Back in 1999 I had found a Sega Nomad – a portable Sega Genesis that eats batteries like they were crack and it was one of those crack-eaters – new in its package at a local Toys R Us store for $US50. I quickly snatched it up, bought a bunch of old games, and happily went about playing my favourite old games in portable fashion for 20-30 minutes at a time.

I was dating a girl at the time, and she had a young son, so I figured there was no harm in lending it to them for a road trip they were taking. Due to my own fickle nature, I soon broke up with the woman, completely forgetting to get my Nomad back from her before breaking the news.

This is where it gets complicated.

The woman I was dating moved on from me to my friend David, who also happened to be my ex-brother-in-law. Eventually the two of them got married, and my young nephew became the stepson of the woman I used to sleep with on a regular basis. For years this was a topic we never discussed. Nowadays I regular taunt him with the fact that I slept with his mum. Then I feel awkward and clarify which mum.

I digress!

For the past five years i have been training my nephew as a master thief, in order to steal back my Sega Nomad from my evil ex-girlfriend. He has failed on multiple occassions, failing to grasp the very basics of stealth. Once he was caught with it down his pants, as if no one would notice a then 13-year-old with a package shaped like a giant box. Sly Cooper he is not.

I had long since given up on getting it back. Sure, I could order one on eBay, but who knows where that one had been? Someone could have licked it or something. No, I wouldn’t order one from some stranger. I needed a personal fix.

I found it in the very back of the convention floor at PAX 09. There, at the retro game store booth in its own little section of the glass case, was a Sega Nomad – soon MY Sega Nomad. $US95 complete with all wires, a rechargeable battery pack, a Genesis controller, and the spiffy branded carrying case. Truly it is a thing of beauty.

This just goes to show that magical things happen when you get large numbers of gamers together in the same place. Now I can finally tell my nephew to stop trying to steal back my property from his stepmother. Now the healing can begin.

But we could take issue with the inclusion of nifty little Vectrex, the vector graphics-only console released in 1982. If we were making the list, we’d put the idiotic, headache-inducing Virtual Boy in its place, but maybe that’s too obvious of a choice. This is why we’re so bad at lists!

If you want to feel good about your console purchases, it’s an uplifting read.

The 6 Most Retarded Gaming Consoles Ever Released [Cracked]