Game UK Could Lose $4 Million on Mass Effect 3

[MelasZepheos_v1legacy]

I'm sure the entire reason that Game isn't allowed to stock Mass Effect and they lost their credit insurance and are massively in debt is because EA are dicks. The carefully worded arguments on this thread have convinced me utterly that EA have singlehandedly managed to bring down what was once a huge game retailer.

Which HTML tag does one use for deadpan sarcasm again?

I have never ever liked Game, even since I was first getting into videogaming aged eight. Overpriced rip-offs for the second hand game sales, ridiculous markups on everything and anything they could markup, badly laid out stores and surly staff in my area. And it wasn't just once or twice, there are only three stores to buy games from where I live and two of them are Game. I have been visiting them for over a decade and it is always surly and rude staff and unhelpful managers.

As far as I'm concerned they are a terribly managed, poorly trained organisation that deserves every misfortune coming to them. And as for saying that EA is responsible for this? Get a grip. EA didn't lose them their credit insurance, EA doesn't have to take a risk on a near-bankrupt store, and EA certainly has nothing to do with their terrible management.

 

[cookyy2k]

I'm sure the entire reason that Game isn't allowed to stock Mass Effect and they lost their credit insurance and are massively in debt is because EA are dicks. The carefully worded arguments on this thread have convinced me utterly that EA have singlehandedly managed to bring down what was once a huge game retailer.

Which HTML tag does one use for deadpan sarcasm again?

I have never ever liked Game, even since I was first getting into videogaming aged eight. Overpriced rip-offs for the second hand game sales, ridiculous markups on everything and anything they could markup, badly laid out stores and surly staff in my area. And it wasn't just once or twice, there are only three stores to buy games from where I live and two of them are Game. I have been visiting them for over a decade and it is always surly and rude staff and unhelpful managers.

As far as I'm concerned they are a terribly managed, poorly trained organisation that deserves every misfortune coming to them. And as for saying that EA is responsible for this? Get a grip. EA didn't lose them their credit insurance, EA doesn't have to take a risk on a near-bankrupt store, and EA certainly has nothing to do with their terrible management.

Whilst I don't know a single thing about their dealings and looking at it from the outside, an amount of ME3 sales were guaranteed, the pre-order ones. They could presumably have reach an agreement to just supply those units that were guaranteed sales on the basis Game would pay them within one week or so of the release date.

True this would be no help for Game, i.e. staffing costs and such would have to be covered from the profit as the cost would have to be saved separately to give to EA but the customer would have got what they'd ordered, EA would have come off as a good guy making sure everyone who waited for their game can definitely play it and Game wouldn't be getting a backlash.

Though in the real world gentleman's agreements with no collateral rarely mean anything in business. Whilst I agree it isn't EA's fault they're not coming across as the "good guys" in this either. Also as said without knowing any actual dealings I can't comment. Game could have wanted the games for £1 or EA could have said £38, those things would shift dramatically who I would look less favorably on for this.

Currently I'd say the UK economy is the biggest contributor, when big name stores that used to print money are circling the drain and others are being pawed over by the administrators something is wrong. You can't really blame Game for this because they are a commodity supplier and so very precarious when money becomes short and you can't really blame EA as they're not a charity there to save struggling businesses.

 

[jelock]

This is really annoying i can't actually get mass effect 3 now as i don't have enough money to buy online (i'm 15) and so can't drive somewhere new.

bugger

Dude, what part of the country do you live in that doesnt also have a nearby Tesco, Sainsbury or HMV????

 

[Farther than stars]

When I read the word analyst I figured this information would be about as reliable as a civilian weather forecast. Then he starts off with an "assumption" and then makes another assumption in the exact same sentece. XD
Whether he might have been right or not, we'll never know, but I can't say I'm sad about seeing GAME go under. After what they did to me, I vowed to never buy anything from GAME ever again, so I wouldn't mind a new retailer on the scene to get my games at.

This whole GAME thing really irritates me as an American. GAME has been known to force publishers to delay Steam releases so as to prevent competition. This is one of the things, at least in my opinion, that caused the lackluster launch of Space Marine. They use underhanded tactics (IMO) and yet still end up failing spectacularly. I hope they completely collapse and I rarely say that about any company.

WOOHOO! You and me both. For the record, I don't think they ever actually successfully blackmailed Valve, but they sure tried to. As far as you can tell from my post though, I won't mind seeing GAME go either.

 

[Farther than stars]

Wait, didn't a past thread say this was a 'choice' of theirs or something 'for the long run'. Me confuzzled

No, no, GAME themselves said that they were "choosing" to shift their business online. But everyone knows they're only saying that because they're going under and want to save face for as long as possible. And even if they do manage to stick around long enough to make it to the online market, they'll be squashed by Steam and Amazon. They simply can't compete.

 

[Andaxay]

I don't get why GAME didn't just ask all the pre-order guys to pay full upfront then use that money to buy the coppies of ME3 ready for release date. Only order ME3 for definate sales (already payed) and no credit needed because they have the money. It doesn't help pay for staff, rent and so on but it makes more sense than this. They'd get some profit from game sales and the customers wouldn't be pissed.

They're not allowed to take full payment for something they don't physically have in stock. They can never 100% guarentee that they will get their stock. That's why we always had to refuse people who wanted to put money down for things that we were expecting stock of in. It'd be a worse situation if this happened anyway and they had to refund thousands of £40-worth of stock, they'd go bust on the spot.

 

[cookyy2k]

I don't get why GAME didn't just ask all the pre-order guys to pay full upfront then use that money to buy the coppies of ME3 ready for release date. Only order ME3 for definate sales (already payed) and no credit needed because they have the money. It doesn't help pay for staff, rent and so on but it makes more sense than this. They'd get some profit from game sales and the customers wouldn't be pissed.

They're not allowed to take full payment for something they don't physically have in stock. They can never 100% guarentee that they will get their stock. That's why we always had to refuse people who wanted to put money down for things that we were expecting stock of in. It'd be a worse situation if this happened anyway and they had to refund thousands of £40-worth of stock, they'd go bust on the spot.

They can, but it's a subtle legal point. It's true they can't take full payment for something they don't have in stock but they can (and a lot of companies do, not just video game shops) take a deposit of 100% the value of the item. Then when the product (ME3 in this case) comes in and the sale is made the deposit pays for the game, the game isn't technically bought until the customer collects it but the deposit has always been with the shop and there is nothing stopping the shop using that deposit to buy the product in the first place.

 

[Blizzarded Soul]

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Incidentally I looked at play.com a few days ago and it got taken over by some Germans called the 'Rakutan group'. Don't know how long ago that happened.

Japanese actually, and some point last year I seem to recall. Aaaanyway on topic: It pissed me off because I had pre-ordered the collectors edition and by the time I had recieved the email telling me Game would'nt be stocking ME3 it was 6PM last Wednesday and nobody had a copr anywhere *fumes*. Don't see myself pre-ordering from Game anytime soon as a result.