A Concert, Some Laser Discs and Game Hardware

Last night I went to a concert on with my wife and her parents, it was a salsa music festival on the beach. The sky looked awesome and I got some nice pictures.

I got a awesome gyro thing while I was there too.

Today I went to Hard Off and Book Eco once again, at Hard Off I found a Model 1 Sega Mega Drive (Genesis) which was missing the cables and there were no controllers. Not to mention it was really dirty but hey only $3.

I also found a bin of Laser Discs they were all only $1 each. They had a bunch of copies of Aliens and Jurassic Park, they also had a bunch of Disney movies. I ended up getting some anime movies that sell for pretty decent prices. First up I got Evagelion 01 and 05 then I found Gun Smith Cats Vol.1.

When I went to Book Eco I made my way to the display case and right away saw that they had two (TWO!) of the Mini Hori N64 controllers, one yellow and the other green. I went right back to the front to get a clerk to take them out for me and leave them at the front while I looked around. I didnt want to risk someone asking for them while I was looking around. After making my rounds I came up with nothing, no games what so ever. It was okay because the controllers were the buy of the day, each was $14. The last time I got one of those controllers I paid $20 so it was a little better.

When I got home I looked at the Mega Drive and decided that I just had to start cleaning it. Here are some before shots.

This thing was really dirty, it had some crazy black/green grime on it too.  I tried for awhile using just some paper towels and magic erasers but that was clearly not going to cut it. I also tried using a toothbrush but I was getting no where so I decided to take the whole thing apart, in which I found some black goo along the edge where the two pieces connect. With the two pieces apart I could give it a proper bath.

I took the shell to the sink and soaped it up and let it sit for awhile.

While it was sitting I cleaned the motherboard and decided to look into what I would need to do to install a region switch to allow me to play Japanese and US games. Here is the section I will be working with in the future to trick this out, I will also need to cut the bridge on the underside of the board for it to work right.

Then I went back to the shell, rinsed it and let it dry then put everything back together. I really love how the Japanese version has a super pronounced "16-BIT" on the top. Here are some after shots.

More Games

Yesterday I went out to eat but stopped by Mandarake to see if there was anything new to pick up. I was actually able to find a few deals. First I stopped by the Saturn section and found a boxed version of The King of Fighters 97 ($6) which had the 1MB Ram cart. I had a boxed version of KOF 95 so I figured what the hell, now I just need KOF 96 in the box. I also found Zero Divide ($2) and Wachenroder ($4). I really wish Wachenroder had an English release because its an awesome steampunk RPG. A nice bonus was that it came with the art book and sticker page.

The last game I picked up on the Saturn was Hissatsu ($34) which was a little expensive but usually goes for around $80 or $100 on ebay, besides that its a fun game.

In the Super Famicom section I saw boxed versions of Donkey Kong and Star Fox they were $3 and $2 respectively but I passed on them. Moving over to the Game Boy section I found boxed versions of Pokemon Red and Pokemon Yellow, they were only $2 each so I had to pick them up. Both games were missing the instruction book but both had the registration and map so not a total loss.

 I also made a pretty massive purchase on Yahoo! Auctions, which is an auction site that requires you to live in Japan to buy anything, hopefully they will come soon. Once I get them in I will post them here for sure.

Games

Well if your not into games you can probably skip this entry as thats all I will talk about.

Yesterday I took a trip to Hard Off and Book Eco just to get out and do something. As I always do I first made my way to Hard Off, they had got a few new Saturn games in but there was something going on with the cases, I don't really know how to describe it but it looked like something was spilled on them. It was weird though because there was a ring on all of them so each looked like it was the top one where something leaking was left. Anyway I passed on a few games due to this but I did end up picking up Alone in the Dark 2 ($1), another copy of Bio Hazard ($1) and another copy of X-Men vs. Street Fighter ($1). The X-Men vs Street Fighter game was just the disc in a generic case and it did not have the instruction book but at that price I couldn't say no. I think I might keep this one and sell the other boxed version I was holding on to.

I was able to find another copy of Virtual On: Oratorio Tangram ($1) the case was cracked but the game was in good shape. I also picked up Samurai Spirits ($1) on the Super Famicom. It was not a good day for cases at Hard Off, I will need to replace all of the cases on these games, so the pictures still have the stickers or are just showing the inside.

Making my way over to the hardware I noticed they had done some organizing or cleaning up. Somethings were gone ( a boxed Super Scope, an Xbox 360 and some Game Boy Pockets were what I noticed missing) and somethings were new/added and the shelves looked much neater. It turned out that they had gotten in some Super Famicom controllers, that or they restocked them, and these ones were in great condition. In the past most of there SFC controllers had that yellow tint to them but theses were a nice original gray. I picked out the best looking ones and added them to my basket, five of them to be exact, each controller was $2.

I also found a few new/restocked N64 memory cards, in the past the memory cards were $3 each which just wasn't going to work for me but these were only $1 each.  I ended up getting three as they were the only ones priced at $1.

I left and made my way over to Book Eco, being Sunday there was actually quite a few people inside. I went over to the Super Famicom section which is usually how I start when I go to this store. I looked though all the carts and found nothing, nothing good, nothing with a good price. I did notice in the case that they had a copy of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles IV: Turtles in Time but they wanted $40 for it. This is the first time I have seen this game since coming to Japan. Probably my favorite game ever but at that price not really worth it for me besides I already own boxed copies of both the Super Famicom version as well as the Super Nintendo version so I'm pretty well covered.

After going though the SFC games and coming up empty I took a look at the N64 games and found a boxed version of Rockman Dash ($5) it was missing the plastic game holder inside but had the instruction book.

I made  my way over to the Saturn games but again struck out. However in the Dreamcast section (which is right below the Saturn games) I found a copy of Marvel vs Capcom and two copies of Marvel vs. Capcom 2 each game was $5. Last time I bought MvC2 here it was $10 so I was happy to see the price reduction. I also found The King of Fighters 99: Evolution ($2) which as a bonus had the spine card and registration card inside.

I looked though the Playstation games real quick but only found one game of interest, that was Vampire Savior ($3). Then I made my way over to the Xbox 360 games and found Senko no Ronde Duo ($22), it was the limited edition version which came with 2 DVD extras.

On a display rack I saw a boxed version of F-Zero for the Super Famicom they wanted $3 so I said what the heck. I also found a boxed version of Pokemon Silver for the Game Boy Color which was also $3. I already had a boxed version of Pokemon Gold so I figured I could sell them together.

Lastly I hit up the Book Off near Hakata station to see what they had as I had time to kill before my bus would show up. I don't know what happened here but the prices, which were always a little high, were ridiculous. They had got some good things in but the prices were just not doable. They had a copy of Cotton 100% on the SFC but they were asking $15 they also had Goemon but they wanted $20 both games were loose but these prices were on the higher side for boxed versions. One thing I found that was shocking was they had a copy of Desert Strike which is a pretty common crapy game and they were asking $10 for a loose copy.

In the Game Boy Section I saw they had a loose copy of Rockman World 4 but at $10 I had to pass though that price is not crazy for that game its still on the higher side. They also were asking $10 for a loose copy of Kirby 2 which is a game I see a lot and think its crazy when places ask for $5. They also had two copies of The Legend of Zelda: Oracle of Seasons but once again the price was too high, they wanted $15 for each. I would have thought about it at $10 but not at $15.

They also had loose cards of Bomber Man and Dodgeball for the PC Engine but they wanted $5 for each, the max I would go on those would be $2 each. Finally I saw Street Fighter Zero 3 for the Playstation, a game I bought for $1 at another Book Off, here they were asking $10.

I did manage to find 2 games with decent prices on the Game Boy Advance. At $2.50 each I picked up another copy of Dragon Ball Adventure and Dodgeball Fighters both were loose copies.

A Waterfall and More Beach House Fun

Two days ago I went out with my wife and two of her friends. We drove to this really famous shaved ice shop which was about an hour away. The shop was up in a mountain which had a pretty nice view, very woody if that makes any sense. Normally there are lines and a wait to get into this place but because there had been a forecast for rain (which never showed up) less people were out. It was pretty good but wasn't really what I was expecting, I was thinking it would be more like a snow cone but really it was like ice cotton candy. I mean thats the best I can do to describe it, it was really soft and had a cotton like texture that melted only cold at the same time.

After we left we continued to drive up the mountain to take a look at this waterfall. It was a really cool water fall and it was pretty tall. The pictures don't do a great job of illustrating the height but I would guess somewhere around 8 to 10 stories high. It was really hot out but standing next to the waterfall was almost too cold. There was also a pretty cool water mill thing-a-majig a little farther down.

There were also people fishing in the stream at the base of the fall and one kid was only maybe 15 feet from the base. He decided the best place to be would be sitting right in the middle of the water which I thought was pretty funny.

After we left the water fall we headed to the beach house to relax and sit around. The girls found this really big sun hat and were having some fun with that. 

Later they went to the pool and sat on the beach for a bit.

Then yesterday I went back to the recycle shop to see about that 3DS. Well as predicted the price went up, she was now asking for $50. Which to be fair was not a really bad price but I asked her if she could do $30 we then settled on $40. So it wasn't a super $5 deal but a pretty good one none the less. Sis you must have un-crossed something, I'm holding you personally responsible for this turn of events :-P.  I also picked up Bloodia ($1) for the PC Engine for no real reason.