Selling my vintage video game collection

When I was little, I was absolutely desperate for an Atari 2600. Of course I never got one, and as a result, became emotionally scarred for life. Something about video games really interested me. Played at friends houses - they always had game systems - haunted the arcade as a tween.

The first system I ever bought was that same Atari 2600 I had desired so much in 1980. I bought it at a flea market in Nova Scotia in the summer of 1996 and mailed it home to British Columbia. I bought a Sega Genesis from a friend that next school year, and the collection was on.

I've never been a 'serious collector'. Not a completionist who must have every game and accessory for a particular system. Not a perfectionist who must have mint in box copies of games. Not a foolish rich person who spends $5000-$10000 on holy grails of vintage games.  Just picking up stuff when and where I could - and when I could afford it.

Ebay, kijiji, and yards sales filled out my collection until I had about 25 different consoles ranging from a Generation 1 Coleco Telstar to a Generation 5 Atari Jaguar. For a while I had my favourites neatly set up in the 10 compartment unit below the TV. The glimpse of the diaper table beside and diaper wipes on top hint at what happened to that setup.

Sticky little fingers on curious boys meant pretty much everything went into neatly labeled clear plastic bins.  For a while, they fit in the same storage unit, but eventually most migrated to a closet.  They would come out once in a while, but less and less due to the hassle of boxes and cords and cleanup.

I do most of my gaming on PC now.  The boys are old enough to play wii, but the old school stuff tends to be too complicated and not geared towards little kids.  There is another on the way, and we've been talking about converting my office space with its stacks of consoles and paraphernalia into a kids room.  I figured it was time to let go.  For the last week I've been sorting and putting stuff on kijiji.  Its taking a while to sort through 15 years of stuff.


It makes me sad to let it all go.  Going to keep the Atari 2600 and the Sega Genesis.  Also going to keep one Dreamcast.  The rest goes.