GAME and Gamestation: An Unfair Monopoly?

Gamestation, is deffo my favourite retail store they know what they are talking about 80% of the time, but it tends to have a lot of bias opinions, but im tending to buy more online for play.com, blahdvd.co.uk etc, i find indie stores to be more expensive although there knowledge is best and Game staff seem to think there above gaming but they just provide a service to lowly gamers, the amount of complaints i have about game, i mean one guy at game even said dont buy a wii because the graphics are rubbish and demo`d this by showing me warioware and saying mega drive graphics!!! i mean come on Game, i worked at game in 98 99 and 00, and it was while EB, Game & Gamestation were all independent of each other competition was good, i enjoyed working there, and i knew my stuff but now GAME is all shirt and tie and All about sales not Games, Gamestation although im sure it has a money conscience side it does aim to focus on the cusomters needs also.

I woulld like to see the US gamestop make there entry and lets see what happens then there is room for more game retailers at least until digital downloads become more prominent.

I left game because they didnt pay me for over two months and offer to pay my bus fare when i complained LOL.

Game screwed me out of a tenner once; giving me the wrong change. I complained to the manager, who swiftly didn't bother extending his understanding of customer service by doing eff all, with an accompanying shrug of his shoulders. Tossers.

At least Game can now pass on their corporate values to the GameStation staff. "How many pre-orders can I shove down your throat today, sir?" über-Wo0t for Game!

Gamestation is my fave. GAME employee's are generally low on info, arrogant and dismissive. They sell pre-owned games for far too much, have a crap selection of games, have little or no non-game items for sale (t-shirts, badges etc.), and are awful on trade-ins.

I've had so many problems with purchasing or trading in with GAME that I avoid the store as much as possible now. I've only had one bad experience in Gamestation, and it wasn't even that bad, they didn't believe that I had bought the game I was returning less than 7 days ago, since the reciept was damaged. Fair enough.

But Gamestation always have plenty on offer, from retro to next gen, friendly and knowledgeable staff, and no ridiculous prices.

Gamestation>GAME, end of.

I too worked at Game, due the EB buyout/Dreamcast vs PS2 days. I hated the stuffing collar and tie uniform, as you felt never on the level with the customer. Forcing preorders on people felt like you were pushing drugs. Those kinds of sales tactics are annoying to most folk.

I hope that in time, if both stores keep their practices, Game stores and staff will understand where they are going wrong, when Gamestation gets more people in the door.

Competition, where's it gonna come from now?

I used to be an Indie retailer. I kept customers by being informative and keeping up to date on the latest news every day. The problem is that it isn't enough, people want the cheapest product, they would come to me asking for information which I was always more than happy to give. I'd then see them walking past with another rivals bag later on due to them being cheaper.

In the end I sold up and moved on. It's amazing being an Indie retailer, but retail prices have dropped and trade prices haven't (at least not for the small indie retailer).

not noticed much difference between them really, ive had good deals in both shops, and shop staff are usually idiots anyway; i work in retail :D

i have worked with game for a few years now and whoever wrote that top comment seems to be more annoyed at having a troubled past with game than anything else. in our store and all the stores close by and people i know working in game the product knowledge is unbeatable most people in our storew are hardcore gamers and know theyre stuff. and for the nintendo wii post... the thing sells itself... and even saying that, as focused sales staff if someone was enquiring about the wii we would promote the posotive aspects of the machine. at the end of the day we want the customer to spend money withus and return happy with there purchase in the future to purchase more games. so telling someone that a console is crap aint exactly how we work things.

and for not getting paid for two months? come on. we get paid fornightly so you are saying that (even though pay is automated) and hours worked are entered daily, that you worked for a company which supposidly missed four of your paypackets an then left becuse they wouldnt pay you. not only is that illegal but it wouldnt happen.

maybe you had a bad experience at game but doesnt mean that you have the right to critise or judge the company as a whole. and if you are going to do it then do it properly and with due cause.

the purchase of gamestation in time will just widen games potential market and will not lessen or provide any benefit to gamers. however had gamestop got theyre before game it would have proved to be more interesting with more competition on the market.

Any takeover which reduces competition is a bad thing for the consumer. From my limited experience I've found Gamestation to be a better store than GAME. Their selection is larger, the deals on used games better value (e.g 2 or 3 for £10 as opposed to GAME 2 for £25), higher trade in prices and support for the enthusiast into rare or older consoles (which is non-existent at game). I expect much of this will change with the takeover. Whilst Gamestation had support for the enthusiast their core market is in direct competition with GAME.

With this takeover Leeds city center will have 3 GAME stores within half a mile of each other - something has to give. It simply doesn't make business sense to keep them all open. I expect the situation will be similar in many other city centres. Luckily Leeds has CEX and Playtime games to maintain some level of competition - however in a lot of smaller towns GAME now have a monopoly which I fully expect them to milk dry.

to the current game employee >>> i worked there had a bad experience but if you had read my comments i stated i enjoyed working there, i wasnt dising the company as whole just the service and experinces i have recieved, which does give me every right to critise and have an opinion on this, but the company doesnt have a clue about hardcore gaming there target is for mums and n00bs and basically its just a just business i mean the area mangers we had admitted to us that they hadnt played games since mega drive or arcade era, the bigwigs dont have a clue and "some" of the staff basically advise what they want, you may be a fantastic employee and give correct info which is great and what is needed but that deffo means you dont work in bolton GAME, but what i was basically saying was that game isnt on par with gamestation in the GAMING aspect of retail where you go and chat and laugh with the staff on first name terms with them, how many peeps can go to game and feel comfortable doing that with the shirt and ties???

also in re to pay i was full time at i left and came back due to student stuff, and when i returned the pay changed from fornighly to monthly and i got stuffed with HR errors, like a few other peeps, and as the company did nothing to resolve the problem quickly i decided the company wasnt for me, so please dont judge what i say on my bad experinces, im just saying i had them but im certainly entitled to an opinion.

I wish Gamestop had bought Gamestation. GAME is probably the worst specialist videogame retailer ever, all it's good for is casual gamers who want Singstar, Buzz, or the latest CGI tie-in. They rip you off with exchange prices and charge more than the rrp for certain peripherals. Our local GAME as a widehead spiv working for it, and he has absolutely no respect for the customers. GAME are the video game equivalent of Currys/Dixons.

it's good for the online retailers and the true indies, they offer a better service and online have great prices. i agree that it doesn't help the pure gamer to have game and gamestation together, but there are some great offers elsewhere. i stumbled accross [SNIPPY SNIPPY SNIP]


[10 May 2007, 14:01: Message edited by 'TimSpong']

Look. This is really simple... if you want to advertise on SPOnG, give us a call. That way we can keep SPOnG going. If you want to be a vulture and also to give your shop a bad name, keep trying this kind of s**t on.

well i work for gamestation at the minute. inside info was that game was going to close down some of its stores this year whilst we were opening more. so it seems more of a takeover to stop itself from going down the pan. Although game is bigger the company were the ones who take more money and they are willing to sit back and not change the way were operated. this way they can just take the profit.

and before i worked for gamestation i felt it was a better shop. they do more trade-in for example pc and retro. retro is massive some of the games and consoles can fetch allot of cash so game miss out there.

What insider info is this? Game posted profits of close to 30 million vs gamestations 2 million. Game has not only opened more stores in the uk in the past year but also in france, australia and spain. Game brought gamestation for one reason - to stop Gamestop entering the UK.