Going to game stores and not buying games (anime instead)
July 05, 2023
On July 5th, I went out with a coworker to check out a bunch of stores in the Phoenix/Tempe area. I was initially really nervous because I’ve never really went out with people outside of school or my family or stuff, this is just kind of… a guy. But it turns out I didn’t get murdered and actually had lots of fun.
Goodwill
First, I went to Goodwill, where I found this monitor and video box thing for SONY VAIO PCs.
The LCD is really charming, but not great quality. The resolution is 1024x768, and the size is good, so muh pixels look really nice.
The video box thing I got with it because it looked like it went with it, but apparently not. I also thought the port in the back matched the port on my pc, but I was wrong. I don’t know if I’ll return it or if I’ll keep it, maybe it’s worth something or will be useful, not sure.
Bookmans
Bookmans was right next to Goodwill, so we went straight there, and man do I wish I had pictures of this place. It was really awesome! SO SO much better than Half-Price Books. They had a much bigger and cooler games selection. I tried to see if they had a PS Vita, but no luck. The closest thing they had to a Vita was Persona 4 Dancing All Night in some box set (which I almost bought but decided not to spend 70 on it). They had a bunch of games though. They even carried PC components, so that was really interesting, never seen that before.
They even had the Evangelion Ultimate Edition box set for 350 dollars… I was semi-tempted, but then checked eBay prices. They go for less than I thought they did. It’s not really a great set anyways…
Zia Records
After that, we went to Zia Records, where they had an interesting little collection of games and consoles. Again, no pictures, but it wasn’t anything exciting. It’s a cool store though, they had a ton of vinyls and CDs as well, hence the name. No PS Vita again, sadly… This was a cool store, but not as cool as Bookmans. My friend ended up picking up Mario Sunshine disc only for 30 bucks, which IDK if that’s a very good deal, but oh well.
Fallout Games
This store was really cool. They had several game kiosks, including N64, Wii U, Saturn, Dreamcast, and I think that’s it. Here’s whatever pictures of the kiosks I took (I know realjame will love that Dreamcast kiosk):
Here’s some pictures of random stuff I found as well:
That Gudetama Tamagotchi was sort of interesting, but 60 dollars is waaaay too much for me for a Tamagotchi. And again, this store had no Vitas. I asked them if they get them in often, and they said that they do, but they go out very quickly, which doesn’t surprise me. This was definitely up there with Bookmans, but I think Bookmans was a bit better cuz of the selection of other stuff since it wasn’t a specialty store. And even then, the selection they had rivaled game stores. Very impressive. Nonetheless, this store was still very awesome.
The End
That was the last store we went to. We grabbed lunch and then I went home after that. Honestly, I was kind of worried at first since this was the first time I’ve ever really hung out with someone outside of school or outside my social ring, this was just a coworker of mine. I was thinking maybe he’d lure me in and murder me or something hahaha, but it was really fun. I don’t think I’ll be able to do this again before I move, but maybe in the future if I come back for a visit, I’ll definitely try to arrange something again and definitely check these stores out again.