A Packrat Moves. You Won’t Believe What Happens Next!

You may, or may not, have wondered why I have not blogged in over six months.  Well… it has involved the buying and selling of houses, it has involved moving, and – more relevant to you, dear reader – it has involved the sorting and packing of lots upon lots of nerd crap.

There’s a running joke among videogame collectors comparing the hobby to compulsive hoarding, or simply calling it “the disease”.  Now, there is a difference.  Collectors are genuinely exciting about their collections and are proud to show them off, while hoarders hold onto things indiscriminately – regardless of value – and are often not aware of their behavior.

So we’re not magpies, and we may be off-the-hook in terms of this particular medical disorder, but the fact remains that too much stuff can quickly become a burden, and when you have to sort and pack said “stuff”, the thin line between collector and hoarder becomes null and void.

So, I sorted and labeled and packed the lots of crap into boxes.

Call it what you will, a man cave, a room of doom, but my previous rec room was filled with old videogames, and later – after my sons were born – included Legos.  As nerd rooms go it was a fine one, if a little cramped and little too much like a comic book store with everything on display.  The space was not exactly inviting and it was never much of a room for the whole family.

For the new rec room, I was determined to create a friendlier environment.  Games and consoles would be out of the way, unless in use, and not everything needed to hooked up.  Stuff I rarely used, like old magazines, would be chucked or stored elsewhere.  It helped that it’s just a nicer space, and after laying the room out, I settled on sticking with a standard def set and I hooked up the Wii U, along with a PlayStation, a Saturn and a Dreamcast via a switcher.  An Atari 2600 is at the ready for coaxial delights.  To be fair, the whole room is primarily a dedicated Super Mario Maker station for my youngest … with the occasional garnish of Nintendoland or The Wonderful 101, but that’s as it should be.

One happy accident of sorting through my junk is that I rediscovered my Saturn Arcade Racing Wheel.  I had held on to it mainly to play the import of Race Drivin’, which plays very close to the arcade when combined with the wheel.  This led to remembering how much I enjoyed the Sega Saturn, which led to tracking down some additional racing wheel compatible games, which led to Virtua Racing.

Virtua Racing Deluxe was one of my favorite games on the 32X when I had that system, yet I had steered clear of the Saturn version due to the mediocre reviews at the time.  Reviewers must have found the port to be primitive compared to Daytona or Ridge Racer, because playing it now, I have to say that Saturn Virtua Racing is great.  It may not have quite the coding polish of the 32X version, but the detail and draw distances definitely benefit from the more powerful hardware.  It also has twice as many tracks and a career mode.  The only rub is that I can’t quite decide if it plays better with the wheel or with the standard gamepad.

Other racing games I’ve since tried with the racing wheel include:

• King of the Spirits 2 (import) – the graphics really push the Saturn hardware, but the courses all feature winding roads with sharp corners and I have yet to master powersliding in the game … at all. Still, I had a blast as a horrible driver.
• Shutokou Battle ’97 (import) – this one has more of a Ridge Racer feel to it, but with a street racing vibe. I fared better, but will need to give it another go, or two, to see if I can improve.
• Daytona Circuit Edition (import) – this third try at Daytona is the definitive Saturn version with even better graphics, draw distances and handling, plus it keeps the option of the original “Daaay Tooonne aaaahhhh” soundtrack. I stink at cornering in this game as well.

One thing I have noticed is that non-common Saturn titles have nearly DOUBLED in price since the last time I was actively playing the system.  It’s a bummer and there are some games that I used to have that I can probably never reasonably replace, but that’s how it goes.

So anyway, sorting though my nerd crap has led to what I hope is a more inviting space, with the bonus of actually starting to enjoy some of my old games, versus looking at them neatly stacked on shelves collecting dust.  Who knows what you might find if you go through your crap?

Cheers,
Ben