That's what did it. The problem is real people have been removed from the equation. The system basically looks for dollar amounts and trends, not if it was justified. Customer service has reached an all time low.

Well yeah that would do it, but if you wanted to I'd fight it. It's their own fault selling damaged stuff pushing the 50% mark and thinking stuff wouldn't get returned. Resurfaced or cracked, it's all the same -- misrepresented damaged goods.

Damn, it sounds like gamestop needs to open a eBay store! 

its amazing that a company as poorly run as they are can dominate the market. Selling trash is not acceptable.

How does a company dominate the market for so long when they're poorly run?

Because people don't really care about searching, finding out who pays best, who'd treat you right, etc. They know gamestop is a big store and assume the best, so they take their stuff there and just trade it in for whatever price they want to give them.

terrible company, i will shop literally anywhere else before i go into a gamestop.

So it points once again at the people? Like I said before, if the people are too dumb or lazy to do any research on what they're buying or trading in, why the hell should Gamestop care? If Gamestop is so blatantly ripping people off and horrible at customer service, why are they still dominating the used game market?

I think a lot of opinions I'm hearing are personal and from a collectors standpoint.

Take a step back and think about the casual or non-informed gamer or gift giver that views Gamestop as the one stop shop for all their gaming needs, whether it be out of necessity or convenience. They probably dont care about condition, or if the game even has a case for that matter. As long as the game plays, that's all they want to do is play it. They spend more money than collectors.

Where else are you going to go to get a BOGO coupon for used games? Look at the OP's example...he's a reseller spending a lot of money at Gamestop. If a reseller is spending over $1,000 on games, I think the price and deal is more than fair on Gamestops end.

all the more reason to not do business with gamestop.

Actually, based on the utter shit they sent me after I spent all that money, and the couple of hours I had to spend on the phone afterwards, the price wasn't all that great

I agree with most things you've said though, Gamestop is obviously a well-run business and there are often deals to be had if you know how to look for them. They can also ban anyone they want and I don't blame them for that. I just wish their distribution centers had better quality control.

Yeah, I think the quality of their used merchandise is poor. Anytime I've actually looked for a game in there, I'd guess over half the used games in the entire store were without cases or manuals.

I imagine that's how they receive all the games when they're traded in. Most dont have cases or manuals, some are scratched, etc. So if that same customer base treats their games like that, they probably dont care if that's what they're buying.

I think Clutch is a Gamestop employee or executive.

It is the peoples fault as much as it is Gamestop. People go in with the flashy ads, the printed deals, and the rest and know from various sources (tv, print, etc) they do trades and credit on stuff. It's a big chain, it's game centric, and sadly the rest are gone devoured mostly by them. People who are too damn lazy to care, research, bothering to post to ebay or craigslist take the easy way out and ditch stuff not bothering to find out the true face value. Laziness is Gamestop's weapon and trump card, as long as there's slothful idiots out there, they got a large group to take advantage of. That is why they can get away with being so blatantly awful with some really terrible customer service, because people who go there don't care, think it may be their best option, or aren't smart enough to realize there are better options.

As long as people stay that way and Gamestop is willing to stick to their model, they'll last for the time being. Third parties(hell all parties) are furious at them and continually approach and poke a stick at them about used games. As it stands now it's a known fact Gamestop has been key in the blow back creating such things as the EA Pass, the Sony Download Key, the THQ passes and their lower price points to start, and various others starting to safeguard. All of them place waivers with games harming resale by making 1/2 of their games not work with a one time code, so you end up having to buy one to get the full package ultimately paying $5-10 more than a new copy. Gamestop isn't just screwing over the lazy, they're also hurting the rest who don't shop there too who have to buy used for one reason or another and in the long run will hurt others as in time it'll all go digital or with keys effectively ending Gamestop's reign of terror and at that rate we'll be 100% at the mercy of the developers and whatever prices on games and any sales if they care to grace them on people.

Ha! I'm proud to say that I've never worked at any video game related outlet in my life. I used to think working at Funcoland would have been awesome, but I was wrong.

Anyway, what you said in your first paragraph is what I've already said in here a few times. That's been one of my main points in the argument against Gamestop being "poorly run".  From a business standpoint, it's obviously doing something right. From marketing, acquisitions, pricing, etc...they're not "poorly run".

As for your second paragraph...that's a whole separate argument against used game sales in general and has nothing to do with what I'm talking about from a business standpoint. If Gamestop was called Funcoland and had great prices and service, we'd still be looking at the same circumstances surrounding used game sales and publishers trying to cut out that market.

Ef He-Man ,Skeletor BeastMan , Man-E-Faces and the rest of the crew! Gamestop,Ebay,Pay Pal, Walmart and Starbucks are The Masters of the Universe! I hate Gamestop with a passion. However (as with the rest of the masters), they are number one and everyone else is fighting for the number two spot. These software companies are so funny! Once you opened the shrink wrap, games were cootified and no store wanted them back. You prayed someone would be willing to trade with you to get a beaten, unwanted or crappy game out of your hands. Capcom did not give two shits what happened to my copy of Commando or Section Z once I bought it. They cried foul when Blockbuster and the Mom and Pops started trickin carts on the ave. They started screaming rape when Eb and Gamestop started making millions off of flipping the same games over and over again. Now you want to implement protocol so if I buy Resident Evil for the 3ds, it becomes a wafer thin post-it weight if I pass it on to someone else. Screw you Capcom and all other publishers trying to shut down the used game machine. As for Gamestop's reign of terror, it can be easily ended early if Walmart decides to get into the fray. Moreover, once everything goes digital or keyed up, Gamestop will be forced to go into full retro mode (lol).

It's not actually a separate argument, it's really the same but fairly applies to any big box on or offline retail chain too. That argument I brought up is real, my brother was working for THQ and they along with EA and some others had been trying to negotiate with Gamestop to profit share a few bucks on the used games because it was hurting their bottom line a lot being cut out causing projects to fold and well we've seen enough small developers eat it. Gamestop told them to go f themselves and if they didn't like it to stop sending them stuff. As was pointed out, with MS being Nintendo 80's like, they can't just jerk their software if they don't print it. It's a nasty trap and they're furious so that's why I brought it up as due to the market % of those doing it in bigbox, GS is nearly single handedly screwing them hard. But in the end dumb people buying from that shop used on current retail titles is killing our own rights to choose as more of these companies are moving toward that model or even more strict with it too so they can recoup losses.

genesisdon't (and Clutch) -- umm your grasp on what Capcom did with Resident Evil is poor at best, it's not a worthless paperweight, and most apparently don't give a shit as it is still getting good coin on the resale market regardless if you can't wipe the save. The problem is that IS one of the more severe thing I was thinking off in my last bit up above. Games with saves on them (3DS, etc) may see more of that in the future to combat Gamestop which hoses us over to a degree while the disc based ones will go more to using codes to unlock more and more of the game. In time there was talk of having an unlock code to just get the game to work since all systems now have storage, you can call it in or use your wifi/wired system to register. Then if you do resell it you can buy a new unlock code for the new used owner for like $10 or so. That would shatter Gamestop's grip real quick.

You're the king of jumping to conclusions and making bold assumptions. I'm glad you can deduct that my grasp on the RE situation is "poor at best" based on....nothing.

I'm glad you have inside information on all of this from your brother. My dad's cousins uncles former roomate's brother in laws stepson owns Activision and he said that Gamestop gave EA free cupcakes and muffins every Tuesday just because they're nice. Sounds like Gamestop is a really caring organization.

Anyway, my point stands in that it's not specifically Gamestop's "fault" for what's going on with the change of game delivery and lockdowns.

Blockbuster video, Gamestop, Funcoland, Mom and Pop's used game shop, pawn shops, eBay, etc...all hurt the bottom line of publishers that are trying to sell a brand new $60 game. When you look at the amount of money Microsoft is pulling in from digital downloads...it's sickening. Together with Steam they have proven that digital downloads are a viable solution. I personally hate it...but if you can cut out all the middle men and sharing of content, you're going to make a lot more money. And as much as you dont like it, they dont give a shit, and they dont have to.

I can see you're taking it personal now for some reason, guess you really like them after all. I'll leave it alone since you're just going to throw out irrational arguments and be an ass about it. You have no point other than to defend their practices of praying on stupid people and screwing over game makers.

I don't want you to blow a blood vessel getting all hot and bothered over it. If you're not good with insider information on why those new practices of online keys and the rest exist, that's your problem, my problem, and everyone else who becomes victim to these new practices. I'd give you a link to verify employment but pipeworks software doesn't have that, and he's already off volition inc's page since he left there a couple months back not that I think it would matter as you're set in your ways of calling me a liar.

If they don't want people to resell why don't they just make games worth keeping longer?  Seriously there is absolutely no legitimate beef there.  The value obtained by being able to resell your item is part of the value that the primary market customers are paying for.  It's the same deal with every second hand market, cds, dvd, hammers, whatever.  The publisher's only real problem is that they don't make games that people think are worth keeping very long, but thats ok since people are still willing to pay 50$ for it since they know they might be able to get some of that money back.

Ok. I actually just find it funny that a majority of your posts on NA include some sort of whining. Whether it be about Apple, Gamestop, Square, or whatever the topic may be. I like to see what's behind the whining is all. It seems like everything sucks in your mind, and I find that amusing.

Like i've said a million times, I also hate Gamestop. Someone said they are "poorly run", and I wanted to see why he would think they can be poorly run and dominate the market. After all this back and forth, you ended up saying what I've been saying all along. No need to keep diving into new topics.

They've already started that with downloadable content. The problem is that some consumers feel that there are sections of the game left off at launch with the intentions of selling it at an additional price later on. Especially with map packs and such. Personally, I've enjoyed a lot of downloadable content on the 360 and It's extended the life of a few of my games.

Right dude. It's Tanooki who starts the 20 topics per day of eBay whining and Paypal disputes. If he bothers you so much, FOE him and quit responding to it. 

They leave tons of content out, a perfect example of this is Reach. Halo 3 was nice and big and set the bar, and then Halo ODST and reach were both terrible content wise. They had nothing compared to other games. At least Call of Duty includes about 15 maps per main release, despite the game never changing much, I like that they don't only give you 7 and then make you buy the rest.

Ohh f*** it, I must be grumpy today.

Let's just don't get personal guys mmm'kay?

Zzz.

If it isn't worth keeping it isn't worth keeping, it doesn't matter if it has DLC added to it later or not if people are bored with it.  You paid 50$ or whatever for it, you play it awhile and you beat it so fast or it sucks and you decide you would rather have 30$ back than keep the game anymore so you sell it. 

This is supposed to be somehow unfair to the publisher?  Not everything you make will make people want to keep it for a long time, then you don't sell as many because people are like "this game blows" or "this game was great, but only gave me value for 2 days" and they try to resell it right away, but whose fault is that?