I'm totally fed up

Games
1

Ok, I’ve had it with EB.

The store I frequent the most, on Mission street in San Francisco, has to have the dumbest, unfriendly and generally unpleasant retail clerks I’ve ever dealt with.

So, here’s the situation. (I’m not going to go into the 10+ previous episodes at this store, let’s just say they were similar to this).

I walk in, and ask for a copy of Mario Kart and Animal Crossing for the DS.

I look at the clerk, and know I’m in for it. It’s a fairly obese guy who is standing behind the counter with his mouth hanging open. His mouth never closes for the entirety of our transaction. Just hanging there slack.

So, he lumbers around behind the counter poking at the games for awhile, and comes back with Animal Crossing.

“We’re… uh… out of … um… Mario Kart”

Another one of the clerks (there are 4 of them packed behind the counter, looking equally confused) says:

“I think there’s a gutted one over there”.

Great, I think. A stickered up mess of a box, in worse shape than a used copy, sold to me as “new”. Fantastic customer service, there.

OpenMouth lumbers around the store for about 5 more minutes, and eventually comes back with a Mario Kart box. Plastered with stickers, of course.

While waiting for him, I noticed they had a copy of Taiko Drum Master on top of a game rack behind the counter.

“Hey, how much is that Taiko Drum Master up there?”

“Huh? Uhhh… I dunno”

“Can you check for me?”

“Uhhh…” OpenMouth then lumbers under the box and squints at it. “Uhhh… I think it says 30?”

“30? Ok, I’ll take that as well”.

OpenMouth then tells me “Ok… uh… I’ll uh… get it when I ring up this stuff”.

He then rings up Animal Crossing and my “NEW!!” copy of Mario Kart and hands me the bag. Then he stands there, staring at me, mouth agape.

I look back at him, waiting. He continues to stare at me.

“Uhhh, the Taiko Drum Master? Are you going to sell it to me?”

“Ohhh … uh… yeah… uh…” Then OpenMouth lumbers slowly to the back of the store, is gone for another 5 minutes, then lumbers back with a ladder. He slowly climbs up, gets the game, and brings it to the counter and rings it up.

Finally, after about 20 minutes in the store, I pick up the bag with my games in it and leave.

Fast forward to an hour later, sitting in my living room. I look at my sticky, filthy mess of a “new” box that they gave me for Mario Kart. I open it up to get the game out, and there’s no instructions in the box. Just the cartridge sitting in it. Brand new copy. Thanks.

I’m so goddamn sick of these tools at this store. I need to talk to the district manager… I’m amazed any of these guys still have jobs.

How do I go about getting the email of the EB district manager? I’ve poked around their site, and found nothing.

2

I don’t know of a way to get the district manager’s email off hand, other than to say you could ask another store for it. If you don’t want it to get them in trouble, they won’t care…

3

sounds like every single EB/gamestop I’ve ever been in in my life, except sometimes they are pimpled covered rather than obese, or a little from column a and a little from b.

Just order online or go to a big box or a mom 'n pop game store. ‘gamer’ chain stores are ALWAYS the worst place to shop if you are a gamer in my experience.

I’ve had exactly one good experience in an EB.

4

The EBs and Gamestops here are very good. I think it’s simply a product of the manager of your location. The manager at that store is probably just like them.

Anyway, go in there with your receipt and your MKDS and get your manual. While you’re there, ask them for the 1-800 number for corporate as well as the number for their District Manager. Call the DM and talk to him first. If he won’t give you satisfaction, talk to the guys at corporate.

One thing you might find is that Gamestop has taken over and they’re not nearly as pro-active about this stuff as EB was. It’s actually a really lousy thing that Gamestop bought EB because EB was generally a lot better about weeding out the goofballs in their stores.

–Dave

5

Same here. I’ll either order online or head down to Fry’s where the person at the register doesn’t speak English which is fine by me.

6

That describes just about any EB I’ve ever been in, which is why I’ve pretty much stopped shopping there. In Toronto I shopped exclusively at Gameshack in Atrium on Bay (and if anyone reading this lives in toronto and doesn’t shop there… you should, it’s cheaper to boot), and here in Montreal Gamebuzz has been satisfying my needs.

7

I’ve never liked it much, but it’s never been this bad.

I’ve shopped at various EBs around San Francisco for about 15 years now… the state of affairs has been in the crapper for the past year.

8

I’ve actually been to that EB on Mission St. I tried to buy two PC games there. The guy spent 10 minutes digging around and couldn’t find the actual discs to the empty boxes I had brought to the counter. I told him to forget it and walked right out. Never been back, either.

9

The new EBGames in our rural community always seems to have a fairly sharp fella at the desk: never tries to sell me game insurance, and I had to stop him telling me Ico-prequel conspiracy theory spoilers when I bought Shadow of the Colossus. Also, he told me to fuck the XBox360 and get a dreamcast on ebay, which is about +10 gamer lol street credits in my book.

10

Not always - the EB in the Eaton Centre sometimes scoops Gameshack by five or even ten dollars - and the staff in that EB have always been polite and helpful to me.

Gameshack is great for used games, though, and will sometimes get stock in a day or two before EB.

11

Where is Gamebuzz?

12

I have two EBs near me. One is great, with genuinely friendly and knowledgeable staff who aren’t annoying, and the other is like the diametric opposite of that store. Unfortunately, the good one is a farther drive. Nonetheless, I generally go to that one anyway.

The annoying store is staffed by guys who range from dorky and kinda creepy to just plain dorky. They follow you around the store when you are trying to browse and keep bugging you with helpful suggestions, none of which are actually helpful, since they are obviously all things that management has told them to suggest to customers. The last time I was in, they had a stack of games on the counter, which the salesdrone brought over and explained “Hey, these are the games that are really hot with our customers right now! Want to check them out?”

Uh, no. Please take your stack of overstock and get the hell away from me.

They also hover over your shoulder when you are looking at stuff on the shelves and pimp various titles that they obviously haven’t really played.

“Hey, you should try out that Star Wars Galaxies… it’s supposed to be awesome!”

Uh, no.

And they practically shake you down for trade-ins. I can walk into the store empty-handed and they’ll be like:

“Did you bring in all your old games to trade in today?”

Yeah, I sure did. They’re all up my ass, though, so you’ll have to give me a minute. Dumbass.

God, I hate that store.

13

I bought 3 used games the other day from my local EB. Got good prices on them too. (Space Channel 5 2-disk for PS2, $6. Unlimited Saga, $9. Dark Cloud 2, $15).

Luckily, I asked if they all had the [edit] manuals. Turns out Dark Cloud 2 didn’t, so he knocked off 10% for me. I was fine w/ that. The guy was nice enough – no complaints.

My big complaint is that when I got home, I spent more than 20 minutes removing stickers – AN AVERAGE OF 8 PER GAME CASE – from the cases. Even after I was done, they were sticky and marred and generally shitty looking.

If that’s how it’s going to be, they can suck it. I swear, there was as much area covered by stickers as the game itself, and of course now, at the counter THEY ADD YET ANOTHER STICKER THAT IS VERY DIFFICULT TO REMOVE ENTIRELY. They added this new sticker to each case as I was paying.

Bah.

14

It really depends on the individual store. I generally go to the San Francisco EB at the Stonestown mall because the staff there tend to be a bit more friendly and knowledgeable. The one on Jefferson near Fisherman’s Wharf isn’t bad, either. But the Mission St one, and the one downtown on Powell? Idiots.

15

wtf is the extra sticker for? so they dont buy it back or something?

if they dont want the game sold back, shouldnt it be on some list of games they do not buy anyways?

or will they buy that title back - UNLESS it was bought from them?

In which case, what the hell?

they want you to shop there all the time, right?

they want you to buy games from there.

They want you to trade in all your old games to them as well.

they also want you to buy used games from them.

So uh, why the sticker?

16

I think I probably have the best story:

I bought an Xbox at my local EB about a year and a half ago. After getting home with it, I open it up to find that it is a completely old, used one. It even had the original monster controller with it. I just sat there speechless. Needless to say, I returned it and went to Futureshop who hooked me up with everything.

If I’m buying anything from EB, it has to be sealed and in that glass cabinet behind the counter, otherwise I don’t want it.

17

Try being a woman and shopping at EB (omg there’s a chick in the store! lets giggle like 10 year old schoolgirls)

I have had mixed luck in the LA area stores. the good ones just tend to be overly enthusiastic at having a female customer, which can be useful. Then there’s the useless drooling, pimply twats such as flyinj describes.

I recently tried the Santa Monica EB at pico and lincoln - the one guy there was helpful and enthusiastic.
the Howard Hughes Center EB - when he finally got round to helping customers instead of gossiping with his friend, he turned out to be useless and smarmy.

18

Bah, too bad. I live in Etobicoke and work in Markham. I would rather have my teeth extracted without anaesthetic than drive downtown to buy games. :P

19

I’ve never seen that. Best case, it was the same price in both places, but I’ve never seen it cheaper in that EB. Speaking of, how long have you been going there? I stopped shopping at that one sometime in 2002, because of an asshole manager, of all things. This guy with a brush cut, thin, and a british accent. He freaked out on me one day when I was asking after a game, he said it hadn’t come out yet, and I told him that Gameshack had it, but had sold out (which was true, I watched the last copy sell as I walked up to their counter). He told me that was absolutely impossible, as the game wasn’t out for two more days.

Anyway, it ended up with him saying something rude that I can’t really remember, and them me asking to speak to his manager, because at that point, I thought he was just some clerk on a power trip. He told me he was the manager, and I said “Ah, well, that saves me time then, I just won’t shop here anymore.”

After that, I rarely went back. With the fact that gameshack got it faster, was often cheaper, and didn’t pitch the strategy guide bullshit (usually; occasionally they’d point out they had them, but they never tried to upsell.) I had no reason to dick around with assholes at EB.

St. Catherine street, NW side, near the Futureshop halfway between mcgill and place des arts. Right next to that used DVDs place with the flashy sign.

20

Bah, too bad. I live in Etobicoke and work in Markham. I would rather have my teeth extracted without anaesthetic than drive downtown to buy games. :P[/quote]

Well if you are ever bored, it’s pretty much right at the Dundas subway stop. So if you were up for the park’n’ride you could get there easy enough.