Has anyone accidentally purchased a game you already own?

[JustLikeHeaven1]

So I've moved a bunch since moving out of my parents at 18.  I usually kept the latest and greatest stuff with me and slowly brought over the older consoles.  One thing I've never actually done, is move my entire collection.  I own a house now and I have all my new consoles as well as a couple older ones...but the majority of my collection is still residing at my parents.  I went there today and grabbed some PS2, PS1, GC and GBA games...while looking at the games I found a bunch of stuff I'd completely forgotten that I own.

Which got me thinking...I wonder if I've ever purchased a game I already own.  There is a pretty good chance of it happening now.  My collection is scattered between 2 houses and a few different rooms at each house.  I really have no clue what I have anymore lol.  Sure I know I have a copy of Steets of Rage 2 and a copy of Final Fantasy VII.  The big games I'm well aware of.  However, a copy of Rising Zan: The Samurai Gunman (PS1) or Sim Theme Park (PS1)?  No clue I owned those.

So...has anyone here ever accidentally purchased a game they already owned?  If you did, did you eventually realized you already owned the game?  

[HardcoreSadism1]

I'm gonna risk being ousted as the village idiot, but when I had the PSP Go, I willfully repurchased two of the three original Crash Bandicoot titles just as a trial for that handheld.

I accidentally bought another Dreamcast when I just wanted a second Visual Memory Unit. The guy insisted on sending the second one over despite the overlying hassles. I don't think I can give it away however. My Dreamcasts' software are tinkered around with a bit.

[txsizzler1]

I have done this with PC games (in particular with Steam, forgetting I already had a physical copy of the game).

[Rev1]

I do this somewhat frequently... Mostly with my NES collection. There are several titles I got in bundles and I ended up buying them separately (afterwards) thinking I didn't already own them.

[Greisha1]

I got Super Metroid on the Virtual Console. 

A few months later, I found my old SNES cart at my parents' house. I thought I had traded it at Funcoland years ago. Whoops!

[kew9820001]

I can usually prevent buying duplicates by keeping track of the games I own. I have a program on my home computer called Game Collector Pro. It allows you to keep track of your games and systems. Some of the other features it has is keeping track of when and who borrows your games if you lend them out. You can also punch in price values for games. The feature I like the most is the ability to print out a list of games and systems to keep in a safe place. To me this is a great thing to have for insurance purposes. I've recently found an app on my Iphone called Game Vault which is also a great tool to keep track of games you own if you're not at home. I am in the process of adding all my games to it but I have a massive collection lol. I can see where this can be very useful when finding games at yard sales, flea markets, thrift shops, etc. Hopes this helps.

[PSX1]

Like Rev, I think this happens to me pretty frequently.  When I was in grad school, my entire collection built up from high school and college went into storage.  And it was like 5 years ago now since I moved them into storage.  So that's dozens of systems and hundreds/thousands of games that I haven't seen in years, and it gets pretty tough for me to remember exactly what I have.  When I'm at a flea market or game store, I'll often find myself asking myself, "Do I already own this game?"  A lot of times I'm not sure, so I just have to go with my gut and decide whether to get it.  I justify it by telling myself that I can just resell any duplicates down the road.  And heck, my memory is so bad that I just bought an Intellivision set on eBay and I accidentally bought duplicate games at my local game store because I couldn't remember what games came in the bundle!

Sometimes though, I've rebought games purely out of laziness.  For example, I love Tecmo Super Bowl (NES) and I know I have 2 copies in my storage unit, along with my NES set.  When I recently bought an extra NES for cheap from a friend, I decided I needed to play TSB on it.  But, rather than dig endlessly through my storage unit, I just paid $15 for a new copy.  That's not the only game I've done it with either, and I often find myself doing the same thing with movies.

[Rev1]

Sad part is a have a list of all my games and consoles but I still do it. If I had a better phone I'd just carry the list with me on the go so I could avoid the hassle but usually the games I do this on are only a few dollars at most so I don't really feel too bad about it.

[Vexer1]

Never done this with a game, though there was one time I bought a film that I already owned without realizing it.

[ZetaX1]

I've got about a half-dozen Pong clones, for no good reason. Some are in color...

I've bought/rebought Joust for the 2600, 800XL, 7800, PlayStation, Xbox, Gameboy, and Game.Com. Of course, I've done that on purpose...

I've also got two copies of the Double Brother's Greatest Hits, for some odd reason. Oops.