I'm in a state of shock. Something great and worthy has died. I went up to Gamestation before, to see whether they had any 'new' Saturn games in and was devestated to find that the whole Saturn section had been cleared out...
Its where I bought my four Saturn Light Guns (one boxed up Virtua Cop Edition) , my Saturn Steering Wheel, and also where I bought the majority of my Dreamcast games and peripherals, my Sega Game Gear, the majority of my Master System games collection and also a variety of PS1 and PS2 games, PSP and DS titles...
Certain standout memories include discovering my Dreamcast Keyboard and Mouse, Shenmue 2, My Namco Light Gun and RE:CV Survivor's Guide, the time I was given a Dreamcast 4MB VMU and a copy of Retro Gamer magazine for free... Plus all the "buy one get one free" (or BOGOF) deals which meant that you could walk in with £10 and come out with two Dreamcast games and four Saturn games.
Gamestation has been bought out by its 'landlord', Blockbuster. Having seen the DVD rental business dwindle, as people download movies or buy cheap pirate copies, Blockbuster have seen the capital potential of the gaming industry as a way it can recoup sales.
But the new ownership of the franchise has decided in its wisdom, that the retro market is not profitable enough, and therefore it will concentrate on PS2, PS3, Wii, DS and 360 sales.
One ray of hope is that it might send a little business the way of 'Chips', which despite being a chain, is certainly not a multi-national corporation, and retains the feeling of the "independent" game shops of yore...
So, I'm pouring a 40 oz to the kerb, in honour of my homie Gamestation, and the end of some great times... I won't be going there again.
It's sad indeed...
ReplyDeleteBut hey, at least you still have chips, better than nothing. :)
By the way, my precious import title for the saturn is finally here. I'm just waiting to finish my next post to try it and, of course, talk about it here.
My disposition is slowly improving, largely due to my recent acquisition of Monsters of Metal Vol.5. It's a compilation of metal videos and this vol. in particular has some clips I really like.
It's a shame that Dimmu Borgir's video is censored in some parts (seems like we are watching that fucking MTV, with it's ridiculous censorship policy's), but at least the Deathstars and Katatonia videos are intact.
Ok, this is really off-topic, so I'm gonna stop here.
Cheer up Father, I'm gonna try to do the same here :)
The anticipation grows stronger... I'm intrigued to know what it is!
ReplyDeleteI've never heard of any of those bands, but I do enjoy rocking out myself occasionally... Most recently to Marilyn Manson's 'Best of' on my way to Gamestation... (a very out of character purchase for me!) I love a bit of Led Zep and AC/DC too!
anyway, glad you're feeling a little better!
I've got Fighters Megamix out for a bit of a bash tonight, and I'm hoping to give it a thorough going over this weekend... talking of which...
It doesn't surprise me that you don't know those bands, since they're just well known among the "metal head" community. Dimmu Borgir is black metal, pretty hard stuff, although they're more melodic than other pure black metal bands. Deathstars is a relatively new band, they sound a bit like Rammstein. As for Katatonia they play gothic metal, I think. Try to hear their single "my twin", maybe you'll like it (I doubt you like the other two).
ReplyDeleteBut since you seem to like older stuff, you should definitely listen to (in case you haven't already) what's playing in my winamp right now. Rainbow - Stargazer, from the 1975 album Rising. This is the true genesis of what later became known as power metal, and isn't it powerful indeed! That Ronnie James Dio really lives up to his name, because he sure sounds like god when singing this song.