The Great Collection Cleaning and Downsizing

[techwizard]

This has been an ongoing issue since soon after I first started collecting. I would grab large lots of games and because there were so many, I had no motivation to clean them all at once. I tried many times to go through them in bulk, but it never happened. Until now.

I had already been determinedly cleaning, and taking note in my excel list of anything beyond repair, through about half of my collection when my girlfriend left on a family trip for 2 and a half weeks. As I tend to work better under pressure I set a goal to finish cleaning every game left in my collection before she gets back. That left me with just over 200 N64 games, all but 15 of those being CIB, to clean in a little over 2 weeks. I managed it in a week and a half, cleaning at least one shelf on every day that I didn't have too much else going on. I never thought the day would come where I could say my collection is completely cleaned, and all beyond-repair issues that are bad enough to bother me have been noted.

Unfortunately a good 25 or so N64 games were in bad enough shape to warrant pulling from the collection to sell and replace later. My standards are a lot higher now than they were early in my collecting days. At this point I don't see any point in holding onto anything if I know in the future I would be replacing it and in the present it's an eyesore.

The next big project I've been working on, already started in between cleaning games, is to sit down and play at least 10 - 30 minutes of every game in my collection that I don't know very well. If after playing that long I feel like I have no interest in the game to play, I pull it from the collection to sell. This excludes N64 of course as I'm still going for the full set of that. I'll also be using anything I can scavenge from the sale pile to improve condition on stuff that's staying, swapping cases and stuff like that. Also all Player's Choice, Greatest Hits, Platinum, and the like are all gone now as well as anything loose, after I purged those last summer.

Lastly I'll be making a WTB list for every console besides N64, full of games that I think are worth playing. Mostly based on recommendations I see in the archive threads here, or sometimes on "top 10" style lists from other places. I'm sure I'll miss some good games and will go beyond my lists if I come across anything like that, but for the most part my goal is to make these lists and then stick to them while shopping, to ensure I'm bringing back games that I actually want to own.

I really feel like I'm finally getting my collection closer to the point that I'm very happy with it. I want quality over quantity, and to feel like I'm actually collecting things that are worth collecting to me instead of hoarding everything that crosses my path.

[Addicted]

I'm glad to hear you've found a style of collecting that works for you and I bet your found some hidden gems in your collection by cleaning and playing them. I'd love to see a picture of your newly cleaned collection and your sale list!

[techwizard]

I'm glad to hear you've found a style of collecting that works for you and I bet your found some hidden gems in your collection by cleaning and playing them. I'd love to see a picture of your newly cleaned collection and your sale list!

There's definitely some games that I totally expected to add to the sale pile but they ended up being a lot of fun. Disney's Cars on PS2 being one, Lost Planet Extreme Condition being another.

[techwizard]

still chugging away at weeding out games, down to about 1 and a half shelves left. also made some progress on my WTB lists, finishing off Dreamcast and 3DS for that. those lists take way longer to put together than i expected, it took most of one day to make those 2 alone. decided to also go ahead and confirm that my lists all match what's actually on my shelves, i've found a handful of mistakes so far but not too bad.

edit: minor progress on weeding the PSP collection, not much being removed there. finished checking that my lists match my shelves, excel and rfgen both had discrepancies but both match each other and the shelves now. used some good condition cases from my sale pile to upgrade stuff that i'm keeping but was a bit rough. everything's coming together nicely, once i finish the weeding i can focus on making the WTB lists. after that i'll have no major collection projects to work on other than the hunt to find stuff from my WTB lists. actually that's not entirely true, i'd like to make some more youtube videos talking about the games in my collection from each system. I don't see that as quite the same though, it's not a maintenance task but more of an extra thing.

[techwizard]

finished weeding out games from every system in my collection a while back!

making significant progress on my WTB lists but it's taking ages. for every console i'm looking up recommendations and "top 10" style lists, then checking wikipedia or rfgen's database to confirm that the game is exclusive. if it's not, then i have to decide which system i want it for if i have any of the others. lastly i look up gameplay videos or reviews or trailers of the game to decide if i actually think it's worth picking up.

later i'll go back through everything and look up market value from ebay sold listings to decide on a price range i'd be willing to pay for each one. i'll probably print it all off in a booklet format to make for easy referencing on the go.

[techwizard]

jeez this WTB list is taking forever. about 1 month or more into it and i'm finally done deciding on which games to add, all that's left now is to price them out. final count is 1287 games (edit: not including N64 titles remaining which i forgot to add, so probably closer to 1400 total WTB). this will be an unattainable list, especially since i'll be wanting every game on it CIB, but at least i can go shopping with confidence that i know what i want for my collection and i'll have a rough idea of market value.

[Duke.Togo]

Are you going to be putting your WTB list on here or on your wishlist? Might be some folks here that would have some items.

[techwizard]

Are you going to be putting your WTB list on here or on your wishlist? Might be some folks here that would have some items.

i haven't decided yet, the problem is that it's so long that everyone with something to sell is likely to have some of what i want, and i don't have the money to buy it all at once. this is really a long term list, i could see it taking 10 or more years to complete. my original intention was to print it and take it out game hunting locally more than for online.

[techwizard]

the list is finished! it took nearly 3 weeks longer than i expected, but it's done. final count: 1455 games. all of them were meticulously researched on wikipedia, rfgeneration, youtube, and ebay to decide which version i want for each title. that being said, i can guarentee that there are mistakes throughout, some games that could be better on a different console and i just didn't find the clues to reveal that. if you see anything that stands out in the link below as being better on a different console, please let me know.

i printed it in booklet form and even managed to find an industrial sized stapler at work that could go through the 15 or so sheets of paper at once. i'll probably attach a picture of it here when i get home tonight.

Here it is for those who want to check it out: https://www.dropbox.com/s....%204%2C%202015.xlsx?dl=0

be aware that the prices are all in canadian dollars, and the exchange rate is brutal right now (edit: oh and they're all CIB prices too). they're all taken from ebay sold listings and are a rough picture of canadian market value, that's why so many of them are so high. i plan on attempting to update the prices every 6 months or so, so hopefully they'll be more reasonable next time around.