Messages

31

General / Re: VGC's Anonymous/"General" Topic:

« on: July 08, 2021, 01:03:15 pm »

I do all the heavy lifting around the house, and I've had to move boxes filled with comics in the past, which I hated, so I understand where you're coming from. I would suggest to maybe start moving them now, placing them somewhere where they'll be easy to access/pick up when needed. I remember I once made plans with someone to look over some boxes I had for a potential sale, but we weren't going to meet until around a week, so I placed them on a countertop near the dining room area for easy access. Lifting heavy boxes strains the body, especially the back, but if you put them on a place where they're at waist level, the process becomes far less strenuous. You could also transfer half of what's in one box into another to make the handling process easier. Sure, you'll probably end up using double the boxes, but your back will certainly appreciate it.

There's easily 40 boxes at a minimum with it probably being closer to 60. 

They're in the basement in a room designated for all of my crap so there's no point in staging them as that'll just aggravate the roommates with them being in the way. Still not looking forward to moving them all.  Over the last year I've started becoming disillusioned with floppies anyway. The prices per issue have gotten downright stupid. Once Marvel was like "all our books are $4.99 cover price" I dropped all of their books. DC has since followed suit and I cut everything except Action, Detective and like 3-4 others. Plus I've been finding trades more desirable. I can find them cheaper, read the whole story without having to bag/unbag floppies, and toss them on a bookshelf when I'm done.

Also, I just had a unicorn property slip through my fingers. It hit every bell & whistle I was looking for. It was a 2-story home with full basement, in a cul-de-sac and literally a 1/2 mile from where I currently am so my commute would have been identical. I asked my realtor to set up a showing ASAP and he went radio silent on me for like a day and a half. Messaged me this morning about going to see it tomorrow then about an hour later he was like "no dice, it just went pending".  It's only been two weeks since I started looking but I'm already starting to get over it. I really want to throat punch whoever put my city back at the top of that "Most livable city" nonsense. 

32

General / Re: VGC's Anonymous/"General" Topic:

« on: July 08, 2021, 01:45:25 am »

[...]

As for pzeke, he's brusque for sure but then I feel I haven't been on my best behavior on here at times and for those that are bothered by that I apologize. That said, context is a killer sometimes and while we've butted heads a time or two, I can see pzeke's viewpoint on the matter. Maybe you might want to go back to the Terry Bogard avatar pzeke (or don't change at all). All I know is, the Canadiens are gonna have to do better as they nearly got swept. I know teams have come back from being down 3-1 in the past but I'm thinking the Lightning are gonna repeat as Stanley Cup champs. 

You think is the avatar? I guess I could change it to a cute, little cat to soften the blow of my posts and downplay my "assholery". After all, no one could stay mad at a cat, right?

And yes, I'm not into hockey, but Tampa won.

Anyway, with all this crock going on your post mentioning you're house hunting went completely unnoticed, so godspeed on that. Moving day will surely be a blast.

Pzeke should try out the neo-geo.com forums, might fit in, presuming he can survive registration.

I flow like water, so I'll fit in no problem. I'm not interested in joining another forum at the moment, but the invite is appreciated.

I doubt it'd matter what your avatar was. I just remember at one time it was a green Terry Bogard. I'm assuming the current one is related to the band Misfits? 

Also, isn't it required by Quebec law that all citizens born there are automatically Canadiens fans, speak only French as their primary language and are duly required to mock the other provinces for how they make their poutine? 

As for moving day, I have quite the collection of comics in long boxes. Those things are NOT light and I'm no spring chicken so it's going to hurt BAD for a while afterwards.  Games won't be so bad as they're mostly tubbed up. I don't have much in the way of furniture other than some bookcases, desk, entertainment center and a small bed. I figure I'll still be budgeting for furniture purchases a good year or more after I get a place. 

Trip is spot-on about neo-geo.com. That place is a fucking cesspool and that's a compliment. I've been there almost 20 years and have seen some straight up dire shit go down between members. If this site was a G-rated Disney film, that place would easily be a R-rated raunchy dark comedy (or for Star Wars fans, a wretched hive of scum and villainy). 

33

General / Re: VGC's Anonymous/"General" Topic:

« on: July 06, 2021, 12:37:59 pm »

Yeah, I only pop on here maybe once a week, probably less.  I'm also not even really buying games anymore... prices are nuts

I've been going through the same thing as Flashback as we've been looking at buying a new house and selling our house.  We put in an offer on a house two months ago, it got accepted, we retracted our offer after the inspection showed like 30k worth of work that would need to be done. 

We had the spiel from our realtor that the market is so hot right now, it's hard to win when you've got flippers, rental companies, and other competitive buyers out there.  Flippers/rental companies are waiving everything because they know what they can get out of it long term.  Buyers are doing it a lot too just to win.  Things are crazy, everybody has realized buying is the way to go so now everyone everywhere is fighting over buying up every single house available.  We just want to move somewhere better, but basically the same house, but even that's looking like hell. 

We've had the conversation that the neighbor issues might be worth trying to resolve over getting a house at 100-150k more than our current house, it's just that we've got little way forward other than mediation or litigation... neither of which is gonna be fun.

The search continues. I don't know if I've set my expectations too high or the "quality" of homes I've seen so far are a bunch of common rocks with fool's gold painting on them. I've been to 8 showings over the weekend and only one of them was good enough to bid on. I went to two of them yesterday and props to the photographers as they can make a place look much nicer than it actually is. 

I mentioned the one house being similar to the one I got outbid on. The similarities end in the layout and too many things cropped up when I actually set foot in the place. You can tell the house was made to flip and again I got that "Bath Fitter" feeling walking about the place. The other house looked decent from the outside (aside from a groove in the garage roof) but the interior just felt off. Also, it listed a partial basement and there was not one to be found. At least I was able to determine why it had been on the market for 12 days. 

Everything I've seen that I do like start in the 250K range and I'm feeling that even though I make a decent wage, there's a barrier of entry I just can't get past. I mean I COULD afford that range if I paid into my mortgage and absolutely nothing else. 

This is just the first week so I'm not disheartened as I was expecting this to take a little time. What I wasn't expecting was a lot of these homes being "bath fitted" flips. Again, I don't know if my expectations are too high or what but all of the imperfections come out screaming after actually being in the houses. Luckily my realtor has the patience of a saint and hasn't been pushy to get me into just anything. I have ZERO doubt I'll owe that man a nice steak dinner when this all over. 

As for pzeke, he's brusque for sure but then I feel I haven't been on my best behavior on here at times and for those that are bothered by that I apologize. That said, context is a killer sometimes and while we've butted heads a time or two, I can see pzeke's viewpoint on the matter. Maybe you might want to go back to the Terry Bogard avatar pzeke (or don't change at all). All I know is, the Canadiens are gonna have to do better as they nearly got swept. I know teams have come back from being down 3-1 in the past but I'm thinking the Lightning are gonna repeat as Stanley Cup champs. 

34

General / Re: VGC's Anonymous/"General" Topic:

« on: July 04, 2021, 09:52:05 pm »

if it was hassle free they'd probably inspect the house thoroughly after the purchase not before it. since a full on house inspection takes several days plus time to bargain when certain defects are found.

Still you also have people who flip houses for a living.

It's not uncommon for these individuals to buy houses as is without an inspection because that's usually how you get the lowest price.

I doubt the other bidder was looking to flip. The house was priced in-line with other houses in the area built the same with the same square footage. Very little cosmetic work needed to be done inside or out that I could tell outside of a jank gate to the backyard that just needed to be set and not replaced. The tenants kept the home in surprisingly good shape. Like I said earlier, it must've looked good enough to them that they felt an inspection would have been a waste of their time/money and/or they were in dire need of a house. My bid was the higher bid and lost because I wouldn't budge on inspection so for the seller to take less money in a quicker fashion seems mildly nefarious to me. 

There's a house that went up for sale down the street that looks like a flip. Same style of house, almost the same square footage for only $5K more than the one I bid on. In the photos I did see some water damage on the wood paneling in the laundry room but it's on top of a hill so I don't know if I can chalk that up to flooding. The washing machine might have went haywire and they never fixed the paneling. You'da thought they would have cleaned it before taking photos. 

I'm hoping the agent can get a showing for that house in the morning. Being that it's the holiday it's both worked for and against me. The only real downside I've seen from this new house is the neighborhood nearby isn't the best and it's a little too close to a cemetery for my liking. 

35

General / Re: VGC's Anonymous/"General" Topic:

« on: July 03, 2021, 09:34:41 pm »

Flashback, I think you've hit the most important nail on the head - as long as the month-to-month is about the same, and you can keep a nest egg for emergency repairs (and you will have emergency repairs), you should absolutely go for ownership over rental.

Busy day today on that front. I got in touch with the realtor and we scheduled six showings. A few things...

The darling of the six, my frontrunner, turned out to be a complete waste of time. Overpriced for what was actually offered and there was a LOT wrong with it, mostly backyard flooding for the semi-ravine that was the backyard. They claimed to have a partial basement but it was nowhere to be found. Super disappointed because the pictures made it look like steal. For this and most of the others, photographs hide a lot of things that are glaring when viewed in person.

One was decent but you had to drive through a BAD neighborhood to access it. Thanks but no. Another one looked like it was situated by a golf course so semi-quiet. Also near a run-down area and up a steep hill (concerns about black ice/inclement weather became an immediate concern). In pictures it looked AMAZING but once inside like the first, the flaws were glaring. One door's frame I accidentally hit and it popped off a bit. The whole house had a "Bath Fitter" feel to it where you could just feel the old bones of the place covered over by a shiny new facade. 

There was one in the middle of the pack that was actually quite nice...at least nice enough that I put a bid on it. Three of the houses were occupied and this was one of them. It felt a little cluttered but gave me a good idea what would fit and what wouldn't. No major structural issues that we could see. I just got a call about an hour ago that while my bid was higher, the owner went with the other bidder because they offered to waive all inspections. They must have REALLY loved the house because there is NO world I'm doing that. That might hurt my chances as time goes on but peace of mind is important to me. I imagine the seller wants it moved with the least amount of hassle as well so more power to both parties. 

My cousin is a big Elvis fan and one of the houses we looked at converted their garage to an Elvis shrine. I scheduled a showing just to see the shrine in person but the house had potential. It was 20K more than the house I bid on, roughly the same layout but we uncovered lots of hoodwinking going on. The tiled backsplash in the kitchen was actually stickers made to look like a backsplash. Additionally, the "granite" countertops were also stickers slapped onto formica. 

The realtor I got paired up with has been great. Very knowledgeable about all manner of things, clearly he's seen a lot. I brought my current housemate with me as he's quite the handyman and did repair work for years so he knew what to look for as well. Between the two of them I was able to get a lot of insight on what I should be expecting. That said, the search continues. 

36

General / Re: VGC's Anonymous/"General" Topic:

« on: July 01, 2021, 11:47:26 pm »

So over the past weekend I made the move to becoming a homeowner. I made it past the first hurdle in getting pre-qualified through my credit union and my cousin (a former realtor) referred me to a co-worker of his. I've only spoke to the guy through text and email so far but I'm sure he'll help me figure what all I need to get started. That said, if anyone has any tips/pointers I'd greatly appreciate them. Market is stupid here like most places with houses selling for 50-100K what they did not even 5-6 years ago. I do realize this isn't the best time to go house shopping but I wasn't given too much of a choice in the matter and need a new abode by no later than this time next year. 

I figured if I'm going to drop over 1K a month it should be toward my own home and not lining a landlord's pockets. Luckily most of my stuff is already tubbed/boxed up but I'm still not looking forward to moving it all.     

37

General / July 2021 - Recently Added to Collection/Recently Purchased New

« on: July 01, 2021, 02:33:25 am »

Past the middle point of the year....new month, new gets!

38

Video Game Database Discussion / Re: Error Listings and rejected edits 2021

« on: June 29, 2021, 11:01:31 am »

Is it possible that it doesn't exist? I can find the UK and the JP version. None of the UMD release lists for NA have 300. The UPC on this entry is the same as the game as well. I'm thinking the entry should be merged with the game entry. You let me know if you can find whether this actually exists in NA or not.

https://vgcollect.com/item/57122

Cover art needs removed. Shows cover art for 300: The Game on PSP. I would have replaced it with a photo of the UMD movie but my Google-Fu is weak and I couldn't find a suitable NA pic. 

I could have sworn I've seen a domestic UMD release for 300. Now I gotta be on the lookout. As for this entry, I'd say merge it!

39

Video Game Database Discussion / Re: Error Listings and rejected edits 2021

« on: June 28, 2021, 11:39:06 pm »

https://vgcollect.com/item/57122

Cover art needs removed. Shows cover art for 300: The Game on PSP. I would have replaced it with a photo of the UMD movie but my Google-Fu is weak and I couldn't find a suitable NA pic. 

40

Video Game Database Discussion / Re: Developer/Publisher Requests

« on: June 28, 2021, 07:53:58 pm »

Developer: Tastemakers
Publisher: Tastemakers

For the Arcade1Up machines. 

Can't publish hardware, Publisher should not be set on hardware or accessories.

Ok sure. 

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Video Game Database Discussion / Re: Developer/Publisher Requests

« on: June 27, 2021, 04:30:27 pm »

Developer: Tastemakers
Publisher: Tastemakers

For the Arcade1Up machines. 

42

Modern Video Games / Re: E3 2021

« on: June 16, 2021, 01:01:07 pm »

Pretty solid E3 from Nintendo


Didn't expect advance wars to ever make some form of return so that's pretty sweet.

Yay, Advance Wars remake. I'll take what I can get. Now do Golden Sun! 

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Classic Video Games / Re: Limited Run E3: 2021

« on: June 16, 2021, 12:59:21 pm »

Regarding Axiom Verge 2, from what gather it will be a timed exclusive for pc through Epic Games. Whether or not, it will be available on pc through other means after the timed exclusive period isn’t clear, but it’s getting both digital and physical releases on Switch, PS4, and PS5.

Thanks for clearing that up. Must've missed the logos for the other systems in the trailer.

44

General / Re: June 2021 - Recently Added to Collection/Recently Purchased New

« on: June 16, 2021, 11:53:07 am »

Decided to burn some accumulated credit card points and got a couple of surprises. I ordered Hero Land and received the Knowble Edition. Also, I order Void Terrarium and got the limited edition. In both cases the site did not specify which version I got so I assumed I was getting the standard versions of both. 

45

Classic Video Games / Re: Limited Run E3: 2021

« on: June 16, 2021, 11:36:55 am »

If this presentation was the show stealer of E3 then the E3 show overall must have gone WAY downhill because this presentation was pretty terrible. I know this quirk humor is kind of their thing now and this isn't the first show they've done like this but it reeks to me of how full of themselves they are.   

Plumbers Don't Wear Ties should have been the first thing they showed off, not saved for the very last. The Rondo/SoTN + Rondo US TGCD should have absolutely been the endcap for the presentation. Most of the rest of the stuff was decent but largely immemorable IMO. I do know I'm NOT looking forward to competing with the flippers/scalpers over a US Rondo release. That damn thing BETTER be an open pre-order. 

Also, this show made me raise my eyebrow several times when they did show a title and it would say "Available Now" but it meant available in digital format. Being a company that prides itself on physical releases, you'd think they'd downplay the availability of digital a bit. At the very least there should have been a big "COMING SOON" with smaller text underneath saying "Available now on digital store" or something. 

I still can't figure out the whole Axiom Verge 2 thing. So if it comes out as a PC release, I'm locked in to the Epic Games Store? If that's the case then I'm skipping that one and holding out hope that it'll possibly get a console release in the future. Sorry, but EGS can kick rocks.