GAME Axe Trade Ins.. 

I'm not surprised Game are struggling. The high street is general has been suffering, but any company headed by Mike Ashley is bound to fail.

The UK had once many places to explore and get your Games but here we have high street gaming stores entering their coffins

I worked at the Notts branch of GameStation, and it was an absolutely incredible place to work, especially part-time as a student. They were fantastic people to work with. Shame GAME came along and ruined it. GameStation used to have a fantastic retro section, as well.

CEX is the only place in the UK that works for used games in the highstreet.

I remember back in the days of the video rental store our local Blockbuster was closing up and they were selling all their Nintendo game rentals off for 50p each and I took the lot, £50s worth. That night me and my two young kids spent all night picking the rental stickers off them and the next day we went to Game to trade them all in, we actually had to go to 3 Game stores as we had so many and there was a lot of duplicates. That was a great day, I can still remember the staff scanning the trade in price, beep, £4, beep £4, beep £7 etc. By the time we were through my £50 and a half a tank of petrol got one boy a new Gamecube, the other got a New Dreamcast along with some games and I got some PC games, the only one that dipped out was the wife lol.

I spoke with a manager from a CEX store that closed down in a small East Coast seaside town in Yorkshire. They said the store was making a profit and moving lots of product. The problem that the company had was that the store wasn't taking in enough trade in stock and had to have stock shipped in from other stores. It's interesting how CEX values the trade in compared to Game.

Electronic boutique was the best game store in the early 90’s.

I went into Game last weekend actually because I just so happened to see some D&D stuff as I walked past. The shop was littered with all kinds of crap. Board games, kids toys, plushies, film merchandise, phones etc… It’s like they’re trying to sell anything to still remain relevant. It was like a mashup of Build a Bear, CEX, The Entertainer and HMV. Now that’s not necessarily a bad thing as brands do need to change to follow consumer demands but at the same time it’s sad to see what it’s become. I feel like it’s lost its identity and that they should just completely rebrand tbh to better reflect what they actually now sell. I feel it’s now too late for them to become a CEX type of store.

just received email regarding this today. I worked for gamestation for many years, so many memories and a great time in my life. Staff nights, midnight launches were amazing, great staff perks. all staff true gamers not like game corporate monkeys, i worked in most of the north west Uk :) really miss gamestation, I love going to car boots and seeing gamestation stickers on games. even found my writing on a sticker haha

Agree - Gamestation just had a different vibe, more consoles to try in store and happy staff. I have been thinking of opening my own retro trade in store in Glasgow for a while, consoles stands, retro game competition, etc

Mike Ashley is the kiss of death to any organisation he gets involved with. I admire him as a successful businessman, but he will strip the soul out of any brand he gets into. House of Fraser, Firetrap, Jack Wills, Kangol...the list of brands that he has diluted and stripped of all identity is a long one. It'll be interesting to see what happens with Mulberry. That is a high-end luxury fashion brand. In that market you have to rely on strong branding, that is all high fashion really is. It is purely clever branding that allows them to charge £1000+ for a handbag...so if they start appearing in Sports Direct alongside Everlast tracky bottoms for £29.99, the prestige will disappear overnight and the brand will be destroyed.

Not taking trade in would essentially ruin the gamer relationships where folks go there specifically to recycle old games. I don’t see it being a sane strategy

I could spend hours in gamestation as a kid now I'm in game barely 5 minutes and still don't buy anything.

We were spoilt for choice up north. We had Game, Gamestation and Grainger Games everywhere. Grainger Games was an interesting one as they went from a market stall in Newcastle, to having a shop in every town in northern England and Scotland. It was where you went for the cheapest deals. The owners were…dodgy, and there was always rumours going around that some of the shops were fronts for other dealings at the back, then suddenly they vanished from northern high streets.

As a guy that worked for both Game and Game station. I can 100% say gamestation was absolutely the best as an employee. At Game, We used to get treated like selling games was used car sales, pressure sales for add ons, disciplinary action for not meeting sales targets with no incentives to do so. I worked as an assistant manager and my manager at the end wasn’t even a gamer. I can clearly remember upselling someone’s grandma to a season pass for COD one year and I knew she had just dropped 35 quid and had no idea what she bought, couldn’t get it refunded but I got told good job.

The problem as always is that Online has killed the high street,

I do miss Gamestation We had a giant one with two floors in Birmingham; the staff and products were great. Did a couple of midnight launches there as a teen (3DS and Skyrim) which were cool. Definitely feels like the times are changing on regarding to buying games now, though. Our actual Game store in the Bullring has turned into an Ann Summers, and Game now lives in other Mike Ashley buildings like House of Fraser and Sports Direct and is just full of junk.

I always preferred gamestation because they had better prices and always slightly more obscure items for sale; like collector's editions you don't often see

As an older chap, I am in my 50s, I have been playing games since the start of the video game era. Back in the days when it began with Pacman and Space Invaders! I went through the home computer boom of the 80s with a Spectrum, C64 and then Amiga. And every town had a computer shop or two and WH Smiths and Boots used to sell computer games! Thats how old I am! I saw the computer and electronics games industry come from nothing and now its going back to nothing. Physical at least. Its all online. GAME used to be great. I live in the North East so there was a huge shop in Metro Centre, and in Newcastle, Durham and all major towns. They used to sell PC games back in the day, like the early 90s on and did well out of it. Till consoles started to evolve and the Playstation and X Box came along. Last time I saw a GAME at the metro center it had moved from its big shop, into a small broom cupboard style unit. And all it was selling was soft toys, Funko pops or whatever anything but games! And that is its problem. Its a prefect storm of issues. Business rates on shops are now extortion. Heating and Lighting bills are too high. They cant make a profit. So they close or try to sell other stuff that people dont need. Add in the fact that modern games are now getting so large they cant fit them on disks anymore and its...Game Over... For physical media, and shops in general. Towns are so unfriendly these days with high parking charges, bad public transport, crime and muggings, people stay away or dont bother half as much as they used to. I think its sad also, to have these places where gamers would meet up in real life to chat about games, play them and buy them and share the experience. The early 80s computer shops were buzzing hubs. It was all about the hardware and the new experience of computer games, as well as what you were playing....so now its going. It will be all online. Downloads only, direct from developers for the systems and shops for games are just no longer needed and you cant make profit from them.

Gamestation was a legendary games store. I literally lived in my local store. I had a fantastic relationship with the employees, the customer service reps were so knowledgable, polite and happy people. I was gutted to see them go😢

I think that Ashley has 'asset stripped' Game. Maybe the motivation behind stopping the trade-ins is to remove the need to have specialists in the Sports Direct who need to check traded in hardware etc. Now they can put any shop member on the 'Game' till.

Gamestation was awesome!! Way better than game, better prices and better staff by a mile! I was proper gutted when gamestation went under.

Okay, that was a trippy watch. Never expected to see my handwriting on the "Your nearest respawn point is..." posters, as it was my Gamestation store that closed down in Sheffield City centre. Gamestation always felt passionate about games and the gamers in the store, GAME never felt like that. I'm surprised they've lasted this long tbh.

Game used to be a great store. The feeling of meeting gamers for a midnight release was amazing. A shame really the way it went but cannot deny the great times.

I used to love going gamestation, the staff in my 2 local gamestation shops were so cool, I often wonder what happened to them

I do miss gamestation, the game i visited i built up quite a good rapport with most of the staff and management at Game when Gamestation closed its doors. But when my local Game moved to another building, the workers I spoken to and got along with had basically been let go for some new people that don't even bother to talk or converse in any new games coming out. I use to have a good rapport with my local Gamestations too. Even remember the challenges they put on the CD boxes back in the ps1 days "if you complete this game within a certain date you'll get £50 store credit, have to show proof on memory card".

So my sister is an assistant manager at game and have just been told today that all the pre owned games are being transferred this month to the Blue Water store, that will be the only store that will still deal with pre owned games in the country 😮

I started working for Gamestation in my local area around 2009 and was there for the crossover to Game. I think that Gamestation was definitely more hardcore and the customer base was up for a chat. As it crossed over to Game, I didn't see a massive amount of difference, the pos changed and the pink started to become apparent. I left in 2016 after a lot of speculation that the company wasn't doing well and we started to see 'to let' signs appearing on our store 'without being told. It was that day I decided I'd had enough. I do miss it dearly. You don't have the same atmosphere on a launch day and community is none existent now. Going to a shop to buy a game lessened an already mainly anxiety driven customer, now it's the opposite.

I remember electronics boutique, that was different time man. But anyway, about a year ago I went to my nearest GAME to trade in about 4 games and some of them were quite new releases and they only wanted to give me £40 in trade, I refused obviously then went to cex and got nearly £100 in trade. It's like GAME just gave up being competitive but now we're gonna see CEX taking the piss

Both of our local ones have just closed and I think they’re on their way out completely! I was only about 15 when all the game stations closed and I remember feeling really sad about that as they always had a good choice of retro games!

Quality video, mate. Being a local lad and avid gamer myself, your story hit me. I remember those days when I used to go into Cardiff City Centre with my weekly pocket money and first ship I would go to would Virgin Megastore (pre Game). I would spend hours each weekend doing this, just to find those hidden gems for my C64 and my Amiga. In most occasions, I would bump into fellow gamers who were doing the same, and we would chat about what games they were buying etc.. Anyhow, you got a new subscriber and follower on your social media platforms. Keep up the great work, your content is awesome.

Ahhh dude, Gamestation was my first and favourite job. Game were never meant to be competitors because Game and Gamestation were actually both owned by Game Group but Gamestation was always clearly the favourite amongst locals and while working there i never once heard any customers say anything good about shopping in Game. Honourable mentions of my time at Gamestation: - Awesome midnight launch parties (I mean queues out the door). - Being able to borrow games from the shop and even play games pre release. - Having hilarious marketing slogans such as "Cheaper than your Girlfriend!" that could never be used today. - Customers who smoke bringing in consoles to trade in, and then taking offence when we tell them that we weren't gonna buy it from them because it stinks like an ashtray and has turned from pearl white to pissy yellow. - 2 Local Police officers coming in asking about Xbox 360 bundles a couple days before Christmas, who accuse 16yo me personally of false advertisement because we had no stock left. - That one guy who came in every 2 weeks to tell us we cant legally sell traded in games because selling something that is bought in second hand makes it "third hand". Those were the days!

This happened in America too. GameStop had a competitor once called Electronic Boutique and like your story GameStop bought them out and slowly took over their locations and destroy any policies they used.

I think subscription services have also been eating into their sales for a while now. When you were going through the games I couldn’t help but notice how many were free with ps plus extra or game pass. A lot of people don’t even have disk drives anymore. It’s a shame, but I think the market is heading in that direction.

Completely agree with everything you said. Little insight to working for GAME. I left GAME just under 5 years ago and worked for them for 3 years. The first year was actually ok, good team good customers and a nice village store. The 2-3 years went super downhill with the Mike Ashley takeover. after the takeover cuts came in to the rota affecting everyone including myself. Everything was under a microscope and it killed customer service and what I enjoyed about working for them. As for not taking pre owned, the only thing we where told was to sell pre owned as that was how GAME made there money. If you sell a PS4 or ps5 console GAME got no money. If you sold an Xbox S/X or the one range you got £6 per unit. In comparison pre-owned margin was almost a minimum of 50% I can't remember if GAME made anything from new Nintendo units. When I left the writing was on the wall for me. Bleeding and no way to fix it. The X2 Plymouth stores went quickly after they built pay-to-play arenas in them and they didn't make any money. The 3 stores closest to me one which I have was working in, have lost all their managers and are now thin on staff and people who understand the retail business at all. Very sad but at the same time a completely confusing and frustrating business. Top people not understanding the market, dodgy staff and management.

The thing I liked as a gamestation customer was all the really cheap DVDs etc that were also in the stores, if I didn't find any games to buy I'd normally buy a load of £1 DVDs.

I remember in 2011 when I got a bumper bonus at work. I randomly bought an Xbox 360 (having sold my PS3 the year before due to financial issues) and Gamestation were kind enough to do me a special deal on a butt tonne of games to go with it. I think i got something like 30 games for something stupid like £120.00 and some of them were pretty recent releases too. The staff were super knowledgable in my local store and the trade in system is what essentally allowed me to devour so many xbox titles over the next 8 months unti I sold the console. Still one one of the best gaming eras of my life and thanks in part to having access to cheap used games, as well as being able to recycle them in a sense.

I feel like Game never recovered from administration in 2012 and were always worse after it. To me they were always fighting online from that point on and moved their model further and further away from just video games. I last went in a SD Game 4 months ago to try to buy a Lorcana deck, as online they wouldn't give you a choice of which starter you got! I'll probably never go in one again unless they sell off all their 3 for 2 stuff

"GAME, on the other hand, are kind of run by people who don't know anything about video games." You are absolutely correct 😂 I asked one of the GAME employees to recommend me between three different games I was indecisive on, and he said to me "I don't play video games so I'm not sure."

I loved working at Gamestation. We had our retro cabinet right up until the end, and you're right, Pre-owned was 100% the money maker, which is why CEX completely embraced it.

R.I.P. Game! I've not been in Game in years. I used to like Gamestation before Game took it over and converted it to one of their stores. We had two Game stores within a quarter of a mile of each other.

I think it would be cool if CEX tried to buy the game company from Mike Ashley as I could see CEX brining Game in to the bigger CEX stores to sell new games, goanna suck to not have a shop you can trade in old games for money off new games as easy as game allows it to be done at the moment.

Found this by pure chance, my local store is (was) also Caerphilly which has just closed its doors for good. Great content mate.

Really great video, I remember going to Game station as a kid picking up a new game for my xbox every week, i miss that.

Purely as a customer, I loved gamestation. I remember going to midnight launches for games like halo reach with the staff wearing cosplay and setting up lan patties in store. Such a great vibe that Game never had

In the branch of CEX I work in it would surprise you the amount of Dvds we sell 😂

I miss Gamestation, All the staff in mine were gamers and knew what you wanted and always able to help you out. You go into a Game store now and they look at you like you've grown another head when you ask them something. Me and my mates used to do all nighters at a cyber cafe on Counterstrike and stuff too with them. It was such a good shop if you were a true gamer R.I.P

It’s so weird in Australia we had Game and EBGames, there was literally a mall I went to with ebgames and game.

I used to love gamestation growing up. Such a shame the way things are going

Was always a fan of Gamestation, their disintegration was devastating to gamer me. Wasn't topped until Grainger Games shut down.

Weve a CEX in our local town and they are the obvious go to games store for trades in now and I've had an email from Game to say exactly what you are saying.

Every now and then I throw a thought back to Game and Gamestation, I miss buying games from a high street, especially Game Station, no you're not bias it was the better store, even if I was being upsold a product the staff knew how to actually engage with me and recommend something I actually enjoyed rather just constantly asking me if I wanted to preorder FIFA...I miss those days, taking a bus to into town, grabbing something that caught my eye, and reading and rereading the manual on the bus back home...Its depressing that I'm likely never going to have those experiences again, thanks for making this video and making me remember better times.

I agree. Game, despite growing quickly and then absorbing Gamestation, have done all the wrong things since then, in trying to strive for profitability and growth. In a business like this Trade-ins keep customers coming in to get the latest games, and there is definitely more profit in pre-owned rather than new. (I have knowledge of this, being a console game retailer in the halycon days of gaming, before Game exsisted!) Like you, I will be in for the bargains when the pre-owned sales are on, and I give them six months left on the High Street. I presume they could keep an online presence still?

Personally, I think the shareholders are running it into the ground intentionally to force games to go digital only.

The nice thing about this whole situation is that even in terrible towns people are now making a living opening up independant retro game shops. usually 5 percent less than ebay on sticker price and no brand new stock but they tend to offer very good trade in prices to keep the inventory stocked. Im happy to pay toactually have a chat to the owners that are usually enthusiasts, get my hands on a cardboard box and work out a deal. still makes me long for the electronics boutique days!

Game stores are almost invisible now. Went to get a game as a Xmas present for someone a few weeks ago because Amazon prices were a bit silly, and after googling it found out there was a Game store near to my work, that I had walked past countless times but never clocked was there. It’s at the back of the 6th floor of a huge sports shop, right on Piccadilly Circus. I couldn’t see a single sign saying it was there. It really felt like the sort of place they have open to fulfil some contractual obligation rather than expecting to make many sales.

Game is a zombie games shop at this point. At my local one a good half of what they sell is Forbidden Planet-esque plastic nerd tat, the most basic entry-level board games and overpriced Pokémon plushies of sleeping Pikachus and the like. Honestly the writing has been on the wall for a while.

Gamestation was loads better, travesty they were merged and basically shut down

There's a dedicated Game store in Chesterfield and it's a really sad place. Board games, plushes, pop vinyls, phones etc, all at the front of the store. You have to go right to the back and round the corner to find any actual video games. It's like they don't want to actually sell the things.

As of January 2024, Game have 64 standalone stores left. Yes, I went to the website and counted them.

Do we reckon that CEX will start to reduce the prices they offer for trade ins? Punters have now got basically no other alternative if they want to sell their games quickly that day- unless you're lucky enough to have an independent game store nearby

I think what you said is 100% true..but you have to think about the gaming company’s.. like Sony and Microsoft.. they are making consoles that are digital.. so there is no need for physical copies of games anymore… I grew up on physical copies since I got older and the console have changed alot, I have recently moved over to PC where I can get AAA games for like half the price what they charge on console.

5 things that killed GAME: -Digital Sales like gamepass etc -Poor management and leadership -Lack of communication with customers -Fallout 76 flopping so hard -The death of retail and the high street.

Man, gamestation was my place in the late 2000s , I used to spend half of my wages on Xbox and PS3 games,.the trade ins were awesome too, I genuinely felt sad when I found out they were going to be taken over.

Tbf i saw it coming when they left Ireland years ago. Sad times so many childhood memories in GAME

As a former Gamestation manager myself, I concur. I miss the early 2000's that was the heyday !!

My local one closed months ago. It was always expensive. CEX has plenty of cheap games and they also stock vintage games as far back as Megadrive carts. AND they play Heavy Metal which is equally cool and really embarrassing at the same time.

I remember GameStation on Birmingham New Street. I used to love visiting that back in the day, just to play new demos and checkout out the retro corner.

Games more like a toy and tat store nowadays ..CEX will eventually decline once digital fully grips console gaming

I've not gone to any game store in about 10+ years, digital is just easier and better in every way other than if u want to collect physical copies.

Always had better vibes in gamestation, I could talk to an employee about a game and end up talking for around 15-20 minutes about that game, because they genuinely knew what i was talking about and had passion for gaming in general. I talked to one employee about Halo and we stood there for ages talking about Halo. I went into game a few years ago before I started buying digitally and it was a mess... They had hardly any idea what games I were talking about, it was more of a hurry up and get out experience... Such a shame. Gamestation lives on in our hearts, fantastic store.

It's hard going trying to walk into a store to purchase a new release in 2024, and that's quite sad considering my childhood and the time I spent in video game stores. I used to walk back and forth between GAME and Gamestation checking prices as they were right next to each other, and Gamestation always seemed to offer the better trade-in deals and just had a better vibe to it. I loved spending my time in there (my parents got very bored and angry 😂). I always remember the queues being nearly out the door at Gamestation so I was very surprised at the time when it closed down 🤷. My local Asda sells a few games but that's about it now. Sainsbury's and Tesco have stopped selling physical media and my local GAME has just gone. It's just sad to be honest as I have the memories of how it used to be. As a gamer, nothing beats going into store flipping the boxes and making your decision... now it's all online. Understandable but still a shame.

As someone who grew up in the EB era in the UK, and used to go to Gamestation when EB moved to game its s sad sight. I can see why though... Afaik Gamestop are struggling so much theyre closing (or at least reducing) their international portfolio. For example, here in Ireland (I live here now) in June 2023 Gamestop closed their own stores completely. Our local store basically sold all stock off and closed the doors. Recently a "Game" appeared in our Sports Direct store. Like you said it literally is a few systems, 4 games per system and a plethora of merch. If it survives I'll be entirely shocked.

When game and game station were both trading at the same time, they were great. As soon as game took over game station, things changed. Over the past few years, back to about 2018, they had gone downhill rapid. The games , both new and pre owned, have dwindled right down, the vinyl pops and other stuff took over. I now haven’t been to a game for a few years. One of the reasons also was that I could get some games cheaper new off of Amazon, then getting it from them used from game! Obviously when your on a budget your going to choose the cheapest. I don’t think game will last another year. Great video mate.

This is so true! In Bradford we had 2 Gamestation, 2 Game and 1 Game Trader. One of the Gamestation's managers was a pillar of the community, as teen and then young man he would tell me what games not to waste money on unless I really wanted it, the staff in general seemed way more approachable and not trying to shill. I remember wanting Predator Concrete Jungle so badly, he was like it's completely crap, the guy at Game was saying it was incredible lol. Game Trader was amazing as they did foreign imports and kept previous gens and classics around for longer. Now we have 1 Game store, it's bleak!

There’s no GAME within a reasonable distance from me anymore for me to be able to get to and I don’t live out in the sticks, I’m in a busy area of West London. It genuinely does make me sad because I used to love going into high street computer game stores but it just ain’t the same now.

Interesting observations. I'm across the pond and would have shopped in GAME Dublin up until they closed (2005?) I always got the feeling that the staff weren't into games!

I actually really rate Game and have bought a lot of new PS5 games from them in recent times at very good prices. Admittedly, some of these were from the website but I've also picked up numerous bargains in my local Wet Midlands store. It's a shame they'll no longer be stocking the pre owned stuff as like you say, the 3 for 2 promotion was always worth a browse. Even without that though, I think a lot of the prices they have for new games are very competitive, probably not so much so for AAA titles in the chart, but certainly for less mainstream stuff.

I worked for electronic boutique and had the same issue with youse moving over, but we did get too take games home and have gaming nights and discount which was slowly dissolved before I left

The Game store are Lakeside in west Thurrock has closed down since Xmas. It was actually the very last store in the entire shopping centre to not have moved or closed since the mid-90s. Now it's gone. I remember going into Game at Lakeside back in the 90s, when it had its old black and purple colour scheme, with corrugated steel high up on the walls with graffiti style are of characters like Sonic and Mario. At one point there was also an Electronics Boutique upstairs and slightly across from that store. Unfortunately that was taken over by Game som time in the early 2000s. There was also a retro style gaming shop in Lakeside shopping centre called Thatz Entertainment. They mostly dealt with pre-owned games, PC games and a lot of retro games and consoles. Although they something of a rip when it came to trade-ins. Then some time around 2009/2010 Game opened another store in the nearby retail park. And by 2011 Game had a third store in Lakeside shopping centre, although this closed down around 2012 when they nearly went under. Now all there is is the "Game" section in the nearby Sports Direct store on the far side of the retail park, but it's been renamed/rebranded as Belong.

In Bedford, we had an Electronics Boutique and a Gamestation. EB got bought by GAME, and went the same way as GS. Then after the GAME in Bedford closed. We now only have a CEX, which is OK. The nearest GAME is in Milton Keynes, which, ironically, is next door to a CEX, and next door to that is an indie games store.

just a bit confused about what trade ins they are axing is it just the game disc/cards or is it all trade ins inducing consoles and accessories?

I worked in game about 15 years ago and worked in retail for about 5 years either side of that. You're right that pre-owned has a much higher markup but remember that game has been brought by Sports Direct Group. Their speciality is high volume low markup and don't want to have to train staff members or pay for staff who have good product knowledge. Companies like CeX also have to hold a lot of stock, for example a Legacy console could be sat on the shelf for months maybe even longer. Tying it up as capital. Sports Direct will try to get through stock as quickly as possible, ideally selling it before the period where they have to even pay the suppliers. Also the target audience is mostly not hardcore gamers and this was the case even back when I was there and the target market was actually people who didn't really know what they were buying for example parents and grandparents buying their kids presents. And on top of that even back then companies like Microsoft and Sony were putting pressure on them to not sell pre-owned as it broke into their sales. With digital they now have even more power as they can simply stop selling to stores and still have a good market share selling directly to the customer.

As a kid i loved going into my local Gamestation and spending quite a bit of time looking at all the xbox 360 games they had. Later on in 2012/2013 they were rebranded to GAME which didnt bother me at the time since everything was pretty much same but under a new brand and i could still use my Gamestation reward card i had. Around early 2017 was when my local GAME store shutdown for good and it pretty much made me switch to digital only games since there wasnt any other GAME stores close to me. Last year i ended up walking past a GAME in meadowhall and i decided to walk in and check it out since i haven't been in one for years at this point. I was so disappointed when i walked in because it was mainly just plushy's, toys and board games with an Xbox/Playstation/Nintendo section to the side. I spent probably 5 minutes in there before walking out and i didn't even en dup buying anything I know GAME has its issues but i will forever miss being a kid and spending nearly an hour in a Game store just looking at Xbox 360 games that i wanted and trying to convince my parents to by them for me lol. I really cant see GAME lasting until the end of the year

A game store inside a House of Fraser closed in Essex last month and were selling off pre owned xbox one and PS4 games for 99p each! Despite having another store nearby that must have absorbed a lot of the other stock and fixtures etc

I work at CEX and I can tell you that people buy a lot of DVDs, although we usually receive more than we sell from people 'having a clear out'

I think the reason is to just save shelf space. I think they're accepting that games are going digital and are shifting towards being a gaming merch company where 1/4 of the store is selling actually game stuff with the rest being game/nerd culture merch. Kinda like HMV is mostly a merch store with some CDs and vinyls.

I was a Christmas temp at GameStation back when I was 18, absolutely loved my short space of time there. Was a sad day when it closed down

Very interesting video. I miss Game Station. Sad to lose all these shops...

Tucked in the back of sports direct I didn't even know they were there

Currently in Trowbridge in wiltshire and Basingstoke hampshire have a physical stores, I dont really shop at game stores, I buy more and more from charity shops via online or in stores, Find them are cheeper if your looking for older games for older game machines. But mostly have gone digital buys for ps5 and ps4 games via ps store when the games are on sale. I do compaire them to actual discs prices on line before i buy digital.

Oh wow, this brings back memories. I used to work at Gamestation in Brighton!

I still have my Game reward card and it's been very useful, just doing up a bathroom and it's great for smoothing down silicone sealant.

at my local town centre we had a game and a game station and a few years ago game obviously moved into sports direct and the funniest thing is cex moved into the old game location

It's over now. I've seen CEX adverts on you tube already. With a statement saying "we are proud to be the last man standing on the high street."

15 years ago there were two Games, another sub-shop in Debenhams, an HMV and a Gamestation within a 5 minute radius of each other. You can get a 360 with 4 games for £200. What a time.

I thought it was only my local Sports Direct that has a Game in it. It’s weird going into a store and there’s just a Game in the corner

My local Game closed a few years ago, since then our town centre is just clothes shops and coffee shops

Gamestation was the best! I miss the one in Bangor, North Wales. All of the staff there were brilliant and treated their customers with the outmost respect.

Hi, I'm a former GAME store manager and started when it was EB (Electronic Boutique) happy for you to reach out if you want any background on what it was like 2001-2010