[img align=right width=150]http://sales.starcitygames.com/cardscans/MAGBOX/10themedeckred.jpg[/img]
Maybe you've read how I went to the gaming event called Next two weeks ago. I was somewhat dissapointed with the (small) amount of goodies given out. However I did get two Magic: The Gathering Theme Decks (The Green & White one) for free, which was pretty cool.
A couple of days later I took the time of going through the many flyers and product booklets that I had put in my plastic bag without even looking at them. Many of them had nothing interesting on them, however three of them caught my eye.
The first one was a very nice booklet about the Nintendo DS. Although many of the shown games don't interest me at all there was one thing I found "shocking". On almost every page there was picture of a 30-year old woman playing on the DS. Now get this: In the entire booklet there was only one guy, at the very last page! I knew that Nintendo's focus isn't the hardcore gamers anymore but I didn't knew that men weren't part of Nintendo's audience anymore either. What a difference compared to the Game Boy Advance.
Second was a booklet of a brand I never heard from before, called Onkyo. Onkyo is a Japanese consumer electronics manufacturer, specializing in home cinema and audio equipment including receivers, audio networking equipment and surround sound speakers. The receivers really look cool and would be a handy all-in-one solution for us, retro gamers. Just look at one and see what I mean:
[img align=left width=700]http://www.eu.onkyo.com/ir_img/17905593_cdadf2924e.jpg[/img]
Wow!
Just imagine hooking up
all your consoles to that thing. The only other cable that you'd need is a HDMI cable to hook up the receiver to your HD TV and you're all set to enjoy all your games in 1080p upscaling glory.
Well, that statement isn't entirely correct because the receiver doesn't seem to have an RF input. But still, hooking up all your consoles with composite output or better is still pretty nice. Unfortunately, these things aren't exactly cheap. Luckily, there are models with less inputs/outputs available that cost a more "manageable" $700 or so. (Compared to the $2000 price tag of this one)
[IMG align=right width=300]http://i460.photobucket.com/albums/qq324/Ingeniousdevices/Magic%20The%20Gathering/Kamer100.jpg[/img]
Anyway, what I wanted to talk about in this post was, you've guessed it, Magic: The Gathering. I had this flyer that told me I could get a free 40-card Theme Deck if I registered at
www.playmagic.com. Pretty ironic because I already had two of those theme decks, but a third one wouldn't hurt so I registered anyway. What I didn't knew was that you can only receive the cards at an official Magic dealer. (Which not too many shops are, apparently) so I selected a shop near to me, in Brussels.
Yesterday I finally did the effort of going down there. I had beforehand checked out the shop's website to make sure it would be open. It was, and according to the website it's opening hour was 11AM. Because I had no school yesterday (and today) I decided to be there at 11AM, so I still had the rest of the day to do whatever I want.
Armed with the flyer, a copy of the mail that included the code you must show at the shop and a Google Maps print of the location of the store I embarked on my epic quest for a free Theme Deck. (Notice the sarcasm) A bus, a subway and 15min of walking later I arrived at the store at 10:55AM. The store wasn't open yet but waiting for 5min isn't long anyway. At 11:10AM the shop still wasn't open and I began to wonder whether I misread the calendar on the website. 10min later there still was no sign of life, so I asked the shoe store owner next to the game store whether they always open that late. He said they were indeed always late and that the owner would probably show up in 10min or so. I waited for another 10min but at 11:30AM I really started to get impatient. I was about to leave when suddenly the shop owner showed up, 35min late. Now I don't demand stores to open precisely at their opening hour, but letting a customer wait for 35min just isn't acceptable in my opinion.
So I was already a bit annoyed with having to wait there that long but things got worse when I showed him the code because he said that he only had one deck left, the Green one in French. Obviously I didn't want that because I already had that deck from the event and secondly because I don't want my cards to be in French. After talking with him for a couple of minutes he suddenly "discovered" some more Theme Decks behind the counter so I chose the Red one, Kamahl's Temper. (Shown above)
Then he suddenly started talking about this "closet" that is filled with cards. I didn't understand what he meant but he took me to this closet at the front of the store which I didn't even see when I entered because everything is painted rather dark/black. So he opens up this "closet" and it was literally filled with loose cards. He then said I could "fill up a box and take it home". I didn't believe what he said so I asked him why they are free and he said that they are all cards left behind by players who don't need them anymore.
I did as he said, thanked him, and left the shop. Seeing I took home about 800 cards I'm guessing that there were somewhere between 50,000 and 100,000 cards in that closet, pretty awesome to say the least. It's funny how I went to that shop with the intention of getting a free Theme Deck and walked out with over 800 cards instead.
Everything in the picture below was free. After organizing the cards:
[img width=600 height=487]http://i460.photobucket.com/albums/qq324/Ingeniousdevices/Magic%20The%20Gathering/MagicTheGathering002.jpg[/img] [img width=600 height=487]http://i460.photobucket.com/albums/qq324/Ingeniousdevices/Magic%20The%20Gathering/Kamer076.jpg[/img]
Guess I don't know that much about receivers/home cinema but it isn't unimaginable that people would spend that much money on it.
