Here’s a recent haul, which landed through my letterbox (apologies for the crummy pic). All for the princely sum of £42 which is about the RRP of a new title these days.

Now this post isn’t to brag about my amazing new games or my bargain hunting skillz. I thought I’d take the chance to highlight some of my favourite sources of gaming deals:

• Gamestracker.com – Couldn’t live without this site. You can use it to find the best price for practically any game. It also supports “watchlists” where you can keep track of stuff you’ve got your eye on (even games not released yet). So I maintain my ‘to-buy wishlist’ on there. Another good feature is email alerts, when a game drops below a specified price you will receive an email. Brilliant.

• The rllmuk “Bargains” folder (Note. You’ll need to be a member, sorry!) – An excellent source of all kinds of gaming & non-gaming cheap finds

• There are quite a few sites out there that post gaming bargains on a daily, even hourly basis, here’s some good ones, I’ve used in the past:
- Frugal Gaming
- Postabargain
- Cheap Ass Gamer

• Twitter. Some of the sites also have twitter feeds which is a really good way of spotting the deals as they arrive, as often these bargains are very short lived. For example: @frugalgaming & @postabargain. In fact this is becoming my main source of impulse buying

Well there is a little thread going on rllmuk, asking for people’s top 100 games, I normally scorn “list threads” as something the kids on gamefaqs post about, but I thought hey what the hell, so here goes… I think in the end I ended up a bit retro heavy, but I am an old git these days so I guess that figures.

Top 10
Resident Evil 4 (Wii)
The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time (N64)
Okami (PS2)
Castlevania: Symphony of the Night (PS2)
Bioshock (Xbox 360)
Super Mario World 2: Yoshi’s Island (SNES)
Doom & Doom II (PC)
Shadow of the Colossus (PS2)
Half Life 2 (Xbox 360)
Shenmue (Dreamcast)

Top 20
R-Type (Arcade)
Devil May Cry (PS2)
Luigi’s Mansion (Gamecube)
Super Mario Galaxy (Wii)
Unreal Tournament (PC)
Dungeon Master (Amiga)
Super Mario Bros. 3 (NES)
Tomb Raider (Playstation)
Ico (PS2)
Metroid Prime (Gamecube)

The Rest (In alphabetical order)
1942 (Arcade)
Advance Wars (Gameboy Advance)
Angband (PC)
Baldur’s Gate: Dark Alliance (PS2)
Black Crypt (Amiga)
Bomberman (Multi)
Cannon Fodder (Amiga)
Castle of Illusion Starring Mickey Mouse (Megadrive)
Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow (Gameboy Advance)
Chaos (Spectrum)
Contra III: The Alien Wars (SNES)
Crash Bandicoot (Playstation)
Donkey Kong Country (SNES)
Duke Nukem (PC)
Dune II (Amiga)
EDF 2017 (Xbox 360)
Eternal Darkness (Gamecube)
Fable (Xbox)
Gauntlet (Arcade)
Gargoyle’s Quest (Gameboy)
Green Beret (Spectrum)
Guitar Hero II (Xbox 360)
Gynoug (Megadrive)
Half Life (PC)
Half Life 2 Ep 2 (Xbox 360)
Hired Guns (Amiga)
Jet Set Radio (Dreamcast)
Jet Set Willy (Spectrum)
Llamatron (Amiga)
Magic Carpet (Playstation)
Marvel vs. Capcom 2 (Dreamcast)
Maximo: Ghosts to Glory (PS2)
Metal Gear Solid (Playstation)
Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty (PS2)
Metal Slug (Arcade)
Metroid Prime: Corruption (Wii)
New Zeland Story (Arcade)
Oblivion (Xbox 360)
Paperboy (Arcade)
Perfect Dark (N64)
Phantasy Star Online (Dreamcast)
Pikmin (Gamecube)
Populous II (Amiga)
Power Stone 2 (Dreamcast)
Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time (Xbox)
Psychonauts (Xbox)
Quake (PC)
Resident Evil (Playstation)
Resident Evil 2 (Playstation)
Resident Evil: Code Veronica (Dreamcast)
Revenge of Shinobi (Megadrive)
Rez (Dreamcast)
Rock Band (Xbox 360)
Shinobi (Arcade)
Sonic Adventure 2 (Dreamcast)
Sonic The Hedgehog (Megadrive)
Sonic The Hedgehog 2 (Megadrive)
Street Fighter Alpha 3 (Dreamcast)
Street Fighter II CE (Multi)
Super Ghouls ‘n Ghosts (SNES)
Super Mario 64 (N64)
Super Mario Bros (NES)
Super Mario Kart (SNES)
Super Mario World (SNES)
Super Metroid (SNES)
Super Monkey Ball (Gamecube)
Syndicate (Amiga)
Tekken 2 (Playstation)
Tetris (Gameboy)
The Chaos Engine (Amiga)
The Legend of Zelda: A Link To The Past (SNES)
The Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap (Gameboy Advance)
The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker (Gamecube)
The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess (Wii)
Tomb Raider II (Playstation)
Tomb Raider: Anniversary (Xbox 360)
Uncharted – Drake’s Fortune (PS3)
Wipeout (Playstation)
Wipeout 2097 (Playstation)
Worms (Amiga)

• Half Life 2 (Orange Box)
• Half Life 2: Episode 1 (Orange Box)
• Portal
• Okami
• The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess
• The Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker
• Tomb Raider: Anniversary
• Metroid Prime 3: Corruption
• Gears of War
• Resident Evil 4: Wii Edition
• Guitar Hero II
• Resident Evil: Umbrella Chronicles
• Castlevania: Symphony of the Night (200.6% )

There might be a couple of retro and GBA things I’ve missed but that’s the bulk of it. Actually for me I think that’s good going. I’ve broken the cycle of; see new game, buy new game. Inevitably leading to a pile of barely touched and/or half finished games. Generally buying games I intended to play all the way through is a bit of a novelty.