i missed out on the Gamestop stock price catapult because i went into a few of the stores and they all looked like crap, unlike a few years ago. tiny shelf for PC games, no new releases and just lots of used games thrown into bins.

sounds like the company is in the last stage of doing anything to keep the numbers going at a level that wall street will like. Too bad it will end up with a stock shorter's paradise.

I don't know if they gut all of their new games, but on the rare occasion I go into a store and see shelves lined with "new" games, all opened with their discs removed and stickers plastered all over the cover, it doesn't make me want to buy them.

If they have fifteen "new" copies of God of War II that way, I'm assuming that they've gutted their entire inventory, so I'm not even going to bother asking if they have any unopened ones.

Wow, small world, I work across the street in the Sony building (but not for Sony), and I go to that EB all the time, once every couple of months. I mainly just browse there and I don't think I have ever been hassled to preorder at that location. It's been a while since I bought a game there because of the gutting of games.

So do you guys take the gutted games home to play? How new are those games?

We are allowed to check out games to try them out for a few days. As far as I know, the company allows checking out of new games. The current district manager for our district doesn't feel it's ethical to check out new games, but that's not the company standard.

You work in the Sony building? You should come by and say hello.

Problem with that is that do we really want to get rid of all the game-specific stores and rely on big stores like Walmart, Target, and Best buy? For new and popular releases, they're great, but what about niche games? Or even games that came out a year ago? For instance, I haven't seen the PSP Tekken game in a CC or Best buy for the past few months.

I wouldn't mind so much because Fry's tends to get 99% of all releases, but not everyone has a Fry's around them.

Yeah, that's what I do. But recently I've been noticing that the Best Buys in my area are strapped for space in the Video Game department (what with two XBoxes, PS2, PS3, GBA, PSP, GC and Wii games in stock - there's no room!). I have had to ask a sales associate if they carried such and such a title and he has gone back in the store room to get it for me. Both times the games were not in security boxes leading me to wonder if they were out of those as well. No wonder I prefer to shop online!

I just order them online since I refuse to shop at the game stores. Usually find better deals to boot.

Suprmallet, glad to hear you're doing well sir, best of luck in your new spot.

The question I've always had about GS/EB has been, how much wiggle room do store managers have to keep a customer happy? If a shipment is late on pre-orders, or if the game isn't in great condition, if the CSR gave out wrong information, etc...?

I've seen some store managers that do EVERYTHING within their power to fix a screw up or really go out of their way to keep a customer happy. I guess a good example is a few years ago a store manager let me return a DS that broke one day outside of the return policy (whatever it was at the time). And so, I traded in all my games there and drove out of my way to buy stuff specifically from him.

But then there are some managers that almost take odd delight about telling a customer to screw off. Obviously, it depends on the manager, but I've always wondered whether it's at their discretion to help out however they can or if they're actually going above their head to do so.

there's this newfangled technology called the internet where you can buy anything you want 24 hours a day without leaving the house. Check it out.

I wonder how internet sales of games are, though, and if internet sales alone would be enough to allow games like GBA Super Robot Taisen to still be made.

Do a lot of people buy games online? I know there are deals to be had out there, but I'm talking brand new games without some kind of super discount like abusing Google checkout. Usually, games online with shipping even without tax comes out to around the same as buying something in-store, and with the deals that places like Fry's have on new games, it's often cheaper to just go buy or pricematch at a B&M. I know I only buy games online when there's a CAG deal or something.

It's a good question. I doubt an internet only release of a small title could survive, but in regards to the second half of your question, you would have zero problems finding a title a year or more after release online.

I called GS yesterday to see if Forza was coming out yesterday or today. This is how the conversation went:

Me: Will you have Forza 2 today or tomorrow?
Them: Have you pre-ordered it? (this is not germane to my question, btw)
Me: Yes (my mistake, I know)
Them: We will have it tomorrow. Bring in all your trades so you don't have to pay cash.
Me: I don't think so.
Them: (Ignoring my response) Shadowrun also comes out tomorrow (no shit), so you can pick that one up too!


Come on now, are we really that desperate? Do we have to badger our customers on the freaking phone? I mean, come on! I asked a very simple, relevant question on the phone. Very frustrating.

sounds eerily familiar to an interaction I had IN STORE over wiiPlay ON release day. Here's mine:

Me: Did you get WiiPlay in today?
Them: Have you pre-ordered it? (this is not germane to my question, btw)
Me: Yes (my mistake, I know)
Them: Not yet. Wait until the company calls you at home to let you know it is here. Bring in all your trades so you don't have to pay cash.
Me: I don't think so.
Them: (Ignoring my response)
Me: I'll take my deposit back please. Best Buy has it already, and I'll just get it there.
Them:

Maverick

I'd say so as EGM uses Amazon.com for their monthly top selling games lists.

It is a good question whether the niche titles would continue to get made. I'm guessing they would, as most are made in Japan. Just a question of whether less would get imported over.

Fair point, I don't care that much as I don't really play those types of niche games anymore, and wouldn't set foot in a gamestore to buy one anyway. But that is an angle I hadn't considered.

Goose

Tell me about it. I stopped in there last year to buy a new release for a friend's birthday, and the sales clerk handed me an opened copy while asking for full price. I said, "You're kidding, right? I'm not giving him a used copy and paying that much for it." The clerk mentioned that the game hadn't been played yet, it was only opened for security reasons. My argument, of course, was that it the game was opened, period. After all, they wouldn't accept an opened game for a cash return, so why should I?

Long story short: I bought it elsewhere.

How come Gamestop stopped selling McFarlane figures? I would only go in there to purchase figures and once they stopped stocking them I never went in there again.

That's more of an involved question than you realize.

Back when EB and Gamestop were separate companies, EB Games had very definite return policies that managers could override in some instances if they felt it was warranted. Back when I was an assistant manager, my manager's credo was "You'll never get in trouble for helping out a customer," and that's something I've always held to. At the same time, I've been known to hold strictly to the return policy if I felt someone was trying to cheat the system. Our customer service line and corporate office almost always backed up our in-field decisions.

After the merge, this was the way for a while. Portions of the review policy changed, but the attitude didn't. Then, recently, the corporate office has taken a "Anything to make the customer happy" policy. While our return policies are the same, the moment someone makes a complaint to customer service, the store is told to do what the customer wants. Of course, if a customer is trying to get something ridiculous like a free PS3, that won't fly, but on 99% of customer complaints, the managers are told to ignore the return policies. So if a manager is smart now, they will do anything within reason to make a customer happy no matter what the return policy. If you're at a store that isn't treating you the way you feel you should be treated, ask for their corporate customer service number. Do not ask for the number of the district manager, because the DM will attempt to prevent your complaint from getting to corporate, and it's at the corporate level that you will get what you want.

They probably didn't make enough money to keep them in stock. I remember many many action figures being sold for as low as $4 when we finished restocking them.

Perfect. I've complained to a DM before and gotten absolutely nowhere. The DMs actually seem more clueless than anybody else, I wish I would have known to call corporate a few months ago. Thanks.

Yeah - sadly I still shop at EB/GS thanks to the sheer number of trades I have. However, I still throw my bitterness at them on occasion.

I went to buy GH2 on launch, and the dude was like "yeah, we have it. Did you pre-order?" Naturally, I said "Nope - I see no need." to which he said that i'd have to wait until the next day to get it, pre-orders get priority. So I was like "Whatever dude, see Target two doors down? I'll go there and get it." Then I did, and walked by the window and gave him a thumbs up with the case in my grubby mits. I love being petty.

My stores are notorious for that kind of thing as well. That preorder thing might have flown when EB/Gamestop got the games first but places like Best Buy get the games extremely fast now, even before Gamestop alot of the time.

I had that same problem. The day Halo 2 came out I went to EB Games. They wouldn't sell me a copy since I didn't pre-order it, so I went to Best Buy and grabbed one of their 1,000 copies.

There's a Gamestop nearby that I don't shop at, but one day I was driving by and noticed that the entire building had been demolished! I guess that's one way to get rid of a Gamestop.

Awesome. I like it.