Why were game cartridges so jacked up?

[dudeguy]

A good portion of NES, SNES, and Genesis cartridges look like they were beaten to Hell and back. I feel like the weird one because I never tried to mix my copy of Aero the Acro-Bat with ice cream, milk, and chocolate syrup in a blender or attach a copy of McKids to a fishing lure, thinking I could reel in a monster bass with it.

 

A lot of the labels appear to have water damage but somehow the cartridge works perfectly fine? I see a lot of gouge marks in carts as sell, and I can only assume some very hungry child tried to eat it because his parents spent more money on games than they did food.

 

My family and I took very good care of our games. Our mom got on our case about leaving toys out so most our stuff was in immaculate shape.

 

Do you have any stories about childhood games getting damaged?

[Tanooki]

I was I guess neurotic about damaging stuff, because my old games never looked anything but fresh in the 80s and 90s.  Aside from the lame chemicals that tinge the plastics a hue of some shade of light gray to green or brown that can happen, they look shiny nice on them stickers and stuff.

 

I've seen some horrid stuff, have had debates about it over the years.  While it is a little speculative, largely I think it has been figured out where things go wrong you're talking about.  Yeah you get the bite marks, some brat did it, or some angry puppy.  But it's the nastier stuff.  Like the ones that have gone shades closer to a white or offwhite into yellow a little, usually that's over exposure to a combination of direct sunlight and more moist air that'll do it between those.  Another is where it looks all bubbly like a top layer is coming off like cart herpes, that is a nasty mix of high humidity, heat, and improper storage.  That one the heat wears away with the moistness on the cart surface enough over time the porous surface of the cart gets micro holes and the humidity seeps in, stews, and bubbles like a warm marinara in a sauce pan on high heat.

 

As far as the other shades of nasty, usually food, dirty people waste (earwax, boogers, oiliness, etc), or as nasty but far worse, flood damage and you don't even want to guess what may have been in that toxic stew of down stream nightmares.

 

Personally the only issue I ever had, between one house being sold and another late being built when I moved in the late 80s, we got stuck in this apartment, and those stupid little kid decided during the summer my NES looked like it was hot, so she fed it an orange popsicle.  Obviously, that didn't do well with that cold orange icy mush making contact with the pins and the board...it didn't turn on again for about the two week turn around to NOA to pay to have it fixed.  Pissed and depressed having games sit with nothing to stick into it right while I was enjoying some new stuff. ?

[Reaperman]

The 'super neat' people, who liked video games, but don't currently live on classic game forums, threw their carts away or otherwise got rid of them 30 years ago. Clutter holds that type back. So the people we're buying them from are the people who fished them back out of the trash, and at best, piled them in a mildewy cardboard box in an attic or basement until the reality-tv hoarding crew showed up.

 

Oh but I do have a story. So a few months after finally gathering enough money for an NES (this was 1993, so they weren't super-pricey) I had a house fire, likely started by a family member. The NES games, which were in a stack, kind of melted together, and were mostly fine--once I pried them apart and got the boards out of the cases. I wedged a pencil above them to hold them down when the tray lowered and one short one (tetris?) got part of a paint stir stick glued to it. I borrowed a hand-me-down NES from a classmate that I didn't especially care for, but our fathers worked together so that's how that worked out. I still have an orange smoke-damaged zapper around, but the game boards are long gone.

Edited August 3, 2022 by Reaperman

[Tales from the Game Room]

I could never understand this myself.  The only reason I could come up with was that those folks who did not take care of their things either did not work for them, did not appreciate them, or simply did not care.

 

I always treated my games well, and the cartridges still look as good as the day I purchased them.  If I have any cartridges that are damaged, it is because I bought them that way used.

 

I still have fond memories of going to FuncoLand, and buying up all of their overstocked Sega Genesis titles, for about $2 each, which is how I amassed a lot of my collection.

[jhd]

 

Maybe I am just fortunate. 

 

Of the many, many cartridges that I have purchased used (from the late-1980s through the early-2000s), most were in decent to very good condition.

 

I have a Keystone Kapers with most of the label torn-off and a Combat cart that was obviously chewed on. I cannot recall anything else in especially poor condition.

 

Likewise most CD format games were in decent shape. I once passed on a title at a used game shop that had obviously been used as a sanding disk (why were they even trying to sell it?), but I cannot recall any other egregious examples.

[+jeremiahjt]

Maybe some of it is just bad luck? I take care of my cartridge games quite well, but sometimes I drop one. I broke my childhood copy of Space Cavern recently.

 

And then there is my almost supernatural ability to break Sega CD cases. Anytime I get out a Sega CD game there is a 30% chance I am going to break the case. I have to be 100% focused on nothing but the case and preferably have a large flat, uncluttered area to use also.

[Tanooki]

Reading a couple posts here since yesterday it got me thinking, I do have a few less than say 8-9/10 quality carts, but they were all acquired second hand, and usually it was a case where I let my usually uptight standards fall off because the price was at least 50% less or more than what they had sold at for the time so I took the screw it type stand on it.  I figured it'll get worse and worse, and if not eventually I'd find a replacement.

 

The funny thing is, the ones popping up in my mind, and I could take pictures, but don't see a reason really, aren't too awful but aren't great either on the Nintendo side of things since their older NES/SNES labels were more layered, laminated, sturdy.  I've got a Duck Tales 2 where the top flap is a little crinkly and bubbly but I don't want to rip it to flatten it, and I have this Darkwing Duck where it's like that, worse on the flap too where it looks like it got damp under the laminate so it's all swirly in a tiny(relative) spot.  The worst though is Ninja Gaiden Trilogy where for even a decade now it has been a $100+ cart, and I think I got it for like $30-40 range at most, it's worn, had a few holes too, but hey, big savings.  I cleaned it carefully, then used some inks(yeah I can hear the collectors whining already) and filled in what I could, especially where one spot was to the plastic so it looks less like an eye sore.

 

I have in the last 6mo been getting some Genesis games after a long time, had a few that were with the usual(their cheap standards and lack of layers) sticker wear with commonly ink loss, and one where a tiny corner on the top flap was just ruined.  I've figured out how to match their inks using a kit I have and cleaned up stuff where it was pretty wretched, and in one case where the corner was done I made a patch, took some time, it has a corner again though it looks like the ehhh...of darkwing duck I'll take that over missing.   That one was caused by a rental buffoon using 2 types of pen on top of a paint pen that ate the actual sticker away like it was food to it.

[Leonard Smith]

It boggles my mind to see how trashed consoles, games and controllers are.

I maintained my items in pristine and original condition...kept the boxes, kept things clean, put everything in its place.  That's why when I sell stuff, I note how minty and clean my games are in comparison to the junk you find on eBay and Gamestop.  

 

WHy are carts and discs so 'jacked up' in general?  It's stupid spoiled kids who don't understand the value of a dollar.  Shit gets abused, lost, mismatched and ruined.
Pretty simple.

[+GoldLeader]

I think I agree with you all.

 

After eBay and the internet,  and things I didn't even consider until the 80's were nearly gone like Pawn Shops, Yard sales, and Thrift Stores...Well, Now I've seen everything and I've even collected games where I can't believe the condition...

 

But...

 

As for me,  I'd even say for my whole  entire childhood,  I Never saw a cart that wasn't mint.  And I put them right back in the box when I was done.  Now, sure some of the boxes will show wear and tear, but never what was inside.

 

In fact I was talking to a friend of mine (who never liked home systems anyway (only arcades,...Yeah, I know a real weirdo))...Anyway he asked me why anyone would even keep the box?

 

I was so flustered trying to answer I nearly couldn't speak! 

 

I think I just belted out something about not wanting your stuff to look like it'd just been run over by a monster truck...

[+GoldenWheels]

Seems to be the assumption is all the damage happened in the first household who bought them. While that is possible....these things have banged around how many yard sales, basements, funco lands, trade tables at dumps, etc at this point? The stuff is just plain old (I'm willing to bet most of us aren't "minty" any more either!), and for much of it's life after it was new BUT before "retro" became a thing, they were viewed as near worthless! That's not going to lead to white glove handling on tag sale day.

 

OTOH, you savages who wrote your names on your games in permanent marker BITD, well, you're dead to me.

[+GoldLeader]

5 minutes ago, GoldenWheels said:

Seems to be the assumption is all the damage happened in the first household who bought them. While that is possible....these things have banged around how many yard sales, basements, funco lands, trade tables at dumps, etc at this point? The stuff is just plain old (I'm willing to bet most of us aren't "minty" any more either!), and for much of it's life after it was new BUT before "retro" became a thing, they were viewed as near worthless! That's not going to lead to white glove handling on tag sale day.

 

OTOH, you savages who wrote your names on your games in permanent marker BITD, well, you're dead to me.

 

Heha...yeah,  these days (If it's a good deal) I don't worry too much if a name is on the cart,  I even found it entertaining when it's a cart from Japan and they have kanji characters (names?)  on them,  written in Sharpie just like some American kid might have done...Plus I have a Go-To dumb joke when someone sees a name on a cart...For example I have a Game Boy game that says CHRIS R. on it,  after a raised eyebrow or questioning look, I say, "But what if it's THE Chris R.?"

 

Unfortunately they will then ask, "Who's THE Chris R?"

 

And I will be left scrambling...Ummm  Chris Rock?

 

 

[+GoldLeader]

PS:  When reflecting upon such acts of savagery and desperation,   I can only imagine these are the by-products of broken households where the parents never learned birth control and have at least 8 kids, all of whom become very possessive of their stuff, and want to deface it and desecrate it in such a manner that it both shows ownership, and keeps someone else from wanting it...

[Leonard Smith]

It's just general sloppiness and lack of pride.
 

Take your average college dorm room, for example.  Note the disgusting filth and clutter.  And yeah, that applies to both sexes.

Check out your friends' cars.  I guarantee you the majority are unwashed, loaded with unnecessary items, with all kinds of crumbs and snacks strewn about.

 

Next time you're out in the supermarket, check out how folks dress.  Note the number of adults wandering around with pajama bottoms, stinky Crocs, and unwashed hair.  

 

Just those examples pretty much prove why most used items (not just games) are in pretty bad shape.