Gamestop's shenanigans.

lol wut

They stopped selling Dreamcast stuff way back when they stopped with PS-One and N64 stuff.

My local Game Stop must come from an alternate reality, because the staff are friendly and enjoy chatting, the selection ain't too bad and neither are the prices, and the manager is a Cool Old Lady. And I don't think they've tried to sell me Game Informer in years, though they do put the latest issue on display.

I also live within close distance (one is literally right behind my house) of several used-whatever stores that sell a ton of retro games, and if I ever feel like driving out to the mall in the boonies, they have an amazing game store with pretty much every major console on display for play, with new titles right alongside old. So if you want to walk in and play some Mario Tennis, go ahead. More interested in the latest Mortal Kombat? They have that, too.

I really do think it must be a middle management issue, because the Game Stop at the big mall had prices $10-$15 higher than the one at my local mall. I don't know where the unusually high concentration of managerial douchebags comes from, though.

"Proto-Indo-European makes the damnedest words related. It's great. It's the Kevin Bacon of etymology." ~Madrugada

Oh, you lucky son of a SQUIRREL! Either way, very happy for ya, but I wish I was you in that case.

I've had crappy Game-Stop luck before, but at this one in the Millenia Mall, when I was trading in two Dot Hack installments to get third G.U. game and came up two cents short, he let me have the game for what I traded in. D'aw, that was nice—granted, it's just two cents, but still. Something similar happened to my brother at the Waterford Town Plaza Game-Stop as well.

IMX, the various exchanges carry roughly the same selection (or better) of PC games, and slightly lower of console games. Usually, they're more expensive - when prices drop at GS, or Wal-Mart, the price at the exchange will stay at the original release price for another month or two.

*gasp of horror*

That’s the epitome of privilege right there, not considering armed nazis a threat to your life. - Silasw

As a outsider being from the UK I guess the issue is simple note: Gamestop is a monopoly. If one defeats that error then it will not be able to rule game sales with a iron grasp.

I’m a lumberjack and I’m ok. I sleep all night and work all day.

I suggest that, if possible, you/we try to exert some market force and try taking more things to Half Price Books. They won't pay you as much for them, but they pay straight cash and they're INFINITELY less douchy. Ask them about their charity and donation work sometime.

I'm a member at Gamestop (the whole Power-Up Rewards Pro deal), but I can't say that I enjoy dealing with them much. I mean, the guys at my local store are very nice, and them I like discussing videogames with. But at the corporate level, Gamestop as a company is outright hostile towards competitors and as others have noted, very aggressive towards its customers.

I personally haven't had any horror stories, but I have an intense dislike for their "console whoring" - I don't have enough money for a console, I don't have enough time (as a very busy high school student) to devote to playing the games I would buy for the thing, and dammit, they roll-over so quickly that it just doesn't seem worth my money to buy the system and all the accessories that I need to actually operate the damn thing when new consoles are coming out in two, three years. Like the Nintendo 3DS. I. Don't. Want. One. I'm perfectly happy with my original DS and my DS Lite, and my Gameboy Advance, as so-called "old" as those systems are. Stop trying to force me to buy one, goddamnit! I tend to buy the used Gameboy Advance games - I can play them on every single system I have, and I find them fun. They remind me of a time when I got so much delight out of videogames that I could barely contain myself. I couldn't wait to play a Zelda game or Lost In Blue or Trauma Center: Under the Knife. Now, just like with everything else, I've been turned into a Knight in Sour Armor.

And I have Gamestop partially to thank for that. Thank you, Gamestop, for turning me off to your products and your sales strategies. If there were any smaller stores around, non-franchised ones, I'd go there. But all there is now, seemingly, is Gamestop. So I have to deal with them. Damn you, Gamestop CE Os!

Gamestop is mad because they know they'll be out of business in the next decade, just like Blockbuster.

Wife bought a PS 3 from GS. Now we get mags in the mail. I'm all over Steam and GOG, man. No need to set foot into a store, usually. Unfortunately, if she wants games for the PS 3, she had to go out and buy one.

Happiness is zero-gee with a sinus cold.

Sorry, new accounts cannot post external links.

I've never had a problem with my local Gamestop, aside from the fact that they don't carry much in the way of PC anymore (which I can frankly understand now that they have Impulse). They sell used games cheap and I can, uh, acquire the manuals elsewhere. Of course, I do not have, and will probably never get, a PS 3 or other seventh-gen console, so you won't see me involved in the preorder garbage. Maybe that's why I get along with them so well.

I despise hypocrisy, unless of course it is my own.

I've got a 360, and in all honestly, I only buy new games 2 or 3 times a year. Unless it's a FPS, you can just wait a few months till the price drops, or just buy some old used games. XBL is shit if you don't have friends.

A buddy of mine wanted to preorder a game at a GameStop, and I suggested she do elsewhere, telling her why. she just said, "Oh," and promptly got out of line.

These days I'll usually just preorder a game on Amazon unless for some odd reason the game doesn't have release-date shipping. It's just more convenient for me since my overnight job means I can't wake up at like ten in the morning to go out and pick up a game anymore. Last time I went to Gamestop was to buy the new Rune Factory, and that was only because they broke the street date for it.

Even then, I never feel like they give me any sort of pressure to preorder anything outside of "oh, this new game is coming out for the system you're buying a game for, do you wanna preorder it?". A polite "no" is pretty much all it takes to get them to move on with the sale. Don't think I've ever had any of that extreme pressure to buy or preorder something you guys are talking about.

The only time I was pressured it was because of one zealot of an employee and he got fired eventually after numerous complaints. Now the ones near my house are alright. Speaking of it, I need to get in and pre order Skyrim, so I don't have to search high and low for a copy.

I'm the same way, I've never felt pressure buying anything there. But I'd rather not support a company that pulls the kind of stuff they're wont to pull.

I've experienced great customer service at my local gamestop. They've never pressured me to buy anything (I hadn't even heard of the Game Informer magazine til I read this). In fact, there was this one time where I was asking the employee about Gamecube controllers for playing SSBB (had 3, wanted one more) and he told me to NOT buy the Game Stop controllers, and showed me a Nintendo-made orange GC controller (which is still my special controller to his day). Another time, I dropped by to do my usual window shopping, and it just so happened that hey were cleaning out extra preorder goodies. The manager pulled out a bunch of Ocarina of Time posters meant to be given out wih a preorder of 3DS. While the three of us (him, myself, and an employee) were chatting, the topic got to Zelda, and then he handed me one of the posters, insisting that I take it. The staff at my local gamestop are pretty chill, and I can usually get a conversation out of most of them. They've definitely earned my business.

Oh, also, I'm a girl gamer, too.

Yeah the service of Gamestop stores depends on the people. Sometimes you get asshat employees, sometimes you get cool people.

Had to stumble into the nearest one earlier this month hungover to pick up Skyrim. A friend had her going away party the night before. Best part was the guy at the counter recognized the signs and asked "hungover, eh?" We joked around about it for a minute or two, pretty cool guy actually.

Canadian EB games to remove Used Game sections and stock them alongside new games?

Huh... WHA? Well, that may be just a rumor, but...

edited 23rd Nov '11 2:21:32 PM by EarlOfSandvich

I now go by Graf von Tirol.

Oh hai Earl!

Huh, that is a stupid move. Hope the original companies (games' developers/publishers) get some profit out of that. And even if that happens in the US, I do most of my game shopping on Amazon nowadays anyway.

Not likely, as it entails placing new games behind the stack of used ones and removing most of the indicatiors that the used ones are used.

Infinite Tree: an experimental story

I just bought Skyrim new from Gamestop a couple of weeks ago, and at the same time bought a used HD Cable, because I ain't playin' no Skyrim on no Standard Definition, and everything is bright yellow. Seriously, it's awful. So I now have to either play Skyellowrim, or with the SD graphics that look worse than Morrowind.

And that's not all! I didn't keep track of the receipt (who the hell files receipts in an organized fashion when they could be playing Skyrim?!) and now Gamestop won't take it back.

WORST. WEEK. EVER.

Skyrim is fantastic though, yellow or not.

Still Sheepin'

Bullshit, the SD graphics don't look worse than Morrowind. I'm playing Skyrim on an SD and they look pretty good.

Edit: or wait, was that comment an exaggeration for comedic effect?

edited 29th Nov '11 12:46:26 AM by MarkVonLewis

Game shops in Finland have had good service, I think its because sellers have been gamers themselves. I guess that since this is so far away country, only people interested in games would be interested in selling games and they are friendlier since they too like games? XD

Necro-ing this thread because I realized that this is the closest thing we've had to a proper Gamestop thread. Also serves to show how much (or how little, depending on your view) has changed in Gamestop over the decade.

Former Nintendo Of America President Reggie Fils-Aimé Joins GameStop's Board Of Directors

This is the big piece of news as of late: Reggie already has a good reputation both within Nintendo and within the gaming community, so there's hope he might have an idea on how to turn the company around in a better direction. He hasn't mentioned any specific plans yet, but he understands how crucial Gamestop's physical storefront presence is, especially towards the more casual gaming community.

Then there's the testing of a new type of Gamestop storefront: one that more strongly resembles an internet gaming cafe, that also includes consoles, and still offers games for sale.

The general reaction online toward the concept seems to be negative, but I'm thinking Gamestop may actually be on to something. Thanks to digital distribution services like Steam, Origin, Go G, etc, along with the decreased need for easily stolen items such as memory cards or disks, it's far more practical to set up and maintain a gaming cafe than in past years. In fact, if you already own one of the games, all you'd need to do is just, pay for a console/desktop, log into your account and start playing (keeping up with all of the game patches will be tricky though). In a sense, I've already seen it work firsthand: an internet cafe decided to take up residence next to our mall's Gamestop, and sure enough there was a ton of synergy between the two: tournaments, demo-ing the latest games or even making sure to install whichever games sold like hotcakes. Sadly the cafe died out due to the expenses involved in replacing the computers, but it was a popular destination while it lasted.

Edited by SgtRicko on Mar 11th 2020 at 4:28:37 AM