Renting

[foxglove9]

Local VHS rental stores were real hot around here in the early-mid 80's. I don't remember too many stores renting Atari games but I bought my Q*Bert 2600 cart at a local Video rental place.

 

I didn't remember anyone renting video games till the big NES surge around 1987-88. I remember them having some Atari games for sale/rental by this point too but by that time all I was into was Zelda, Metroid, and Konami NES games.

[bcprs1]

I live in Massachusetts and I never remember video stores renting out games until NES. It was great when I got my first NES because you could try out games first for a night before you bought them. That was a good thing because it ended up saving you money on crappy games that looked good.

LOL - could you imagine how many more pac-mans and ET's would have been buried if you could have rented them first.

[PaulEMoz]

You could rent NES-Xbox games at blockbuster, so back in the day, could you also rent 2600 games?

 

I could, but we didn't have Blockbuster in England then. There WAS a video store that rented 2600 games though, although they didn't have loads. They DID have most of the Imagic games though, Cosmic Ark was a favourite rental. Miner 2049er was also a big fave.

[+Random Terrain]

I never even heard of any kind of rental place until the mid 1980s. There were no places to rent Atari 2600 games where I lived, even when people started to rent videos. It sure would have been nice to rent them. Renting games in the places I lived didn't kick in until the NES was big in the late 1980s.

[Sanriostar]

The 2600 Basketball cart I own actually has rental stickers on the thing!

[iguana]

I remember a small mom and pop type store renting out Atari games. I never rented them, they only had like 10 if I remember right. I used to go in there to get candy and soda and the such, I remember them behind the counter. I donot think it was a big thing though since most people did not own a beta machine so there was really no movie rental spots

[Lost Monkey]

The 2600 Basketball cart I own actually has rental stickers on the thing!

 

I have a few carts like that.. They have a rental sticker and then a number painted on them with silver model paint

 

They should be added to the "Coxed" cart page...

[Gateway]

What I remember most about one of very few visits to the game rental place( we were poor ), was the colorful spread of each available game on the walls behind the counter in the corner. I think it was a department store? can't remember that part...

 

Anyway, we had finally got a 2600 with 2 games( bought it in mid 80's )( Combat and Video Olympics, I think ) and that weekend we wanted to try out some games: We got Tutakahum, Donkey Kong, and something else.

 

We played and played and played all weekend.... until my Dad said it was time to take them back

 

I was in heaven in the rental section, gawking at all the cool games and their boxes. It's amazing what impact an experience like that has on a young kid when you see stuff you want but can't have... and what it does to you when you are an adult with @ 300 games...

[Jeff Lodoen]

Videomania in San Jose was a hole-in-the-wall that rented everything! Atari, Coleco, Inty - games and systems! Even the Supercharger.

 

Games came in Beta cases with photo-copied manuals that stank of ammonia.

 

I believe a not-cheap membership was required, and the rental fees weren't low. Still going in '87.

 

Shamefully, I once rented Starship!

[lesboulez]

Back in late 70s, early 80s a local True Value Hardware store first started renting movies, then games. I actually rented a couple of Colecovision games I think in 1983. They had Atari and made it up to Nintendo before a Blockbuster opened in town and drove their video/game renting side business out of business.

 

Ahh the memories of talking with someone and they specifically ordered a movie to rent for you..and you could get a video game. And this was me as a kid/teenager.

[jhd]

In about 1982, there was a store near where I went to school that rented movies and 2600 cartridges (I don't know if they had any other systems).

 

The cost was Cdn$7 per week and they had a fairly decent selection. I remember renting Adventure, Star Raiders, and Cosmic Ark. This was not widely advertised; I only learned that the place rented games from another kid at school.

[D.Yancey]

All were "mom and pop" operations around my town. None rented games in the early 80's. All their space was taken up by having a VHS and a Beta section, and a back room with X-rated stuff. Much later, after Beta was phased out and the X stuff died down, the stores did rent some games starting with NES. I never rented because I was still holding out for the Atari comeback!(which it did briefly in the late 80's--when I bought my 2600 jr.)