VideoGame_Discussion

Something else bad I learned the hard way: I didn’t know that you can’t use accumulated points unless currently a Pro member. I was going to cash out my points and not renew with those changes looming, but I ended up renewing anyway just so I could use my points, as my membership had lapsed by a few days.

Damn, just renewed a few weeks ago.

I spent all my gift cards last year when I thought they were going under for sure xD

Yep, won’t be renewing in Feb.

Was already not renewing with the price hike and I forget to use my $5 all the time every month, but I used it almost exclusively on PSN or eShop and now I 100% won't renew. What a lame company.

Well that's a shame. They could at least grandfather in people who bought it just for that until their term expires, but I guess it wouldn't be gamestop if they did something good for their customers.

They're also apparently cutting employee benefits.

Kommie wrote:

There's a reason my local GS closes for an hour between 3 and 4 every day. They can't get enough people willing to work there to cover full hours.

Cutting benefits will surely help with the staffing issue

Weird they would make these benefits changes right before Black Friday.

To be fair, I would guess these benefit cuts are for 2024, since early November is typically the open enrollment period. So the seasonal workers let go actet the Christmas rush likely wouldn't be affected much anyway.

Would love to see how GS responds to a coordinated employee strike, though I doubt most of the employees could afford to not work if their best job prospects were Gamestop.

Really it's time for management to say we had a good run, lets wind down the retail operations and sell all our customer data one last time

People need to play hardball with these guys. Just stop buying from them. One of two things happen..

1) They go out of business. As much as Ive hoped for this in the past, it could be a bad thing. Once Amazon has put everyone out of business, they will have no one to price match and we could all pay more.
2) They stop some of their crazy business practices

Seems like a risk worth taking to me. Gamestop has treated their employees and customers terrible forever. If they dont change, they dont deserve to be a business anymore. I havent bought a single thing since they started charging $8 for a return and changed the free shipping threshold to a million dollars. Sure I may have missed out on a deal or two but I havent had to deal with the stress of receiving disc only "new games" or games that are cracked and broken. I'm ok with that.

If there is a void, someone will fill it.

Amazon isn't going to put every brick and mortar shop out of business because actually browsing Amazon has gotten markedly worse over the years. Even if you know what you want and type it in the search bar, it's often several items down the list behind their sponsored or otherwise not-the-thing-you-asked-for results.

Can you imagine going into a physical store where they put everything you want to buy either underneath or behind seven other things that are more profitable so you have to physically move them to get what you want?

(I hope Gamestop isn't reading this thread or that's the next thing we'll see from them)

More to say.

Gamestop is already practically irrelevant for new games.

There are other brick and mortar stores that stock most of them in quantities high enough that you can just go buy them without having to pay a deposit and reserve them. Walmart, Target, Best Buy, etc. There are also plenty of online stores that will ship so that it arrives on or close to release day that carry everything popular and then the lesser known titles as well.

They are only relevant for buying used games when they have their massive sales, otherwise you are typically better off buying online, even after factoring in shipping. They are working hard to become wholly irrelevant in this department by shipping busted games and charging $8 return fees though.

The one thing they do have relevance for is taking in used product. It's way easier and faster to just dump stuff at gamestop versus trying to sell online, take photos, package, and ship things. And their trade in prices reflect that.

Even with that one bit of relevance there are plenty of other people waiting in the wings to take their used game business. We have a couple Mega Replay stores within 50 miles of us, which would probably open several locations if GS was out of the picture.

A few locally owned shops might expand or return as well. The only reason GS is still around is because old habits die hard.

Oh wow, i subbed just for the $5 discount with gift cards. Is there documentation anywhere that says you cant use that? I'm going to ask them to cancel and refund me if that is the case

brian9824 wrote:

As of next month, it is no more.

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I only used the $5 promo for Playstation cards, so this means I won't be bothering to renew this.

Kommie wrote:

Same I used it on switch cards for the kids I'm going to use my code this month and try to get them to refund me and pro-rate it. Complain that they changed the terms after I signed up for a membership. Worst they can do is say no

brian9824 wrote:

GameStop employee literally sold me the Pro based on doing this - I wouldn't do it otherwise.

Kommie wrote:

Exactly the same here. I'm sending them an email asking for a pro-rated refund for the unused months now and citing this. If they refuse i'll probably file a complaint with the BBB even though it does nothing most of the time.

If they are going to change this they need to grandfather people who are already subbed into it.

Well, where I live, there aren't too many options. A lot of the games I buy are relatively niche, and won't be carried in store at Walmart or Target. I used to buy from Best Buy, getting the discount for in store pickup, but then they closed my local store. So all that I have left is GameStop. It's more than 20 miles to the nearest independent store, and I don't even think they carry new games. (Interestingly, the only other GS that was within 20 miles of me also closed.)

So if GS did go under, I'd be forced online, where prices are the same: full MSRP plus tax. At least at GS, I can get something back, plus paying $25 for $60 off my buys removes some sting. Everywhere online I know of that sells below retail charges for shipping, negating any benefits. Yes, it's strange, but GS is my cheapest option…

Although to clarify when you say digital cards. If you go into the store and go to buy a PHYSICAL card, say a $5 or $10 switch card is that allowed?

Or are they considering any physical cards to be digital cards?

brian9824 wrote:

Point of sale activation cards. So yes, those. They want you to buy actual games now with it.

https://slickdeals.net/forums/attachment.php?attac...

Found that, bottom is cut off but pretty clear why.

Also no more renewal incentives. I'll let you all know if they agree to refund me, I HIGHLY doubt it, but won't hurt to ask

14% seems way too low. Most GameStop employees sold it alone on the Gift Cards

Kommie wrote:

I mean its why I got it, sucks that i literally renewed Oct 1st. so this effects 10 months of my membership

I've barely used Gamestop maybe a dozen times if that since the PS2 era which was 20 years ago.

Let's not forget that a Pro membership now costs $25 and the Game Informer magazine is now digital (you have to jump through hoops to request the physical copy).

GameStop requested I show iD to use my $5 off monthly on $10 eShop code that prints out on receipt

EclipseLion wrote:

Of all the ridiculous shenanigans Gamestop pulls, this is like the bottom of the bottom tier.

Well I contacted Gamestop and they cancelled my membership and said they would refund it back to my card. So if you renewed recently and used it mainly for giftcards its worth a call

benstylus wrote:

I mean I wasn’t annoyed , just reported what happened. They already need to see id when trading in so it’s no big deal for me. In fact it could be helpful if someone over heard my number. And Actually Ive yet to be frustrated with these new rules. So next month I can’t use the $5 monthly on digital currency anymore, ok cool, i’ll find something else ya know even if it’s something as simple as batteries which I’ll always need. What does frustrate me is getting a new game that’s already opened from them. We all know the future of gaming is digital, physical being GameStop’s bread and butter they are fully aware the next couple years will be a struggle as we transition, especially if they don’t figure a way to resell digital licenses. What would also frustrate me is if GameStop started asking for my social or kept a running total of my trades and once it reached $600 in a year they start asking to do something with needing to be a part of my tax return. Gamestop is going to be cutting the corners they’ve already cut as well as many more I imagine to stay relevant in a digital world on a foundation that was created on physical media

brian9824 wrote:

Better make sure you follow up with that. I wouldn't trust them one bit to refund that GameStop membership... Especially if you didn't get the funds almost initially returned.

Rollobobo wrote:

I will be, I have an email stating its being refunded and ill make sure its followed thru

People are upset they will no longer receive a new system to replace the new one they bought with the warranty but I can tell you firsthand at least one aspect of why they aren't doing it anymore. I go into GameStop and a man comes in with a boxed PS5 and demands his warranty replacement, okay so they check everything to make sure the serial matches the receipt and ask what's the matter, "The system comes on and crashes after 30 seconds" guy says, GameStop says mind if we set it up and reproduce the issue, guy says no I want my replacement NOW, GameStop says no we need to do at least the bare minimum troubleshooting steps before that sir, guy relents, "ok" so they set it up and it does present the issue that guy claims but also live german roaches are coming out. The warranty was instantly voided, and the guy is furious and wants to speak to every member of leadership under the sun, management comes kindly letting him know what they discovered voids his warranty, the guy wants his warranty refunded pronto, but GameStop cannot. There's no other solution for him but to possibly try a 3rd party to repair the console for him gamestop is telling him but recommends also fumigating the console first due to the insects. The guy leaves furious and claims he's going to better business bureau with this

All the more reason why you wouldn't want a used console replacement.

it's a sucky situation all around, you want a fully working replacement console, free of roaches or strange smells like cigarettes, GameStop doesn't want you trying to return consoles with roaches, (don't think they care about cigarette smell), consoles that have had parts or serial tags swapped to commit fraud, etc.

My solution would be if the system did qualify for warranty replacement you would receive a new console BUT each month passed on your warranty diminishes the value of the console you're returning for replacement. So yes you will get your new console but you will have to pay a bit, I would impose a cap at a certain month where the value wouldn't dimmish any further so even if you returned the console on the last day of it's warranty you'd still get a decent amount towards the new replacement

It should go for whatever you bought. If you bought a new console, the warranty may cost more but you get a new console. Buy a used console and get a used console for a replacement, but the warranty costs a little less.

Or you could get a Costco membership, buy a PS5 which has a forever warranty for returns because it’s Costco and then refund the membership.

BucketofJustice wrote:

What about when people are returning roach-infested consoles, home of a smoker and now tar-colored consoles, and bad actors who buy broken consoles and then swap out the serial numbers with new consoles?

If gamestop doesn't want to deal with warranties, maybe they shouldn't be selling them.

I already had a post on here about how the canceled my pro membership with out telling me stated for to many returns (all were because they sent the wrong item, or wrong condition) they told me to F off so I would double check, and make sure they refunded you or press early or you might get the same result as me.

EclipseLion wrote:

Do the work to get it working and sell it again? The costs of the warranties should be more than able to fix them. Or, have a disclaimer that anything damaged outside normal wear and tear won’t be covered and be honest about it up front? If anything appears tampered with, don’t accept it? There’s options.

Inside of 3 years none of it matters because that's when consoles complete the digital only transfer. PS5 slim is going to be digital only with optional accessory disc drive. Xbox has a similar refresh coming.

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ryanflucas wrote:

That’s a trash can

ryanflucas wrote:

Probably still have 1 or 2 more gens for Nintendo. People like to complain about them being behind the other two, but in some cases that's a good thing.

They were last to jump on the DLC train, last to charge for online play, and will probably be last to drop physical games.

Well I need to use my points ASAP and use my last $5 this month looks like. I get the $10 PSN cards when I remember. Maybe missed 3 months this year, I will not renew in February.

FWIW, I was able to trade in a couple games and use that credit on a Steam gift card. Not sure if that will go away next month along with using the $5 coupon.

Time to edit the topic then

Well, you still can't use GS gift cards, but I know some people were wondering if trade credit could be used. At least through November you can.

Porksta wrote:

I heard December 7 is when it goes into effect. Gift cards / trade credit can't be used on digital items.

Thanks for the tip. I got a Left 4 Dead I want to trade in. Will see if the computers allow it.

Confirmed that the $5 monthly certificate won’t work on digital currency anymore. Tried today in store. Instead I bought a Bulbasaur plush for $9.49. I won't be renewing next time in Feb.

They gave me the runaround with my refund of subscription, said they were doing it and wait 2 weeks, then after 2 weeks said i had to do it in store, then store said they couldn't do it. Their support rep online just told me to dispute it if the store couldn't refund so I did and got my money back already