Old Computer Game Covers - Collectible, Or Just Nostalgia?

zentechno writes "While cleaning out some very old boxes in a long-untouched closet, I discovered my first supply of PC games, some of which came out when 386s were new. While there's almost zero use for these, I still think the cover art is quite cool. I found the original Zork, its sequels, Enchanter, and Sorcerer from InfoCom, Star Trek: 'The Kobayashi Alternative' from Simon & Schuster, Pool of Radiance and Eye of the Beholder from SSI, Loom by Lucas Games, Nuclear War from New World, Annals of Rome and FireZone from PSS, Sidewinder from EA, and Defender of the Crown from Mindscape, to name many. I loved these games, and wonder if there's any sort of serious collector's market out there as exists for vinyl album art — or is it just a personal thing?" I know I'll always hang on to my copies of Star Control II and Think Quick! from when I was a wee PC gamer. What's still rattling around in your closet?

Ogre!

[Weaselmancer]

I've still got my original C64 Ogre box. Complete with rulebook, backstory, and even the radiation badge. Although the radiation dots have long since maxed out.

They just don't go out of their way to add cool stuff to games like this today, AFAIK. Like an actual working radiation detector.

Go to the source

[ubrgeek]

Just a quick search on ebay [ebay.com] shows that there's not a lot of interest. Don't know if you'd have luck at a comic con or something similar. While I agree that they're cool, I think that's mostly from a fond-memory kind of thing and not something that could be turned into something financially tangible. That and my wife would kill me if I offered to buy them ... ;)

It's personal

[EightBits]

Sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but it's personal. At least for now. You'll have to wait until your grandchildren are in college to even be anywhere near that kind of value.

As a previous post says, it's how rare it is that counts. Basically, if you can still easily buy these games right now (and you can on Ebay for instance, with boxes intact even) then there will be little to no intrinsic value to these items.

Re:Ogre!

[hitmark]

not gonna happen. it cost to much.

also, the future of gaming is probably steam and similar. just look at games via xbox live or the ps3 equivalent.

still, this reminds me of when i bought a b-17 fight sim for amiga 500. it came with a microprose sweater, a history book about the b-17, and i think two manuals. one that covered everything for the game in detail, and one that simply held the hotkeys and interface guides.

all this for a game that came on 5 (iirc) 3,5" diskettes...

last fight sim i bought didnt even come with a hotkey list printed. i had to print the pdf myself.

Re:Ogre!

[kkwst2]

Yeah, Steam certainly does it's job of getting me to pay closer to full price for games. Usually I would wait a few months and order the games significantly cheaper online, usually waiting for the $20-$30. However, the "now" factor of Steam has suckered me into paying close to full price for several games. I generally could care less about the packaging. The really nice thing about Steam is that i don't have to worry about losing the disk/package to reinstall it. I'm willing to pay a couple extra bucks for that.

Re:Ogre!

[Z34107]

You may not trust the steam servers to be running in 25+ years, but the steam program lets you back up any and all of your games. You tell it which ones you want to back up, whether you're backing them up to CD, DVD, or a network share, and it will compress and burn them for you. When the steam servers die, boot up your steam client and restore the games. Run them in "offline mode."

If that doesn't work for whatever reason, you can always apply one of the many no-steam/no-CD cracks they have out there. Before steam, I would never have purchased a "digital download" copy of a game; I want my box and CD. But, steam saves me gas (or shipping), isn't run by some fly-by-night company, gives me the all-important instant gratification, and makes it ridiculously simple to back games up.

Other than your steam username and password, there's no DRM, either. Install the games on as many computers as you want, as many times as you want. (Of course, multiple users can't log into the same steam account at the same time.) No CD checking, no Starforce - I wouldn't buy Bioshock, for example, anywhere except on steam.

The only problem is that there's no secondary market - there's effectively no way for you to sell steam games you've purchased; somebody in another discussion on slashdot brought up the "right of first sale" problem. So, if you like selling used games back to Gamestop, then avoid steam.

But, all the games that I've had 25+ years ago (well, OK, 10-15) like Might and Magic III, IV, and V have all since decayed. Some of the floppies just plain wore out being boxed up on a shelf for so long; I had to pkzip the installed game onto a couple dozen floppies and move it off my 486 to get a "backup." Good thing I still had the manuals, too - finding manual passwords is an even more invasive form of DRM in my opinion, though MicroProse handled them better than most.

Re:Ogre!

[hawk]

As usual for gaming questions, nethack is the answer!

Not only TANPIN, TANIE!

nethack--the only game that matters

hawk