UK retailer GAME has announced that it will not be stocking Mass Effect 3, one of the biggest games of the year. This news follows previous announcements that the chain wouldn't be stocking The Last Story, and until recently had no plans to sell Ubisoft's PS Vita launch lineup.
According to an alleged internal memo, leaked to Eurogamer, GAME blames unfavorable credit terms. The implication seems to be that GAME was not offered a good deal in exchange for selling the game, so it made a "very difficult decision."
While it's certainly believable that EA would offer a retailer a bum deal, this is still reflecting very poorly on the UK's most powerful videogame retailer. Not stocking high profile titles is becoming a "thing" for the company, and I'd say that GAME not stocking Mass Effect 3 is like a movie theater being unable to show The Hobbit. It's embarrassing.
Many pundits have confidently declared that GAME will not die because of these recent shenanigans, and that may be true -- but you can't convince me that it's not in some real hot water at the moment. A game store that can't sell games is a game store that's in a pretty bad position.
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Contest:
8:00 AM on 02.29.2012 | 
Of course the real story here isn't Mass Effect 3, it's that after SSX they won't be stocking any EA games at all. Cutting a whole publisher out is a helluva step. Makes me wonder if theres some of that good ol' publisher-store battling going on over used games and online passes, what with EA pushing Origin (not to mention all the pre-release DLC and passes) and GAME getting most of its money from second hand sales.
FUUUUUUUUUUUUU
What about Gamestation? They're owned by GAME, aren't they? Will they be selling it?
Also, no one can say anything bad about Gamestop now.
More info is definitely needed, much more than some alleged internal memo. A large retailer doesn't pull popular product from the shelves out of spite.
Amazon, Grainger games, Take my money and in return don't turn into another GAME
[i]Why is this happening?
GAME are a hugely popular brand with gamers of all ages. The high street is having a tough time at the moment because people have less money to spend. We're doing as much as we can to give our customers the widest possible range during this time, but as flagged before, we need our partners help in order to do this. We want to be in a position where we're selling as much of their products as we possibly can. We need their help to do this and that's what we're working on at the moment.
Will this keep happening?
As we have stated before, we are still negotiating with our partners which will mean we can stock as much product as we possibly can.
Will you stock Mass Effect in the future?
We may do.[/i]
Rest of it is here.
"Oh, great. Wonderful....Shhhhhit!"
Jesus Christ, not Grainger Games. Have some dignity, go to HMV or shop with Play or Zavvi.
Speaking of, VCUK4OFF40 gets you £4 off the price at Zavvi. The N7 edition there is already £5 less than other places. Interetsingly, Zavvi have suddenly got a lot of EA stuff on their site, including a ME3 skin, a contest, offers on extra reward points and mentions of extra content. Makes me think they've known about this for a while.
I wasn't supporting an publisher, I was supporting a retailer and now that retailers has let me done three times in the last month that's it.
So you little fuck heads who think you know everything about the game industry and how they're 'hoarding' these invisible assets go fuck yourself. It's not all a big conspiracy, I just wanted my fucking Space game with no complications. I don't give a shit who the publisher is.
or maybe...maybe I secretly support EA fanatically just to keep you up at night.
GAME have had terrible customer service in recent months, and I haven't liked their business practices in years.
I smell some closures and serious downsizing.
I don't know much about Gamestop, but both GAME and Gamestation do sell a lot of used games, and I've heard they actively encourage used sales from customers.
I miss when Gamestation used to buy and resell retro games and consoles like NES.
Game and gamestation are owned by the same company, I think play.com too, same as hmv and zavi are owned by the same company.
A company runs to make profit, they make profit by buying cheaper than they sell it. Ea are trying to make it so they're there own distribution company with ea passes, origin and other fees like day one dlc. Game wants to make profit, but ea want more money and won't give in to better deals, which in the long run will hurt ea because not everyone buys online. I see this more as an end to ea if shops no longer sell their games. Just because you have the internet and a credit card doesn't mean everyone has them.
In my area game is usually £5 chapter than other shops plus you get bonus content and money off other games, I got dark souls, batman, warhammer and gears3 for 99p each. When they close it will be a sad day.
I really can't stand this series. If I knew my boyfriend liked this and call of duty I wouldn't have even concidered dating him. All day long all I hear is BOOM bang bang peoooow BOOOM! <----guns and explosions and stuff.....thats my weekends folks just because a new game is coming out and he has to replay the first two before he can play the new one. Okay so I did the same thing with fatal frame but they take me 3 hours each to complete. Before you judge me I tried to be the good girlfriend and play call of duty....I kicked his butt apparently my resident evil playing has made me more advanced with a gun and combat knife than him. I fired, I ducked and I threw grenades until I realised it wasn't a stradegy it was mind numbing. I gave Mass effect ago and I fouund the same problem that and Xbox controls (my boyfriend loves his Xbox more than me)do my head in. The camera angles made me feel sick and I pyhsically couldn't play it. He swear he only fracking likes it because they fracking swear all the time and it fracking makes the story like dark and edgey. The story line doesn't have a thing, their in space they travel with alien tech, they fight alien races that won't follow the alliance rules .......whoa Star Trek the begining...I <3 Star Trek. Anyway rant
I really can't stand this series. If I knew my boyfriend liked this and call of duty I wouldn't have even concidered dating him. All day long all I hear is BOOM bang bang peoooow BOOOM! <----guns and explosions and stuff.....thats my weekends folks just because a new game is coming out and he has to replay the first two before he can play the new one. Okay so I did the same thing with fatal frame but they take me 3 hours each to complete. Before you judge me I tried to be the good girlfriend and play call of duty....I kicked his butt apparently my resident evil playing has made me more advanced with a gun and combat knife than him. I fired, I ducked and I threw grenades until I realised it wasn't a stradegy it was mind numbing. I gave Mass effect ago and I fouund the same problem that and Xbox controls (my boyfriend loves his Xbox more than me)do my head in. The camera angles made me feel sick and I pyhsically couldn't play it. He swear he only fracking likes it because they fracking swear all the time and it fracking makes the story like dark and edgey. The story line doesn't have a thing, their in space they travel with alien tech, they fight alien races that won't follow the alliance rules .......whoa Star Trek the begining...I <3 Star Trek. Anyway rant to boyfriend over. Hope he reads this I want to see his face lol!
I really can't stand this series. If I knew my boyfriend liked this and call of duty I wouldn't have even concidered dating him. All day long all I hear is BOOM bang bang peoooow BOOOM! <----guns and explosions and stuff.....thats my weekends folks just because a new game is coming out and he has to replay the first two before he can play the new one. Okay so I did the same thing with fatal frame but they take me 3 hours each to complete. Before you judge me I tried to be the good girlfriend and play call of duty....I kicked his butt apparently my resident evil playing has made me more advanced with a gun and combat knife than him. I fired, I ducked and I threw grenades until I realised it wasn't a stradegy it was mind numbing. I gave Mass effect ago and I fouund the same problem that and Xbox controls (my boyfriend loves his Xbox more than me)do my head in. The camera angles made me feel sick and I pyhsically couldn't play it. I swear he only fracking likes it because they fracking swear all the time and it fracking makes the story like dark and edgey. The story line doesn't have a thing, their in space they travel with alien tech, they fight alien races that won't follow the alliance rules .......whoa Star Trek the begining...I <3 Star Trek. Anyway rant to boyfriend over. Hope he reads this I want to see his face lol!
Fact is, on average, most people don't know what the situation is with GAME and Gamestation, not because they're "morons", but because they're either part of a large US readership, who are exempt from knowing about UK stores, or just regular UK consumers who just see different brands, because the parent company doesn't like to be explict about who they own.