Why does nobody talk about how a secondhand game collection can fall apart in 6 months?

I scored a huge lot of board games from a garage sale outside Portland back in March. Probably 30 games for $40, thought I hit the jackpot. By September, half of them had sticky dice, warped boards, and one even had a dried-up bug glued to the inside of the box. The owner kept them in a damp garage with no climate control, and it wrecked the paper and cardboard. Has anyone else bought a bulk lot and ended up with games that were just trash after a few months?

2 comments

2 Comments

ruby_murphy1mo ago

oh man, that "dried up bug glued to the inside of the box" part hit home. i bought a big box of old games from a guy on facebook marketplace a while back. they looked fine in the pictures but when i got them home the boards were all warped and the cards felt weirdly sticky. like i knew they were secondhand but i didn't expect them to just fall apart so fast. it's crazy how much damage humidity and heat do to paper and cardboard without you even noticing until it's too late. i swear my copy of clue has a permanent wave in the board and the pieces won't even roll right anymore. i feel you on the garage sale gamble, it's like you're paying for the hope that they were kept somewhere decent but you never really know.

kellyr181mo ago

Maybe they're hoping the sticky residue preserves the cardboard better.