I'm definitely not OG, but I've been here since September 2013 which currently feels like a lifetime ago, not just in terms of the collecting/gaming scene, but just life in general.
I can't remember how I originally found this site, but prior to coming here my primary video game forum site was Gamespot who at the time had a pretty crude collection tracker that I used to keep track of what games I had. As for Gamespot's forum it was more or less pure shit. It was full of trolls, the worst fanboys you've ever seen online, and moderators on a constant power trip just waiting for the most minor infraction to temporarily suspend or ban you. But at the time it was the best way I knew how to track my collection outside an Excel spreadsheet. Oh and fun fact, I actually knew Burningdoom from my Gamespot forum days before joining VGcollect; we were both regulars on the Legacy gaming forums which were one of the least toxic places back then, but it still wasn't great.
But one day Gamespot decided to nuke the collection tracking feature and with that I had no reason to remain an active user on that site so I went looking for a better collection tracker. I forget whether I found this site through just a google search or because of a Metal Jesus Rocks video where he name dropped it *shudder*. But either way I found it and I was blown away at how much better the collection tracking and cataloging was on here, but also the amazing user base. To this day I don't recall ever having to deal with any fanboys on this site and outside several troll accounts that I'm 90% sure is the same person or two, this site has remained a great place to discuss video games and collecting.
Probably the things I miss the most about this site was how much more active it used to be. I remember coming on here daily and there was always several new, interesting threads to reply to and discuss. Over the past two or three years I've literally gone two weeks without logging on only to find not a single new thread created and only a handful of new replies to about 5 or 6 threads in the General discuss forum. It bums me out since I really enjoy and value most of the people on this site and enjoy discussing video games and collecting with them. However, I completely understand why the drop in activity has happened.
Video game collecting is probably 10x more expensive now compared to when I first joined this site and about 100x harder and less accessible than it was back then too. I used to post fairly big hauls and crazy scores in the monthly recent purchase thread weekly, as did many others on here. By the end of the month we'd be 10+ pages into one of those threads. Now I feel like they're lucky to break 3 pages. On top of that modern gaming has continued to suck more and more, mostly due to the absolute greed and hubris of the video game industry. I don't mean to be all doom and gloom, but gaming and collecting is kind of in a dark place right now, as is the world in general so it's hard to want to come to a place like this and chitchat about how awesome video games and collecting are.
I've tried fighting against this by attempting to create threads that will interest and inspire people to post, as well as contributing regularly to the Monthly Pickups thread and the annual 52 Games Challenge. Speaking of the 52 Games Challenge, this reoccurring thread has become my favorite part of VGcollect for several years now and it has been incredibly rewarding to chip away at my massive backlog. That thread is honestly a big contributor to why I'm definitely way more of a gamer now than a collector, which is kind of ironic since when I first joined this site I was way more into the collecting aspect; I was probably beating under a dozen games a year back then compared to the 60+ I generally beat now.
But to wrap this up, I love this site and plan on sticking around as long as the site remains active. Even if only a handful of us are using it regularly and all we do is post in 52 Games I don't even care. I will use it to track my collection and count myself lucky to be a long time member of this gem of a website, even if few others know about it or care about collecting video games anymore.