The Biggest Lie I've Read All Week

I have never really had problem with Gamestop here in Denmark. I have never been offered a pre-order or a game guide and they have been rather honest with me.

Maybe I go to a magical store?

I love the Gamestop where in my local mall. The staff is friendly and pretty damn funny too. I'm one of the ten people who think that preordering is a good idea, since I like the sense of having a guaranteed copy of the game when it comes out....

But yeah I've heard your stories on "that other podcast from long ago" about how one of the California Gamestops sold people's preorders and such.

Lastly the Wal-Mart/Target glass case thing really pisses me off.

Why would anyone want advice from some guy who works in a videogame shop about getting "into the right gaming experience"? What does that even mean. Does it include the best kind of beanbags to buy and what snacks go best with Halo 3? Mood lighting and appropriate soft music for driving to romantic missions in GTA4?

And that's why I shop at Gamecrazy!
The one by me has pretty cool people in it... and it's not evil like the huge Gamestop corporation...

The couple EB's that are within normal driving distance from me are pretty damn cool. Of course I know a lot of the guys in the one i normally go to. But even when I don't know them, it's still a regular shopping "experience". The people that work at Jeff's local gamestop are just assholes.

EDIT: Also toCurtisManCannon, if there is someone on the shelf that's open at ANY store, you get a discount. That's the way it works. At least where I live.

I hate to defend these guys, but I just went into a Gamestop this morning to pick up Yakuza 2 and wasn't asked to pre-order anything. Sure, I have been asked before, but a simple "no" always ends that part of the converstation and my purchase is rang up and I walk out of the store. I don't live in California though, should I assume everyone there in retail is a shyster asshole?

It would be great to actually see a REAL video gaming store.  Gamestop should be disgraced with there gaming knowledge.

*Has never had a problem with Gamestop.  Then again, she isn't a stupid ass lemming who sells off her games*  Hell, I love GameStop.  Only  place you'll find a lot of smaller games like what Atlus puts out, unless of course you'd like to walk/drive for miles on end to find the nearest Best Buy or Circuit City, or would rather wait a week for an online order.

As a Former GS manager I can back the part about people being fired for not asking for a reservation/trades. But I do have to throw the red flag on "all opened copies being played 0 times".

The reason that 20 copies are opened is because the companies (Gamestop/sony/nintendo/ MS) Don't give out too much in the way of promo materials, so several copies have to be gutted to fill the shelve and displays. But there is also a practice in place that allows employees to "Rent" out copies of games for what I guess to be research to be a "Knowledgeable employee" . So to say that your opened copy of a recent release being sold as "new" is not always the case.

But usually that doesn't bother me much , as long as the disc isn't effed up at all. I'm just going to open the damn thing in the parking lot anyway!! (I have an unnatural obsession with the smell of new plastic.. I know..it's weird)

I would go to a gamestop that was 10 minutes out of the way even tho there is one less than 3 minutes from my house because the asshole manager that always seemed to be there when i went there would TELL me about games that I had to reserved, even after I said no man thats ok, he would tell me that I need the preorder for it. I remember last year telling the guy I wanted to change my Too Human pre-order because its not coming out for a while and he told me that i really should keep it, and i told him that im a college student and im not made of money. I remember a few times also gamestop guys trying to get me to pre order some game that never actually came out, for example, some cowboy bebop game for ps2.

I don't have many problems at gamestop. I guess I'm lucky

yeah gamestops really piss me off every thing that vp said is the exact opposite ''experience'' i have. one time i asked when orange box came out and he said did i preorder it , I said no. Then he said he wouldn't tell me. That made me wanna kick his ass.

Yeah, I hate Gamestop. Everytime I go in there, some virgin fanboy feels that he has to give me his opinion on why buying a PS3 was a mistake, when all I want is to look at the latest releases. Those guys are passionate because they are friggin' crazy.

You guys need to learn a little trick that has saved me time and money. They start pestering you about anything, other than giving you the game you just payed for, threaten them. With what you might ask? Well, a call to the local district manager. Boy o' Boy do they cough it up fast, and I'm on my mary way. Of course now they know who I am, so I never get the pre-order/subscription BS. Ahhh, good times. Of course I don't shop there anymore unless the local game shop doesn't have what I need.

Also for the guy with the DS charger problem, do what I told you above instead of making your life harder. They don't do it, they get fired, simple.

Oh my God, I hate third party N64 controllers!

 Sounds seriously bad. I live in England and I guess I'm luckeir that we have the kind people of GAME here but even they like to jack up their prices for personal gain. I guess there's no winning really. As far as that fake story thing goes I can't believe so many sites reported it as real, all you had to do was check Kotaku to see that even they classified it as rumour.

Yeah that is a pretty big lie.

I've also had GS actually try to sell me a used, scratched disk at full price because it was the last one they had. I've decided I'd rather pay more for used games at other places than be heckled into ordering Guitar Hero Metallica or some other bullshit. I'm tired of the dickish attitude I get from employees telling me I shouldnt buy a game because it sucks. I'm done getting a non-verbal "go fuck yourself" everytime I dont fall for their sales tricks.

I have a love/hate relationship with GameStop.  On the one hand, they are pretty bad at actually having games (their core business) in stock. 

On the other hand, GameStop is a great place to dump all of my old gaming crap and get new gaming crap.  Last week I dumped a bunch of worthless old cap there (including my PS2 and a couple of old guitar controllers) and walked out with a new 360 for $35 out-of-pocket.  Can't do that anywhere else.  I could have gotten more money for my crap, but not nearly as quickly nor effortlessly.

In my experience, Best Buy is the best place to buy games because 1) you generally don't need a BB employee to get them for you and 2) they usually have lots of new games in stock.  I'm out of the store with the game i want in under 10 minutes, and that's if I take time to browse.

I've made hoaxes that Kotaku's fallen for. Good times, good times.

Is it any surprise that I'm banned from Kotaku's comments section despite never actually mouthing off to anybody?

"Is it any surprise that I'm banned from Kotaku's comments section despite never actually mouthing off to anybody?"

Not really. I got banned from Kotaku for, near as I can tell, saying something politely critical of telemarketers.

As for Gamestop, I just don't understand why people go there. You walk into Best Buy or Circuit City, you pick up your game (which is in stock on day 1), you take it to the register, and you leave.

You don't hear about how you should have pre-ordered because they didn't get enough, you don't get a pitch to pre-order other games that they plan to short-stock, you don't get sold an open copy, you don't get asked to buy a used copy for 5 dollars less so they can screw over the devs and some dumb kid who they gave 7 bucks, you don't get an insurance-salesman push for a crappy discount card, Game Informer, or a system cleaning kit.

"For the record, I don't actually think that Target or Wal-Mart are much better, since you often have to flag down some shiftless wage-slave who's too busy trying to shake last night's bong session out of his brain to open the stupid glass case and get you a game. At least they usually share my sentiment of really not wanting to be there."

I hate retail stores, I only shop online.

The Cheap Ass Gamer story isn't that the contest was held and blogs were fooled.  These are blogs, after all and anyone who expects 100% fact checked news stories from these sites needs to do some self reflection.   The story is how the bloggers reacted when they were caught with their hand in the cookie jar: ridiculous internet drama.

The fact that you honestly admit that you would have run the story as well, given a chance, demonstrates why I like your style Jeff.   You could have self righteously gone on about how reprehensible your competition is but instead you were honest and took the high road.  Blogs are blogs and you have to take them for what they are worth.  They're often the first to break a big story but they are also notorious for disseminating false news and rumors.  If you read them from the right perspective, they can be entertaining.

Im listening now to the CAG cast..... I was busy last week so i hadn't had the time to check the story on blogs.....I think its a great thing to do...I never thought that that joke will turn up so big....so big even the biggest ( giant bomb ) had to write something about

The only thing I EVER buy at Gamestop is pre-order games.  That's it.  I never buy used games there, or anything that hasn't JUST been released that I already paid for.  Maybe if they would stop trying to sell me opened games as new, or used games with stickers all over the trashed box, I might consider it.  Until then, Ebay has MUCH better selection, pricing, and quality.

Ironically they don't actually ask me if I want to pre-order anything that often.  Maybe something about picking up a pre-order causes the check-box in their brains for pre-ordesr to get marked off.

its THERE, not their! ahhh

Strangely enough, I have yet to have an embarrassingly negative situation with anyone from Gamestop. Either the ones I encounter actually match the employee description, or the ones I go to comprise of 2% truth and 98% lies. I mean, they do have good clearance sales every once in a while.

Jesus, Gamestop. Why can't you just go away? At any rate, are you going to review The World Ends With You, Jeff?

Speaking from Denmark, Europe I must say that my local GameStop is pretty ok. They're always up for a little chatting about games. We always end up giving quite personal accounts of our opinions and experiences. They have never tried to sell me something without me asking about it first. Quite nice, really. Also, one of my X360 controllers gave out recently. I went up there and inquired. Since I'm luckily still within warranty they will hand me a new one just like that, no questions asked, and what's more important - they don't need to see my receipt. Isn't that some form of trust in me?

Reading what I just wrote, it almost sounds too rosy to be true. But hey, there you go. It is.

Gamestop once sold me an open copy of the greatest hits version of The Shadow of the Colossus for 20 bucks plus tax because it was the last copy they had on store shelves. Though that didn't bothered me really. Though what did bother me was, that he opened so he could make more copies to sell. I was confused at that point because I thought pirating games was illegal.

my girlfriend works at gamestop...since one of their employees touches my penis on a regular basis I must applaud their customer service

It's very rare for me to buy anything at a shop, I buy online and get no hassle from people trying to sell me extras.

if you can find your game ANYWHERE else... or unless it's on the way to the restaurant you're gonna have dinner at that day... DON'T go to Gamestop.

Maybe it's just West Coast Gamestops? I don't really enjoy dealing with retail staff anywhere, but I've never had a major problem with the 'stop. You can't buy used and return within 7 days at Wal-Mart/Target/Best Buy....

Gamespot has REALLY become obnoxious.  

About 2 years ago, the EBGames/Gamespot on Powell Street, in San Francisco, fired ever single employee -- including the manager.  All of them had been working there for about 5 years at lease.  I was on a first name bases with most of them, they ALL were gamers and knew there shit.  Pick-up any box in the story and one or all of them KNEW something about it.

EB then replaced ALL the employees with a bunch of high school students -- including the manager.  None of them have a clue, what's going on.  I asked this one guy about Shin Megami Tensei, he didn't even KNOW what I was talking about.  

So, then I asked him, "Do you play games?", 

He said, "Sort of..."

I said, "...but not really?"

He said, "um... yeah."

I said, "OK.  Good to know. Nice talking with you.  I'll be going home now, to buy what I need off Amazon."

SUPPORT THE VIDEOGAME INDUSTRY! BUY DIRECT FROM THE PUBLISHER NOT CRAPPY MIDDLEMAN STORES!

The saddest thing about this article isn't GameStop customer service, but the fact that Jeff owns a copy of The World Ends With You and never did anything with it. What a crime.