Frontburnr: It was a beautiful Saturday morning when I walked into a local GameStop to purchase The Last of Us. This wasn’t my regular GameStop so the employee behind the counter asked if I had already pre-ordered my next gen console. I responded by telling him I had the Xbox One pre-ordered at another store. He gave me a look of despair and said “oh, I’m so sorry” as if I had just told him my parents just died. I gave a halfhearted fake laugh and wished he would hurry up with my trade-ins so I could get the hell out of there. The clerk took his time so that he could explain to me why I made the wrong decision by ordering the Xbox One. GameStop employees are there to inform consumers about their products but should they be harassing people about which next-gen console they choose to buy?
A gamer tried to sell his PS4 Pro to GameStop USA and found out that he would actually have to pay the store.
Well there’s no stop like GameStop I’m surprised they didn’t go deeper into the hole with their USED cables and controllers prices.
Edit:
For those that don’t know if you go to trade a console you need it to be ready to go with all the controllers and cables if you don’t have them they ask you to buy them and deduct the price from the monetary appraised for the console
That makes perfect sense really, why would you be selling your console without all the things it came with and needs to actually be used.
Not always I've seen plenty of refurbished units go cheap because people have picked them up broken then repaired and onsold with no controller or cable. When they are this old many people just want to replace the main unit
In the UK, eBay has removed selling fees, letting you list and sell any item for free.
I love gamestop. I still shop there. I prefer buying a game from a game store than a department store.
I preferred goin to Circuit City but that died out. Years back I'd go to Best Buy cause of Gamer Club, now Best Buy barely sells games and doesn't sell Blu-rays and looks dead most of the time. Same with GameStop, these stores look like a barren wasteland of Funko Pops and anime figures. These retail stores don't seem to care about pulling in customers. Those figurines are neat, I collect them too but they ain't pulling me into a GS. Rather than attracting gamers they've pay walled everything behind a subscription. As if they weren't already cheapskates back then with their trade ins.
I still go in there and browse, but never buy anything, the video game section is getting smaller and smaller, even the PS5/Series X/Switch game selection is getting tiny.
I miss Best Buy's Gamer Club, I used to get pre-orders for like 20% off often with other discounts then get points I could trade into discount rebates. It was so good, getting day 1 games for like $30.
When they shut that down I stopped buying games day 1 almost completely.
I stopped going to GameStop when they no longer let me use my monthly $5 rewards points towards PS network cards.
Weird I live in Canada and the Gamestop near me says you need the console, controller, controller cord, and an HDMI cord before they will take a console on trade. And if the console shows signs of being opened they still won't take the machine. And if you upgrade the PS4 HDD from 500 gig to a 1TB they will count that machine as modified and label it as a 500 gig model. Better to just sell it on Facebook Marketplace.
I also live in Canada. I had a similar experience trading in an Xbox One S. Gamestop would give me a pittance for it, so I sold it on Marketplace for almost as much as the original selling price.
GameStop has announced plans to shut down stores across the country after closing 300 locations just last year.
The popular gaming retailer says net sales have fallen 20 percent, now sitting at $860 million - a drastic change from its $1.08 billion in 2023.
Also giving you about $5.00 off for buying a used game is just bullshit. For example: https://www.gamestop.com/vi... New is $59.99, if your going to sell it for a used price it needs to be at least $10-$20 less. I hope GameStop just goes away.
Same nonsense they were doing 20 years ago. 🙄
Time to take old yeller out behind the shed...
One of the reasons I went digital. I used to trade games in back in the day when money was tighter. Trading a game in for 10-15$ isn’t worth the trouble. Especially when they turn around and sell it for almost full price.
Not surprising, but sad. WooT is killing it with their game discounts...on new games.
This is just market forces adjusting for GameStop’s long-time practices of nickel and diming the consumer. I feel bad for the workers though. It’s not good that they have to lose their jobs over this.
Not too surprising. Lots of people buying digital.
And GameStops trade in and resale pricing strategy is awful for customers. I will miss them when they are gone though.
Most I will miss being able to trade in a console, get a couple hundred towards the new model like PS5 to PS5 Pro.
I’ll miss the midnight launch parties. Standing in line with strangers sharing our excitement about a video game. Digital took that from us. I wish younger audiences could experience how joyful it was
I often think about times like that and how good we had it, before social media and smart phones gave way to a generation that expects instant gratification.
GameStop is one of the last remaining relics from a bygone era where stores like Blockbuster, Game Crazy, Hollywood Video, and many others were found on every corner. If you…
Or it was all to do with the fact he did not pre order from them? Getting him to pre order ps4 with them (why would he cancel pre order of xbox just to re-pre order?) instead, so the dude focused in on the psychological warfare aspect of selling a rival product...
At least he tried to sell something to someone unlike the "manager who never personally sold a vita to anyone" story recently.
Is it all about people can afford only one so they have to find reasons to justify their purchase?
Cant call yourself a hardcore gamer if you only play games on only one platform
Everyone is entitled to an opinion, and retail employee are in a unqiue position to share theirs with you whether you like it or not. Its not just gamestop, If the guy shared the same opinion as the author than he wouldn't have an issue. Totally not worth writing about...
I hate going into Game and just wanting to buy something and being told about the latest crap they are being pressed to sell me. I appreciate that they are just doing their job, I understand that, but it still annoys me. I bought The Last of Us the other week and the guy insisted on telling me about the DLC and the season pass, I know about it, I don't want it, at least not yet -
'The benefits of this is that you don..'
'No thanks, I just want the game'
'Yes but after you've finished it you'll want to...'
'Just take my money and give me the game!!'
I mean, it's right there on a big f***ing poster stuck to the counter, if I didn't know about it before you haven't give me much option of not knowing about it now unless I was blind as a bat. If I want it I'll let you know, otherwise give me the game I've brought up to the counter, and offered you money for, and stfu.
You can't move in the shop unaided for 2 mins before they want to come up and give you their pearls of wisdom on what your purchase should be, it's quite off-putting sometimes, it has the opposite effect of what they want you to do - you want to walk out and go shop somewhere else.
Maybe I'm just a miserable sod but I hate their sales tactics.
EDIT:This article is about Gamestop, I know, but it's pretty much the same with Game.
Well, speaking of console wars in Gamestop, I went in immediately after E3 to chat with they employees. (I'm somewhat of a regular eheh, it's on my way home)
First thing I said was "call me crazy, I still am getting the Xbox" (both, btw) He said "you're crazy" - I laughed. And then I said, "yeah I can't deny me some Dead Rising" he quickly rebutted "It's not gonna look anything like that!!"
I know what he was getting at, with trailers being target renders ect, but I still thought it was somewhat silly for him to, so enthusiastically, jump at the opportunity to knock my opinion, my selection, and one of his products.