The Hoard – June 2012

This is my 700th post on here and I’ll have been blogging for exactly 4 years after today so I thought I would do something a little different. Once in a blue moon, I make a quick set of photos of my collection for insurance purposes. I’ve little idea what it would all be worth and hope never to need to find out but I need to have some proof of what there is should the worst ever happen. Putting the photos up here is as safe as anywhere so I thought I’d do a virtual tour of sorts.

There are much bigger collections around but this is definitely up there and has grown way beyond what I expected when I started. It’s far from just Origin games with the main focus being late 80’s/90’s PC games with a definite bias to adventure games.

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These first two bookcases hold all of my magazines + the cover CD’s that will fit. I’m not sure if I want to hold onto all of these long-term or not but for the moment, I can safely say there is no shortage of articles to scan in. Don’t ask how long it took to get all these in the right order so that I could find anything.

As collectibles, these old magazines are more fun than the games themselves in many ways and they are certainly cheaper but they do take up a lot of room, and weigh enough that some of those shelves are decidedly curved. These have all migrated into my spare room, with my far too small and crowded game room not being up to the job any more. There is plenty of Origin memorablia in the spare room keeping them company but I’ll skip over that and get to the games.

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In the games room, the only game on the near wall is my copy of Akalabeth which I had to frame having paid so much for it. That sits next to my completion certificate.

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Every other wall is lined with bookcases. Bookcase #1 contains all of Lucasarts’ adventure games, a plethora of Star Trek and Star Wars, near enough every Bullfrog game, a full set of Might and Magic and some random RPG’s and adventure games. DOS 4.01 serves as a suitably geeky bookend for the row of boxes balanced on the top.

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Most of bookcase #2 should be familiar from this blog. I’ve had many of these games for years which is one of the things that prompted my attempt to play through them all. There is also a little Sierra/Dynamix on here and a load of Westwood on the bottom shelf.

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Bookcase #3 concentrates on all of Sierra’s adventure games + some of their other titles. As far as I know, every SCI and AGI game is represented except for the AGI version of King’s Quest 4 and the King’s Quest 1 remake which I only have in a compilation. I’m not keen enough to chase down EGA versions of SCI1 games although I wouldn’t say no to the pre-AGI adventures. Also on here are all of the Access adventure games + the UO figures stuck to the side for want of anywhere else to put them.

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From here on it all gets a bit random. The highlights of bookcase #4 are my growing but still far too small Infocom collection, a full set of Trilobyte and Descent games and the copy of Caverns Of Callisto it took me 10 years to track down.

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I have a sloping roof getting in the way for the last wall so the rest of the bookcases are all undersized. This is the largest containing a complete run of Legend games, a set of Lemmings games + all the boxes that are just too big to fit everywhere else (except for Ultima Online Charter Edition which is too big to fit anywhere).

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That gets me onto the baby bookcases, this first being dominated by a large pile of GOG games on the top. The highlight on here are the Interplay RPG’s.

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Bookcase’s #7 and #8 contain most of the game guides that won’t fit in their respective boxes as well as gaming novels and all the Wing Commander figures stacked at the top. This corner of the room tends to house some of the games I’m less keen on which probably won’t survive the cut if I run out of room.

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The final case has Japanese books/games, some of Origin’s console games and a smattering of cover CD’s that I couldn’t find anywhere else to put.

It should come as no surprise that I haven’t played all of these games but it isn’t about to stop me looking for more to fill the gaps. Once you have the collecting bug, there is no such thing as a complete collection although I will run out of room sooner or later. The main things I’m currently after are a full set of Infocom games, Maniac Mansion and Loom hint books, Space Rogue + Ultima 4 & 5 on FM Towns and a Japanese copy of Underworld with the letter opener. If you happen to feel the urge to part with any of the above, drop me a line.

8 thoughts on “The Hoard – June 2012

  1. If you decide to get rid of magazines, the University of Texas’ videogames archive (where Garriott and Spector donated their notes) is on the lookout for old gaming magazines! I’ve given them the hard copies of much of what we’ve digitized at wcnews.com and it’s kind of neat knowing my collection is preserved for the future.

  2. Wow this is an amazing collection! Congrats! A few questions:
    1) Best car-boot/charity shop find?
    2) Game you spent the longest tracking down?
    3) Most regretted auction loss or missed/turned down sale?

    • 1. Most of this was obtained over the web, much of it years back before Ebay took over. It tends to be all consoles at car boots around here which isn’t my thing. One item that comes to mind is a mint copy of Gene Machine I got for £1 at my local car boot. It’s not worth a fortune but it’s a rare game to just run across a copy like that.
      2 & 3 get the same answer. It was around 99/2000 that I was collecting most of the Origin games and I forgot to snipe an Ebay auction for Caverns Of Callisto which went for something like $15. That ended up being the only Origin game I didn’t own until last boxing day, 11 years down the line and it cost a whole lot more than $15.

  3. Wow, that’s some collection you have there! I don’t see any SSI games mentioned though, were you not partial to any of them? I have many of their titles (wargames mostly, and several of the AD&D) but nothing like your collection at all.I cannot let my wife see this site 😉 .

    On the shelves. If they are removable, turn them upside down every few months. They’ll straighten out and will eventually droop the other way. Then you can turn them back around again. I also put all my Gaming and Cadillac LsSalle club monthly mags on the lowest shelves to minimize the top heavy weight load that the dense magazines tend to have vis a vis games with a lot of air in the boxes.

    • That’s not a bad idea with reversing the shelves, I’ll take your advice and give it a go.

      I’ve got a handful of SSI games but I really should have more. Their RPG’s tended to be written off as outdated by the magazines I read around the time I was getting into PC gaming so I never gave them a shot at the time. I did play Veil Of Darkness which I liked + the Eye Of The Beholders but that’s about it. I’ll get some more of them one of these days but I’m going to fill out that Infocom shelf first.

  4. I am especially impressed by the diversity of Pix’s collection – there is a great balance of different genres (including some typically unrepresented ones). Of note are hardcore flight sims, such as Longbow 2, Inferno and F-15, platformers, such as Alladin, strategy, such as Ancient Art of War series, Populous and Netstorm and sport, such as Nick Faldo’s Golf. A truly fantastic variation, and deserving of all commendation for valuing the importance of these often neglected niches.

    • The diversity is not by deliberate design, I just get whatever happens to interest me. I played a pirated Ancient Art Of War to death back when I got my first PC which I is why I have that one. I was also a huge fan of Sierra’s Manhunter series by the same authors.

      You won’t see many sports games. The reason I have Nick Faldo’s Golf is that I wanted a copy of Flashback and the first one I found came with 3 other games.

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