Let's say your VGM collection were lost to a fire.  Assuming you got an insurance payout: would you take the money and build a collection again, or would you forget about it and move on?

In my case, I would probably just move on.  Too much work to buy things again from scratch.

I think about this sometimes. I honestly don't know whether I would start again or forget it all but would probably lean towards giving the whole hobby up. I think the building of the new collection wouldn't be as fun and interesting because everything these days are more expensive and/or harder to find. The situation might prove to be a blessing in disguise (i.e. no more "stuff" to hold me back/tie me down). Still sucks to lose it all though. I imagine the feeling is like a hard drive that hasn't been backed up dying, except 10 times as bad.

Assuming I didn't get a fair market value insurance payout, the above also applies except with the possibility of added mild short-term depression.

On a related topic, any new developments/research on the bit rot front? Maybe half of our disc-based stuff is already gone, we just don't know it yet.

unless the insurance company had an exact record of what i owned (they don't) I don't think i would bother again i would just give up. I have insurance but i wouldn't even know how to go about convincing them i have a collection worth something in their eyes.

Reassemble, huh? Yea, I would. In fact, my collection would become better than it was before.

This is also something I've thought about before.  I think I lean toward not trying to reassemble it.  2018 marks 20 years since I started collecting game music CDs, and there are so many memories of times in my life and places I've traveled and the proverbial hunt for things that could never be replicated by simply getting new copies of things.  I mean I still look at my copy of The Dig and remember getting it out of a clearance bin in a Best Buy that no longer exists, or Symphony of the Night that I found at Mitsuwa (Yaohan at the time?)'s bookstore on a trip to LA, or buying things from Kahori and going to the post office to get international money orders.  Plus all the stuff that I found at rural shops while living in Japan.  In theory I could reassemble stuff, but it would take a LOT of time and effort and I probably don't have it in me at this age.

I couldn't bring myself to reassemble my collection. When I first got started finding all the essentials were a must. I got so many excellent deals here, vgmdb, and Lucy's site which for the life of me I can't remember the name of anymore. Countless packages of new releases from play asia and otaku. The value of these albums is so great today I would probably struggle putting together something similar. Back in the old days of having extra cash to burn on VGM. I love the hobby but I would have to give it up.

i think if anyone of us suffered a total loss,, the rest of the forum here could start something akin to a "go-burn-me" cd-r campaign

Although much less dramatic and done by my own hand I've disassembled and re-assembled my VGM collection a couple of times over the past 15 years or so due to not having work, moving/relocating, etc., and even though it was a hassle at times to find and dig up some of the rarer albums the second time around it was worth it overall. That said, if I had to rebuild again from scratch at this point in my life I don't know how much gas I would have in the tank for it seeing as there are certain things that I would not want to hunt down in this market (first pressing Chrono Cross OST w/slipcase and poster, ZREO Twilight Symphony). Then there are certain things that simply cannot be replaced like my signed copies of FFVII or Vagrant Story from when I met Uematsu at Play in 2005 and Sakimoto at a concert at Symphony Hall in Boston with Miker with a cameo from Ramza. On the other hand there are certain albums that wouldn't be too hard to find or expensive to buy (SSCX Black Mages, PSCN FFVI OSV) that I would absolutely hunt down and repurchase.

My collection is currently full of all of the albums that have been important to me but I weirdly only have five of the OSTs from my original collection: Silent Hill 1-4 OSTs and Shadow Hearts OST +1. I had sold SH+1 to Idolores a long time ago and when I was hunting for a copy a couple of years ago I unintentionally re-bought my original copy from him, so welcome home to one of my favorite soundtracks from the PS2 era.

Props for the unintentional fire/burn pun. The gears are moving even when you don't realize it!

I mean, I already have all my CDs on my computer, hell I don't even listen to the actual disc more than once any more.

10 years ago I would have re-bought but now as I deteriorate into middle aged obscurity I would simply give up!

I would say partially. Assuming a total loss, I would probably cobble together probably a top 100 and make it a point to replace those over time, with anything else being a bonus. I feel like I'm still licking my wounds over selling stuff many years ago (many of which have been fully replaced, the exceptions being Mario RPG, Mystic Ark and Tecmo Game Music, because of $$$), so a total loss would probably present a similar situation. Tough call if it would have priority over my NES/SNES carts though. The rebuild would probably happen simultaneously.

It also wouldn't be stuff that is immediately apparent. For some reason, I was ecstatic to find that I still had my copy of 19XX: The War Against Destiny a few years ago, a soundtrack that is average on its best day. Same for Falcom Special Box '96 (okay, this one really is crap, I literally still have it just to have it). The recent Sega System 16 set and the second Rockman Box Set (the one with the Gameboy soundtracks) would have as much priority as a lot of older stuff. Ironically, I would probably also make finding a copy of Rockman 2 The Power Fighters a priority, since it was one of the first game soundtracks I ever bought (the soundtrack is also included in the boxset). I also had a similar situation as Zane with the Shin Megami Tensei Sound Collection. I bought my original copy back from Crash a few months, after a good 14-15 years (I keep all my old emails, so I found the original sale email...then I just HAPPENED to see it in his large sale section on VGMdb).

I can confirm my stuff from the late 80's and the early 90's is still good. I also have a lot of mid-80's prints of regular music and classical stuff, no damage to report.

Chudah's Corner

I always have this in the back of my head and I struggle to know what I would do, I would continue to collect I think but going back to try and replace it all is so daunting I'm not sure I could.

Probably only a few of the essential releases. I offloaded my entire game collection to pay off debt, and only have a desire to rebuild off a few [portions of it.

This actually happened to me...kinda. It wasn't a fire, but we got a MAJOR flood a few years ago. I'd say 70% of my collection was safe in my room at the time, but the rest were in the basement which got a foot of water. All of the CDs were intact and are playable, but there was damage to the CD casings, covers, and info cards/booklets.

From the flood damage, all of the CD casings were thrown out. I'd say maybe a little over half of the covers/info cards were salvageable while the others were either molding or stuck to the casing or other parts of the pamphlet. I had to dispose of them and was more determined to get them replaced until I saw what some of the soundtracks were going for nowadays. I was like "screw that", I'll keep what I got.

Another good thing was that I was in the process of moving and the day the flood happened, we were going to see a series of houses, but postponed the visits for two days due to the rain. Once we were able to house shop again, the realtor said that if any house we visit has flood damage, they would not be considered. The main house I wanted to look at didn't see a drop of water; I eventually made the deal and am living there to this day. And those soundtracks are NOT in the basement

Double post - ignore

i actually noticed that a few of my cd-rs that i acquired in cd-r trades in the late 90s/early 2000s are starting to get static, even though there are no visible marks on the written side. it was particularly a no-name brand cd-r (no markings of any kind to distinguish the name) of a zelda-sound & drama ost. I didn't have any others with that same kind. I'm wondering if the black-backed ones (like ps1 games) are supposed to hold out longer? only time will tell. for my own burns, i usually bought memorex whenever possible.

I very recently got a Gensou Suikoden (1) soundtrack that has physical scratch damage to the label side and probably because of that, I had trouble ripping a few of the tracks. Not sure if that counts as bit/disc rot or just CD damage.

I just wanted to provide an epilogue of this post a few years back.

I came to the decision of completely restoring my collection back in August 2022. Since then, I created an Excel spreadsheet, documenting everything that I needed to accomplish this mission, which came up to about 105 soundtracks total: Damaged soundtracks and getting rid of some of the SM Records that I bought in my earlier years. I've been on a quest to repurchase everything that I lost while at the same time preparing to sell the remains of the collection that was damaged.

While I don't have an official dollar total, let's just say that this journey was VERY expensive. And I'm still not done (I have about 9 soundtracks left), but I made a decision a few months ago knowing what I was getting into. I had the budget, and I felt that this was a wrong I had to right. Learned a lot during the recollection process, and it's frankly been the most fun I've had in years; I'm collecting like it was 1998 all over again.

I even got some rare stuff to boot...like this soundtrack. Hoping to be 100% by the end of the year.

Congrats on putting your collection back together! I don't know what I would do if that happened to me. I was cleaning house the other week and found receipts for purchases made back over 20 years. Part of me thought that maybe I should keep them for insurance reasons, but I don't want to be a hoarder, so into the shredding bin they went. If the unthinkable ever happens, I guess I'll just cry for awhile and then maybe just seek to replace my favorites.