If you have read the about us section of site you’ll see that I’m a bit of the fan of the SEGA Dreamcast which I own 182 games for (Yes it has that many games). I was on eBay looking at games for the DC (as 182 just isn’t enough) when I came across a game I own Evolution 2 which someone was asking £179.99, Yes you read that right £180 for a DC game now you’re thinking that nut’s I could buy maybe 4-5 PS4 games for the same money.
This has become a problem with retro gaming as a whole; £180 isn’t that expensive in grand schemes of things for a retro game as not to long ago a sealed copy of Stadium Events on the NES went for over $35,000.
Articles from The Sun Newspaper being printed don’t help matters when there saying that an original GameBoy is worth £400, which it is if it’s new but they don’t state that which have led to a lot of people to believe there old GameBoy is worth a fortune now.
I used to pick up a lot of games at boot sales etc but now because of things like those articles, it’s now near impossible to find something reasonably priced at them and if you look at games on eBay for most consoles there games are going up & up and even re-releasing things such as Castlevania: Symphony of the Night hasn’t effected prices that’s still a £100 game on PS1 but only £7.99 on PSN.
I’m not saying this is all bad as some of these are worth their money still like picking up Xenoblade for Wii, that set you back around £50 and I hear that’s well worth the money.
So you might be thinking dam I should have keeped some of my old games or I want to look at retro games but there too expensive for me get.
Well that depends on what you want as you can checkout older stuff on PC or Wii U’s Virtual Console but if you like me you prefer to have the original physical copy hence why people will still pay £100 for SOTN.
There is two ways at looking at retro games I feel now as there going up in price you could be looking at them as an investment (Amiibo might be better if you looking for a quick return) and hope that GameCube game rises in price that you just bought but some have predicted the retro market will crash and be flooded with people thinking the same.
The other way at looking at is for fun and playing games you enjoy which should be the reason you get into retro gaming (I’ve got no issue with people wanting to make a buck), myself still think the dreamcast is one of the best systems ever made and I love talking about it and picking up new games for it, so my collection has grown over the years because of that.
So you might want to just pick up a retro console of your choice and a few games you want to play & nothing more.
But I believe there is a console that might fill both wanting to make money and collecting / playing for fun….
The Sony PlayStation Portable otherwise known as a PSP
You might think I’m a bit crazy as there is some more retro options like a master system which is still cheap to buy and lot of cheap games, also the PSP is only actually a last gen handheld not particularly retro.
The reason I think it might make a good choice for someone is
The Price
If you’re lucky you can pick up a PSP in GAME for £19.99 used and they don’t go for much more else where either unless you’ve got a nice special edition. The console unless it’s said nice special edition will not go up in price much like its PS1 brethren due there being over 80million of them.
The Games
You just got to look at some of the Top Games even going by scores you got things like God of War, Gran Tursimo, MGS: Peace Walker, Tekken, Grand Theft Auto’s that’s some big names but what I think will make it a retro fans dream is all the JRPG’s & Niche games on it
Such as 3rd Birthday, Breath of Fire 3, Fate/Extra, Seven Final Fantasy games including one of my Favourites Crisis Core, Half Minute Hero, Kingdom Hearts, Legend Of Heroes, Loco Roco, Patapon, Persona 2 & 3, Tales of Eternia
Just to name a few and most can be picked up on cheap as well, if you are lucky and your GAME still has some PSP games you can pick up a Final Fantasy for about £3
Other things the good, the bad and final thoughts
As you can see the console can be bought cheap and so can its games, memory sticks are a little pricey still £25 for a 16gb card.
It’s also region free and there is a lot of games that haven’t come out of Japan, UMD films are region locked though.
Talking about regions recently the storefront closed in numerous regions including Europe; you can still download stuff (such as PS1 Classics) but has to be done via the online store not through the handheld itself. This is a bit annoying but now one of these things for online systems that eventually stuff will go but if you get yourself on the North American store that’s still up and running where it recently got a NEW game Brandish: The Dark Revenant.
That game Brandish: The Dark Revenant can also be played on a VITA and thanks to online nearly all the PSP’s library is available in digital form on that but like I said before about SOTN, digital is yet to affect the price of physical retro games but that could change.
There you go if you’re looking at getting yourself into the retro scene and don’t want to spend hundreds of pounds on games & system’s and maybe make some money in the future the PSP might be for you.
By Chris "masofdas" Pengilly