A sad day occurred recently, a local game shop that had been serving the community for years had shut down, this was due to the fierce competition from local big store rivals, for years it had offered not only a great selection of current generation games but also had a large amount of imports that you will never find in high street stores.
Game shopping is a love hate relationship with me, sometimes you can look for hours not really knowing what you are after, where on other days you find a real gem which you can’t believe someone has missed. It takes me a long time to start to like a shop, the shop staff have to be friendly and chatty, some good knowledge always helps, not just of new stuff but some of the older generations, and also to be honest. So with this recent sad news I have started to look at the pros and cons of the shops in my area, in the desperate need to find a new gaming haunt.
I used to make an hour long journey to London every month to visit CEX, one of the best shops around, there are a few more popping up around the country, I recently spotted one in Edinburgh, but the best has to be London. It is pure wall-to-wall games, wherever you look your eyes are assaulted by boxes from all generations, you can easily spend days just deciding what to spend your hard earned cash on. The members of staff are well versed in the world of gaming and you can feel safe in their hands if you are looking for something a bit different.
Game on the other hand has a very clinical approach to their sales, the shop is pristine, very white, almost like a hospital, all of the new releases adorn the walls, newer consoles to the front, older generations will then start to slide to the back walls, their shelf space getting smaller and smaller until, like the Xbox and Gamecube, they are relegated to a small island shelf facing the back of the store, and then, nothing, where do all of those games go and how can I get them? This shop is great for the big sellers, your Fifa’s and Halos and is the sort of place you can send your Gran to get a game, but look for anything slightly obscure and there is not much hope. Second hand games always tend to be overpriced and the staff, and I don’t intend to be rude to them, but a majority only seem to know about the current generation, news and opinions don’t really get to the staff. But if you’re after Need for Speed, they know their stuff.
Halo they know their stuff.
Gamestation is a good bit of middle ground, the shop will play loud music, it is generally a darker feel, more like a record store than a games shop. Whilst they have all of the new releases, there will be times when a great rarity will pop up, I picked up classics like Panzer Dragoon Saga, Virtua Boy, and some old SNES games there recently, all for a good price. The staff do seem a bit more clued up than at Game but there have been times when I have been outright lied to rather than turn a customer away, so in my estimation, this is not great. Also a recent experience really altered my perception of this great shop, with the release of Guitar Hero 3 shops all over the county had varying price ranges, Gamestation the more expensive and HMV one of the lower, I purchased mine from Gamestation but they agreed to a price match, however for all of the people before and after me they had to pay full whack, I know this is a business but I do not see this as fair and to be honest, quite anti customer.
With the recent takeover from Game to Gamestation I had many fears that they would all just turn into white rooms, but thankfully I had been assured by a few of the local managers that this is not the case and Gamestation will trade as a competitor with the same price points and great trade-in deals as before.
That now leaves us to the independents, there are a few other shops popping up around the county like Chips who have a friendly and chatty staff who are always glad to help. I like nothing more than finding a new game shop and going through all of their titles, always on the look out for something I missed or have always got on my looking out for list, but these shops tend to be dying out.
Away from the high street is the online shops, places like Amazon and Play, they do not have the face to face feeling of buying from the high street but what they do have is a massive advantage, the price, most of the time they can undercut by a large margin and I am aware of a few occasions where highly sought after games are sold and sent out a day before release. When I used to work in retail and this happened head office would hammer us, I wonder if this still happens.
Everyone has his or her own favourite shops, in the end, where you get the best service tends to be the places you go back to. At the moment I am in a shopping limbo, CEX London is now 8 hours away, Gamestation, whilst great for trade-ins and second hand games has lost my faith and Game, well its just Game. Living in a new city and not knowing the ins and outs of all of the small shops is a shame as I know there are some great ones out there.
What is your favourite games store? Is a major chain store like Gamestation or a small independent store? Let us know by discussing this in our forum or leaving a comment below. 
