Anyone have one of these new coleco-style tabletops?

[deadpool18]

 I was thinking of buying these (they have them at Books-a-million for $30 each) but I was wondering if they were any good?  I'd love to have one of the old Coleco ones, but I haven't been able to score one for a reasonable price yet.

http://www.amazon.com/Space-Invaders-Desktop-Mini-Arcade/dp/B000VL4WKC/ref=pd_bbs_sr_10?ie=UTF8&s=sporting-goods&qid=1215397745&sr=8-10

http://www.amazon.com/Back-to-Basics-4011-A-Frogger/dp/B000U0CD82/ref=pd_bxgy_sg_text_b

I'd love to know how they play, but I can't seem to find any reviews.  If you have one, let me know what you think!

[TOK]

Yard sale! My buddy has bought at least 5 of each of the old Coleco games at yard sales. He pays between 50 cents and 2 dollars for them and sells them on ebay for 50 bucks. He's also bought a boxed NES with all the paperwork etc. for 15 dollars and sold it for $250.

I'm not into yard sales at all, but if you're looking for old game stuff, its the way to go. Ebay is for suckers.

[ChadTower]

Yard sale! My buddy has bought at least 5 of each of the old Coleco games at yard sales. He pays between 50 cents and 2 dollars for them and sells them on ebay for 50 bucks. He's also bought a boxed NES with all the paperwork etc. for 15 dollars and sold it for $250.

I'm not into yard sales at all, but if you're looking for old game stuff, its the way to go. Ebay is for suckers.

The days of the $250 complete NES are waaaaaaaaaaaaaaay over.  So is the $50 Coleco tabletop.  I did the yard sale for console items for years.  It was good for a while but that ship sailed probably 3 years ago.  It used to be you could pick up 5-6 good classic consoles a week that way but at this point that has pretty much dried up.  If you're dedicated you can find a couple of them a month now and they wouldn't sell for half of what they did 4 years ago.  When you look at the time spent looking in classifieds for yard sales, mapping out the route to get to them all early enough, the gas consumed and time spent looking under piles of old bras and chipped vases...  ebay is actually a much better value even if you end up buying one of the higher priced nice examples.

[TOK]

Yard sale! My buddy has bought at least 5 of each of the old Coleco games at yard sales. He pays between 50 cents and 2 dollars for them and sells them on ebay for 50 bucks. He's also bought a boxed NES with all the paperwork etc. for 15 dollars and sold it for $250.

I'm not into yard sales at all, but if you're looking for old game stuff, its the way to go. Ebay is for suckers.

The days of the $250 complete NES are waaaaaaaaaaaaaaay over.  So is the $50 Coleco tabletop.  I did the yard sale for console items for years.  It was good for a while but that ship sailed probably 3 years ago.  It used to be you could pick up 5-6 good classic consoles a week that way but at this point that has pretty much dried up.  If you're dedicated you can find a couple of them a month now and they wouldn't sell for half of what they did 4 years ago.  When you look at the time spent looking in classifieds for yard sales, mapping out the route to get to them all early enough, the gas consumed and time spent looking under piles of old bras and chipped vases...  ebay is actually a much better value even if you end up buying one of the higher priced nice examples.

Well, he's still doing it. The NES was about 4 months ago. The Coleco tabletops are more recent.

[ChadTower]

Well, he's still doing it. The NES was about 4 months ago. The Coleco tabletops are more recent.

Right, but is he finding much relative to the time/resources investment?  That's the key.  If you enjoy it, sure do it, but in most places you're just not going to make any type of profit anymore.  The end actually started before the supply dried up.  The end started when sellers started saying "I could sell this for $250 on ebay so I'll give it to you for $200."

[TOK]

He's not finding that to be true is all I can say. Every weekend he sends me messages about what he found. Last weekend it was a boxed and working Vic 20 with software for 15 bucks.
He keeps a ton of stuff and sells the stuff he doesn't want. If he auctions it, I'll post the link. Think they go for around 100 bucks or so.

The other thing that he's killing on are 80's LED watches. There is a crazy market for these, I can't imagine why. He probably makes more on these than the games, since he'll often by 2 or 3 in a box for 50 cents and sell them for 40 or 50 bucks a piece.

[RayB]

You're both right, OK? 

Used to be you could get $40-$60 guaranteed. Now, it really depends on the condition of the stickers, battery cover, etc, etc.

LINK

[Barry Barcrest]

WOW $70 for the table top Donkey Kong, that's not cheap.

[TOK]

Well, he's still doing it. The NES was about 4 months ago. The Coleco tabletops are more recent.

Right, but is he finding much relative to the time/resources investment?  That's the key.  If you enjoy it, sure do it, but in most places you're just not going to make any type of profit anymore.  The end actually started before the supply dried up.  The end started when sellers started saying "I could sell this for $250 on ebay so I'll give it to you for $200."

I don't think he's doing a spreadsheet on it.
I'll give you his e-mail address if you'd like to debate it further.

[Barry Barcrest]

$4k for a NES Game anyone?

That is just crazy, wonder what it was worth 4 years back?

[deadpool18]

If anyone has a decent original coleco Frogger to sell, I'd love to buy one! 

Back to my topic though, has anyone tried these new tabletops?

[SavannahLion]

The other thing that he's killing on are 80's LED watches. There is a crazy market for these, I can't imagine why. He probably makes more on these than the games, since he'll often by 2 or 3 in a box for 50 cents and sell them for 40 or 50 bucks a piece.

Not every place is like Philly. Some local ---fudgesicle--- nut has been trying to sell the same two Atari 2600's for $95 for two months now, someone else got the bright idea that he'll get $150 for his one 2600. Yeesh. Of course, I ---fouled up beyond all recognition--- up and missed the free computer swap last Sunday... Oh well.

[SavannahLion]

Couple years ago, my brother found a sealed copy of Zelda in a K-Mart for $5.  He opened it, "just to see what it was like to open a new NES game."  Turned green when I showed him what it would have sold for on Ebay!

He also pretty bummed that opening an NES game was just like opening any other consoles game? 

I've got sealed games going all the way back to the 2600. It's bizarre, sometimes I've found a sealed game for less than what I paid for the same opened game. Because, for most of those twenty year old titles, I just can't bring myself to actually break the original wrap on them.

[Ummon]

The other thing that he's killing on are 80's LED watches. There is a crazy market for these, I can't imagine why. He probably makes more on these than the games, since he'll often by 2 or 3 in a box for 50 cents and sell them for 40 or 50 bucks a piece.

I had the GameTime watches and a Q-bert watch when I was a kid. The GTs were cool in that you could mute them and get away with playing them in school. A quick search on ebay brought nothing.  TOK, if your brother knows anything on these, could you pass any info to me, please?

[TOK]

I'll ask him... I know he finds some of those Nintendo game and time things (not sure of the exact name). IThey're handhelds, not watches though. One is very rare and valuable, the others aren't. I'm not really into that stuff so I kind of just listen to what he's saying to be a good sport.  Most of the watches he gets are just regular Timex and Casio watches. I guess they're some kind of nerd chic.

I asked him about the tabletop games. The last Coleco tabletop game he sold was a Donkey Kong that went for $75 in working condition w/o box. That was a few weeks ago.

[bvicarious]

Cool, do those new tabletops have LCD screens or are they like the originals? I saw a Frogger at a flea market a few years back for $20 but passed up on it since I wasn't sure if it was in working condition.

[deadpool18]

The new ones are LCD not VFD like the originals.  To be honest, the Frogger looks like crap compared to the original.  The screen isn't even backlit!

I'm considering the Space Invaders just because it was never released in classic form from Coleco.  I love the design, I just wish someone could give me an idea about how the gameplay is...

[SirPeale]

Frogger wasn't backlit either.  It relied on light coming down though a diffuser.

[bvicarious]

Well, maybe you can hack some LED backlighting in.

video review:
from this wacky website: http://www.vat19.com/dvds/space-invaders-desktop-arcade.cfm


this video shows the old ones too:

[RayB]

to answer the original question, I heard they are crap compared to the originals.

[deadpool18]

Well, the originals look great in the video.  I remember playing the Donkey Kong (my friend had it) when I was a kid.  I still have my Alien Attack handheld, although that didn't have an arcade style case.

Anyone here play the Space Invaders version of the new ones?

[kayoteq]

I had one of those Colecos in the day. Galaxian. That was one of my first mods, one of the video game magazines had instructions on how to put an Atari joystick port on it. One of the original 'build your own arcade control' bits.

As far as the LED watches go, I'd say it's an concerted effort by Douglas Adams fans to keep the 'fascinated by digital watches' reference alive.
Will have to keep a lookout for those in the junk piles, now..

[Ummon]

Well, the originals look great in the video.  .

But they're not really like them, display-wise.

[Yvan256]

Does anyone have both the old Coleco and the new coleco-style machines? I'd like a side-by-side picture for size comparison. The new machines may be crap but the plastic shell itself could be useful to make sub-mini cabinets (with a Jakks joystick + 2~3" LCD TV).

[WunderCade]

I have an original Coleco Frogger and an original Galaxian I got for X-mas back in the 80's. The boxes are long gone but you can make me an offer on the Frogger if you want.