Your Best Local Game Store - What's It Like?

[nikon_62]

I will point out the obvious, my town has 3 games stops within the same mile strip and I won't go into any of them. For a while I was going to a place called Mind Games in Imlay City Mi. It's a decent store with a selection from NES to PS3 but the service sucks and the markup isn't great.

One day I had a friend on the phone who had asked me to get her Yoshi's Cookie. She said she found it on ebay cheaper than what they wanted. The owner heard me and was on ebay outbidding her before I got off the phone. I went back a week later and not only did he screw over my friend he had the game for sale at double what he bought it for on ebay.

[shallowgamer]

I will point out the obvious, my town has 3 games stops within the same mile strip and I won't go into any of them.

What? You don't like your "new" games opened, with price tags all over the front? Come on.. Hey, for 2 bucks less you can get it "used"!

Sorry, I can never pass up on a gamestop rant.

If you're in the Saint Louis, MO area, there's an amazing store in St. Charles called the Game Trader (I know, there are probably 200 stores with that same name).

Picture an avid collector with everything under the sun strewn about on tables and on the walls. He's got everything, old and new, import and domestic. Last time I was there he had some Japanese arcade cabs setup, with Twinkle Star Sprites running. Can't argue with that.

There's another store in Fenton, MO called Trade-n-Games. This guy loves video games. Truly. He's not just doing this to make a living. He keeps some of his personal collection in back, and it is phenomenal.
http://www.tradengames.com

[vgaddict]

I live in Worcester ma. there is a place called That's Entertainment. I'll tell you they have everything you can think of. They carry every gaming system to date whatever you need they carry it from the 8bit era to the current gen systems. They also carry comics and magic and also DVDs, VHS movies, Aime everything you can think of even old retro toys like star wars , g.i. Joe, transformers g1 etc. I've been going there for almost 20 years and everybody that works there is so cool. I never met such a good group of guys like Ken who manages the store and the rest of his employees who all have put up with me over the last 20 years because I would go get a game system and in about a month I would bring it back for something else. You cant beat such customer service with employees like Evan, Chad, George, Pete, Kevin, Dave, There are more people that work there but I cant think of there names or I cant spell some of them especially the girl that works there she's also cool. I always go there and the prices of the games are decent in prices. Sometimes they do get a bit expensive but they have to because since this is really the only store in my area that carry this stuff they have to compete with the likes of eBay but believe me they are very reasonable that's why I'm there every day Because who knows what anybody will trade in. I have seen even the rare top loaders nes to a turbografix 16. Plus they also sell the retro duo's and game accessories. If anybody wants to look at the store its on the web at www.thatse.com I highly recommend going on the site. I really would recommend going to the store if you live in the New England area. It is definitely worth the trip.

[ott0bot]

I will point out the obvious, my town has 3 games stops within the same mile strip and I won't go into any of them.

What? You don't like your "new" games opened, with price tags all over the front? Come on.. Hey, for 2 bucks less you can get it "used"!

Sorry, I can never pass up on a gamestop rant.

If you're in the Saint Louis, MO area, there's an amazing store in St. Charles called the Game Trader (I know, there are probably 200 stores with that same name).

Picture an avid collector with everything under the sun strewn about on tables and on the walls. He's got everything, old and new, import and domestic. Last time I was there he had some Japanese arcade cabs setup, with Twinkle Star Sprites running. Can't argue with that.

There's another store in Fenton, MO called Trade-n-Games. This guy loves video games. Truly. He's not just doing this to make a living. He keeps some of his personal collection in back, and it is phenomenal.
http://www.tradengames.com

That sounds pretty sweet! A Twinkle Star Sprites cab can never be a bad addition to a game store. The web site you linked doesn't have a great selection, but has pretty decent prices on the stuff they do have. Nice!

[RadarScope1]

I will point out the obvious, my town has 3 games stops within the same mile strip and I won't go into any of them.

What? You don't like your "new" games opened, with price tags all over the front? Come on.. Hey, for 2 bucks less you can get it "used"!

Sorry, I can never pass up on a gamestop rant.

If you're in the Saint Louis, MO area, there's an amazing store in St. Charles called the Game Trader (I know, there are probably 200 stores with that same name).

Picture an avid collector with everything under the sun strewn about on tables and on the walls. He's got everything, old and new, import and domestic. Last time I was there he had some Japanese arcade cabs setup, with Twinkle Star Sprites running. Can't argue with that.

There's another store in Fenton, MO called Trade-n-Games. This guy loves video games. Truly. He's not just doing this to make a living. He keeps some of his personal collection in back, and it is phenomenal.
http://www.tradengames.com

Hey Shallow I live down in Springfield and my wife's family is from STL so we're up there a lot. I never get a chance to explore and look for game stores so thanks for the tips. The only place I ever get to drop into up there is the crummy little Game X-change next to Best Buy in South County (like five minutes from my mother-in-law's house). Isn't the guy who runs Trade-n-Games the guy who runs/or ran Game Collector magazine? Or maybe that's the store where they are sold??

In Springfield, we have a couple of Vintage Stock stores which are pretty good for selection of stuff going back to Master System, NES and 2600, but as Mozgus said sometimes they have high prices. I've bought many a game there, however. I like the staff at the south-side store. Sometimes it's just about going in and chatting about games with people....

[shallowgamer]

I will point out the obvious, my town has 3 games stops within the same mile strip and I won't go into any of them.

What? You don't like your "new" games opened, with price tags all over the front? Come on.. Hey, for 2 bucks less you can get it "used"!

Sorry, I can never pass up on a gamestop rant.

If you're in the Saint Louis, MO area, there's an amazing store in St. Charles called the Game Trader (I know, there are probably 200 stores with that same name).

Picture an avid collector with everything under the sun strewn about on tables and on the walls. He's got everything, old and new, import and domestic. Last time I was there he had some Japanese arcade cabs setup, with Twinkle Star Sprites running. Can't argue with that.

There's another store in Fenton, MO called Trade-n-Games. This guy loves video games. Truly. He's not just doing this to make a living. He keeps some of his personal collection in back, and it is phenomenal.
http://www.tradengames.com

Hey Shallow I live down in Springfield and my wife's family is from STL so we're up there a lot. I never get a chance to explore and look for game stores so thanks for the tips. The only place I ever get to drop into up there is the crummy little Game X-change next to Best Buy in South County (like five minutes from my mother-in-law's house). Isn't the guy who runs Trade-n-Games the guy who runs/or ran Game Collector magazine? Or maybe that's the store where they are sold??

In Springfield, we have a couple of Vintage Stock stores which are pretty good for selection of stuff going back to Master System, NES and 2600, but as Mozgus said sometimes they have high prices. I've bought many a game there, however. I like the staff at the south-side store. Sometimes it's just about going in and chatting about games with people....

The trade-n-games guy does do the price guide for the Game Collector magazine.

That SoCo game x-change used to rule, then they changed owners, yadayadayada. Back in the day (old man anecdote coming your way), I found a loose TurboDuo behind the counter and asked about it. The guy helped me piece it together, modified a generic power supply, fired it up, and gave it to me for 30 bucks. Those days are over.

You guys still have Caveman games in Springfield? There was also a pretty good Game x-change there about 10 years ago. There was an older guy behind the counter that was telling the employees what was valuable and what wasn't. Started talking to the guy, and it turns out he didn't work there. He just hung out and told them what things were worth. Kinda pissed me off, so much for treasure hunting.

[nikon_62]

I will point out the obvious, my town has 3 games stops within the same mile strip and I won't go into any of them.

What? You don't like your "new" games opened, with price tags all over the front? Come on.. Hey, for 2 bucks less you can get it "used"!

Sorry, I can never pass up on a gamestop rant.

If you're in the Saint Louis, MO area, there's an amazing store in St. Charles called the Game Trader (I know, there are probably 200 stores with that same name).

Picture an avid collector with everything under the sun strewn about on tables and on the walls. He's got everything, old and new, import and domestic. Last time I was there he had some Japanese arcade cabs setup, with Twinkle Star Sprites running. Can't argue with that.

There's another store in Fenton, MO called Trade-n-Games. This guy loves video games. Truly. He's not just doing this to make a living. He keeps some of his personal collection in back, and it is phenomenal.
http://www.tradengames.com

The last time I went into a game stop I was actually kinda amused. I was looking for a Wii Fit about a month after it came out. The gamestop is actually in the same parking lot as Walmart and Meijer so I stopped in. The fat blob at the counter laughed at me and said I won't find a Wii Fit anywhere in town because gamestop didn't have it.

I've heard that line of crap before from every gamestop in my town. If they don't have it nobody has it. So I went to Toys R Us and bought my Wii Fit where it was in stock and the employees are friendly.

[pompeyparsons]

I only have a couple Gamestops locally so I rarely if ever go to them.

Last time I went to a Gamestop to pick up a couple used Xbox games on the cheap, there was a girl there that was extremely helpful and helped me find the games I was looking for very quickly. Also she didn't do the whole hard sell thing on reserve copies or magazine subscriptions which I appreciated.

Of course the other guy working there was badgering a kid about reserving his copy of NCAA Football '09. The kid looked like a deer caught in the headlights and finally gave in and reserved his copy. Felt kind of bad for him but oh well. People need to learn to say "No".

[skate323k137]

i'm freaking surrounded by gamestops- one just to the north, one just to the south, two in the same mall on the east side, one in the mall on the west side, one across from said mall, and one just down the street from that last one. I think that makes seven. I stumble into them from time to time, and i've managed to find complete copies of REZ (ps2) and Ikaruga (GCN of course), along with probably every domestically released PS2 shmup, and all the PS2 fighters that i wanted as well. mind you, yes, it does piss me off that they open thier "new" games. (not to mention that employees can "check-out" games to try them)

however my 'best' local game store is Game Hits- I've been going there for probably over a decade; I always check there first. They were the only place to stock imports in the playstation/dreamcast days, and they still stock everything from atari to Xbox360. Over the years i've probably bought/sold every home console at that place. Sometimes it takes some patience to find hidden gems, but every once in a while someone goes in and dumps off a bunch of dreamcast/saturn stuff, and you just have to be lucky enough to come in soon after. for example last year i scored the following dreamcast games; MvC2 (import), CvS2 (import), Power Stone 2, Bangai-o, and SF Alpha 3. Sure, I probably could have gotten them a little cheaper online, but I like supporting local small businesses as much as I can.

[RadarScope1]

Caveman is Vintage Stock now. It's the exact same store, just changed the name to match the rest of the regional chain.