Physical Video Game Collecting Is Dead - My Retro Life

These are sad days for physical video game collectors.

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Thanks for watching!

[MyRetroLife]

Hey guys thanks for watching. Wanted to voice some feelings in this video about the future of physical game collecting. I really hope my predictions are false! Let me know in the comments what you think. Thanks everyone.

[Larry]

What irks me about physical releases now is most of them don't actually contain the full game, you need to download half of it anyway. So when the servers are closed in the future, those discs will be completely worthless.

[MWO]

And here I am being outraged when they stopped printing manuals for games years ago. That was the best part. Opening the box\case and reading the manual on the way home as a kid.

[ALLSILVR]

This actually made me tear up. It was the simple things that gave us so much joy back then. Having to wait for your favorite game, and only getting a game for a Birthday or Christmas built so much patience and appreciation that is slowing going extinct.

[matthewsprague]

It's been a year since my dad passed, and your videos have been helping me with my grieving process. They definitely take me back to childhood. I, too, was a child in the '80s and '90s and my dad made sure my brother and I had the latest consoles and games (NES, SNES, Sega Genesis, Playstation, N64, Dreamcast, Xbox). Even though he himself wasn't a gamer, he knew it made us happy and worked hard so he could afford to provide us these things. You and your dad's relationship makes me think of mine. Yes, there was nothing like opening physical cartridges as birthday or Christmas gifts back in those days. And gaming itself! 37 years old and still addicted to side scrollers. Thank you, Tyler!

[jfh.]

I am so happy I still collect physical video games and don’t download them ever. I’ll never stop. Kids today will never ever know awesome the 80s/90s/2000s were. Best time to grow up ever.

[mcleanF]

Your dad would be so proud of you my man. What an amazing channel. I just came across it recently and can't stop watching.

[BobbySullivan-cxbi]

Some kid in 2044- "Remember how awesome it used to be walking into Target and picking up that awesome piece of cardboard back in 2023? You had that beautiful picture on the front, a nice little summary on the back of your cardboard card to get you excited in line. How INCREDIBLE it felt gettinf that download code... its just DIFFERENT now"

[spoonsVSforks]

Man when I was a kid there was nothing like leaving the video game store with one or two games… you were so excited just looking at the cover and the instructions 😂

[Ranger]

Nothing beats physical. Memories of Toys R Us walking through the game isle. Flipping up the little pictures to see what the game was, then taking that paper slip to the game counter and waiting for the person to bring it to you was so magical as a kid.

[monkeycop]

I just discovered your channel, and I’m so glad I did. I have been gaming since I received my Atari 2600 for Christmas in 1982. It’s refreshing to know there are still lots of people out there that like the physical copies of games.

[TheGeekPunkGamer]

I really miss physical games. I miss instruction manuals too. It was always nice to look at the box art and see the screenshots on the back of the box/case.

[adept_digits]

I totally agree. Gaming companies started killing physical gaming when they stopped putting manuals in the cases. My favorite part of the trip home after buying a new game was reading/looking at the manual on the way home or during set up. I still buy physical games despite this.

[chrisfoley]

I felt the same way after toy stores went away. Felt like a store just for me. After mom would drag me to all those boring stores all day, trying on pants or whatever…she’d take me to KayBee or Toy R Us. Those amazing experiences I had, my kids won’t.

[ssjtrunks]

I've definitely felt the same these past few years. Every time I walk into a Best Buy I get a little more depressed. I remember as a kid, Best Buy was almost as huge of a mecca for games as Toys R Us or Funcoland was. It was almost an entire video game store sitting in the center of this larger electronic store, with huge Mario and Sonic statues standing over the section. It was always an area I was essentially dropped off at as my parents went to shop for boring adult stuff like washing machines and refrigerators. I remember bouncing from kiosk to kiosk playing the latest demos on systems like the SNES and the Playstation, and just looking so wide eyed and the huge shelves full of video games, dreaming of owning them all. Last time I was at a Best Buy, it was a couple of months ago and I walked through the game section and was immediately disappointed. Most of the shelves were just empty. There was nothing but a couple of games from 3 years ago and some shovel ware that was left from the bargain bins. I never spent so little time in a Best Buy in my life. I looked back as I left almost like it was my last visit. Maybe it was. I think I was just hoping to catch a glimpse of how amazing the video game buying experience used to be. I'm so glad I got to live it and damn do I sure miss it.

[Akitbfpf]

I live in Japan and I still love the fact we have game stores here. Walking into a store and seeing rows of games and a lot of them are used so it’s almost like hunting for games again. Many times I have picked up a game not knowing what it is makes me so happy. I wish back home was the same.

[XcellanteGaming]

I feel ya. Once physical is gone, I’m done with buying future titles. I’ll never stop gaming, it’s so embedded in my DNA now that it’s nearly as vital as my heart or kidneys. I will always keep building and playing my retro games. I mainly keep to the consoles that have always been a constant love since Day One. Don’t want to get too cray cray.

[Warmaster_horus]

Your videos have been a saviour for me. I served 2 tours of Iraq and 2 of Afghanistan and left the army in 2016. It’s been an absolute struggle to make it day to day and I can’t move on from my time in combat. Your videos remind me of a time when my childhood was almost the same as yours and I miss those times. Long comment I know, just to let you know your videos help someone.

[buens]

Hello. I am French and I discovered your YouTube channel which I really like. It reminds me of my childhood. I am also sad about this disappearance of physical games in stores (even if we are less affected in France for the moment). I buy a few digital games (only games that don't exist in box) but as long as there are boxed versions, I will continue to take them in this format. I go through a translator, I hope my message will be understandable. Nostalgia for physical games is universal. Peace.

[sno]

I like how the 3ds would have your games “wrapped” when you buy it and you had to click it to unwrap it. It would be so cool if Nintendo implemented this again on the switch (made it optional maybe) and maybe even have a PIN system, or timer system so that the games can only be unwrapped on a certain day or when the pin is entered. This would make it special for kids to see the wrapped game in their collection and anticipate opening it