#733 - Baby Boomer (I Love the Smell of Commerce in the Morning!)

Game #733
Baby Boomer
3D Games - The Galleria

Today we went to The Galleria. The Galleria is the enormous shopping mall in the swell part of town. Everything is expensive in The Galleria. The Galleria smells like a mix of men's cologne and pretzels.

The reason we were at this shrine to capitalism was to visit the newly renovated Disney Store. My wife is a Disney nut, and I've been promising her a trip to see the latest in mouse-adorned merchandise. In addition to the little guys in the picture above and a couple of t-shirts, we walked away with a blue Color Dreams NES cart that I didn't already have on my shelf.

Near the escalator was a kiosk called 3D Games. There's another location in a different mall near the apartment we just moved out of, but I had never really found anything in there to buy. The selection was small and skewed to the PS2 and Xbox eras. Today at The Galleria location I noticed a smallish stack of NES in a glass case. I had everything they were selling, but noticed a blue cart on the top of the stack. The conversation went something like this:

Me: "What's the blue game on top?"
Store Guy #1: "Um...Baby Boomer?"
Me: "How much are you selling it for?"
Store Guy #1: "Um...let me look it up..."
Store Guy #2: "Oh that one's $4.99."
Me: "I'll take it."

Not a bad improvement over the $30+ the eBay sellers are asking (and not getting) for it.

Baby Boomer as a game is kind of strange. A baby has gotten loose somehow and mindlessly crawls along the landscape. It's up to you with your controller or Zapper to shoot all the snakes and wolves that are out to eat the baby, or to shoot the clouds to form ice bridges over pits. Umm...yeah. It's weird. Either my Zapper doesn't work with my TV or it doesn't work at all, because I couldn't shoot a damn thing with it. So I used the controller to move the crosshairs around and shoot stuff for a few minutes. I can now say that I've played Baby Boomer and that's good enough for me.

I know in my last post I said I wouldn't be getting games as frequently and would dive into some of the other stuff in my collection - but wouldn't you know it? I've got ANOTHER cart on the way that I'll share with you once it arrives. It's raining Nintendo!

#731 & 732 - Turtles, Dragons and a Guy Named Andy

Games #731 & 732
TMNT: Tournament Fighters & Dragon Warrior IV
eBay & NintendoAge

Arriving in the mail today are the two newest pieces of the collection: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Tournament Fighters and Dragon Warrior IV. The Turtles game is a victim of a release date too close to the end of the NES's shelf life. Most people who bought this game got the 16-bit versions for the Super Nintendo or Sega Genesis. Many of the games I've had to track down on the back half of my collection have a similar story - limited distribution too late in the game. I do plan to give this one some playtime as it looks to be a competent fighting game...for the NES. I picked it up on eBay for a slightly lower price than the average BIN - but I had some extra funds in the Paypal account after selling off a couple of carts on NintendoAge, so I got it for just a few bucks out of pocket.

Speaking of NA, the DW4 cart comes my way by way of Andy, who is one of the all-star members over there. I've mentioned the NA community on this blog a few times already, and I really do mean it when I say that I enjoy the company over there (even the disproportionally large percentage of Canadian members - you know who you are). Andy is a cool cat, always ready to shave various parts of his body on camera for shits and giggles (and a few bucks). I picked up the Dragon Warrior cart from him in a cash/trade deal that worked out pretty well - no eyebrow removal required. Thanks, Andy!

If my goal for 2012 is to finish off the licensed set (minus the video-jogging-and-jumping game that I already have under a different title) then I'm keeping on pace. Only 12 carts left to go. Since I doubt I'll pick up more than one game a month from here on out, I'll start to dig out some of the rest of the Nintendo collection and show off a few of the goods I've happened across on this little journey. Until next time...