I've always been a huge fan of the NES and always will. About 3 years ago, I bought a NES off a co-worker and it came with a few games. However, I wanted to replay my old favorites such as SMB 1, Metal Gear, Snake's Revenge, River City Ransom, etc. So I started buying them off ebay. It was during this time that I remember seeing a game called "Rodland" sell on ebay for $107 (cheap compared to now). So I started doing a little research on it and wondered why it sold for so much. That's when I found nesworld. That's also when I found out that there are a few different games that go over the $100 mark.
I lurked quite a bit on the nesworld website but never joined the forums. Especially since you HAD to be a member to see them. So after about 8 or 9 months of lurking, I finally joined. That's when I really started getting into collecting and went for CIB games only. I slowly starting learning the different types of games and the variations for alot of them. I started doing hours of research on anything and everything NES. I read a TON of NES threads over at DPand nesworld and gained a bunch of knowledge. Hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of emails back and forth between hundreds of different NES collectors asking about different NES releated things.
I haven't been in this as long as some, but my 3 years and some change have made me pretty knowledgable in some areas. You will eventually learn the values of everything and what's a good deal and not. All comes with the collecting spirit
I'm actually really glad that I got into all this because I've met some of the nicest people. Of course, there are the not-so-nice people as well but you learn to just ignore them. LOL This site here is full of a bunch of my favorite collectors. Nice to be able to come to a place where we all share the very same interest =)