Keeping up with your game collection can be a chore. Thankfully, many apps have been designed and released to make it as easy as using your smart device, which is a lot more reliable than using your memory, especially if your game collection reaches over 100+ games. App Developer HDNA has invited GameTraders USA to check out their app, GAMEYE, which was designed to help you keep up with your collection, using a lot of different methods to assist you.

First Glance

Firstly, GAMEYE is Free. This is a nice start considering that most apps of this type usually cost anywhere from $5.99 to $14.99. Once GAMEYE has downloaded and installed on your device, it does need some more time to download images, databases, etc, so just keep that in mind if you do want to use the app on your next run to your local game store.

You can create lists for your collection, a For Sale List, and a Wish List. These all function the same, but it’s nice to have separate lists for each category.

The Encyclopedia will give you a brief summary of any game listed in the app, along with links to the game on other websites, like the game’s page on thegamesdb.net, Amazon, Ebay, and a few others.

All information used in the app is from the website thegamesdb.net. If there happens to be a game you can’t find in the app, you can add that game to that website simply by creating an account.

Creating Your Lists

Onto the actual functions of GAMEYE, you can add games to any of the three lists through one of three methods: You can search for the game manually on the app, use the built in Barcode Scanner, or GAMEYE’s most intriguing feature, a loose cart scanner.

An estimated price is included with each game’s listing, and for the most part the price was pretty accurate. A few games I searched did not reflect their current selling price, however. Some were higher, others lower, so always remember to double check that using other sources before you find yourself in a bad deal.

Searching manually works as expected without many issues. The most commonly known games like Super Mario Bros for NES, & Sonic The Hedgehog 2 for Genesis, are found easily, and even some of the rarest games of all time, like the Nintendo World Championships Cart are easily found as well. One interesting thing I discovered was that some ROM Hacks have made the lists without any notation that they aren’t original games, other than the developer/publisher will be something that even a modest collector will notice is a little off. Not a deal breaker by any means, but it would be nice to see a notation or something signaling that these are in fact hacks of other games and not original titles for those who might just be getting into collecting. Digimon Rumble Arena 2 (Xbox), a game I own that I used to test the barcode scanner features on the app, was not found, so the website providing the information for GAMEYE isn’t an end-all resource. From what I can tell though, these incidents are few and far between, as every other game I own that was tested was found.

When the Barcode Scanner works, it works great. Not every game is working with it right now however, which again I blame thegamesdb.net more so than GAMEYE itself. I tested the following games: Silent Hill Book Of Memories (PSVita), The Legend of Zelda Windwaker HD (Wii U), Digimon Rumble Arena 2 (Xbox), & Shadowrun (Genesis). Two other games I was curious about, Tales of Eternia (PSP) a European exclusive, and physical copy of Firewatch (PS4), which had an extremely limited print run, were tested to see how in-depth the barcode scanner is with rare games and games from other countries. The Results were split even, Shadowrun, Windwaker, and to my surprise Tales of Eternia all were recognized, however Digimon, Silent Hill, and Firewatch were not. The Games were found and added via the manual lookup, with the exception of Digimon, which I explained earlier.

The loose cart scanner, unfortunately, does need some work. Only Game Boy, Game Boy Color, Game Gear, NES, SNES, Genesis, Atari Lynx, and TurboGrafx 16 cartridges/cards are supported. While this might seem like a bummer, I fell back to the manual search function, and I was able to add each game I intended to test that wasn’t supported. I was able to get NES, Genesis, and Game Gear games to work with fairly good accuracy, but I wasn’t able to get any SNES games to be recognized with any accuracy at all. Tecmo Super Bowl III (SNES) was recognized as Strike Gunner: S.T.G. (SNES), the Death of Superman (SNES), and a handful of other games, even while using GAMEYE’s advice on scanning carts in it’s “HELP” section. While this feature isn’t 100% accurate, it does show a lot of promise, and I have hope for it to only get better over time.

Preserving Your Information

One thing that GAMEYE does differently from it’s competitors is it can send a restore point via a .ged file to your email. This feature is critical, as you don’t want to lose your collection’s data after you upgrade your device(s), or you would like to have the data on multiple ones. Some paid apps allow you to sync your collection via a server, however that drives up cost. I actually prefer the method used by GAMEYE, as you can use the file without having to keep up with usernames, passwords, etc. You can also export a list or a Spreadsheet, which is a really nice feature for bragging rights, printing off a wish list, or if you want physical documentation of your collection.

Verdict

So, the question is, do I recommend this app? I actually give it two big thumbs up! This app can only get better over time. If even a handful of people that use this app create accounts on thegamesdb.net to update, add and edit information, this could become a very valuable resource for any gamer, especially since this app is free. I have another app that has similar features to this one, however that app costs $14.99, and after reviewing GAMEYE, I feel like I was swindled out of my money.

I Give this app a solid 4.5 out of 5, and I can’t wait to start using it for myself.

GAMEYE was tested using the following smart devices: LG V20, ASUS ZenPad 10, and an iPhone 6+.