WTB: OK, I need a new game or two

[arromdee]

Allegedly.  As in I think I heard someone mention free shipping somewhere sometime.  I have no idea if there is such a thing.

[soop]

Allegedly.  As in I think I heard someone mention free shipping somewhere sometime.  I have no idea if there is such a thing.

Understood.  I wish there was some way of knowing

[BuraiFighter]

I can vouch for Auc-egames on Rakuten, I bought 6 Famicom carts and the shipping came to £5, also the prices on some of the games were a tenth of the BINs on eBay. I recently made a rather large order with Surugaya-a-too but I've yet to hear back from them on the postage costs, if it's cheap I think the majority of my imports will be from there. They also have some things there I've never seen on eBay like the WonderSwan dev cart.

[arromdee]

I Googled rakuten free shipping.  As far as I can tell, the free international shipping promotion was for a single 30 hour period in the middle of last June.  So there is such a thing, but it probably doesn't happen all that often.

Also, the tenso.com forwarding service is having a 1000 yen shipping promo until the end of the month.  I never used their service and I don't know if this also includes handling, but I wish I had known about it before I made my last order.  (My last order included a Bubblegum Crisis B-Club Special, which is a book and thus a heavy item.  This thing used to go for insane prices among anime fans.)

[SignOfZeta]

I can vouch for Auc-egames on Rakuten, I bought 6 Famicom carts and the shipping came to £5, also the prices on some of the games were a tenth of the BINs on eBay. I recently made a rather large order with Surugaya-a-too but I've yet to hear back from them on the postage costs, if it's cheap I think the majority of my imports will be from there. They also have some things there I've never seen on eBay like the WonderSwan dev cart.

Yeah, I bought some stuff from them as well. A bunch of LDs and PCE stuff. Let me know if you hear anything from them. It's only been four days since I placed my order, but they haven't actually charged my card, sent the shipping total, or communicated in any way. I assume the shipping will be very high since they only do EMS, but considering what the cost of the actual items was (nearly zero) it would be very worth it.

[bartre]

yeah, keep us posted, rakuten seems nice, but i'm still a little trigger shy, despite there being a few goodies i want.

[BuraiFighter]

I finally got some word back from Surugaya asking me to confirm the order before charging me. The shipping came to a whopping £30 for 5 GG carts, 8 PCE cibs, and 1 WS cib. Considering I saved that much money on just several of the games alone I think it was worth it, you just need to take that into consideration when comparing prices. Again Auc-egames uses the far cheaper Airmail so you can get even better deals with them.

[SignOfZeta]

I sent Surugaya an email the other day. They replied saying they are "processing" it and to be patient. I ordered approximately one metric f*ck-ton of laserdiscs so I can understand the guy not being able to just pop that shit in an envelope and stick it in the post box.

Its good to know your shipping wasn't *too* bad, although it wasn't that great either. I'm probably going to have to give them $200 or so since I ordered a lot of shit, including three LD boxes that weigh a couple of pounds each. But, like you said, I saved SO MUCH money I don't care.

So now I'm really wondering most about condition. The items were more or less un-described. Sometimes they say "the cover is blue", which I think probably means its sun faded, but that's about it.

[Keith Courage]

you should buy 2 games. Not just 1  :-"

[SignOfZeta]

you should buy 2 games. Not just 1  :-"

...what?

Update on Surugaya order by way of Rakuten: As expected, shipping is cataclysmically brutal, but I'm pretty sure I'm not being gouged. Eight LDs, four LD box sets (one is 3 LD, three are 7LD), five PCE games. Total for EMS shipping was 20,060 yen, which is a hell of a lot, but...that's what shit costs. LDs are heavy. Original MSRP on all this shit back in the day was in a few hundred thousand yen, so I'm cool...as long as the items are in good nick when they arrive.

BTW, two items I ordered, an LD box, and the Hori Commander have gone out of stock since I placed my order. That's my only real complaint right now. That, and a lack of a sea mail option.

[esteban]

you should buy 2 games. Not just 1  :-"

...what?

Update on Surugaya order by way of Rakuten: As expected, shipping is cataclysmically brutal, but I'm pretty sure I'm not being gouged. Eight LDs, four LD box sets (one is 3 LD, three are 7LD), five PCE games. Total for EMS shipping was 20,060 yen, which is a hell of a lot, but...that's what shit costs. LDs are heavy. Original MSRP on all this shit back in the day was in a few hundred thousand yen, so I'm cool...as long as the items are in good nick when they arrive.

BTW, two items I ordered, an LD box, and the Hori Commander have gone out of stock since I placed my order. That's my only real complaint right now. That, and a lack of a sea mail option.

I would have fallen off my chair at 20,000 yen! But, doing some quick math, it doesn't seem too crazy...assuming that the items are in nice condition! I have a feeling that everything will work out for you, if that helps .

[SignOfZeta]

OK, I took a gamble with sight unseen merchandise with little to no description and stock photos with huge shipping...


...and it TOTALLY paid off like no other. I'm not even kidding.

As for the PCE games, two ended up being HuCard-only, Victoly Run and Wataru. How are "loose" HuCards created? Same thing with Mega Drive. WTF happens to the cases? This makes sense with shitty US releases that only came in fragile cardboard boxes with art so hideous you'd never want to have the thing in your house without it paying rent, but with JP stuff? Where is a better place for a PCE game than in its own case? I'll just trade these off and buy them again, I guess. Blodia, Askua %120 and Valis III were utterly mint.

For the LDs, the bulk of my purchase, I am f*cking amazed. These things are in better shape than my own collection. The Mobile Suit Gundam boxes are the first print (I think there are 3000 of these) that came with the huge outer box to house the two slightly less huge boxes. Its almost 4" thick, 13 or 14 LDs. HEAVY. I paid ¥1520 for this, btw. When this came out (in 1998, maybe?) it was something like ¥75,000 or so. When they do pop on eBay they still go for $200-500. I payed $20. Insane. I got the second half of the Z Gundam series, and now I wish I had just bought both halves since my Box 1 is kind of rough on the outside. Also I got Aim for the Top (the later boxed release) Chibi Go Nagai World, Wings of Honeamise (TV size version, unfortunately), Unico and the Isle of Magic () Otaku no Video 1982, Plastic Little, Char's Counterattack (reprint), and Tenchi Muyo Sound File. All that, and the games, ¥6,341. Possibly the best deal I've ever made.

Now, will everyone get deals like this? Will anyone else here actually want ancient untranslated anime LDs? Maybe, maybe not. When you buy something "from Rakuten" you are buying from many store fronts. My stuff all came from Surugaya, and despite their non-existent descriptions and tiny stolen Google photos the stuff was all perfect (sans two HuCard cases) as well as almost free. Its kind of like getting something from eBay. Sometimes you are lucky like me, sometimes you are Michael Helgeson and get f*cked daily. I suggest caution. I used no caution though...come to think of it, so I guess I'm being a hypocrite.

BTW, EMS is STUPID FAST. I sent an email confirming I wold pay the shipping cost some time on Sunday. The shit arrived today, Wednesday. ITS EXPENSIVE BECAUSE THEY SHIP VIA TARDIS, obviously.

[nectarsis]

NICE on the Gundam LD's...I personally only have 2-3 sets of X myself.

[SignOfZeta]

I'm not mature enough to watch X. I decided I hated the MS 15+ years ago and haven't ever given it a fair chance. Of course I hated ∀ MS even more, and that show's pretty great. I hated Macross 7 even more than that, but it eventually became one of my favorite shows of all time. Eventually I'll probably give X a shot.

[nectarsis]

I'm not mature enough to watch X. I decided I hated the MS 15+ years ago and haven't ever given it a fair chance. Of course I hated ∀ MS even more, and that show's pretty great. I hated Macross 7 even more than that, but it eventually became one of my favorite shows of all time. Eventually I'll probably give X a shot.

What is about X that you hate so?  I was the same on Turn A, though Macross7 clicked fairly quickly for me.