So, we covered our Selling or keeping our VGM collections pretty well, with opinions on both sides.

But here is my predicament:

Since I was a young lad, I have had almost every good videogame system, and the good games that came with it.  From Sega Master System to today, I got it all.  Most of my games are RPGs, especially from the 16-bit era.  Expensve, I would imagine, by now.

Now,  I am older, and I own these systems and games, but never use them.  They just take up space and clutter while maintaining their good conditions.

Should it stay, or should it go?

It's totally up to you.  There is no right nor wrong answer.  Personally, I've sold many of my old video games because

a)I need the money
b)I have plenty of other things to play
c)I don't like clutter

I'm not really into collecting old games, so it was an easy decision.  However, if you enjoy collecting the games, then you might want to hold on to them.  I personally think that many video games (especially RPGs) will only go up in value.  Up to you though. 

cheers,

-avatar!

My opinion in Hitori's thread covers pretty much anything that one might have a tendency to hoard, whether it be CDs, video games, books, magazines, newspapers, mugs, shot glasses, collectible spoons, figurines, vases, whatever have you. So far I've kept most of my games and all my systems, mainly because I have a generally small collection, I play them once in awhile, and they haven't exceeded the amount of space that I've set out for them. (I own fewer than 10 Gamecube games, maybe 10 to 15 Gameboy games -- and that's for ALL GB systems -- and maybe 15 PS2 games because of my DDR obsession, heh. My cart collection is the largest, but still quite manageable.)

All the games I'm keeping, I keep because I like playing them. Well, okay, so I still have FF9 because I really do want to finish that thing despite my dislike of it.

But hey, we all move on in life, you know? If you think your stuff is just taking up space andyou'll never use them again, you should just get rid of them. And even if you don't feel like getting rid of them right now, it's always good to take stock of things every so often, to re-evaluate what you want to keep, especially since with life being the way it is, we always accumulate more stuff. Clearing things out is something that has to be done every so often, or else your possessions will overwhelm you.

I've been moving around a bit lately, so staying portable is my biggest concern. I'd say that if your faves are the 16-bitters, just grab a good USB controller and use emulators. My old systems are sitting in boxes back at the parents' home, and dealing with the wires and the space isn't something I really miss.

I know it's a huge leap when there's sentimentality and nostalgia involved, but it's easier to have a CD wallet and a controller sitting next to your computer than having to dedicate entertainment center space (which I no longer have) to 3 or 4 systems. Cable management is a non-factor except for my computer, which I would have with me anyways.

I've also done this with my music collection (all FLAC and APE now) and movies (although I still have favorites on CD and DVD). I went from having 80 or so CDs to 14, and most of my DVDs fit on one rack (excluding box sets). I've not been one to care about original packaging for the most part, so it just made life easier.

The downfall to this is that if my PC coughs up blood, I have nothing to keep myself entertained (except a GBA... thanks Angela!) until an ordered replacement ships. I went through this recently with my motherboard. Those were dark times, let me tell you.

Yeah, I am slowly loading all of my music cds onto my PC.  Which means, I will be having a big sale soon.
Being in the military with all this crap to lug around isn't grand either, especially if I do not use it.
I really, only use my PC, Gamecube, PS2, and Xbox 360. 

Everything PC related is stored on an external hard drive, which, I hope, never fails me.

I think of it like this when I play a game: If I play it and don't like it, I get rid of it. If I play it and I like it, it's earned the right to stay with me and I'd like to think I'll replay games I like down the road. It's not a collection, but it is a bunch of games I feel better having than not having. The paltry amount of money I'd get for most of my games isn't worth not having them when I feel the urge to play them (and ones that would fetch money, like Suikoden 2, definitely aren't going anywhere). The two biggest name games I've sold over the course of my gaming life are Guardian Heroes and Dragon Force and while neither was my favorite, I've wanted to go back and try them at least a few times over the past couple years.

For older games, it's much more satisfying to own the original cartridges/CD's, to the point I can't even play ROM's seriously. Maybe it's just having to play at the computer (which I generally hate doing, as opposed to my console setup) or just that having the carts and playing from the actual system is cool. I remember I dragged all of my favorite NES/SNES carts with me to and from college each semester and I probably played my SNES there more than any other system.

Every so often when I'm moving stuff around I will pull out some games and trade them in just to make some space.  I usually get so little for them it's a joke.  I know GameStop rips people off so badly with trade-ins, but I'm too lazy to buy a digital camera and bother with the whole ebay thing.

I like how I've been told I can get "up to" $7 for some games at Gamestop. Makes me want to go swap my entire library in and even get 7 whole bucks for a few of them! Maybe even $10 for my copies of Suikoden 2 and Valkyrie Profile.

Newer games though get decent prices if you get rid of them early enough...Think I got offered $25 or $30 for MVP Baseball 2004 and Kingdom Hearts when I swapped them in early. Of course, it probably would have been better to ebay them and get $40-$50 apiece for them, but it saved a bunch of hassle and I knew what I immediately wanted to get with the credit in both cases.

Bet Gamestop owners take a collective, instantaneous dump once Sony starts discussing ways to cut down or eliminate used games.

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I have yet to complete an rpg on my ps2...  in fact i still own only 8 ps2 games after buying the console in feb 2003.  Snes roms = the greatest thing ever. especially when you want to whip through a story like ff3 in a matter of hours. since i certainly dont have time to sit down for hours and play games anymore...

As I believe I mentioned in my other post about clearing stuff out, I'm definitely planning on severely thinning out my gaming collection at some point.  There are a ton of games I've bought that I thought to myself "someday I'll get to this!" and it's becoming increasingly apparent that no, I won't ever get to them, most likely.  With the glut of new games coming out with the DS alone, let alone the Wii and the 360 that I'm likely to have within a year, I can see myself hanging onto things like Panzer Dragoon Saga and not Shining Wisdom or Skies of Arcadia and not Evolution.

And let's not go into the enormous pile of dirt cheap games I've bought in Japan to play "once my Japanese is good enough."  Yeah, my Japanese has gotten a lot better and I probably could work through an rpg, but with as many as I have, will I ever make the time when there are English language games available?

Too little time.  Too little space.  :\

It's funny. I've no compunctions with ROMming stuff from earlier generations, in fact I prefer it in most cases (oh, savestates, how I love you). But...just the other day I bought a physical copy of Hogan's Alley. Dunno why. I have an emulator that handles Zapper reasonably well, I just wanted it. You may have similar urges yourself.

I say dump what games you don't want, keep all the hardware and the games you still like and/or haven't played, even if it's for a system you haven't plugged in in years.