You are out shopping.  Maybe it’s a flea market or garage sale.  You discover an opportunity to make a purchase of item/s that you know can be had at a decent amount below their “street” value.  Your first thought is “Great!” and you go to pull the trigger.

Let’s put the brakes on for a second my friend.

There are two mentalities at work here.  The first is to buy everything in the hopes to sell it.  The second is to buy it for the sake of buying it due to the price and absorb it into your collection.

If you are like me you are borderline obsessed with not just having a nice collection, but also curating it.  I want each and every piece to be outstanding (to me) and give me joy whenever I glance at it or play it.  Having purchased lots before (first mentality) I have always been stuck with items that I did not want and had trouble getting rid of.

Having bought things because I couldn’t turn down a deal (second mentality) once again, I have been stuck with lots of crap that made my collection focused on quantity and not quality.

Each time the outcome was the same – I am stuck with loads of items that are essentially filler.  This filler clogs up what’s important – the good games!  It’s harder to find something magnificent to play whenever you have to wade through a river of digital feces to find it.  On the flip side, if you can close your eyes, pick a game and know you are in for something good no matter what….what a feeling!

Now I am not saying there are not times where you have to take advantage of a lucrative deal, let’s face it  – some things are too good to pass up.  However I feel that for the most part our community is increasingly interested and obsessed with just accumulating and obtaining things “at a good price” at the detriment of what this all (the love of old games) really means.

No one wants to pay any more than they have to…for anything!  But think to yourself, “Do I really want all of this stuff?  Or do I want to carefully build up my collection?”  I personally had a huge N64 collection, simply for the fact that I felt I had to.  It was a high profile Nintendo system and quintessential to the “retro gamer’s collection.”

Then I realized I kind of hate the Nintendo 64.

I won’t go into all of the reasons as they are not necessary to the current discussion but once I realized that I sold off almost the entire thing.  My thought process is that if I ever want to play a bunch of the games I can always purchase an Everdrive for a fraction of the money I got for the games.  In short, those games did not “sing to my heart.”

So next time you see that stack of PS1 commons, or that box of NES commons, just take a step back and take inventory of what exactly is going on in your head.  As people our first reaction is to act quick, accumulate, and sort the rest out later.  This might not be your wisest option and may take a little cognisance on your part to see it.