How to make your games strech further"
I play alot of games, 35 hours on an average week, fifty hours when I have no school. Needless to say I play alot of games, I don't have Xbox live, and therefore I own a pile of games, here's some tips for even the most obsessive gamers:
Seek out trophies/achievments, some of fun and easy to get, the Fallout 3 "Vaul-Tec CEO" added four hours to my gameplay and was generally fun (I've played Fallout 3 4 times already, since buying it on December 1st 2010, buy this game now.)
Replay, if you liked a game, and want to buy the $60 dollar sequel in stores to get more of that addictive gameplay, replay the game, and I promise the price will have dropped $10 by the time you've played the original twice.
Another tip is buy the EB games or Gamespot "Edge" card it nets you a good 10% off of all used games, I live in BC (Canada) so it doesn't quite cover the tax, but On bigger titles (Call of Duty Black Ops) I can save a cool $7, which pays for the $5 card.
Bargin Bins: Always check bargin bins, Wal-Mart, Superstore, EB Games, Best Buy, Future Shop, even video rental stores all have these, and you can find good titles for under $20. Mass Effect 2 on Xbox, Left 4 Dead 2 on Xbox and Legends of Wrestlemania on Xbox are all amazing titles bought for under $20 at a local video store.
Video stores: Block Buster, Rogers Video, Movie Gallery, these are all movie places, but generally run great game sales from November 1st to the end of Janurary. Great for spending some holiday cash. Be careful, you can buy new games for five bucks more than EB games, and ten more than Wal Mart, make sure you know your prices before buying anything new! However used games net you points in the (five dollar membership)rewards programs all of these places offer, after buying $50 of used games, I save ten dollars on my next purchase (I got Gears of War 2 lightly used early last year for fifteen dollars.)
Garage Sales are key, look in the friday paper if you have a free saturday (In summertime, duh) and check, you'd be surprised how many garage sale ads claim to have video game/computer junk. I've found all sorts of Xbox acessories and even a few good games through sales. Same goes for Farmer's markets, or any other sale type environments.
Check news paper classifieds, or look for "Bargin Hunters" which are books loaded with classified information released every other week, most cities have them, so look for it. (Usually sold on the newspaper stands at the supermarket) I've seen this gen consoles for under $100 dollars (But I'm usually strapped for cash) and new titles for fourty bucks. Great crap worth buying. You can also find cheap iPods, computers, movies, books,cars, trucks, pets, rental suites, you name it in these books, Spend $4 on this book and it could potentially save you hundreds. A new one is out each week, so checking once a month is usually your best bet to avoid having the same ad run more than once, and thus wasting precious space in the book.
Pawn Shops generally have cases of video games, always used, but you can find some older cool titles (I know one in my town full of N64 Games) and some newer titles (Final Fantasy 13 a few months ago for $15 dollars, all three discs were there) usually you can trade video gamestwo for one at these places, and once you get to know the owners, they'll even put games on holdfor you if the title is newer (I've got some cool game this way, and even aHalo CE onclassic Xbox because he knew I was a halo fan)games generally sell from $5-$20, if you pay anym ore and you have to wonder if it is the best deal for your hard earned cash, but chatting up the owners of these stores has saved me a couple hundred dollars, and gives me a place where I can potentially get $10 for really old used games (Movietie inson GBA can be traded two for one for a new xbox game, but avoid doing this too often of the owner will hate you.)
So that's how I fund my excessive gaming on under $100 dollars a month, hell I bought no games in two months by playing and replaying games. Use these tips and send me a message if you have any tips for me to save cash.
- Justin
Log in to comment