I am a huge video game collector. I have about 3,500 individual games and 26 consoles and handhelds. I always knew people had a bigger collection than I did, and I knew a lot of people had more complete collections as well; but years ago, I met a person who lives about 20 minutes away from me that blows my collection away. His name is Jason Knigge. I deiced to do an article about how his collection became one of the most impressive collections in the Chicagoland area if not the Midwest. Jason turned his basement into a blast from the past GameRoom.
Before we talk about his collection, we should know a little about Jason and his family. Jason grew up in Hoffman Estates, IL. The last 15 years he has lived in Island Lake, IL with his wife and two sons, Jacob and Matthew. He has been working for UPS for about 26 years, the last 20 as a UPS driver. He loves fishing, and any activates that involve his boys including video games. After all, Jason has a few video games for them to play.
As of December 3rd, 2018, when this article was done, Jason had 5,850 indi- vidual video games. These games range from Magnavox Odyssey to PlayStation 2. His ultimate goal for collecting now is to reach 6000 games and only to buy games he knows, and he wants to play someday. Jason’s collection is more about the retro old school games (before the year 2000) than the current systems of today like Xbox One and PS4. He does, however, have a few of those games. If you include handheld systems, Jason has 64 workable systems in his collection. This breaks down to 44 consoles and 20 handhelds. Also, in his collection are 20 tabletops (mini games) as well as 26 Game and Watch systems. Jason’s family is supportive of his collection. Jason has a complete NES collection minus Stadium Events and also a complete Sega CD collection. His wife is not a gamer and stays out of the scene when Jason travels to different gaming events. His friends are very impressed with collection. Jason’s kids love showing their friends the collection when they come over to the house.
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Todd Friedman is heavily involved in the retro gaming community and has co-promoted the Video Game Summit in Chicago, IL for the past 16 years. He also has published 2 books and written for various different gaming magazines including Old School Gamer.
