find the thread that brought me to this site. I've had no luck. I'm not sure who it was that made the post but it seems like it was one of the sites founders, I want to say it was Lord Nep himself.

[Crabmaster2000]

Back in late 2005/early 2006 I decided to pick up a large 50 game NES lot off of ebay. It had a few games that I remember playing as a kid, namely Hydlide, and a lot I had never heard of. After finding a few hidden gems in that box I looked for other gaming stuff I'd never played. Didn't ever know anyone with a Sega Saturn when I was a kid so I grabbed a Saturn off of ebay with a dozen games to try out. Then a Virtual Boy, then a Dreamcast, etc etc.

After getting a few new systems and around 200 games under my belt I started looking online for other games/system I'd missed out on and started lurking on racketboy for more gaming info. After accidentally picking up a few doubles I decided to start looking for something to track my collection with. Noticed a few people recommending rfgen from the racketboy forums and came over here to check it out (got it right the first time and didn't have to mess around with IGN and others like you suckers ).

Just kind of lurked for a while and then started paying special attention to the small scores thread. Started learning where to find things locally from it and started hitting up pawn shops and garage sales. After getting a few good scores I finally posted my own findings and found it very enjoyable to share my triumphs with other members. Found an N64 with a bunch of games at a garage sale, but the system was missing it's AV cords. Asked on rfgen about where to buy one and ended up purchasing the cords from BadEnoughDude which was my first private transaction online. It was a magical experience that had me largely cut out ebay ever since in favor of the much more personal touch you get from sites like this. After a few pats on the back for good scores, a couple successful purchases and sales and many many hours spent chatting in the IRC I was hooked.

Eventually started writting up blogs that eventually made it to the front page, competed in submission contests, was asked on as a guest of Slackur and Bickman's podcast, started podcasting with Duke and eventually Bil, and finally opening my own game store all thanks to the wonderful community right here

[Addicted]

I was over on the Nintendoage forums when Duke posted a thread about a new podcast over on RFGeneration. I found the forums were full of helpful members and the collection tools were much better than what I was using at the time. Since joining RFGeneration I've learned a lot about Skylanders (too much?), pinball, and much more.  Thanks to everyone on this site for making this site a great community and resource.

[Sauza12]

Pure crazy dumb luck lead me to be (AFAIK though i would love for one of the other old timers to prove me wrong) the first person to actually register to the site. I believe the previous 44 had already been carried over or informed about it before/during the splinter from and then collapse of VGB.

Actually that sounds right to me.  There might have been one or two people that signed up before you, but you were the first non VGB member to actually make your presence known.

[MaterialHandlerMike]

Met Crabmaster, when he opened up his game store, here in Prince George last year. We discussed things gaming and I eventually asked how he kept track of his collection. He directed me to RF generation and the rest is my short history here.

[Crabmaster2000]

Met Crabmaster, when he opened up his game store, here in Prince George last year. We discussed things gaming and I eventually asked how he kept track of his collection. He directed me to RF generation and the rest is my short history here.

I'm still waiting for my recruitment cheque........

[bickman2k]

Met Crabmaster, when he opened up his game store, here in Prince George last year. We discussed things gaming and I eventually asked how he kept track of his collection. He directed me to RF generation and the rest is my short history here.

I'm still waiting for my recruitment cheque........

[img width=500 height=500]http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7346/9510996474_1111cf7282.jpg[/img]

[Crabmaster2000]

About time!!!

[MaterialHandlerMike]

A Zero-cheque? like Marvel's no-prize.

[singlebanana]

Another member and collector from my hometown, Deviant, recommended it to me several years ago.

Well geez........I just realized how boring this was, so I'll have to add to it:

After being recruited by Deviant and actually joining on 7/19/2010, I quickly logged my "smallish" collection which consisted of basically 3 paper boxes of 2600 carts and about as many boxes of NES carts all stowed under the bed in our guest bedroom. I started under the guise of "necrom99" (a slightly altered tribute to the animated movie "Wizards"), but soon learned that another member was using the actual character's name from the movie, Necron99. To avoid confusion, I chose the name "singlebanana" and that has really stuck.  You'll still see "necrom99" appear quite often on the front page in the "Updated Collections" box; that would be me and the reason you never see singlebanana.

While out searching for NES and 2600 games at flea markets and pawn shops, I kept coming across other systems at unbelievable prices and the "Oh Why The Hell Not" Syndrome quickly evolved into a collecting addiction.

I started out on the threads discussing collecting with others and posting a few of my small scores until August 4, 2010 when I made my first blog post to share a New Yorker article, which no one commented on....... Deciding that my blog needed more of a theme, I revamped it on 1/17/11 by renaming it "A Boy and His Blog" and posted a small paragraph about my intentions to review titles for the 2600. I received some encouragement from several members at this time, namely noiseredux, dsheinem, slacker, and my now good buddy in NES crime, Crabmaster2000. Encouraged by the replies, I put up my first review of Jawbreaker on the first day and received further encouragement from other members. My next entry on Entombed (1/24/11) was promoted from the blogs to the front page and my subsequent posts (Space Cavern, Tapper, Dark Cavern, and Vanguard) were given the same treatment. Before my next post on 2/24/11, a little over a month after my first 2600 blog post, I was asked by a staff member (maybe NES_Rules???) if I wanted to join as a blog contributor. I assume they didn't think they could get rid of me anyway......

I soon became more comfortable with the site, started trading, and even posted my opinions about gaming topics without people throwing shoes at me. I made the mistake of telling someone, "You know, I think the playthroughs are a great idea, but we hardly play any retro titles." And the rest is history. Great site, great people, great part of my daily life.