Video Games and flea markets

Today was a beautiful day for visiting the flea market at the Meadowlands in New Jersey. It was probably around 50 degrees and sunny out, after many many cold wet days in New York and New Jersey. The girlfriend and me picked up coffee and egg sandwiches at the QuikChek on our way to the flea market. The coffee was free becuase the girlfriend had some coupons. She is the best. We got a good parking spot after the short drive to the Meadowlands. I think we arrived around 10:00AM. 
 
We went right to all the rows of people selling older stuff. Sometimes these vendors look like they just picked up their garage sale or estate sale and brought it to the flea market. There are also some specialty vendors among the used sellers, selling old stereo equipment, old vintage clothes, old knives and kitchenware and one or two hobbyist collectible vendors selling old video games, records and tapes, comic books and more. 
 
Walking around looking for old video games it was slim pickings at the beginning. We did not see much at first. So I kept my eyes open. There are always some vendors who do not know what they have. There was a gentleman who had various garage sale type items; old dinnerware, tools, home electronics and alot of old remote control cars. Sitting on a blanket were just two old NES games; Friday the 13th and R.C Pro AM. I guess he had the one game because he or someone was interested in R.C. cars. I checked out the games and the contacts were in good shape. I offered him $2, a dollar for each. He bawked and said $5 each. I asked if he could do any better and he would not budge on price, so I put them down on his blanket he had laid down on the ground and walked away. No sale for him.  
 
We walked on. Me and the girlfriend kept our eyes open for other vendors selling old video games. There are always people selling old Playstation and Playstaion 2 discs. They are always scratched and in the wrong cases. Sometimes we look, but typically we go through them real quick and move on. Today was another day like that. Then we came up on a man selling old toys, action figures and two SNES systems, but no games. Strange. A fex steps away was an older woman with some games and dols and other odd and ends, including some Genesis games. We went through the small bin of Genesis games and found Somic & Knuckles intact with the flip-top lock-on to connect the other Sonic game. She only wanted $1. Score!  
 
We walked on and eventually found one of the vendors selling lots of old video games. We looked through several of their bins of NES, SNES, N64 and Genesis games, then even had some old Atari 5200 carts mixed in. The girlfriend picked out Donkey Kong 64 and also found a perfect pristine copy of the original Metal Gear Solid that looked like it had never been played. I found a copy of Chu Chu Rocket among some Dreamcast and Playstation games. We decided on those games and offered a cheap amount, but the vendor was pretty savvy and asked for $25. Too much, so I asked for $20 and the woman working there agreed.  We walked around and didn't find much more, but made a good haul of games for onlyt $21. 
 
Has nyone else been doing any shopping of old games? 

Today was a beautiful day for visiting the flea market at the Meadowlands in New Jersey. It was probably around 50 degrees and sunny out, after many many cold wet days in New York and New Jersey. The girlfriend and me picked up coffee and egg sandwiches at the QuikChek on our way to the flea market. The coffee was free becuase the girlfriend had some coupons. She is the best. We got a good parking spot after the short drive to the Meadowlands. I think we arrived around 10:00AM. 
 
We went right to all the rows of people selling older stuff. Sometimes these vendors look like they just picked up their garage sale or estate sale and brought it to the flea market. There are also some specialty vendors among the used sellers, selling old stereo equipment, old vintage clothes, old knives and kitchenware and one or two hobbyist collectible vendors selling old video games, records and tapes, comic books and more. 
 
Walking around looking for old video games it was slim pickings at the beginning. We did not see much at first. So I kept my eyes open. There are always some vendors who do not know what they have. There was a gentleman who had various garage sale type items; old dinnerware, tools, home electronics and alot of old remote control cars. Sitting on a blanket were just two old NES games; Friday the 13th and R.C Pro AM. I guess he had the one game because he or someone was interested in R.C. cars. I checked out the games and the contacts were in good shape. I offered him $2, a dollar for each. He bawked and said $5 each. I asked if he could do any better and he would not budge on price, so I put them down on his blanket he had laid down on the ground and walked away. No sale for him.  
 
We walked on. Me and the girlfriend kept our eyes open for other vendors selling old video games. There are always people selling old Playstation and Playstaion 2 discs. They are always scratched and in the wrong cases. Sometimes we look, but typically we go through them real quick and move on. Today was another day like that. Then we came up on a man selling old toys, action figures and two SNES systems, but no games. Strange. A fex steps away was an older woman with some games and dols and other odd and ends, including some Genesis games. We went through the small bin of Genesis games and found Somic & Knuckles intact with the flip-top lock-on to connect the other Sonic game. She only wanted $1. Score!  
 
We walked on and eventually found one of the vendors selling lots of old video games. We looked through several of their bins of NES, SNES, N64 and Genesis games, then even had some old Atari 5200 carts mixed in. The girlfriend picked out Donkey Kong 64 and also found a perfect pristine copy of the original Metal Gear Solid that looked like it had never been played. I found a copy of Chu Chu Rocket among some Dreamcast and Playstation games. We decided on those games and offered a cheap amount, but the vendor was pretty savvy and asked for $25. Too much, so I asked for $20 and the woman working there agreed.  We walked around and didn't find much more, but made a good haul of games for onlyt $21. 
 
Has nyone else been doing any shopping of old games? 

Very nice. I got Ocarina of Time, Zelda Collectors Edition for the Gamecube (Sold), and other pretty good games from the flea market. You can really do well at flea markets. I certainly love em'!

I got to Value Village a couple times a week. this is how I wound up with over 900 games.
 
Buying old games is awesome.

I snagged a mint Symphony of the Night from a yard sale a couple years back. 
 
Needless to say, it's not in mint condition anymore.

Thanks for the comments guys. I need to find Ocarina again and would like to get Symphony of the Night

I always want to go to the flea market and search, but I've never been. I may try and go next time they're open. I also like to scavenge garage sales and whatnot, and the season for them is rapidly approaching!

i've found gamecube and genesis consoles for as little as 5$ each. found a bunch of ps3 games (ie, like madden 08 gta4, etc) for 5 or 10 each, and this was like two years ago. not bad i guess

Nothing feels better than flea market/yard sale found gaming stuff. Unfortunately it doesn't happen as much as it used to. Sounds like you hit the jackpot.

Flea markets/swap meets are awesome. So much great stuff.

The flea market, a sign of things to come...Fallout style!

If you think 5 dollars for shitty old games is expensive you should try a Canadian west coast flea market. Around here every asshole who sells something is doing it to make their living and they act like they're running a business.
So of course they're total knobs and ask way too much for worthless shit. Even if I haggle them down I'm still getting screwed. We're talking on average base price 25-50 dollars for old games. Not even the popular ones.  So I've kept away from flea markets.
 
Lately the only old games I get are from friends. I'll either borrow a game indefinitely or buy it for next to nothing.

5 bucks was a bit steep for two NES games, though they were sweet old games with a bit of kitsch value.  R.C. Pro-Am is still an awesome game, and I think Friday the 13th will get more popular as years roll by.  Sometimes terrible things get better with age.  

That's actually a pretty great idea. I should find a place near me and go on a treasure hunt! There wasn't anywhere close to home back in Southern California, but now that I'm at a big University, there's probably something around here worth looking at.

Oh yeah...I goto the local one every weekend....Yeah I rarely pay 5$ a game...Most of the time its 1$ or 2$ or something like that....I generally get good finds some insanely good finds as well....I tend to stay away from most consoles....I mean literally 40%+ of used ps2 systems will need work to get them working right....The discs at flea markets typically aren't too nice but I pick them up anyway because I do have resurfacing equipment....Honestly I can't understand why these people sell at flea markets....I mean theres one vendor for 2 months he seems to always have the same n64 games....Good ones maro 64 DK64 paper Mario....But they've been siting for 2 months and they literally have sun fading on them....Then I sell online I've sold as many as 7 copies of Mario 64 a month at his price even after fees shipping etc....People sell at flea markets because they don't wanna do a flipin thing to their games....You know they don't have the equipment for discs I even had 2 years ago....They don't clean their Nintendo games or even test them.....Oh believe me I find great buys every week most people will give you a decent price if you buy 10+ of their games at one shot....Believe it or not to pawn guys who are their always give you good deals....Well they get games for .10 so they really don't have a problem selling for 1$ or 2.....The one thing I can say to all the collectors gamers on here....Its not where you go to find games whether it be a flea market thrift store etc.....Its Patience.....Especially for popular but not too rare games there for example don't go paying even 10$ for Zelda Oscarina of time n64 be patient you will find it for 1-3 in a 2 month period if you just look around in your spare time....Granted your chances for finding a cheap copy of Nintendo World championships are nill.....But even something like Earthbound snes (which is not a rare at any given time there are 50-120 of it on ebay alone) if you give it time you will find that game for 50$ or less wherever......Just be patient and know what you can buy for online and don't pay even relative to that number at a flea market