Gamestop isn't entirely delighted by free digital games

sharkboy1200

sharkboy1200

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Sep 11, 2013
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Generally speaking, hardware manufacturers and games retailers are natural partners, seeking to create order and control in the universe.

The console companies make the machines and the retailers sell the machines and both profit from the sale of games for the machines.

But as the nature of retail shifts, so too does the relationship between the retailers and the hardware companies, a ripple that threatens the harmony tying these powerful forces together.

As the digital era gets into full swing, it's Sony and Microsoft which become the chief beneficiaries, selling games directly to consumers without the need for mall store-fronts or even online retail hubs. The console companies become retailers. This puts them in direct competition with their chums at companies such as GameStop.

And if there is one thing competing retailers are most likely to get antsy about, it's price.
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In its investor call yesterday, GameStop president Tony Bartel made a comment that can only be interpreted as a criticism of Sony's and Microsoft's digital retail strategies. "We want to help ensure that our industry does not make the same mistake as other entertainment categories by driving the perceived value of digital goods significantly below that of a physical game," he said, according to Gamasutra.

Both Microsoft and Sony have worked hard to tie consumers into digital subscription plans that come with generous game giveaways and discounts. PlayStation Plus and Xbox Live Gold offer good value to consumers by delivering up digital goods with mostly nominal costs at a low price. They also offer extreme competition to retailers, whose costs are always actual and often onerous.
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At this time of year, retailers are looking to sell as many video games as possible to people who are buying or receiving consoles for the first time. This becomes more difficult when consumers are being offered a wide array of hardware bundles, attractively priced, and including top-branded games. Retailers do not make much money from hardware units, and rely on software after-sales to make the exercise worthwhile.

Consumers flush with big-name games bundled in with their consoles, being offered digital discounts beamed directly into their homes, are less likely to buy full-priced games. Consumers who buy digital games are also, of course, not to be seen trading games at GameStop counters, an area which brings in the company's biggest margins.

During its call with investors, GameStop claimed that "$100 million worth of games have been digitally delivered for free in hardware bundles" so far this year. In a retailer's mind, this is all lost profit. Little wonder Bartel is miffed. He put the argument in terms of the overall health of the industry. "What we produce has value, and we should protect that value," he said.

If Bartel is making these statements during investor calls, you an be certain more direct conversations are going on in Microsoft's, Sony's and GameSpot's meeting rooms in Redmond, San Mateo and Grapevine.

Given that GameStop managed to bring in over $2 billion in revenues in its most recent quarter, you might think this is all a touch academic. But the company missed its profits targets. Games retailers are haunted by the terrible specters of the likes of Tower Records and Blockbuster Video, once mighty physical retailers, now absent from the strip malls of America, killed off by price-cutting and digital distribution.

For console companies, retailers must be kept sweet, while they transition themselves into an Apple-like state of sublimation, away from the mundane bonds of physical retail.
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http://www.polygon.com/2014/11/21/7...-are-giving-you-games-and-gamestop-isnt-happy
 
With the move to digital games, I think the writing on the wall is there for Gametop. First music stores, then video stores, and now it will be gaming stores.
 
Makes sense, many people still buy/sell used physical games from EBGames/Gamestop.
 
If we can add Gamestop to the list that includes Tower Records and Blockbuster Video then all the better. The robber barrens at Gamestop offer far less consumer value then their vinyl or vhs counterparts while still managing to pull in healthy, if not expected, profits. Gamestop has been f***ing customers so hard for so long I will be happy when they are finally f***ed.

I guess Microsoft wasn't so far fetched when it unsuccessfully tried to launch a primarily digital console. If only the world hadn't glommed onto Sony's fear mongering and instead followed Microsoft's path, Gamestop might not be as bad off - since MS was working to allow digital trades at brick and mortar stores. Problem is, Sony didn't have a hand to play at the time so made up this bulls*** about 'saving' physical media. Well, if Sony is so f***ing concerned about discs then why don't they mail out hard copies to anyone who buys from PSN?

Microsoft had a way to bridge the technology gap, keeping discs for installs/trades AND going digital in the process, all for the price of a weekly 5 minute check in. Many gamers, and based on what seems to be their imminent demise, Gamestop would have gladly traded a weekly check in to have that functionality. The only ones opposed were Sony, not because they 'cared' about gamers, but because they didn't have a competitive plan.

So, in retrospect, maybe Gamestop isn't the only evil empire at play here. We cannot just blame money grabbing corporation either - maybe a big part of the problem is gamers just enjoy getting f***ed in the ass. How else do you explain horse armor?
 
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Would you like to order the protection plan for the world's tiniest violin?
 
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Well at least from Best Buy I still buy the Steam or PSN cards as I get double points on video game related items. The BB is like a minute from my apartment so doesn't take much to swing by after work. I can go digital when I want but still support a local store.
 
dr-evil-crying1.gif
 
I hate gamestop, burn for all I care. Long as the industry continues to be profitable I'm fine with it.
 
Give GS credit. Despite digital this and that, they are still doing pretty well as a retailer. And that's also with lots of people preferring to buy from online stores like Amazon. Their sales keep humming along and they are still profitable despite net margins of only a handful of %.

But you can tell they are really trying to diversify lately. The last few years they've been pushing the whole buy, trade, sell your tablets and smartphones trying to cash in on that segment. Not sure how successful that initiative has been, but I know a few stores where that strategy is put right at the entrance. So they are really trying to focus on that.
 
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They are screwed and there really is nothing they can do. Like the cable companies who are in a very similar position (with the exception of them being a monopoly) they will just ride out their final years trying to ass rape consumers as hard as they can. Expect an increase in exclusive content and even perhaps they can even swing complete exclusivity of some second tier titles as they grasp what they can as they fade into oblivion.
 
Intellivision said:
Give GS credit. Despite digital this and that, they are still doing pretty well as a retailer. And that's also with lots of people preferring to buy from online stores like Amazon. Their sales keep humming along and they are still profitable despite net margins of only a handful of %.

But you can tell they are really trying to diversify lately. The last few years they've been pushing the whole buy, trade, sell your tablets and smartphones trying to cash in on that segment. Not sure how successful that initiative has been, but I know a few stores where that strategy is put right at the entrance. So they are really trying to focus on that.
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Glorified f***ing pawn shop. electronics into gold lol
 
Well, I know that nobody is forced to go to Gamestop. There is Walmart, Target, Best Buy. Kmart and the endless online stores as well as digital download options.
 
f*** GameStop. They've been ripping off cash short young people for years cause they know they're desperate to get a new release. Day they close down I'll laugh like a gitty pirate.
 
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T
Lnin0 said:
If we can add Gamestop to the list that includes Tower Records and Blockbuster Video then all the better. The robber barrens at Gamestop offer far less consumer value then their vinyl or vhs counterparts while still managing to pull in healthy, if not expected, profits. Gamestop has been f***ing customers so hard for so long I will be happy when they are finally f***ed.

I guess Microsoft wasn't so far fetched when it unsuccessfully tried to launch a primarily digital console. If only the world hadn't glommed onto Sony's fear mongering and instead followed Microsoft's path, Gamestop might not be as bad off - since MS was working to allow digital trades at brick and mortar stores. Problem is, Sony didn't have a hand to play at the time so made up this bulls*** about 'saving' physical media. Well, if Sony is so f***ing concerned about discs then why don't they mail out hard copies to anyone who buys from PSN?

Microsoft had a way to bridge the technology gap, keeping discs for installs/trades AND going digital in the process, all for the price of a weekly 5 minute check in. Many gamers, and based on what seems to be their imminent demise, Gamestop would have gladly traded a weekly check in to have that functionality. The only ones opposed were Sony, not because they 'cared' about gamers, but because they didn't have a competitive plan.

So, in retrospect, maybe Gamestop isn't the only evil empire at play here. We cannot just blame money grabbing corporation either - maybe a big part of the problem is gamers just enjoy getting f***ed in the ass. How else do you explain horse armor?
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That's one way to look at it.
 
Wait. Digital games are priced higher than their disc counterparts. I thought this was enough of a bone tossing to retailers who would certainly be affected if digital sales were 50% of the price they are now.

I'm sure Blockbuster wasn't thrilled when movies / TV started going digital, with netflix and other type of services, but you can't stop progress.
 
So Gamestop says Sony and Microsoft are devaluing games? Isn't this the same Gamestop that gives you $10 trade-in for your $60 game?
 
Kassen said:
So Gamestop says Sony and Microsoft are devaluing games? Isn't this the same Gamestop that gives you $10 trade-in for your $60 game?
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If you're lucky. Seems like 90% of the time they give you like $5.
 
So far DD day one games are f***ing BS. No way they should be the same price as games in the store. They should be $10 cheaper at the least.
 
Lnin0 said:
If we can add Gamestop to the list that includes Tower Records and Blockbuster Video then all the better. The robber barrens at Gamestop offer far less consumer value then their vinyl or vhs counterparts while still managing to pull in healthy, if not expected, profits. Gamestop has been f***ing customers so hard for so long I will be happy when they are finally f***ed.

I guess Microsoft wasn't so far fetched when it unsuccessfully tried to launch a primarily digital console. If only the world hadn't glommed onto Sony's fear mongering and instead followed Microsoft's path, Gamestop might not be as bad off - since MS was working to allow digital trades at brick and mortar stores. Problem is, Sony didn't have a hand to play at the time so made up this bulls*** about 'saving' physical media. Well, if Sony is so f***ing concerned about discs then why don't they mail out hard copies to anyone who buys from PSN?

Microsoft had a way to bridge the technology gap, keeping discs for installs/trades AND going digital in the process, all for the price of a weekly 5 minute check in. Many gamers, and based on what seems to be their imminent demise, Gamestop would have gladly traded a weekly check in to have that functionality. The only ones opposed were Sony, not because they 'cared' about gamers, but because they didn't have a competitive plan.

So, in retrospect, maybe Gamestop isn't the only evil empire at play here. We cannot just blame money grabbing corporation either - maybe a big part of the problem is gamers just enjoy getting f***ed in the ass. How else do you explain horse armor?
Click to expand...

wait when the f*** did Sony talk about MS's DRM? s*** if I remember it. Yeah it was all Sony and not MS with their dumb s***ty messaging and gamers not liking that message. Yep that had nothing to do with it. It was all Sony.
 
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Kassen said:
So Gamestop says Sony and Microsoft are devaluing games? Isn't this the same Gamestop that gives you $10 trade-in for your $60 game?
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The didn't devalue the game, they bought it for 10 bucks but sell it for 55 bucks! :grin:

To be fair, its not that you do not know how much they return you. You have the choice not to sell it to them also. People do it, & admittedly often I do it also, as it is convenience.
 
Retail is dying to online (not just DD games but everything). Old habits die hard for some gamers, but physical media will die.

Best Buy is now going to the "hard sell". Try to go in there and not have a swarm of blue shirted teenagers trying to get you to buy random things.

Preloading, plus better pricing on games over time will be the final nail in the coffin.
 
In other breaking news Texas oil men believe the Tesla model S is a pile of $&@#.
 
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TOPDAWG said:
So far DD day one games are f***ing BS. No way they should be the same price as games in the store. They should be $10 cheaper at the least.
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The reason digital carries those prices is because MS and Sony are both in bed with Gamestop. If retail wasn't still a big factor with console games, they would be pushing prices and sales that say, "f*** you gamestop". They could potentially undercut retail pricing and still make more profit on new games.
 
Or they can get rid of Gamestop and still charge $60 for a digital game because they know people will buy it. There really is no reason to lower the digital prices since there is no competing store for the digital version. And I doubt they're too worried about Best Buy having some flash sale for digital codes.
 
New digital games have always been the same price on Steam as well. Not sure why people expect that. What we should expect is better sales on games that aren't brand new.
 
Yup, kill gamestop and lose access to all those retail outlets for the item(s) that can't be downloaded like hardware.

Then make deals with big box stores like Best Buy and (shiver) Wal Mart to sell hardware and download codes only. They free up floor space for other physical goods and the logistics of selling physical games. Everyone makes more money, games get cheaper and gamestop stops raping people on a daily basis.

I mean I sh!t you not. I watched this woman trade in a wii + tons of accessories + 10 or more games as well as half a dozen or more PS3 and 360 games.

She got $35 cash. I almost offered her $50 to get the stuff for my nephews and f*** gamestop, but I wasn't in the mood to stir up sh!t. I just wanted my download code and to be gone.
 
IdleHands said:
Yup, kill gamestop and lose access to all those retail outlets for the item(s) that can't be downloaded like hardware.

Then make deals with big box stores like Best Buy and (shiver) Wal Mart to sell hardware and download codes only. They free up floor space for other physical goods and the logistics of selling physical games. Everyone makes more money, games get cheaper and gamestop stops raping people on a daily basis.

I mean I sh!t you not. I watched this woman trade in a wii + tons of accessories + 10 or more games as well as half a dozen or more PS3 and 360 games.

She got $35 cash. I almost offered her $50 to get the stuff for my nephews and f*** gamestop, but I wasn't in the mood to stir up sh!t. I just wanted my download code and to be gone.
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What goes GS sell that can't be bought at other retailers or online?

Name one thing that can't be easily bought/sold online between people who want to resell hardware?

GS does nothing but lowball people on price.
 
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