Seven Tips For Finding Classic Games At Goodwill

So, you wanna be a Goodwill hunter? There are a great many treasures to be had a Goodwill stores across the country, though it can be a challenge finding them. Every store is different, and that means the prices and locations of stock vary wildly from one to the next.

Here are a few tips for making the most of your trip based on my own shopping experiences.

1) The Case

As soon as you walk into most Goodwill stores, you'll find a glass case filled with what they consider to be their high value merchandise. In some cases, that's where you'll find the games, and oftentimes the systems as well. You'll probably need to have an employee take them out in order to find out what they are. 

2) Behind the Case

In many stores, boxed systems and accessories will be kept behind the counter in order to avoid theft. If there's a stack of boxes, ask if you can look through them. You never know what's in there.

I've also seen baskets filled with cartridges hiding in this area, too. Have a look around before you move on.

3) The Bookshelves

The bookshelves occasionally house boxed games and cartridges. It's worth a quick scan.

4) The CD Section

This section can take a while to browse, but is occasionally worth it. Some stores split games and software CDs into their own section, but many do not. Even in the ones that do, things will be missed. Always browse through all of the music CDs, because you'll almost definitely find a Playstation, Dreamcast or PC game hiding in there.

5) The Electronics Section

This is the most obvious place to look, and tends to be your best bet in any store. Sometimes, they'll stack the cartridges here, but you'll almost always find accessories here - controllers and AC adapters and the like. Unless something is taped to a system, the employees won't match them up and will usually price them separately.

Another thing to keep in mind while browsing this section is that not every consumer electronics device is as it seems. Inside that stack of CD changers may be a Laserdisc player, which could even be a LaserActive. That bunch of DVD players may hide a Nuon-capable DVD or a CD-i. Always scan this section for things out of the ordinary.

6) The Aisle Next To The Toy Aisle

Okay, this one might sound a bit odd, but hear me out. In my local store, this aisle is the sporting goods section, and I've come across a number of controllers and light guns. My theory is that kids pick them up and play with them while their parents browse the other sections, then drop them in the nearest aisle in a mad dash for the toy section. I've seen this in multiple stores, so it isn't an isolated incident.

7) Tag Sales

Most Goodwill stores have tag sales, in which a price tag of a specific color is half off for the week. These change every Sunday. If you've found something you want with a price that's just too high, come back on Sunday and it may be half off, provided it hasn't sold in the meantime.

Keeping these things in mind will help foster a more efficient and lucrative shopping experience. Got any tips of your own? Leave them in the comments section!

Goodwill Hunting - Pitfall 3D and Game & Watch Gallery

Eh, why not?

Planted firmly in the "it was on sale, so why not?" territory are these two pickups from 2 days ago.  Pitfall 3D was half off at around $1.50, Game & Watch Gallery at it's regular price of $4. Neither have very much value, so this isn't a pickup for the record books.

In other news, It looks like I'll be needing a bit more time on my current game review, so I'll be bumping up the review of the PowerPak to this week.  Look for it soonish!

Famicom Games, A Sega Master System And The Weakest Thrift Trip Yet

So, in response to a Craigslist ad, I took a trip out a bit farther out of the way than I usually go, and picked up an awesome deal.  I'll come back to that.

While I was out, I also took a run to my usual day-trip thrift shops.

I've had a sort of unspoken superstition for a while. In every playlist I make before I head out, I sneak in Sievert's Party Dog, the song I use as the theme for my videos. If the song plays at random during the trip, it'll be a good trip.  Well, today I proved there's some merit to that - the song didn't play before I reached my first shop.

No matter how many stores I went to, it was the same. Common games or no games at all. Every single place, nothing. No consoles, no accessories, and no games.

I even stopped at The Bins (the Goodwill Outlet store) and picked through everything they had.  Nothing.  Nothing at all.  Finally, just as I was about to leave and call the whole trip a bust, I found this hiding in the display case.

My favorite Game Boy game, when I was very young. Also I didn't have a Game Boy.

Yes, it generally goes for about 50 cents less than I paid, but damn it, I conquered the stores tonight. I found something, and therefore I won. So there.

I'm kidding, of course. I love taking these trips, even if I find nothing at all. There's a thrill in the hunt; digging through the trash and finding the hidden treasures.

Next, I received an awesome package from Japan.  4 Famicom games for $26 shipped, from Sean at http://famicomblog.blogspot.com.  None of the markup you usually get on these games... seriously, check eBay.  Anyway:

My first 4 Famicom games - pretty good choices so far.

The games are Final Fantasy II, Final Fantasy III, Tower of Druaga and The Goonies. You can't beat $26 for these games, when you figure how much you're usually charged just for shipping from Japan.

So, on to the big Craigslist score, and the reason for the trip out today.  The listing was for a Sega Master System, several controllers, and some games.  He said he couldn't get it to start up but didn't have the correct AC adapter, so I figured I'd give it a shot, since I've got two of them.  Fired it up when I got it home... and it does not start up.

Looks like I've got a new repair project.

EDIT: A small update - I've found out the original owner tried to start it up with an NES AC adapter, which is a very, very bad idea. The NES adapter puts out AC and is converted internally, whereas the SMS adapter converts to DC. Plugging in an NES adapter will fry your Master System. Just don't do it. I know it fits, but that doesn't mean it works. If you have a Sega Genesis Model 1 AC adapter, that'll work just fine.

Now, we buy a replacement voltage regulator.

One of the controllers is an Epyx joystick, which makes me smile.

The games are the reason I went for it, though.  Well, one, in particular:

Global Defense, Monopoly, Golvellius, Rescue Mission, Missile Defense 3-D and Alf.  Believe it or not, Alf is a very rare and difficult to find game, netting around $40 boxed.

How much did I pay for the whole set?  $25. Even with a non-working Master System, I still win the day.

Yard sale season starts up again soon, though. Get ready, I've got a feeling this year's going to be a great one.

Can't Win Em All - Today's Thrift Run

Today's haul is not great.  Not at all.  But, I really wanted to grab some new games, so here we are.

Harvest Moon!

First stop was Salvation Army, which is always hit or miss where retro games are concerned.  Today was a pretty big hit.  Nine Game Boy games in a plastic bag, marked at $10.99 for the lot.  I'd have passed, but then I saw that Mary-Kate and Ashley game...

...actually, it was the Harvest Moon that pushed me over the edge.

The games are Sports Illustrated Golf Classic (valued at about $1), Buzz Lightyear of Star Command ($1), Harvest Moon GBC ($9), The New Adventures of Mary-Kate and Ashley ($1), Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers ($4), Centipede ($1), Top Rank Tennis ($1), Ultra Golf ($2), and Space Invaders ($4).  So at around $24, this set is the star, regardless of quality. But hey, I love Harvest Moon games.

And the "meh" collection.

Next, a Goodwill.  Sometimes you're out at a store and just think, "Y'know what? Damnit, I need some N64 games."  Then you grab them all up and overpay like crazy.

Or maybe that's just me.

Anyway, the games are WCW vs NWO World Tour ($1), Hey You, Pikachu ($2) and Rayman 2 ($6).  I paid almost $13.  Yes, yes, I'm ashamed, but you know what?  I don't care at all abut pro wrestling, and normally dislike pro wrestling games as a result.  Wrestling games developed by AKI, though, are in a class of their own.  I don't mind overpaying for that.

Besides, I'm still up around $10 in final value.  So there!

Finally, a good hunt.

It was bound to happen eventually, right?  Today I finally took the chance to go out and hit up my favorite thrifting haunts, and while it's not all top-shelf stuff, I feel pretty good getting back in the game.

Too expensive?  Yep.  Do I care?  Nope.

First off, two complete Genesis games, NBA Jam and Eternal Champions for $2.99 each.  I overpaid by quite a lot on both of these super-common titles, but y'know what?  That's fine, sometimes.  Especially when you've been out of the game for a while.

My N64 collection's starting to get somewhere.

Next, three N64 titles at $2.99 each - Blast Corps, Star Fox 64 and Mario Party.  Blast Corps is worth just slightly more than I paid, but with Star Fox 64 worth around $10 and Mario Party at around $19, they really made this trip.  See that Mario Party label, though?  It's covered by the single most vile, horrible and evil thing ever conceived by man - Blockbuster's security stickers.

These stickers are designed so that if you try to remove them, they will literally rip the game's label right off the cartridge.  There's no way to remove them without destroying the label, and this one's got permanent marker all over it.   It just had to be on the biggest prize of the day, didn't it?

There's one of these on my Pokemon Puzzle League, too.  If I ever meet the person who invented these, I'll... have strong words for him.

I'm unashamed to say I love these old Capcom Disney games.

Chip 'n Dale Rescue Rangers for the NES, $4.99 at Value Village.  This one's also just under the estimated value, but that's okay.  It's Chip 'n Dale.

If you're not excited by this, you're clearly not a part of my generation.

Another good, cheap-ish game.

Vectorman 2 for the Genesis for $1.99 at my local Goodwill.  It's worth about what I paid for it, but if I remember correctly, these were pretty good games.  Now I just need to find the first.

There is no way to look cool in 3D glasses.

So, where have I been?  Aside from the the fact that I don't have access to my car as often as I'd like, I've also dropped around $1300 on building a new killer gaming PC, with a Playstation 3D Display as the monitor.  It's a thing of great beauty, and has kept me occupied for a few days now.

Yeah, the real-world Jerry does play modern games.  Not that guy in the videos, though.  He's been stuck in a time loop since 1999.

Talk to him about the Playstation 3, and he'll tell you, "Yeah, I DO have three Playstations."

I Do Still Hunt, I Swear.

Guess what?  I'm still here.

Let's start off by repeating what was already said in the video - Fami-complex is a year old as of yesterday!  It's hard to believe it has already been a year.  So much has happened in so little time!

I'm sorry about the lack of content lately, aside from the regular review episodes.  I haven't had access to my car regularly, which means I haven't been taking my regular thrifting trips.  As a result, of course, I have less pickups and less new acquisitions to talk about.

But, I will, of course, update when I'm able to make it out.

Today's trip was a fairly successful one - I picked up Resident Evil 2 for the Playstation and Pro Wrestling for the NES at just under $5.  I overpaid for Pro Wrestling (which is at around $1), but Resident Evil 2 was a pretty good deal (at around $7).

The best deal, however, came from last weekend, when I hit up a new and unfamiliar Value Village, finding a Sega Saturn backup cartridge for just $2!  The official cartridge generally sells for around $50, so this is a steal.

Oddly enough, I'm most excited about Pro Wrestling, common and cheap as it is.  It's one of those games I played a ton as a kid and haven't touched since.  I always played as Starman.

Real men wear pink leotards.

I mean, just look at him.  So calm.  So mysterious.  Is he from Mexico?  What is his date of birth?  Did he accidentally throw his white costume in the washer with his red towels?  The world will never know.

Goodwill Hunting - More Atari 2600 Finds!

What's cooler than a console with a wood grain sticker on it?

A box for your games with a wood grain sticker on it!

Today's Goodwill finds actually come from of Goodwill's auction site, http://www.shopgoodwill.com.    Goodwill's auctions can be another great source for bulk retro items - but there are a few caveats.  First, it's become quite well known, so don't expect a super-rare game to go for a low price.  Second, the shipping tends to be atrocious, so watch it carefully.  The best course of action, in my opinion, is to watch for local auctions, because that means you can pick it up locally for a much smaller handling fee.

This is an Atari Game Center, a wood grained thing of beauty designed to store your Atari cartridges and peripherals, with a set of grooves on top which snugly fit your console.  Included with the game center are all of the cartridges you see inside, as well as a stack of manuals and inserts!

I love this stuff.

The games are Battlezone, Air-Sea Battle, Ms. Pac-Man, Mario Bros., Asteroids, E.T., Combat, Pole Position, Yar's Revenge, Space Invaders, Vanguard, Jungle Hunt, Surround, 2 copies of Missile Command, 2 copies of Pac-Man, and 3 copies of Berzerk.  There are manuals for most of the games... as well as a few manuals for games that aren't here.  Odd, but cool.  Oh, and there's a comic book for Yar's Revenge!  ...maybe it'll help that game make some sense.  This whole set was only $11, which was a really great deal for everything included.

The pickup location for this was the Goodwill Outlet in Hillsboro, so I stopped in to take a look.  The Goodwill Outlet is affectionately known as "The Bins" because, well, that's exactly what it is.  It's a large store that's simply filled with huge plastic bins.  Your role is to tear through all of the junk (and really, a lot of it is junk) in order to find a gem or two to take home.

The great part about The Bins is that they don't charge per item, they charge per pound.  It's the end of the line for this stuff, so they're less interested in profiting off the items themselves and more interested in getting rid of the bulk that the stores couldn't move.  You will have to dig, but you're almost guaranteed to find something half decent, and at a per-pound price, there's never any reason to leave anything behind.

Bad joke in 3... 2... 1...

I found a copy of Steroids for the Atari 2600.  I thought that game was banned?

"Bins" pickups.

For $1.59, I picked up the notoriously awful Dark Castle for the Sega Genesis, a N64 controller in much better shape than the last few I picked up there, and... oh, it's a copy of Asteroids.  That makes much more sense.

Again, at that price, why leave anything behind?  Of course, I hadn't realized there was a copy of Asteroids in the lot I'd just picked up, but oh well.  Still a great day for deals.

Yard sale season is winding down, so hit those local thrifts, before someone else beats you to it.  And, most of all, have fun!

Another Great Craigslist Haul, Plus a Little Goodwill Hunting!

Mario RPG!

The summer sale season may have come and gone here in the Northwest, but I've still got another great Craigslist haul to report tonight!  For $50, I picked up Super Mario RPG, Ninja Warriors, The Jungle Book, Earthworm Jim, Mystical Ninja and Zombies Ate My Neighbors for the SNES.

The value of these games is almost twice what I paid, so I'm very happy about that, especially after paying full Amazon price for my review copy of Zombies Ate My Neighbors just a few weeks ago and winding up with a beat-up, rental sticker-covered monstrosity.

2600 games - most are true classics, too.

After driving all the way out to Salem, I figured it'd be a good idea to check the nearby Goodwill as I don't make it out there very often.  They had a whole stack of Atari 2600 games, all labelled $3.99, but each and every one was half off due to the color tag sale.  That's better than most retail stores, but I took a loss on the value of these cartridges.  So, there was a small loss, but after the earlier victory, it all balances out to a pretty great day for my collection.  The titles were Space Attack, Super Breakout, Asteroids, Yar's Revenge, Adventure, Centipede, Reactor and Atlantis.

Goodwill Hunting and a Value Village Pillage - NES, Playstation Games and Genesis cleaning kit

W.ho keeps the box for their cleaning kit?

Yesterday was a very, very good thrifting day.  Value Village makes it's first appearance on this blog in style, with a fantastic deal.  As pictured above, The Legend of Zelda II, Mega Man 4 and Mega Man 5.  Also, a Sega Genesis official cleaning kit, which is in the original box.  Why would you keep the box?  I'm not complaining, but that seems like an odd box to hang on to.

Anyway, the total cost was $17.96.  Mega Man 5 alone sells for around $25, so I'm pretty happy with the result.  The Zelda II cart, however, is damaged in such a way that the connector inside retreats into the case when you try to insert it.  I'll take a shot at fixing it once I get a gamebit to open the thing up.

Hell yeah, Bushido Blade.

The Goodwill finds are significantly less impressive, but far more... bladey.  A Greatest Hits copy of Soul Blade and Bushido Blade for the Playstation.  This was purchased along with an original model Playstation 2 - which is outside of the scope of this blog - for $19.97.  With a $15 store credit, I paid $4.98 out of pocket and couldn't pass it up.

All in all, a very, very good trip.

Goodwill Hunting - Philips CD-i

The CD-i. It's NEW, according to the sticker.

Speak of the devil.  In my last post, referring to the SNES mouse, I mentioned that devices like the CD-i are likely pop up in the wrong section, because employees don't know what they are.

Less than a week later, one appeared, stacked on top of a DVD player in the electronics section.  Before
I talk about this one, let's talk about the CD-i.

The CD-i, or Compact Disc Interactive, is an "interactive multimedia player" released by Philips in 1991.  This thing plays just about anything that could be pressed on a CD.  Audio CDs, CD+G (Karaoke discs), even Video CD with the "Digital Video Card" add-on.

The CD-i saw movie releases, interactive audio CDs, encyclopedias and video games - really, if it was coming out for a CD-ROM equipped PC in 1991, you could probably find it here.

The games consisted almost completely of FMV games, though no Digital Pictures titles made it to this platform.  In addition to these, there were board games, game shows, educational titles - and Zelda games.

Yeah, you read that right.  The short version of the story is that Philips was one of the companies that Nintendo partnered with during their attempts to make a CD add-on for the SNES.  Of course, you know by now what happened to their partnership with Sony - but this partnership ended with Philips holding the rights to some of Nintendo's characters - which resulted in some of the worst games of all time.  Two Zelda games and one Mario game exist for this system - not developed by Nintendo.

It was a commercial failure, though, and was discontinued in 1998.  To this day, however, the CD-i has a devoted cult following, as well as a homebrew community still churning out software for the thing.

My CD-i ran $15 at Goodwill, and includes the Digital Video Card add-on.  No remote or controllers could be found, but I'll be returning every day until one pops up - chances are, it was donated with one, and this may be the only way I'll find one for a decent price.  They go for $50 and up on eBay, and that's a bit high for my tastes.

Expect an update here if I come across one.

Goodwill Hunting - Mario Paint w/ SNES Mouse

16-bit music with animal noises?  Sign me up!

There's not much to be said about Mario Paint that isn't common knowledge.  Gamers and non-gamers alike are familiar with its music, animation and drawing tools - or at least their end result.  Videos from the Mario Paint composer are all over YouTube; the early intro to Homestar Runner was composed in Mario Paint.  Despite having been massively popular, it has become uncommon to find a copy with the SNES Mouse included - and sadly, the mouse is required.

Two versions of the game were released for the Satellaview service in Japan that supported a standard Super Famicom controller, but like most Satellaview products, this never made it to the US.

This copy was purchased at Goodwill for a combined total of $6.98.  There are a couple of things to keep in mind when shopping at Goodwill for things like this.

Firstly, the first time I went in, I saw that the game was there, but no mouse was included.  Without the mouse, the game is hardly worth picking up unless you already have one.  The following day, however, there it was.  The key here is that if there's a complete system and a stack of games, chances are they've donated their entire collection.  So if there's a game that requires a special peripheral, wait for it and it'll probably turn up, as Goodwill doesn't set out all of their games at any given time to keep stock moving.

Secondly, don't just look in the game section.  There are consoles that, on first glance, look like DVD players (like the CD-i), and there are consoles that look like wide tray CD changers (like the LaserActive).  Always look closely.  The reason this is relevant is that Goodwill employees don't generally collect video games, otherwise they'd probably be buying everything out before we even get to see it.  The mouse was found in the computer section, tossed in with a group of PC mice.

Happy hunting!

Goodwill Hunting - Final Fantasy Legend II

Finally, something to play on my Super Game Boy.

When you think back on Square's 8-bit legacy, it's easy to forget that a total of four games were released on the Game Boy, all of which were labeled as Final Fantasy games, but none of which were part of the series proper.

Final Fantasy Legend I-III are actually the first three titles in the SaGa series, followed up by Romancing SaGa games on the Super Famicom and the Saga Frontier games on the Playstation.  At the time, Square was a household name in Japan, and a serious and focused contender in the RPG scene.  In the US, however, the only Square games we'd ever seen were King's Knight, the Rad Racer series, 3D World Runner, and Final Fantasy.  It's easy to see why they latched on to the Final Fantasy name here in order to sell cartridges.

This copy of Final Fantasy Legend II was found at Goodwill for $2.99, hiding under some PC games that had been haphazardly tossed about.  It needs a bit of cleaning, but the cartridge and save battery are working as they should.

Goodwill Hunting - Sega Dreamcast

I've missed you so, little grey box.

Was it piracy that killed the Sega Dreamcast?  Was it the result of a number of terrible decisions on Sega's part?  That argument may go on unresolved forever, but the fact remains that the Dreamcast was home to a serious number of instant classics; far more than you'd think, considering its lifespan.  As it was a home version of the popular Naomi arcade hardware, it just made sense for arcade developers to release their home versions here - which is why several games appeared for the Dreamcast after it was pronounced dead by Sega.

The Dreamcast holds a great - though short - chapter in video game history, which is why I was sad to let mine go back when I needed to sell everything.

But hey, now it's back.  For $12.99, I've got a complete Dreamcast with 2 controllers.  Sadly, no VMUs or games as yet, but we'll get there.

Sega Dreamcast Console at Amazon.com

Goodwill Hunting - Sky Shark for the NES

Here's a quick update - a Goodwill acquisition.  Taito's Sky Shark for the NES.  Not a rare find, but a boxed NES game for $1?  I'll take it.

All that's missing is an instruction manual - I'll rectify that later.

Goodwill is really starting to look like one of the best places to acquire random video games and hardware cheaply.  More aquisitions to come - stay tuned.