Old Heads....How were y'all affording shyt back in the day?? These prices are disgusting
- Thread starter ItWasWritten
- Start date
BobbyBooshay
Arnold Jackson
Instructions too
Used to read the bios in the Street Fighter instructions all the time lol
BobbyBooshay
Arnold Jackson
Deezay
All Star
We shared in the hood.
Greenhornet
A God Among Kings
I never beat any of those games on floppy discs ... you could play those shyts forever
The Sear Xmas Wish Book and Sears Credit
When that Sears Xmas Wish Book released around September of every year, I was in my parents ear daily listed all the things i wanted for Xmas because I knew my dad had that Sears credit card. I would circle everything in that book. My dad probably still paying off Xmas's we had back in the 80's.
Buying a floor model TV was a momentous experience because you knew that was going to be the family TV forever. If it stopped working, it was still cheaper to send it to the shop. Every little town in the South had a TV repair shot because it was so expensive to buy a new one. When I go home and drive around, I still see the old TV repair shops that have been closed forever but still have the names on the buildings.
When that Sears Xmas Wish Book released around September of every year, I was in my parents ear daily listed all the things i wanted for Xmas because I knew my dad had that Sears credit card. I would circle everything in that book. My dad probably still paying off Xmas's we had back in the 80's.
Buying a floor model TV was a momentous experience because you knew that was going to be the family TV forever. If it stopped working, it was still cheaper to send it to the shop. Every little town in the South had a TV repair shot because it was so expensive to buy a new one. When I go home and drive around, I still see the old TV repair shops that have been closed forever but still have the names on the buildings.
use to borrow games from people, but god help me if that muthafukka let "a cousin borrow it" 
block buster kept you laced as well.
In general, as a poor kid in the 90s, I only got games on xmas and bday. So I use to just play games over and over, but games were also cheap as fukk in regards to how they extended the length (no saves, some had no check points, no regenerating life, very procedural ways to beat some games, etc). I can honestly say I don't remember beating many games because of this (until years later)
But it wasn't THAT big of a deal because you could, you know, actually go out side and play FOR HOURS w/o worries of sick fukks coming to steal you. We use to be all over the hood, play wrestling, football, basketball, foot races, exploring, etc.
block buster kept you laced as well.
In general, as a poor kid in the 90s, I only got games on xmas and bday. So I use to just play games over and over, but games were also cheap as fukk in regards to how they extended the length (no saves, some had no check points, no regenerating life, very procedural ways to beat some games, etc). I can honestly say I don't remember beating many games because of this (until years later)
But it wasn't THAT big of a deal because you could, you know, actually go out side and play FOR HOURS w/o worries of sick fukks coming to steal you. We use to be all over the hood, play wrestling, football, basketball, foot races, exploring, etc.
Forgot to mention that you had a friend that had a system./game you didn't, best believe im trying to ask his mom/my moms can I spend the night or "can he have company".
Its how I got to play all the piff N64 shyt when I only had playstation.
Sometimes they would be on some stingy shyt doe, and be like
me:" so I heard you got the new n64 with WCW NWO revenge
Ask your parents can you have company 
"
Him:"Nah man, im on punishment, cant have no company
"
Me: but if you on punishment, why did she just buy you a brand new n64 with games and multiple controllers?
...
Him: "I put that on GOD (you knew it was real if he put it on god) my momz said I cant have company :smugfarve:
Me: " woah woah woah, aight man chill, no need to bring god into this"
Its how I got to play all the piff N64 shyt when I only had playstation.
Sometimes they would be on some stingy shyt doe, and be like
me:" so I heard you got the new n64 with WCW NWO revenge
Ask your parents can you have company "Him:"Nah man, im on punishment, cant have no company
"Me: but if you on punishment, why did she just buy you a brand new n64 with games and multiple controllers?
... Him: "I put that on GOD (you knew it was real if he put it on god) my momz said I cant have company :smugfarve:
Me: " woah woah woah, aight man chill, no need to bring god into this"
Man, brings back memories. I didn't grow up poor but my parents did not buy us games on the regular but we had a lot of systems when I think back, Commodor 64, Intellivision, Atari 7800, NES, Super NES, etc. My main source was renting games from the video rental spots. My mom would usually rent movies on the weekends and we would get games that way. I think trade shops (low key pawn shops) that focused on electronics were big then as well so you could get some used or like new games, music, etc for cheap.
still vividly remember buying DOOM for the SNES on my bday w/ bday money/money saved from Service Merchandise for $65.00 on SALE from 80.00
I had a bunch of games, but I was a fukking thief. I used to steal from people at school, from Blockbuster, anywhere I could. Almost got caught once. Blockbuster didn't always put that hard plastic shell around their games. At one point in time, they would have used games that they were going to resell sitting on a shelf where people could browse through them. At the BB I went to, those games were facing the register, so it wasn't like you could pull anything while standing there. So what I would do is pick up the box with the game in it, walk to a different aisle that would obscure the view between me and the register, and I would take the game out the box, and shove it into my pants, in between my thighs, and under my balls.....yep....the taint area. Everyone who frequented BB knows that they had a sensor at the front so if you attempted to walk out with anything, it would go off. That's why whenever you'd rent a movie, whoever your sales person was, they'd ring it up, then they'd take your items around the sensor, so that you could grab your rented items on the way out the door, bypassing the sensor. At least, this is how they did it where I was from. I had no idea that me putting the game in my pants that way would block the sensor. I was just doing it for deniability. My reasoning was, if the sensor went off, they'd want to stop me and I'd remove everything from my pockets and show them that I had nothing on me and they'd have to let me go. I was prepared for just that scenario when I walked past the sensor and.....................nothing happened. No "ding". No alarm. I kept walking and I was home free. I'd just discovered how to steal games from Blockbuster. So you already know I took advantage of this.
Just some of the games I remember stealing were Mutant League Football, Mutant League Hockey, RBI Baseball, Toe Jam and Earl, and a bunch more that I can't remember. But one day it all came to an end. I got cocky. Instead of putting the game down my pants, I just put it in my pocket with my hand over it. My reasoning here was that for some reason, at least I thought, the sensor couldn't pick up the game if you had your body blocking it and that's why it couldn't pick up the game when it was in my pants. So I go in, go through my routine, take the game out of the box, and this time there was an instruction manual as well. I had to have that. I don't know about yall, but back in the day, for me, having the manual was important. It was like the game wasn't quite complete if you didn't have that manual with it. I shoved the game in my pocket and I put the manual under my sweatshirt. Strolled out and DING!!!! Me being the smooth little 11 year old thief that I was instantly thought of a lie. I pulled the game out of my pocket and told the guy that I had rented it and was just returning it.
Dude believed me and I started to walk out as he was on the computer looking up the game so that he could restock it......but then, the DING went off again. Now I'm like......
I was completely confused at this point. I didn't know why the shyt was dinging on me. I'd given him the game. By this point, dude says, "I don't see this game available to rent..........let me call the manager out here" I was about to shyt a brick. The manager came out and looked me over and was like, "What's the problem?" The other guy says, "The alarm keeps going off but he doesn't have anything on him." So I empty my pockets for the manager, spin around, and then jump up and down and then all of a sudden the damn instruction manual slowly falls out of my sweatshirt like a feather falling to the grown. shyt fell SLOW. I never will forget it. So then I say, confident as all hell......
"Oh yeah, I'd forgotten about the manual...."
The manager was like...."Ohhhhh that's all it was, yeah, the manual will set off the alarm too....." I barely heard that because I was already getting out of dodge. It would only be a matter of time before they put it all together. My mom was at the grocery store next door so I went into the store, found her and kept an eye down every aisle. I just KNEW at any moment the guys from the BB next door was gonna come in looking for me, looking for the kid that had duped them. I just knew they were gonna find the empty box for a game that had just been returned as rented, but wasn't in the system. I just KNEW that they'd put it together and realize that I was the kid that had left all those other empty boxes over the previous year. LOL. But they never did come into the grocery store. I walked out the store with moms, staying on her left side and walking beside her so that she'd obscure the view of the BB just in case they were looking for me and just happened to be looking outside as we walked to the car. After everything was loaded into the vehicle, I got into the back seat and laid down as if I was sleepy, when in actuality I wanted to keep my head down just in case those BB guys were looking outside. Once we got down the road though, I suddenly wasn't sleepy anymore. It's safe to say I never attempted to steal from that BB again. I wouldn't steal any games again until a few years later when I discovered modchips for the PSone. But that's one of my favorite memories and that's how I used to get my games.
That wasn't even my greatest caper though.....The greatest and my most favorite one was the Mortal Kombat Heist of '95. BUT......that's a story for another day......
Just some of the games I remember stealing were Mutant League Football, Mutant League Hockey, RBI Baseball, Toe Jam and Earl, and a bunch more that I can't remember. But one day it all came to an end. I got cocky. Instead of putting the game down my pants, I just put it in my pocket with my hand over it. My reasoning here was that for some reason, at least I thought, the sensor couldn't pick up the game if you had your body blocking it and that's why it couldn't pick up the game when it was in my pants. So I go in, go through my routine, take the game out of the box, and this time there was an instruction manual as well. I had to have that. I don't know about yall, but back in the day, for me, having the manual was important. It was like the game wasn't quite complete if you didn't have that manual with it. I shoved the game in my pocket and I put the manual under my sweatshirt. Strolled out and DING!!!! Me being the smooth little 11 year old thief that I was instantly thought of a lie. I pulled the game out of my pocket and told the guy that I had rented it and was just returning it.
Dude believed me and I started to walk out as he was on the computer looking up the game so that he could restock it......but then, the DING went off again. Now I'm like......
I was completely confused at this point. I didn't know why the shyt was dinging on me. I'd given him the game. By this point, dude says, "I don't see this game available to rent..........let me call the manager out here" I was about to shyt a brick. The manager came out and looked me over and was like, "What's the problem?" The other guy says, "The alarm keeps going off but he doesn't have anything on him." So I empty my pockets for the manager, spin around, and then jump up and down and then all of a sudden the damn instruction manual slowly falls out of my sweatshirt like a feather falling to the grown. shyt fell SLOW. I never will forget it. So then I say, confident as all hell...... "Oh yeah, I'd forgotten about the manual...."The manager was like...."Ohhhhh that's all it was, yeah, the manual will set off the alarm too....." I barely heard that because I was already getting out of dodge. It would only be a matter of time before they put it all together. My mom was at the grocery store next door so I went into the store, found her and kept an eye down every aisle. I just KNEW at any moment the guys from the BB next door was gonna come in looking for me, looking for the kid that had duped them. I just knew they were gonna find the empty box for a game that had just been returned as rented, but wasn't in the system. I just KNEW that they'd put it together and realize that I was the kid that had left all those other empty boxes over the previous year. LOL. But they never did come into the grocery store. I walked out the store with moms, staying on her left side and walking beside her so that she'd obscure the view of the BB just in case they were looking for me and just happened to be looking outside as we walked to the car. After everything was loaded into the vehicle, I got into the back seat and laid down as if I was sleepy, when in actuality I wanted to keep my head down just in case those BB guys were looking outside. Once we got down the road though, I suddenly wasn't sleepy anymore. It's safe to say I never attempted to steal from that BB again. I wouldn't steal any games again until a few years later when I discovered modchips for the PSone. But that's one of my favorite memories and that's how I used to get my games.
That wasn't even my greatest caper though.....The greatest and my most favorite one was the Mortal Kombat Heist of '95. BUT......that's a story for another day......
Funcoland and trading with friends. You'd get games from Christmas and your birthday and just have to keep flipping them joints until you discovered everything there was too do in the game.
Back then beating a game several times was the norm. I beat ff7 like 10 times.
I used to eat off of those old playstation demos too. I swiped them right out of the psn magazine as soon as they dropped before other people beat you to it at dominicks and jewel osco
Back then beating a game several times was the norm. I beat ff7 like 10 times.
I used to eat off of those old playstation demos too. I swiped them right out of the psn magazine as soon as they dropped before other people beat you to it at dominicks and jewel osco
Lots of renting games, buying used, and trading with friends.
I paid 70 dollars used at funco land smhI remember paying 80.00 for Mario 64
but it was the GOAT game at the time