Retailers furious at supermarket prices

By GamesIndustry International Published 2 October, 2009

Indies want laws to stop "bully boys".

Independent UK retailers have reacted angrily to Tesco and Asda FIFA 10 promotions that have seen the supermarket giants selling the game at half its recommended retail price - and called for legislation to prevent the below cost selling of goods.

"It's bully boy pricing really," Chips MD Don McCabe told GamesIndustry.biz. "Other countries have laws against this selling at a loss for very good reason."

McCabe admitted that in the short term consumers get a good price, but said that in the longer term the closing of smaller retailers at the hands of the supermarket giants will result in less choice for those consumers.

"Once they've got the whole market they'll expand their profits, reduce the choice and screw the suppliers," said McCabe. And the only thing that can be done is what other countries have, he added, which is to "recognise the insidious march of the supermarkets model is detrimental to the consumer ultimately."

"Long term it is detrimental," he added. "It's decreased choice. You just have to look at the amount of suppliers that are screaming holy blue murder over Tesco whose businesses just get driven into the ground by the demands that some of the supermarkets make on them. At the end of the day, the only people who actually benefit from it are Tesco shareholders."

"This sort of price slaughtering has been going on for years and it will probably always happen," admited Neil Muspratt, director of SimplyGames, who refered to Tesco's pricing action as "crazy".

"The timing of this particular activity is especially unhelpful. Like it or not, software prices are on the increase and selling one of the biggest releases of the year at less than GBP 25 sends a message to consumers that any higher pricing must mean they are being ripped off.

"It is also a particularly negative way to start off the all-important Q4 period and reflects badly on the entire industry – but what do they care? We priced FIFA very competitively and our customers received it in their homes today," he added.

With the supermarkets selling at below cost, Muspratt even admits to buying his own stock from them. "We protect ourselves by keeping stocks to a minimum and, of course, by dispatching small teams of people into supermarkets to buy our next round of stock."

The retail industry is "awash" with others doing the same, said McCabe. "Buy a bit of stock up, wait for the price to go back up, then make your margins. That's retail – or that's the traditional retail model anyway. Supermarkets have turned that model on its head to a certain degree."

Many supermarkets had also sold out of all stock of the game by as early as 8.30am this morning following midnight openings which, when considering the offer is only scheduled to run this weekend in the case of some chains, will lead to large numbers of customers leaving disappointed.

"We all like cheap prices," acknowledged McCabe, "it doesn't matter whether it's games, bread, whatever."

"I understand consumers saying this is a good price, that we should get every game at this price," he says, "but ultimately it will damage the overall market."

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Comments (124) Latest comment 3 years ago

Comments for this article are now closed, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • wizlon #1 3 years ago

    I concur

  • insincere_dave #2 3 years ago

    Oh no, what will we do if all the bricks and mortar retailers go out of business!? It's not as if we have a worldwide network of computers which allows buyers and sellers to trade across vast distance cutting out on pointless inefficiencies of highstreet stores! If only someone would invent this...
    Edited by insincere_dave at 02/10/09 @ 16:36

  • bad09 #3 3 years ago

    We need cheaper games with the way the market is flooded now and if the supermarkets can give us that then good luck to 'em.

    Personally I rent now to avoid the high cost of gaming, (apart from deals on Steam or the odd Live/PSN game) a much better way of gaming these days.

  • mkreku #4 3 years ago

    "McCabe admitted that in the short term consumers get a good price, but said that in the longer term the closing of smaller retailers at the hands of the supermarket giants will result in less choice for those consumers."

    So we get less choice.. of retailers selling the game for double the price? Uh.. right.

  • thefishmonger #5 3 years ago

    Geez, they should be more worried if the supermarkets enter the 2nd hand sector. Then they'd be truely screwed.

  • Tyronne #6 3 years ago

    I remember this argument being used when the stores started selling books and I was not won over then , I would rather pay peanuts for a book in Tesco then the prices in places like waterstones but that is my choice as a consumer.

  • miiiguel #7 3 years ago

    2nd hand is bad for the industry, not supermarkets.

  • thewool #8 3 years ago

    Our local Chips is mega over-priced for new titles, not even trying to be competitive.

    Plus they sold me a 2nd hand Wiimote and Nunchuck that stanks of fags, and would do nothing about it after I took them back.

  • degville #9 3 years ago

    @mkreku you really think the supermarkets are making anything on Fifa at this early point of it's release?

  • Lotos8ter #10 3 years ago

    Fuck you Bobby Kotick, you fat greedy cunt

  • Sir_TimAlot #11 3 years ago

    illogical logic melts my brain........

  • thewool #12 3 years ago

    plus... Don should realise there's a recession biting and at the moment I personally haven't got a pot to piss in.

    He needs to stop this inflated price fixing throughout his franchise and I'll shop local again. For now though - de, deee, de de de (taps arse pocket)

  • Sir_TimAlot #13 3 years ago

    PC world next to my office sells Platinum PS3 games for £39.99, well they have them on the shelves for that much, doubt they sell many.

  • Jesterrr #14 3 years ago

    It's worth pointing out that I was wholly unaware of this... until now. Bet they're loving the free publicity.

  • JahB #15 3 years ago

    @thewool

    supermarkets are trying to cut out other retailers from the video game market by selling games at a loss, which will inevitably lead to those retailers closing/going out of business. and at that time, supermarkets will ramp up the price to whatever they want because the competition is gone.

    this is seriously fucked, and while i'd never though i'd say that - i'm with the retailers on this one.

  • Monsta #16 3 years ago

    This has been happening for years.

    I remember when i worked for an indie woolworths used to sell games for less than we could buy them in for. Now most of the indie's are gone and its HMV or the internet here.

  • Monsta #17 3 years ago

    Tescos buying 100,000 coopies of the game is bound to get a better cost price than the local game shop buy 10. The supermarkets might not be losing much but still selling way below indie cost

  • RedSparrows #18 3 years ago

    PC World is hardly an independent, which is what this article is about.

    Supermarkets offer 'choice' that is chosen by them, not you. If all other shops were to vanish, what would it be? A monopoly of homogenised top 10 choice.

    Woot, I want it now.

    Oh wait.

  • wizlon #19 3 years ago

    Although high street stores can be a bit overpriced it's nothing compared to the underhand tactics of the supermarket giants, they are so morally bankrupt they make Satan look like Santa.

  • soviet_ #20 3 years ago

    @Lotos8ter, I just got busted at work for laughing out loudly at that comment, brilliant

  • RedSparrows #21 3 years ago

    'Oh no, what will we do if all the bricks and mortar retailers go out of business!? It's not as if we have a worldwide network of computers which allows buyers and sellers to trade across vast distance cutting out on pointless inefficiencies of highstreet stores! If only someone would invent this... '

    Of course, this is an alternative. It's rather lacking in terms of the 'bigger picture', but for this narrow band it's a good choice.

  • Monsta #22 3 years ago

    2nd hand games are bad for the industry

    Most of the are only a couple of £ cheaper than a new copy so not a great deal for user and the profits for retailer are much higher, hence the price location the take

  • miiiguel #23 3 years ago

    I don't think 25£ is too much for a game. It depends on the game actually.

    The only problem, with this eventual scenario is that we won't be able to find many other games in supermarkets other than FIFA's or NFS's.

    Oh, and I really dislike the 2nd hand market. The money they give you for your precious game is ridicule, and they even, often, try to get me into buying 2nd hand rather than new. Example: last week I went to buy a new 360 controler, and the guy at Game said: "don't you want a used one", I said, promplty "no way!", and he still insisted. No means no.
    Edited by miiiguel at 02/10/09 @ 16:57

  • thewool #24 3 years ago

    I agree Jah to an extent, but Chips are not even trying to compete.

    I remember when I was trying to get hold of NG:Sigma on the PS3 and they were after £50 for it! I challenged the RRP and was told that it was set. I think Chips set all their prices across the board eliminating pricing wars between stores, which seems to hobble shops ability to compete locally against other shops, inde or otherwise.

    p.s. should just add that I'm not in eithers demoraphic at the moment as I'm only really buying 2nd hand yr old games at the moment due to the stack of old stuff still to get through. Just finished Project Zero III and am now playing Star Wars: Lego.

    Edited by thewool at 02/10/09 @ 17:01

  • kentmonkey #25 3 years ago

    As has been said, less choice of people sticking to the RRP. If they want to lose money on it, then fine. They're not losing money, they're doing it to get brand loyalty and to hopefully sell other items to the consumer whilst they're in store. It's an effective form of marketing.

    On the other hand, bitching about it and admitting to getting people to buy stock from Tesco's and keep hold of it, until the price goes back up and you can start raking the profits in, isn't a very effective form of marketing.

    If it meant that the developers were getting substantially less money for their efforts then I'd be disappointed (they do get less, but not substantially less, but as a bonus they sell a metric fucktonne because of these stores promoting the hell out of it). Just the same as I am with the farmers that get less for their produce as they put a lot of hard work in. Colour me not bothered if somebody who's sole effort is to purchase the game, take it out of a cardboard box, stick it on a shelf, and then take someone's money for it doesn't get a decent £20 for their efforts.

    Instead of trying to compete on FIFA, why not give consumers other choice by selling games that the supermarkets don't hold. They don't have much choice after all (at least none of the stores I've been in have ever had much choice).

  • udat #26 3 years ago

    One issue is that supermarkets only tend to sell the current chart hits and well promoted games, whereas games shops carry a wider variety of games that may never see the light of day on a shop shelf once the only options are buying online or at a supermarket.

    We are rolling along the road laid out by american retail ten years ago, and the end result basically is as described, less choice for the consumer because competition is limited to large retailers like Tesco (or Walmart, etc. in the US) and the internet.

    I'm not agreeing that legislation is the answer, just agreeing that the current symptoms do lead to predictable outcomes.

  • layleeloo #27 3 years ago

    They ARE LOSING MONEY. All supermarkets are losing money on the games they sell at £25. Even though they buy many copies they do not get it at a low enough price to profit on it. It is not about them wanting to rid the world of other game retailers so they can then charge what they want. Gaming is hardly their core demographic.

    They simply do it to get people in stores and hope when in there they buy other items too, of which they make much larger profit margin on. It is a crap situation, as it is to only boost supermarkets profits on OTHER items in store. They do not care about the damage they are doing to the industry and other game retailers, so long as they continue to sell their other items in store

    haha - HOW CAN I GET VOTED DOWN BY STATING WHAT IS THE ACTUAL REASON THEY ARE DOING THIS? IGNORANT TOSSERS.
    Edited by layleeloo at 02/10/09 @ 17:07

  • IronGiant #28 3 years ago

    Let's see Tesco and Asda try this trick with Modern Warfare2.. go on please do it!!! ;)

  • kentmonkey #29 3 years ago

    But that's where they're missing a trick (as I posted above). They should concentrate their efforts on getting the consumer into the store by offering stuff supermarkets can't. But they don't. They've turned into glorified box shifters (not all of them, but certainly most of them) that seem to believe that they deserve a huge profit for what is very little work on their part.

    They should go down the niche games market, branch out into offering items that supermarkets don't stop. How many retailers now carry many accessories? My locals have games and consoles. I want a steering wheel. What about a joystick for fighting games? Entice me in, don't offer me the same shit I can buy everywhere else and for cheaper, when you're not offering any better service.

    If they offered a better service then fine, but very rarely do they. Actually supermarkets even tend to be a bit leaner about taking games back (not usually out of choice, usually down to some numpty that doesn't know or who is too hung over to care).

  • RobotRocker #30 3 years ago

    Well maybe the independent shops should tell Mr.Game Publisher that Nintendo's price fixing shenanigans ended years ago and maybe that selling games for £25 is a good idea as its a better impulse purchase price so they can compete with Supermarkets and increase their own revenue.

    Of course with a corrupt as fuck industry making money in the first place anyway, we aint going to get squat. Pricks.

    / Remember that awful Little Britain game that in-explicably shot to the top of the charts two/three years back. It was RRP'd at £15. Imagine that with a good game
    // Also remember the fairplay campaign in 2003 where ELSPA shit its pants when customers were told just how bad they were being ripped off on the BBC? Those were fun times weren't they?

  • paulf #31 3 years ago

    the joys of capitalism

  • kangarootoo #32 3 years ago

    @layleeloo

    You are a little late to the party to act like you are the first person to explain market dynamics. The article itself did that in part, and several other posters beat you to the punch. If you get voted down it will be due to your excessive upper case usage and lack of puctuation.



    Anyway.

    Small shops are always under threat by larger operators. But I can't help but think that some indie game shops have been behind the curve for several years now. They could have got off their butts and dealt with what has been a slow change in the game retail market (its not like Argos only started stocking games yesterday), but instead they wish to rely on legislation to protect their profits.

    Small businesses should be online, unless they are selling goods that customers prefer to buy in person (such as food and clothing). It is all very well talking about variety and competetiveness, but that is a seperate issue to running your business in an inefficient manner. Lots of small retailers have moved online in recent years (helped in no small part by eBay). If Chips have utterly failed to recognise the same opportunities that have been freely available to them, its their own fault really.
    Edited by kangarootoo at 02/10/09 @ 17:20

  • layleeloo #33 3 years ago

    @kangarootoo

    This is a gaming forum full of retarded opinions (mine being no exception), not a bloody English lesson.
    Edited by layleeloo at 02/10/09 @ 17:36

  • ps3owner #34 3 years ago

    If Asda and Tesco sell COD4MW2 for £25 then there will be a war... please make it happen. I want to join in :).

    and re topic, if they even admit to purchasing the stock from Tsco/Asda then surely they are digging their own grave here?!

  • layleeloo #35 3 years ago

    @robotrocker

    "Remember that awful Little Britain game that in-explicably shot to the top of the charts two/three years back. It was RRP'd at £15. Imagine that with a good game"

    Thats because it was probably made for a tenner and was a niche game. Putting something like MW2 out at £15 would probably sell no more copies than it would anyway, as the people who will buy that game will do at any price. All it will do its sell the same amount quicker to those who cant afford it at full price so would either have to save for longer. Either way that person is still only going to buy the one copy regardless of the price. Just alters the timing of the purchase.

    Fair enough if theres a new game or IP people are unsure of, maybe the price of £15 for example would encourage more people to try it. but with established games the price will make no difference on purchase, just the timing of it. As MW2 will prove. Everyone moaned about the price, but the fanboys will still go any pay whatever is demanded for it.

  • Collymilad #36 3 years ago

    The asshole in me says "Stop bitching about people getting games cheaper, screw you"

    But then the rational part of me completely sees the guys point. What he says is true, although I don't think it would happen as quickly or as simply as that.

    However I don't believe that a price over £45 is needed or justified.
    Edited by Collymilad at 02/10/09 @ 17:30

  • autogunner #37 3 years ago

    I still dont get why games are so expensive. I went to see District 9 at the cinema last weekend and that cost a tenner - the bugeet for that must have been the same as most AAA titles, with a similar amount of man hours... what gives?

  • spidermanalf #38 3 years ago

    But these are loss leaders for supermarkets, it gets people through the doors, buy Fifa 10, oh look what is in the sale right next to the top 10, I will buy Assasins Creed for 8quid.

    I feel bad for independents. There is one near me that is thriving though, as they only deal in used games.

    You get a fair price and they resell them with a 5-10 quid mark up!

  • FladgeMangle #39 3 years ago

    The "less choice" argument is a valid one because supermarkets only sell the top 30 or top 40 games. Some of the big retailers don't even stock PSP games (Tesco don't at least).

    Pop down to your local Asda and see if you can pick up a copy Uncharted 1. Go on. I can wait.

    .....

    .....

    Did you manage it? Without retailers like Gamestation and Chips, high street shoppers will be hard pressed to buy anything that isn't of the moment, so to speak.

    Of course you can always shop online, but a lot of folks still actually like old fashioned walk-in and pick up things shops. Plus you're not at the mercy of the postal system or comedy delivery companies that wait until you go out before trying to deliver a package that needs signing for.

  • Chufty #40 3 years ago

    If they want laws to stop it then there should also be laws that stop their employees going in and snapping up all the cheap games then selling them on for a profit.

    There is, in fact, a law against this. If they pay VAT on stock, it has to be sold as second hand. Which is why that was a tongue-in-cheek comment.

    I agree that there should be laws against selling products below cost price. This applies to much more than just videogames in supermarkets.

  • Bazfrag #41 3 years ago

    The choice of games in most stores is limited. True indies have more obscure titles and imports, but everyone else. including pc world, sell your fifas. gtas, wii fit etc. There is barely enough choice anyway.

    Thats why online rocks! More choice, as cheap as Tesco and not as shit as pcw.

  • soviet_ #42 3 years ago

    Who buys games from indie stores anyway? I never have.

    This guy and others like him that have the same attitude can go the way of the dinosaur for all I care. I buy online, and I doubt that's going anywhere. Besides, by the time the big nasty companies take over and we are left with little choice, digital distribution will be the norm as is the case with my PC gaming for the last 2 years

  • Cappy #43 3 years ago

    Funnily enough I do feel a bit ripped off when games are over £25 already.

  • Fuser #44 3 years ago

    Someone up here said £25 for a game is 'too high'...why exactly?
    The amount of time, investment and skill that goes into a high profile release like FIFA, ODST and the like needs to have an associated price. And for the amount of hours you'll play it for - compared to £7 for 2 hours in the cinema - gives great value.
    My kids are still playing Mario Galaxy and LEGO Star Wars now - £30 on each very well spent.

  • Farstarbuck #45 3 years ago

    I come from an area of the UK where there is no games competition for both Asda and Tesco in my local town. So the theory of...."once they destroy the competition then they'll hike all the prices up" well sorry that still hasn't happened, neither for bread or milk or pretty much most things that Supermarkets sell. I fear these scare mongering tactics by local retailers is a desperate bid to keep themselves afloat. As others have mentioned, they want to sell you brand new games for full RRP and also rip you on second hand games. If cost price of FIFA is £32 quid then local retailers need to get creative with prices to draw in footfall and hopefully impress them with a decent friendly customer service and a reason to return, problem is they are mostly owned and run my rude, obnoxious people who don't like kids and don't have the time of day for people. Serves them right IMO.

  • RobotRocker #46 3 years ago

    @layleeloo

    Wait a minute. You said people wont buy MW2 at £15? If Activision sold MW2 at that Price they would near triple sales of it as its a better impulse purchase. Most people who buy and collect DVD's will usually pick up one or two as an impulse even if they dont like the genre since its only a £10 and wont hit the wallet awfully. A standard industry RRP of £25 for new titles would easily make impulse purchasing viable and also vastly reduce the profitability of the 2nd hand market massively. But hey, dont let logic get in the way of your arguments.

    /lol industry greed. I am praying for a crash.

  • youhavenomail #47 3 years ago

    Anyone who is against me being able to buy a copy of an annual footie game with a few updates over the last one for £25 can go out of business as far as I'm concerned.

  • kendoji #48 3 years ago

    Here in Holland I basically wouldn't dream of buying a game from a retailer (unless desperate), seeing as virtually all games stay at their launch price of around 60 Euros for at least a year after launch, and are only modestly priced down after that.

    Screw the retailers. Long live internet shopping.

  • MrSpew #49 3 years ago

    And he goes and buys his games from the same store! Hypocritical arsewipe dickhead. So he doesn't even buy his own stock from suppliers so he can STFU.

  • Ceaser1980 #50 3 years ago

    Um yeah I know Don McCabe can imagine how upset he is is LOL for the rest of us lowest price the better I can that's Capitalism!

  • Eraysor #51 3 years ago

    What a communist!

  • waynenot #52 3 years ago

    I can't think of an indie I've visited in the last ten years that hasn't been staffed by chancers trying their luck with silly prices. Fuck them - I don't owe them a living.

  • byron_hinson #53 3 years ago

    I'd happily buy at places other than Tesco if these stores actually sell games for less than £40 to £45 that they are selling games for right now - a complete rip off.

  • davisorle #54 3 years ago

    Post deleted at 20:44:35 16-04-2012

  • DAN.E.B #55 3 years ago

    I just bought Dead Space second hand from Play.com for £8.20 result!
    rented it before but only done a couple of levels so i bought it
    i would not pay full price for which is now an old game
    the second hand market isnt killing the industry that much ,if i could only get it for £40 i just would,nt bother.
    90% of my games are bought as new tho.

  • septimus #56 3 years ago

    Heh, they are angry that the super markets aren't raping us to the extent they do. Nice.

  • smelly #57 3 years ago

    Why are the indies complaining? They'll just buy said game back off the kids for a cheaper price than tesco and resell it closer to full price anyhow.

  • smelly #58 3 years ago

    @JahB Quote : "supermarkets are trying to cut out other retailers from the video game market by selling games at a loss, which will inevitably lead to those retailers closing/going out of business. and at that time, supermarkets will ramp up the price to whatever they want because the competition is gone.

    this is seriously fucked, and while i'd never though i'd say that - i'm with the retailers on this one"



    Are these are the SAME retailers who screw over the people who MAKE the games by selling second hand games close to full price and keeping all the profits to themselves?

    Yeah - i feel soooo sorry for them!

  • Chupakun #59 3 years ago

    Go ASDA and Tesco! Cheaper games? Thank you very much.

  • HermitArcader #60 3 years ago

    Post deleted at 09:17:39 22-12-2011

  • MENTAL1ST Verified Senior Software Engineer, Picsel UK Ltd. #61 3 years ago

    I have said it before, and I'll say it again: fuck the shops. The mainstream can get their games from trsco and the preordering hardcore can get them from shopto or amazon.

    Besides, I bought Shadow of the Colossus from Tesco on it's release day, for about 8 quid off it's rrp.

  • chrisjm #62 3 years ago

    game and EB used to have the odd price fight selling below rrp. game now only sell at rrp and dont price match as no one left to price match due to lack of competition. lets see game try to buy tesco like they did gamestation and eb.
    Edited by chrisjm at 02/10/09 @ 22:05

  • scouserfuller9 #63 3 years ago

    I work at Tesco and had loads of customers running up to me asking for the game. My store was out of stock when I arrived at 12pm. With it being out of stock this early there'd have been loads of gamers still out there so desperate for the game they'd be off to other shops just to pay the extra!

  • zedzee #64 3 years ago

    What' s that? Supermarkets selling consoles games cheap as chips (get it)?!

    Thanks for the tip, Don!

  • superteddy #65 3 years ago

    I use my local shop , which is Morrisons, Game ,HMV , and Gamstation are 7 miles away and £5 pound parking or £5.20 busfare, i do not remember a indi for five or six years. On the matter of more obscure games it is no good going to the main 3, the net is the only place to go, even game sells things that are online only, they only get one or two special edtions, if you are not there first you miss out,

  • captain_monk #66 3 years ago

    @MilkybKid1985 - "No second hand is not bad for the industry, it means increased sales as gamers have more money to throw around. I would not buy half as many games new if i couldn't trade in my old games and buy the occasional one second hand."

    Did you seriously just say that?

    Not a single penny of a second hand sale goes to the people that make these games, it's just the shops that make a fortune from them, and they are NOT the industry. At least when supermarkets sale games at a loss the developers still get the full amount for the sale.

    Think about this for a moment, from the money that you buy a new game for the money has to be split between the developer, the publisher, the retailer, advertising costs, the publishers, shipping, tax (I have probably forgotten a few area). From this list the largest wedge of the cash pie goes to publishers and then the retailers. (it might also interest you to know that with the developers usually only receiving about 5% if they have a deal to take royalties). Note: I did see a chart showing this price breakdown somewhere, but not sure where. Will keep looking for a bit and post if I find it.

    Now the retailers that are selling games 2nd hand are quite often pushing the second hand over the original but only dropping the price by a few quid and and buying them in for a few quid too. On each of these second hand sales, the retailer makes ALL of the money. Bearing in mind that a lot of people who buy 2nd hand also sale there games back to the shops means that the game may have had multiple owners in the past not just one.

    So, imagine a popular new game sales at £45 (I'm just making up figures here), and the retailer gets a £5 cut of that.
    The game comes back a few weeks later and gets bought for £5. Ok, so no profits yet (but also no real lose as they have the product back). Now that games gets put on the shelves again at £40 second hand and gets put nearer the door that the new games and pushed by the staff. Now when that sales that is an instant £40 in the pocket of the shop and none of the other people involved in the game (the devs and publishes get anything). If that game then comes back and sales 2 more times, thats a total of profit to the shop of £110 (3 2nd hand sales @ 40 = 120, 2 purchases from customers @ -5 = -10, totoal = 110). Remember I said the new game sold at £45 and the retailer took £5 from that, that only leaves £40 to be spread between everyone else.

    So after 3 2nd hand sales a shop makes £110 and the devs, publisher, advertising agency, shipping companies, etc) have £40 to split between them. 2nd hand games do damage the industry whilst lining the pockets of the shops.
    The answer? Buy your games from Tesco's / Asda. They take the loses themselves and you get a new game you can keep at a cheaper price than one that's been passed around the block a few times.

    Wow! That was a long rant. Sorry about that. Hope that made sense, I can't be bothered re-reading it. 8)

  • Subi #67 3 years ago

    What a shame games don't have something like the Net Book Agreement, like books have to protect them. Oh, wait, they don't anymore, because the supermarkets said it was unfair.

  • layleeloo #68 3 years ago

    @robotrocker

    You have not rad my post properly. You put "You said people wont buy MW2 at £15?"

    I did not say that. I said no more people would buy it at 15 than they would 50. It has a hardcore demographic who will pay whatever it takes, so all it will do is shift the units earlier to those who didnt have 50 to buy it, but were going to wait until they got it second hand. So, i was referring to it not selling many more as a whole, being cheaper, than it would at 50.

    As I say, if it is a brand new IP people are not sure about, then a low proce entices people. But a major game like that, uncharted 2 etc, will sell no matter what the price is. If you dont like FPS, you wont get it whether its a fiver or free would you? Hence the price on major AAA titles rarely affects who buys it, just affect how soon it gets bought by the person who already knew they would get it at some point.

  • StooMonster #69 3 years ago

    long live the supermarket

    Nope, could not disagree more.

  • RobotRocker #70 3 years ago

    @layleeloo

    Hmmm? So No more people would buy a hotly anticipated game at £15 than £55.

    Ok, good consumer logic there. Do you work for Activision UK?

    Lets have a look at a hypothetical. Johnny Casual is browsing the shelves of his local Asda. He likes Racers and Adventure games, but cant really get into FPS games due to single player not being his style and Multiplayer being populated by primitive dickheads online. He spots Marine Kill Frenzy 2:The Hoo-Rah Chronicles, the hot new game by Exploit-Games selling for a ludicrous £55. He quickly makes a beline for the music section because honestly fuck paying that for 8 hours of entertainment and to be abused by 15-year old American kids online. Tommy Hardcore grabs it and slobbers all over it before whacking down the £55 because he has more money than sense.

    Now lets say that game was £20.Johnny thinks "Hey, it might be worth a punt at this price" and takes it to the counter. Tommy Hardcore still grabs it even though we wish he wouldn't because he wont shut up making comments about our sexual preference online.

    THIS IS THE WAY PEOPLE FIND NEW GENRES. Demos can only do so much and no one wants to encourage Piracy. Most people wait till after Christmas sales to pick up what they want because it hurts their wallet less to pick up cheap games and discover new genres. What happens when you bring prices down. NEW CUSTOMERS. ITS THAT BLOODY SIMPLE.

    /SOMEONE PLEASE BRING BACK THE FAIRPLAY CAMPAIGN TO TELL PEOPLE HOW MUCH THEY ARE STILL BEING RIPPED OFF

  • actionfitz #71 3 years ago

    Oh shit!
    guess we'll end up forced to buy games online direct from the makers, thus screwing the poor retailers. The horror.
    Because Retailers are so concerned with ongoing game development that they all offer a cut of pre-owned sales to the makers of the games... OH WAIT! they dont! lol gg

  • actionfitz #72 3 years ago

    ...wonders what tescos will sell Call of duty MW2 for...
    maybe I wont be forced to buy preowned... NOOOO!!
    DAMN YOU!! CURSED PRINCIPLES!!!
    you win again.

    >plans visit to ebay to pay more than £55 just to make sure Bobby Kuntic gets none of my cash.

    --
    -1 eh?
    cheers actibastard fan boys heheh.
    Edited by actionfitz at 05/10/09 @ 09:28

  • bioreit #73 3 years ago

    @captain_monk

    "Wow! That was a long rant. Sorry about that. Hope that made sense, I can't be bothered re-reading it. 8)"

    I think you were missing MilkybKid1985's point - he said that he buys more games at full price, because he knows he can sell them on later. I personally don't trade games in (no real need, to be honest and I'm always wary of trading in a game and then trying to track it down again years later) but I know loads of people who do and their reasoning is pretty similar to Milky's:

    if they could only buy games at full RRP and couldn't easily trade them in at GAME, HMV, wherever, then they'd either not bother, or wait for the prices to drop to sub-£25.

    If there's no second-hand market to compete against, then prices won't drop as much, even with Internet stores and their crazy post-Christmas discounts, because the market would have stabilised at a higher general price. Even if a second-hand copy only lops £3-5 off a brand new RRP, that's still a difference that the new game's price will be reduced to match, at which point the second-hand price drops again and on-and-on-and-ariston. Then the Platinum/Classics come out and it all starts again. If there are no second-hand sales helping to reduce overall prices, then games will start to retain their initial values for much longer, which is likely to result in lower sales - if certain market segments can't trade the games in, they won't buy at full RRP and will instead wait for the price to drop. But then if there are no second-hand sales helping to reduce the cost, it may never get to a price they consider is worth paying - and that's completely discounting an absolute must-have game (in their eyes) coming out in the meantime, which could completely replace the sale of the first game.

    It's like the Music industry's argument against filesharing - "1,000,000 copies of album X were downloaded illegally, that's cost us £10 million at a tenner per album" is a bullshit comment, because how many of those people would EVER have bought that album in the first place, for any price? It's not a "lost sale" if those people were never going to pay for it. Same with second-hand sales.

    I'm still not 100% on the retailers' side with regards to second-hand sales, but the issue is way more complex than both sides of the argument seem to portray it.

    Oh and on-topic:

    Supermarkets are well known to have loss-leaders - they are unlikely to have brought any pressure to bear on the suppliers, but will take the hit based on the promise of increased sales. And my local supermarkets are pants for stocking more than 15 of the latest games per console - which are almost always still full RRP - so retailers and indies have no leg to stand on with this one. If supermarkets started stocking the same breadth of games as GAME and indie stores, then yeah, they'd have an argument.

    Until then, no. As others have said, diversify or die. It's called business.

  • sauron50 #74 3 years ago

    Secondhand market, conversation seems to be concerned about how the way profit is dispersed (not towards the publisher,author etc). Well in my view the point is that the item is MINE and if I want to sell it to retrieve MY money I will. If they really wanted rid of the secondhand market then lock the game to the consoles serial or equally silly idea and that's that. But of course they know that doing so will equal minimal to zero sales however good the title is. Has the secondhand book shop that's been around for what seems an eternity threatened supermarkets or online book sites? Both seem to have a good symbios and can exist without publishing houses calling for 'Ye Olde Book Shop' to be demolished.
    Maybe the problem is that once you take the PR BS machine out of the picture you actually end up with sub standard titles that really only have a quick shelf life from launch (mysterious title chart placing) and are not worth anything secondhand. How much was that copy of Lost in game again...

  • Vanmunt #75 3 years ago

    Some of the comments here are so ignorant it is unbelievable. The ‘indie’ shops are not game and other multiples they are the bloke on the high street struggling in a recession with ever increasing overheads. The indie shop gets shafted form the game distributers by paying more than the supermarkets for the same items, and by simple economics cannot afford to sell a product cheaper than he can buy it for.

    Whilst I have no sympathy for game and game station, supermarkets are scourges of capitalism at its worse. Just look at the high street and see where the small bookshop, butcher, baker etc have gone. I work in catering and laugh when I see the prices you all pay for your Sunday roast now, they are ripping you off by up to 40-50%, and with no competition you have no choice but to pay inflated prices. The same will happen from games if the small independent shops are lost in the future.

  • bad09 #76 3 years ago

    "It cost you a tenner at the cinema, subsidised as it is by popcorn and advertising, and it'll then cost you another tenner on DVD/Blu-Ray/iTunes, and then part of the £20-odd/month millions of people pay for Sky Movies, (assuming it doesnt have a tenure on Sky Box Office first) and then the however much it is they'll get for showing it on free-to-air channels."

    Ah the old "resell" argument. So games cannot be resold?

    1. You have the current new retail high price (which drive a lot of people to those supermarket deals and 2nd hand markets in the first place....)

    2. Renting (which can now be done online with PC - and I believe Sony will be offering something similar if the Go firmware is to believed.

    3. While it doesn't happen that much on the consoles, services like Steam offer sales to revitalize sales on some games.

    4. On 360 you now have GOD and the classics/Platinum series offer new retail at a better price and another avenue for cash. Maybe this could be expanded so publishers release their own games on a cheaper budget label after time.

    5. DLC is raping the arse off gaming.

    The revenue streams are growing for games all the time so that argument is getting old pretty fast these days.
    Edited by bad09 at 03/10/09 @ 10:03

  • Rev.StuartCampbell #77 3 years ago

    "/SOMEONE PLEASE BRING BACK THE FAIRPLAY CAMPAIGN TO TELL PEOPLE HOW MUCH THEY ARE STILL BEING RIPPED OFF "

    Aww, shucks. Sadly, gamers are largely astonishingly stupid idiots who've been brainwashed by the industry into accepting high prices. In fact, not just accepting them - demanding them. Go on any iPod forum and you'll find an endless parade of complete fuckwits actually genuinely COMPLAINING that they can buy great games for 59p, and urging the developers to increase prices. You wouldn't believe the volume of hatemail FP got, or the level of vitriol in it. It's just not worth putting up with all that shit to try to help people.

    "But that's where they're missing a trick (as I posted above). They should concentrate their efforts on getting the consumer into the store by offering stuff supermarkets can't. But they don't. They've turned into glorified box shifters (not all of them, but certainly most of them) that seem to believe that they deserve a huge profit for what is very little work on their part."

    This. This times a million. I tried yelling at indies about the exact same thing way back in 2004, when I was writing for trade mag Indie, but they turned a deaf ear:

    [link url=http://worldofstuart.excellentcontent.com/world/indie/mots19.htm
    ]http://worldofstuart.excellentcontent.co...[/link]

    There is no point to indies. They're dead men walking, raging against the dying of the margins. They used to offer a different service to the chains, now they're just exactly the same stuff only more expensive. They must change or die, and most of them seem to have chosen death.

  • oupe #78 3 years ago

    I love my Indie shop. It allows me to buy old consoles, accessories and games at acceptable prices. True, they can't compete with big retailers when it comes to new games although I have yet to see a supermarket in the Netherlands shifting new games for €25,-.

    Call me crazy, but I for one am willing to pay a max of 5-10 euros more to support a local shop in favour of some big ass box shifter. (I am, in general, a sucker for local shops with freaky inventories and freaky owners)
    Edited by oupe at 03/10/09 @ 11:02

  • Fab4 #79 3 years ago

    @oef,

    Supermarkets in The Netherlands are usually shit though compared to the ones in the UK, in terms of what lines they hold. Most of them have a hard enough time maintaining a stock of bread, let alone video games at cheap prices.

  • Adam128 #80 3 years ago

    I understand the point, and if it were only a couple of pounds difference I’d make the effort but £40+ is just too much for a game. For me im happy to pay £35 for a launch title but more than that and I start to resent it.
    I went into town to buy Shift last weekend but ended up picking it up at Tesco because it was £5 cheaper than anywhere else.
    When it comes down to it these are not the times that most consumers can afford to be getting ripped off on ethical grounds.
    Edited by Adam128 at 03/10/09 @ 12:26

  • Gunzberg #81 3 years ago

    I've always found independents between £10-20 more expensive than retail game stores/ supermarkets. I won't miss them. And if a supermarket charges too much well there's always online and ebay.

    Instead of whining and blaming, the independents should get off their ass and stop talking about what consumers should do and give the consumers what they want.

  • RobotRocker #82 3 years ago

    @Rev. Stuart Campbell

    I loved that campaign and it had so many good points (And seeing ELSPA get humiliated by the fairplay rep on the BBC was beautiful). But I can see your point regarding people demanding high prices. The whole Super Street Fighter 4 announcement has been totally embarrassing since some people (Particularly over at Shoryuken and other hardcore fansites) started declaring that they wanted to pay the full price in lieu of DLC and even brought up paying the outrageous £70 price point for the SNES games as a good thing in their mind and were screaming their heads off at anyone who thought the disc would be reduced price or downloadable content. Thats pretty shocking and even though Capcom announced its going to launch at a "budget" price. You know they have to be thinking if they can get away with selling it at full price now since idiots will obviously pay for what is essentially a tarted up GOTY edition.

    Its shameful that people put up with it, but then even in a recession, people have more money than sense. I hope everyone who pays £55 for Modern Warfare 2 chokes to death in the most painful manner possible.
    Edited by RobotRocker at 03/10/09 @ 23:01

  • Lawlost #83 3 years ago

    How can a weekend promotion on a single game by 2 supermarkets really hurt independents. They have limited stock which sells out very quickly and that is the end of it. Fifa will sell by the bucket load and the number sold by these 2 supermarkets this weekend will be a tiny proportion of the total. Quit your bitching.

  • neorapsta #84 3 years ago

    Tesco and Asda will never sell something for a loss, so they must still be making money off the title, which just highlights how much they get marked up.

  • bioreit #85 3 years ago

    @beemoh

    "Alternatively, new game prices are artificially high because if retailers keep new prices up, they can charge more money for (and claim higher margins on) the used stock, meaning there's no incentive to lower prices"

    If they're retailers that deal in used games, then yes. But e-tailers such as Play don't (not directly), so there's not incentive for them to keep prices high in that way, because all they're doing is helping their competitors. Stores such as Play can easily undercut the stores keeping the prices high (lower overheads in not dealing with second hand games, for one thing), which then reduces the prices again. It's what happens when there's competition and when you have stores dealing in second hand games and stores that don't - the diversity is the key.

    If the second hand market is killed off, not only are you changing the rules on the purchase of those goods - by making it that the consumer is only a licensee, not a purchaser - but you're also reducing the scope of competition. Which results in higher prices.

    On a side note, though, the Indie shops round my way are a joke. Popped into one of the last two a few months back and saw a very battered copy of N64 Goldeneye on sale for £45 and a falling-apart Perfect Dark for £40. Thought I'd take in my two pristine boxed copies and see what I'd get (hoping for at least £15 for each). Was offered £3 total for BOTH. Disbelieving, asked what trade-in value would be. Was told that WAS trade-in value - cash was £2 for both.

    Those Indie shops that aren't already dead are dying fast and it's not difficult to see why. They need to stop wishing this was the mid-90s and sort their business models out, or go away quietly.

  • InvisibleCrane #86 3 years ago

    Can we please stop with the Robert Kotick hate posts please, we get it no one likes him, give it a break please

  • comissars_handgun #87 3 years ago

    The supermarkets are pure evil for any small independent retailer. Music, DVDs, Games, they use all of these as loss leaders to get people into the shop. They give no fucks about the local retailers who get fucked by this and are forced to go out of business. Everyone always harps on about piracy ruining these businesses, but it is supermarkets who must take a big chunk of the blame.

    So support your local indy retailers. Unless you want to only have supermarkets and be forced to go online to buy anything that isn't in the top ten of the chart.

  • Preztail #88 3 years ago

    I always get my local gamestation to match asda's prices as they rip you off on the high street you might as well buy it online!!!!

  • Darren #89 3 years ago

    Well I'm not complaining. I pre-ordered my copy of FIFA 10 from Amazon for £34.99 and was pleasantly surprised to discover that they'd refunded me £10.02 because of their price match policy. So the game cost me £24.97. Bargain. :)

    When you have greedy c**ts like Activision out to rip off its customers as much as possible with Call of Duty: MW2 at £55 RRP, I'm happy with any discounts I can get.

    Thanks Tesco/Asda. Keep it up! :D

  • Rev.StuartCampbell #90 3 years ago

    "If GAME and Gamestation suddenly stopped dealing in used games tomorrow the only things that would change is that new games would be noticably cheaper, and there'd be more different games on the shelves."

    Where did you read that? The Crazy Gazette?

  • MENTAL1ST Verified Senior Software Engineer, Picsel UK Ltd. #91 3 years ago

    So support your local indy retailers. Unless you want to only have supermarkets and be forced to go online to buy anything that isn't in the top ten of the chart.

    hmmm... Didn't I just advocate that in an earlier post?

    Fuck the shops. And fuck you, indie-retailer-boy.

    (and I believe I said I'd say that again in an earlier post, too)

  • MENTAL1ST Verified Senior Software Engineer, Picsel UK Ltd. #92 3 years ago

    I've already dealt with the devil and ordered it off Amazon.

    Actually, I did that too. I was trying to resist, but railing against the whingeing MCV-letter-writers got my blood too hot.

    If you can blag a free subscription like I did, reading MCV is a strangely revelatory experience. The veil is lifted, and you can see the desires of the publishers, retailers and distributors (distributors? I had no idea they even existed). Games 'reviewed' in terms of marketing effort - I don't blame MCV for that (they also write the fine publication Develop, for the people who - probably - Eurogamer readers believe actually count in games development), they just hold up a mirror to the part of the industry for which the dollar and only the dollar is king.
    Edited by MENTAL1ST at 04/10/09 @ 00:25

  • newgameswhere #93 3 years ago

    Oh seriously this article is a joke in itself.

    I've shopped at my 3 local chip shops and none of them for the last going on 12 months have had any stock of anything in ages. They stock about one or two copies of new releases. I'd understand if the chips network were a big chain store like GAME complaining but all they stock is 2nd hand software and thats it. Lets have a look at what recent stock my local chips shops have stocked.

    Beatles Rock Band? no
    Guitar Hero 5? no
    Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2? no
    Ps3 slims? hahaha

    no consoles of any kind since god knows when and the lads who work there put on a happy face and offer to try and get what I want down from another shop which can take upto 2 weeks at a time for some things.

    At the moment I find the boss complaining about supermarkets hilarious about one game when for the last 12 months his shops look bare. And you wonder why your customers have started to shop at supermarkets now!

    PS. Last game I preordered from chips I didnt get till a week after release date...
    Edited by newgameswhere at 04/10/09 @ 01:51

  • Mordum #94 3 years ago

    Him talking about this can surely do nothing but backfire.
    All it's reminded me to do is not pre-order MW2 yet, just on the off-chance that Asda or Tesco might sell it 'a bit' cheaper. If not then I'll buy it online anyway (where I do 80-90% of 'all' my shopping). At no point in my thoughts does an independent 'rip-off' retailer become a possible source for my games... so I won't be shedding a tear for this guys complaints.
    Edited by Mordum at 04/10/09 @ 03:36

  • Tyranix #95 3 years ago

    Ah I remember the good old days when games were £65 and no one complained. The entitled generation strikes! And for once it's a good thing ^^

  • dr_zoidthrob #96 3 years ago

    £25 eh? I think I'll buy a copy then trade it in on a game I actually want to play - Brutal Legend, for instance (or, as a better example, hang onto it for a couple of months and get MW2 for the sort of price it should be).

  • patchbox360 #97 3 years ago

    @gungrave

    ur completely right, thats exactly what i did yesterday, walked into tesco to see if there were any copies of fifa, there weren't, so i did some shopping instead, tricky bastards

  • Geordiemp #98 3 years ago

    The key here is the plural supermarkets - as long as there is more than one, then there is competition and so who cares if in a few years you have to buy games from Tesco, Asda or sainsbury or Morrison.....

    The Fifa £ 25 was at Asda deal of the week (also NGS II PS3) and at Tesco. So no, they wont put the prices up as they have to compete with each other.....They sell out real fast at Asda, but Tesco has Fifa online at £ 25.....

  • db3 #99 3 years ago

    The supermarkets are doing publishers a massive favor. With such highly discounted new releases punters are more prepared to purchase outright than trade in. Every trade in is lost profit for publishers. Activision should bow down to ASDA and Tesco if MW2 goes just as cheap and prevents the market being flooded with pre-owned due to the rip off RRP being set.

    In the long-term specialist gaming retailers are screwed. PSPGo and iPhone are only the start of a shift to a more direct sales model which in-turn will eliminate the pre-owned market. Quite how GAME can sustain so many outlets in the same city is beyond me, once the investors catch on to the potential shift it will be curtains.

  • RobotRocker #100 3 years ago

    @db3

    While there is a digital shift, the likes of Game will still survive as a lot of consumers feel uncomfortable regarding digital content as what's to say that it wont be compatible with the next X-Box/PS3? Plus Microsoft's highly despicable policy of locking people out of their downloaded content if their console and gamer tag has been banned (Which I am very surprised they are allowed to do in Europe considering the consumer protection laws here). Finally, many people prefer a physical copy as it will always be there and owned by them instead of being in a vague grey area of digital ownership.

    While Game are overpriced by far, they do provide good good service and have a decent stock selection compared to the likes of the indies and will always be around.
    Edited by RobotRocker at 04/10/09 @ 12:26

  • bioreit #101 3 years ago

    @RobotRocker

    Sorry to everyone esle for going waaaaaay off-topic here, but have you seriously just criticised Microsoft for locking people out of their DLC when they ban gamertags/consoles? Yes, if it's a case of mistaken identity or a mistake, but the only guys who I've come across to have their actual console ID banned from connecting onto Xbox Live are the actual genuine hackers, who run modded 360s that scan everyone's ports and carry out repeated DDOS attacks on the IP addresses of those who dare to actually give them a hard game even with their cheats on.

    Like "Russian Assasin" on CoD4, who tried to crash my connection - he was 100% invulnerable to everything and walking around stabbing everyone. Me and my friends at one point managed to bring him down (4 RPDs at once, was like using the Proton Pack - "Don't cross the streams!";) and then suddenly all our connections started getting hammered one by one. Managed to do a ping back (he probably hasn't come across the corporate-level security I have installed at home because of work before) and fired off the IP to Microsoft. They banned his account, his console and banned his name/address/credit card/bank account and prevented that identity from ever connecting again.

    Good on 'em, says I. One of my mates lost his connection for a whole day after that attack. If somone is going to be that disruptive to everyone else's gaming experience and break the terms and conditions of the service so completely, then they should definitely lose access to their DLC at the very least. They can still use everything offline - they just can't connect to the online service. There's nothing there for European law to get involved in.

    It's like saying someone who regularly cheats the lottery system by hacking into the serves and changing details should still be allowed to play. No he shouldn't.

    /rant

  • RobotRocker #102 3 years ago

    @bioreit

    Trying not to derail here but as you mentioned, they could hit innocent players too. Its already been proven that the system is flawed. A common form of griefing is report rushing a player by getting other players to report one player for racism/threats on the feedback screen since it flags the account automaticly if theres multiple reports in a certain time frame and usually gets an auto-suspension for a week. Normally MS are aware of such techniques but since the system is usually automated, innocent players get stuck with a suspension or worse simply for being in the same game as a moron like you described.

    Your innconvience over a video game should not trump consumer rights either. What's bought is bought and should belong to the player and be accessible at all times as long as they own it or else its creating a bad precedent for the future where companies can take away your digital content for whatever reason they feel like. But this belongs in the comments section of another EG report so I will leave it at that.

    /Derail over. We now bring you back to your regular "Fuck the indies/games industry" commenting
    //While US centric, Crispy Gamer has an excellent feature regarding why games are priced the way they are currently. The answer will make you angry yet not surprise you at all

    http://www.crispygamer.com/features/2009...

  • captainrentboy #103 3 years ago

    ''game and EB used to have the odd price fight selling below rrp. game now only sell at rrp ''
    You appear to be talking out of your rectum, the RRP for the vast majority of 360/PS3 titles is £49.99, the vast majority of new releases in Game and GS are £39.99. The trade 'buy in' price for most of the current gen new releases is around £32-£35, so why in the bloody hell would a store that specialises in just consoles and software sell a new release for under the buy in price? If they did, they would go the way of ole Woolworths in about 2 months.
    Saying that, I don't begrudge folk going out and looking for the biggest bargain, and if the Supermarkets are putting them out at silly prices then so be it. It'll be interesting to see what they're chucking COD-MW2 out for, because if it's £25 I'll be buying it from them too. :)

  • RESIDENT_nEVILe #104 3 years ago

    Most used-game stores cream an obscene amount of money off trade-ins, but folks still trade with them to get the hot new title (at the stores inflated price.)

    Much as I like the ambiance of my local Gamestation (its broken boxes, its scratched discs, its stink of piss/body odour/ganja, its 400 pound used copies of COD4), strangely, I find myself siding with the superstores because they actually offer value for money.

    What about the specialised knowledge of the indie? If anyone is thinking that then they are deluded. THEY SPECIALISE IN SELLING WIIS AND OVERPRICED PERIPHERALS TO MUMS. They are often so far of the mark with their info, it's hard not to climb on the counter and scrawl "LOL" across the back wall using my own shit.

    Sometimes I think people only hold them in such high regard because of the inane banter: "Hey mate, have you played XXXXX? It's wicked, etc." THIS RESULTS IN QUEUES THE LENGTH OF THE FUCKING STORE.

    I apologise for the generalisation, but this is pretty much my experience of used-game stores.

    I now use eBay to buy older games.

    /valium

  • evilweevle #105 3 years ago

    i am in the unique position of having worked for mr Don McCabe up until recently (i left last year for reasons other than the job) and can safely say that even if tesco asda safeway or wherever WEREN'T selling fifa or the latest game for cheaper they would still make a damn site more money than CHIPS would do.

    The reason??? Stock levels at chips are abysmal, and when i say abysmal, i mean getting 10 copies of halo 3 on launch day (of which 8 were preordered) getting only 2 copies of Mercenaries 2 on launch day because it 'didnt get good reviews' (this according to Don himself) yet getting 6 copies of Top Trumps on the DS and expecting it to sell (because kids arent interested in pokemon or yu-gi-oh its all about the top trumps).

    considering a lot of the CHIPS stores now actually have their own private accounts with distributors as they are sick of Don not ordering enough of the right games and too many of the shit ones (most stock ordering and distribution among stores is handled by Don himself), i remember when Samba de Amigo was released on Wii, and on release day we got a box containing maraca peripherals, 12 of them all priced at about 12quid, and how many copies of the game did we get? a big fat 0. sure i wouldnt expect the game to sell all that many copies anyway, but 12 sets of maraca attachments??? GTFO of here!

    and when staff are told that if a customer preorders a game that we are guaranteed to get it on release day for the customer (by the big man himself no less) to then have to turn around on release day and have to refund the deposit because we wernt sent any copies of the game is disgusting to both the staff and the customers. seriously how can you expect staff to make sales for you when pretty much everything that is said is a lie.

    and also the pricing method stinks, as Don has clearly never fully understood the meaning of 'supply and demand', just because a game is in short supply (within the company, im not even talking about other stores here) does not mean you can charge £50 for it *COUGH*fight night round 3*COUGH* even 3 years after its original release.

    the amount of times we were told by head office to 'tell customers its in short supply everywhere' only for them to just pop down the road to the next game store and pick it up easy peasy, its no wonder the company is hemorrhaging money and closing stores and laying off staff left right and center.

    i could easily write pages upon pages of Don McCabes shitty business practices but ill cut it short by just saying 'sort out your own problems in the operation of your own company before you start crying about supermarkets undercutting you'
    any store that looks after its customers and goes out of their way to help them will have no substantial threat from a supermarket, and thats one thing that Don does not do.....

    edit: and yea theres pretty much not been any consoles to buy in that place for well over a year now the only ones are the occasional 2nd hand ones that get traded in. Xmas is fucking painful working at that place when you have to turn everybody away for EVERYTHING!
    Edited by evilweevle at 04/10/09 @ 14:37

  • bdaggers #106 3 years ago

    Just wait till Modern Warfare hits. Oh man .......

  • comissars_handgun #107 3 years ago

    hmmm... Didn't I just advocate that in an earlier post?

    Fuck the shops. And fuck you, indie-retailer-boy.

    (and I believe I said I'd say that again in an earlier post, too)


    Yeah relying on huge companies for everything is a great idea, you moron. I do a lot of games shopping online as well, but I like having the option of using a specialist games shop. Which is something that is under threat thanks to the huge resources of supermarkets. If you don't believe supermarkets abusing their dominance is a bad thing then I don't know what to tell you.
    Edited by comissars_handgun at 04/10/09 @ 18:18

  • RESIDENT_nEVILe #108 3 years ago

    I feel for the sentiment of the "support your local indie" stance, but at the end of the day it's just business.

    Your local indie would probably give a testicle to be as successful as GAME or Gamestation. Gamestation started as a teeny indie in Yorkshire before selling out to Blockbuster.

    The true specialist game stores are never going to be massively profitable because they are niche, but by the same token - specialist shops are normally run by someone who has a love for the industry, and who is fully aware they aren't developing a franchise. If they bring something unique or innovative to the table then they will continue to do business, maybe even thrive.

    So, some would have the price of new games in superstores set higher to ensure the survival of small stores that recycle old games for huge mark-ups?

    I don't think either side of that argument can claim the moral high ground. And it's the gamer that pays in the end.
    Edited by RESIDENT_nEVILe at 04/10/09 @ 19:09

  • jmr1909 #109 3 years ago

    Loving the fact that the director of SimplyGames is complaining about the supermarkets in the article when theirs are among the very worst prices on the internet, with no regular, gradual markdowns on older titles that you would see at rival stores such as Play, Zavvi, Shopto, etc.

    They infrequently appear in a daily Gamestracker prices list compared to all the others and just slavishly hold onto stock in the hope that someone will happily get mugged, with Clive Barker's Jericho on the 360 for £39.79 as a current example.

  • Xerx3s #110 3 years ago

    "Oh no, what will we do if all the bricks and mortar retailers go out of business!? It's not as if we have a worldwide network of computers which allows buyers and sellers to trade across vast distance cutting out on pointless inefficiencies of highstreet stores! If only someone would invent this..."

    Having experienced this system with ODST, I don't think I will ever buy launch games from webshops ever again.

  • captain_monk #111 3 years ago

    @bioreit - "If there's no second-hand market to compete against, then prices won't drop as much" .... "If there are no second-hand sales helping to reduce overall prices, then games will start to retain their initial values for much longer, which is likely to result in lower sales"

    Maybe the initial price is at the high point it is partly because the publishers know that the money they are going to be making will be heavily effected by second hand sales. Imagine if there were no second hand market (which I'm not actually saying should be the case, but I'll explain my feelings on that in a bit), the games would potentially sell twice or three times as many copies as currently. That would mean to make the same money they could have had a much more attractive price point (and hence sold even more). We all know if second hand disappears the publishers are more than likely gonna swallow up most of that extra money as bigger profits though as the price point is what we all know and expect now.

    @sauron50 - "the item is MINE and if I want to sell it to retrieve MY money I will"

    Don't get me wrong, I am fully in agreement with you there and don't think the second hand market should go. What I disagree with is the way in which most shops that sale second hand (in my area at least) heavily push second hand over new. The kind of things they do are have huge posters in the window saying the price of the pretty recent games second hand, display the second hand games nearer the door and more prominently than the new games, have a larger area for second hand games than few new and when you take a new item to the till, they then say something like "we have this second hand for £5 less if you'd like?". All of those methods together ARE what is bad about the second hand games industry. I can't remember a music shop ever pushing second hand that much, it was always in a corner at the back of the shop with really badly organised racks.

    On a slight sideline, one of the stores near me (GameStation) also uses the prominence of the second hand to screw the customer. Quite often it has prices on the second hand games higher than on the new version of the same games in their own store (and the new games were at the standard price for all the shops), but they know people see the second hand first and just expect them to be cheaper. Now that IS low.
    Edited by captain_monk at 04/10/09 @ 23:37

  • Velios #112 3 years ago

    Buying videogames at the supermarket could ultimately ultimately better for the games industry because Tesco's don't have shady 2nd hand "bargain bins"

    I'm SICK of GAME and the likes selling 2nd hand games at nearly full price, taking a HUGE markup on what they paid 10 year old johnny and then leaving the actual software developer that made the game with fuck all.

  • Velios #113 3 years ago

    Looking forward to buying Modern Warfare 2 at Tescos for £25.99 and also a basket full of coke, crisps and other random high margin shit.

  • newgameswhere #114 3 years ago

    what about the car makers, do they get a profit from used car sales? no of course not. Games publishers seem to act like its only them who have this problem and it's rather funny.

  • captain_monk #115 3 years ago

    @newgameswhere - "what about the car makers, do they get a profit from used car sales?"

    Not really comparable I'm afraid as cars deteriorate with time. If someone tried selling a car with 3 previous owners and a large millage for only £500 less than a brand new version, most people who could afford it would buy new as the second hand may have problems. Games are exactly the same whether they are brand new copies or year old ones been owned and possibly completed by multiple people, so even a small price drop is seen as a winning situation.

    All cars will eventually need new 'unique to this car' parts. The sales of these mean that the manufacture does actually make some money from second hand cars. Games are trying a similar approach with DLC as the DLC is on your console not the disc, so each owner of the game may buy it. The main difference is that cars will need replacements and players do not need DLC.

    Also, all cars on the road are an advertisement for their manufacturer. The more of x car you see, the better received you believe that sort of car is, and the more likely you are to buy that type of car next time.
    Edited by captain_monk at 05/10/09 @ 07:32

  • altitude2k #116 3 years ago

    Do they cap prices on meat in supermarkets because butchers are going under? What about vegetables because of greengrocers? They can complain all they want, but this won't make a difference.

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  • stelee #118 3 years ago

    BTW , Tesco now do 2nd hand GAMES all formats (Source: Tesco Metro - Sunday lol)

  • Nephirion #119 3 years ago

    They generate product demand by buying stocks of their own product to keep the price high. If a developer creates a product that is worth the retail price it will sell easily for that price. What it seems is pissing off this guy is the fact that the supermarket is a better judge of the products value to market than him. Lets face it makes no difference if you have 1000 or 1000000 stock of an item if it isn't going to sell at the rrp because the seller knows their market then its not going to sell, get over yourself.

  • NorfolkNClue #120 3 years ago

    I'd prefer there to be more indie shops around - it makes for a more interesting high street for a completely unrelated starters and has many benefits on up. Myriad more reasons why the homogenisation of shops is a bad idea in the long run. I'm down with JahB on this one!
    Edited by NorfolkNClue at 05/10/09 @ 14:21

  • SylarsStubble #121 3 years ago

    The retailers' point of view is valid if not hypocritical. They can't lambast the supermarkets for selling at a loss when they're relying on them to resell their stock at a higher margin. That is detrimental to the consumer and it's pretty damn unfair to take stock intended for the public and give them little choice but to buy it at a higher price so the indie can make a quick buck.

    I might be wrong but I think that means the indies are selling grey market stock, and that's as unethical to businesses and consumers as loss leading is to competitors.

    The indies need to innovate, and publicly complaining about something while privately supporting it isn't the way to go about it.

  • OldK1ngCole #122 3 years ago

    High street retailers are massivly overpriced and have been for quite some time. Whilst browsing in Gamestation on Saturday I found a second hand copy of Colin Mcrae DiRT 2 on X360 for £39.99, they sell it new for £42.99, how can they justify that price for a second hand product. I bought it new on launch day from Tesco for £34.99. Also found a second hand copy of Left 4 Dead on X360 for £34.99. Needless to say I left empty handed.

    Come to think of it I don't remember buying a game this generation from a high street retailer, all online or supermarkets.

  • YourMessageHere #123 3 years ago

    Surely if publishers really feel this is a pant-wettingly significant problem, they should be reviewing their contracts with distributors, rather than whining? It's not like they couldn't have the control they seem to want if they tried - tell the distributors "either you cap the number you sell to supermarkets/stop selling to supermarkets, or we find someone who will" and see what happens.

    Not that they have a leg to stand on anyway, but that is just another charming aspect of this idiocy. The whole thing misses the basic point, which is of course that games cost too much; it's nice and everything if the developers get a fair slice of the pie, but they'll get no slice at all if I decide the game is too expensive and I go and read a book instead. Which happens with depressing regularity. Thank fuck for Steam's cheap weekend promos.

    Oh, and indie game shops are all crap. They don't have a clue what they're doing - as others have said, the only way they can hope to compete is if they offer superior customer service and niche products, and they just...don't, at all. They can all bugger off as far as I'm concerned.

  • MrSpew #124 3 years ago

    There are a few ways indies can do well - but mostly it's just using common sense and having hygiene that leaves them lacking.