Retro stores: Interview with Juan Santos
Interview with Juan Santos de Tecvia
Juan Santos, one of the figures within the retro panorama in our country, has been dedicated to video games for many years, not only as a seller as a player. In the Madrid neighborhood of Valleys, specifically on Puerto de Alaban Street 41, it is located the store of it, Trivia, a whole reference for the lovers of the classic video game and a mandatory stop if you are through in the capital.
Although visiting your local is an authentic enjoyment for the senses, because it teleports us to the golden age of the video game, the best of all is Juan, a close person and with much knowledge of our hobby that always invites us to move to his workshop In the back room, the place where our classic consoles come out repaired and even improved. Today we have returned to Trivia to pay you a visit and a small interview, and in passing we have also taken a Gamete and a Sega Saturn light pistol that needed a review.
Interview with Juan Santos de Tecvia
When does Trivia begin the journey of him, Juan?
In the year 2000, after I left SPACE. After two years, I took off the unemployment, and with the dismissal and some savings we were able to buy the place.
What did you spend before?
I have always liked the electronics much, but I have developed enough jobs. I have been at a printing press, at a hardware store… always with manual jobs. Furthermore, I was also working by doing plans, as a draftsman — although I am not- in the firm of an architect, as an assistant. Then I started as a technician for the SPACE company, commissioned at the time of distributing the Nintendo NEW video console in our country.
The market and the retro certainty of video games seems to have experienced a strong boom over the past few years. Do you receive many classic consoles for repair and really be purchased as much retro material as it seems?
Well, man, really, having a huge amount of products and having problems with the boss, my lady (laughs) for not knowing what we were going to do with all the material we had, I said it: calm that the product had to leave. I something imagined myself because in SPACE I already knew people who had begun to collect. It was at that moment when I started to take many things, at that time on offer. Items that they no longer wanted, and I said: puts. I kept liked the retro, I kept playing with my Ne’s, with my super, Mega Drive… I followed my thing. Furthermore, I always liked the subject of treating them and knowing their structure, because I launched myself. Furthermore, I started with the NEW, but I went specializing little by little in the other consoles as well: Master System, Mega Drive and Tail. As more consoles were coming, he was studying them. That’s what happened.
The surprise for me was not that people returned to retro, in fact I was convinced that many people had the same sensations as me. There were environments and increasingly powerful consoles, but they did not say anything to me. Everything are very beautiful graphics, but most are copies of what we have already seen. Many current games did call me but others not so much, that’s why I came back to 2D, I like it a lot. The real surprise was the price that the classic product was acquired.
What are the consoles that bring you more commonly to repair, John?
Well, as I say, the classics, the usual ones are NEW, Master… but certainly those that come to the store for repair are the consoles with CD and DVD reader. It is logical, it is exhaustion, and you have to change the readers. The consoles of all life, as I say, practically are for life, each one has its Achilles heel, but they are very hard. The repair of a classic console is easy. The faults they have are not faults of electronic components, almost all are simple faults, such as bad connection, track breaks at the entrance of the connector, etc. But they are hard consoles, hard. People, mostly, bring them to improve them or modify them. Specifically, improvement in your video output. Here we got the PAL and currently everything is tended to see in 60Hz. This modification allows you to view the game better, with more color and full screen. People look for this, do not like the lower and upper lines that the ancient televisions maintained.
What is the most surprising modification or from which you feel most proud?
Now it is a very habitual thing, and it is less complex because Micropic is used, but years ago to modify the Super Nintendo or the Sega Saturn and make them multi-system I had to Murray down the structures. The happy palanquins always tried to put them on sites, which were not seen, and trying not to break the structure of the console. You had to introduce parts from hardware and software.
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And the most common or most successful modifications, what are they?
The most common are the Super Nintendo and Mega Drive to make them multi-region and 50–60Hz.
Tell us some curious anecdote or funny that has happened over the years in store
For men, there are many. The more you remember the bad. On one occasion, I remember a gentleman who brought me a PlayStation 2 for the repair and when we returned he told us that this was not console him, to console him was not full of shit like this. I was surprised because I always try to deliver clean consoles, it is true, we are cleaning around the shop, but the fact is that it was true, at that time did repair but not clean. I automatically went to the serial number we had pointed and said: me are you saying to me that we are nasty, and we are giving another console ? mire, here you are your packing list with the serial number on your entry, or does not correspond job, is it? And he said, yes, it is, and call.
Still, we gave cleaning and polishing, and he already was happier. He struck me that that was not console him because he did not look clean. People, the brings their consoles, not fixed as they bring, are set when the refund. At that time they are set in trifles or failures already brought before arriving with her to the store.
Do you feel a special affection for any particular platform?
I really like the NEW. But I played much with it, I do not know if there will be a game that has not played. I’m still enjoying some, but is itching me the Super Nintendo.
What favorite game?
There you have it… (John says proudly head with a Super Nintendo cartridge Super Metro id embedded)
All elfin suspect in the physical format is getting closer, John. Do you think the PlayStation generation Xbox Series 5 X will be the last physical format with?
Do you realize that people are still looking for consoles that have reader? I do not seek the digital format and is afraid that network providers are closed. I online game, but if do you come down? Furthermore, I do not think there will always be a latency, there will always be people who want the physical form. Today you can buy a game in digital and physical version, but I always look for the physical format.
Think retro material we have is upgraded even more when you have gone, if it disappears completely the physical format?
I think so. Seeing prices reaching some consoles of the 70s, with numbers 600 or 700 euros. These items are no longer attractive to play for most people, but the price is incredible reach. Although only they are for museums and exhibition. I do not know if this will happen with a PS1 or PlayStation 2, there are millions of them, but there was a moment that no one wanted and now begin to rise, and the like Nintendo 64. What happens with these consoles is that what lies are costing components. It’s a power supply of the N64 console. No longer a pack tell expansion, we’ve sold at €25 and the last one I bought cost me €70 with box. How can it be that this product costs €50 without the console box when it is not currently worth ?.
Possibly what you have said many times, John. Trivia is wonderful for those who took a lot of time playing. Stores like yours are few, seeing your workshop and your desire to want to follow Trivia many years, do you think video games retire sometime?
(Laughter) No, I think I will not retire with the theme of the game and mess around with it. Also, I have friends in this world who are concerned boffins programming and others and looking for me as a coach, not as an engineer, of course, as handyman, be welded and… this must be done fine. I loved because I love doing this.
Well John, here ends our brief interview. Thanks for your time.
Nothing man, a pleasure (laughs)
