Second Hand Shenanigans

[BaronSqwelch]

I wont buy a game unless its sealed...gamestation are a lot better on this now though ive found. even heading off to the stock room if one isnt to hand!

Nowadays its even more important with all these online codes the games come with.

Refuse to buy second hand anyway but the high first week or 2 trade in values allow me to play pretty much every game coming out at the mo. so anything that keeps the shops making the money to keep doing that is fine by me

[Decider-VT]

I'm 100% sure i've been ripped off by HMV and Gamestation when buying so-called 'new' games.
If a trade in looks MINTY MINT it goes in the 'new' section, rip-off B'STARDS.

Buy online ONLY.

Christ, paranoid much? I take it you've worked in games retail, then?

[Family Fry]

I've bought a few new titles from hmv, never been sealed always gutted boxes.
One thing im always paranoid about is some douche writing down redeem code and me not being able to redeem, even though I bought new. Always imagine that convo.
I don't even look at discs or manuals anymore personally when i buy new, opened and whacked into console when home.

[yesteryeargames]

I bought a so called new game from GAME once, and it was unsealed and had clearly been put through a disc cleaning machine !
Took the game back 5 minutes after i bought it,got a refund and no apology from them.

Their second hand prices are usually the same as buying them new online, If they actually botherd to price things properly and fairly they could make a lot more money selling second hand games.

[Decider-VT]

What annoys me about this type of situation is the total lack of real action on behalf of the people dissatisfied with this practice. People always take to the internet with anecdotal evidence about why games stores are bad and wrong for unsealing new games for merchandising but practical alternatives are rarely forthcoming. We hate unsealing new games for the shop floor and agree with you in principle, but how else are the games going to be merchandised? If you want to complain, then actually complain. Send an e-mail to head office if you want sealed games with dummy sleeves in the shop.

To put it into perspective, our stores almost never receive dummy cases and are thus expected to provide their own. If we put the games out sealed they get stolen in ridiculous quantities. (Case in point- the nineteen copies of Pro Evolution 2012 on PC I spent ages trying to track down today because they've all been swiped. Telling a customer they were all gone was just embarrassing.) Publishers spend money on POS pre-order materials, standees and other means of raising awareness before release but all that support drops away once the games are shipped to us. They know they'll sell either way, so why waste money on sleeves for the minority of customers that are just going to complain anonymously on the internet? It becomes our problem, and we just try to make the best of a bad situation- leave the games sealed, have them stolen. Gut them and face complaints about standards on the internet. Damned if you do and damned if you don't. Inevitably, a retailer will decide that it's less desirable to have thousands of pounds of stock regularly walking out of the door.

Also: I can't speak for GAME but I'm sure that there are people who work there that share the same frustrations that I do. It's just sad to see games retail being portrayed as a bastion of shady, underhand dealings on account of some incompetent people that clearly couldn't be bothered to do their jobs. And in response to gamerade's accusation, that never, ever happens where I work. Never. Not once, in any of the stores I've ever worked in, across years and years of games retail. In fact, if a customer trades in a sealed game as second-hand (usually Sony reps clearing out their desks) we usually try to leave it like that as a nice surprise for somebody browsing through the racks. It's never stickered up as a new copy, and being accused of trying to rip people off is quite insulting.

[koopatroopa90]

I've bought "new" games from shops and found them to have scratches, particularly PS2 games in the past. Now I understand the reasons for unsealing them but at least take care to store the discs properly. I mean how much would some jewel cases cost to keep the discs in rather than plonking them in a little pouch with the manual?

GAME have been known to send second hand stock as "new" online, as detailed by members of hotukdeals here. I've actually had this happen to me. To counter that, however, I will add I have also been sent sealed stuff when I've ordered preowned, so I guess it's swings and roundabouts....

[Decider-VT]

I agree there but very few shops are going to have that sort of space behind the counter. It's something we used to do with high-ticket DS games but the cupboards and stockrooms filled up really quickly. Doing it for every format wouldn't be particularly realistic across a whole chain.

As for GAME... well, I can't speak for them but I very rarely buy from them either. I've never agreed with the practice of lending games out to staff members either but I'd be interested in knowing what their internal practices/working politics are, as management seem to be far removed from the average shop staff from what I've read.

[Lebowski]

Not sure how game make there money back on preowned stuff i recently traded in battlefield 3 for skyrim minus the online code, id had two weeks on battlefield which was a cheap online preorder, so i essentialy got to play two new games for around ?30 as skyrim was one of them five pound deals, what baffles me is battlefied 3 had an ebay price of about ?20 because of the code issue, so how is it worth ?35 to game.

[thetrooper]

As for GAME... well, I can't speak for them but I very rarely buy from them either. I've never agreed with the practice of lending games out to staff members either but I'd be interested in knowing what their internal practices/working politics are, as management seem to be far removed from the average shop staff from what I've read.

As an ex-Game employee I can say that lending games out to staff was stopped quite some time ago and that was official company policy. I can't speak for every store of course but I never saw or heard of anyone trying pass a preowned game off as brand new.

[elaniel]

I used to work for Game/Gamestation and while at GAME we were never allowed to borrow games, but at Gamestation we were. I used to always buy my games when working there (30% discount), but colleagues would borrow games on the Wednesday/Thursday when they came in and bring them back in a couple days and they were sold on as new, which I completely disagreed with.

This was about 6 years ago though.

[gamerade]

Originally Posted by Decider-VT
Originally Posted by gamerade
I'm 100% sure i've been ripped off by HMV and Gamestation when buying so-called 'new' games.
If a trade in looks MINTY MINT it goes in the 'new' section, rip-off B'STARDS.

Buy online ONLY.

Christ, paranoid much? I take it you've worked in games retail, then?

Walk into an HMV, Gamestation or any other games retailer for that matter (in my area) and look at the many copies of individual titles that are unsealed and marked as NEW.
Multiples of the same empty game cases with disks and booklets shoved away in a drawer - who decides to remove the sealing on so many copies? How many do you need for display purposes?
Contents removed from storage and roughly inserted back into the cases - as one with the same mantra:

"trading anything in today, mate"

Please don't take me for an idiot - it happens in all areas, I've worked in manufacturing for over 20 years, where money is concerned any chance for a quick buck.

Games/DVD/CD/clothing/electronics yadda, yadda - you name it - stick it back on the rack, back on the shelf. Doesn't matter some MUG will eventually keep it 'cos he can't be arsed/too embarrassed to complain/return the items.

If the customer doesn't like it tough, they can go elsewhere, the only thing that matters is 'the bottom line' : PROFIT

simple fact.

eBay definition of new "New: A brand-new, unused, unopened, undamaged item (including handmade items). "

spot the difference..........

[charlesr]

If it hasn't got the wrapper on, it's not new. Does this still happen? I only buy games online so I wouldn't know.

[Flabio]

It's not like this is new, the way some of you are going on you'd think this is something they only started doing this week.

I understand the paranoia issues now there are redeem codes etc... in the boxes, but this is just the way games retail is in this country.

I don't have any issue with it to be honest.

[Decider-VT]

Walk into an HMV, Gamestation or any other games retailer for that matter (in my area) and look at the many copies of individual titles that are unsealed and marked as NEW.
Multiples of the same empty game cases with disks and booklets shoved away in a drawer - who decides to remove the sealing on so many copies? How many do you need for display purposes?

As many as necessary. Do you know what supplier commitments are? It's when publishers pay us to rack games in strategic positions throughout the shop- end-on displays at the front of store, charts, etc. Now, take a game like Skyrim. Do you have any idea of how popular that is over the first week of sale? Dozens of people wander through a store with it in their hands/baskets, and we have to make sure that there are enough for people to wander into the store and pick up a copy from the same place as everybody else, while making sure that the aforementioned supplier commitments are fulfilled. That requires dozens of display copies, while we sell the sealed ones first. Publishers often send reps to photograph our displays, and if we have the stock and the commitments are not adhered to, they complain to our head office. This threatens allocations of future launch stock, extra items and supply of back catalogue.

Contents removed from storage and roughly inserted back into the cases - as one with the same mantra:

"trading anything in today, mate"

Not said in my store. Or any of the stores I've worked in, for that matter. Again, can't speak for GAME, etc.

Please don't take me for an idiot - it happens in all areas, I've worked in manufacturing for over 20 years, where money is concerned any chance for a quick buck. Games/DVD/CD/clothing/electronics yadda, yadda - you name it - stick it back on the rack, back on the shelf. Doesn't matter some MUG will eventually keep it 'cos he can't be arsed/too embarrassed to complain/return the items. If the customer doesn't like it tough, they can go elsewhere, the only thing that matters is 'the bottom line' : PROFIT

simple fact.

You're basing a clearly ill-informed opinion on conjecture, then presenting it as fact in spite of contrary evidence. What you've described simply doesn't go on. I've worked in games retail for nearly ten years. It doesn't happen. There's no big conspiracy to rip people off. In fact, we try to treat customers with a lot more respect than we usually receive in return. I'd really suggest that you go back and read my previous post in detail:

we just try to make the best of a bad situation- leave the games sealed, have them stolen. Gut them and face complaints about standards on the internet. Damned if you do and damned if you don't.

eBay definition of new "New: A brand-new, unused, unopened, undamaged item (including handmade items). "

spot the difference..........

Are you really citing eBay as some sort of standard?

[moonwhistle]

Barring games being missing required codes or some such I don't see what all the fuss is about. We are talking mass produced disposable media, not art or collectibles. Buy it, play it, flog it. I really don't care if a new game isn't sealed, nor do the vast majority in my experience. It's just a very vocal minority of plastic fetishists who obsess over this stuff. A game doesn't have to be sealed to be new, for years most games weren't sealed. It's becoming the norm now though. I'm pretty sure Konami never sealed any PS2 or Xbox games. Does that make them used?