Previous GameStop employee from 2012-2019, so the reason you would get a situation like the Viewtiful Joe game you have is we would very often get people coming in and would trade in the game with the OG case and cover art but the case itself would be a mess like the plastic tearing off etc, so we would put the good cover art in one of our generic cases the company would provide. Also they only have cases now that fit more modern discs so they wouldn’t have any GameCube cases. Also, yes, some people are insane and just chuck the cases and would literally bring in old music cd folders full of their game discs to trade. It made me cry every time lol.
I would also think some people would steal the case and the cover art? GameStop would have the disc behind the desk in a drawer. Then the game would be without a case.
@ yes that was also really common. But most people (at least in my area) knew that the cases were empty and the games were actually in the drawers behind the counter.
I've had people come in to trade stacks of just discs before. like in one of those 2000s CD holders. 90% of the time, if a game doesn't have a proper case its cuz it never had one to begin with
It was funny until he replayed the same clip of him peeling off the first cm like 15 times lol. You need a heat gun or that glue remover that smells like chemical oranges.
@@pegasuskiller9905 So that's what the game was. The main song he's using during the vid is from Persona 2 Eternal Punishment but it was funny when it transitioned to the Yakuza riff.
I never threw away a single box for any game I’ve ever owned, but after I graduated HS and moved out of my parent’s house, my mom yanked my N64 box (inside of which were the boxes to my games) from the attic and threw it away without me knowing. I’m the type that even tucked the purchase receipt in behind the booklet.
If you really want those stickers off the artwork you should use a hair dryer to heat up the adhesive. It won't work on the ancient stickers but it helps
The problem is that people will trade in the disc only because they get the same money no matter what, then sell the manual and cover art online its really scummy to be honest
@@RudyBagels How does it make no sense? I've traded in games while keeping the manual & box art precisely due to how gamestop doesn't care & pays you the same price no matter what. People do actually buy the original art & manual online & plenty of times they'll pay more for pieces of paper than gamestop does for the entire game.
Around a year or so ago after buying several used 3DS games that would come in to my local gamestop, after asking why so many had no cases or manuals, the cashier told me they were instructed to throw them away because they took up too much space 💀
I remember when they began phasing out the space for PS2 games in the store and they eventually just started putting all the PS2 games in the paper sleeves and thats all you got.
I saw that in the video too and I was wondering did he buy NBA street and they put the wrong item on the receipt or did they screw up so badly and send the wrong game
I grew up saving money and selling my used games to buy new ones. I regret selling every single one of my games. I wish i preserved the games with the cases and manuals.
I feel like Gamestop should at least offer the option at checkout to buy the game full CIB, with original case, any case, or loose for incrementally decreasing cost for each one. Then everyone could (Hopefully) buy with a lot more confidence
At the prices they charge now, they should. But I'd rather they just bring the prices back down and let me gamble :) It's fun when the prices are low and you can return them, but market price with boring sales = it's not fun anymore.
@@YesNo-yl6ws local mom n pop shops, garage sales Or Ebay. if your looking for a game in a certain condition ebay is the easiest but you will pay a premium. goodwill is also often overlooked.
My mom made us so the same, but thankfully it was only for our PC games. Our actual disc-based consoles (too many to list here) were allowed to keep their boxes. 😂
Most likely the case on that Viewtiful Joe 2 was water damaged/contaminated, so the employee took the cover art & game & put it in the replacement case.
I'm so sorry, Matty 😅 It's painful to watch but your editing and narration smoothes it out. I have all the gamerscore in *Castlevania LoS* and it was absolutely phantastic. The amazing soundtrack by Oscar Araujo won an award as well. There's also a DLC which was great and challenging. I've also played *Prince Of Persia* 2008 and have all the gamerscore in it. It's my favorite POP, for its wonderful narration and esthetics, even though the gameplay is lacking somewhat. I also recently repurchased this on ebay and I'm still a little mad at myself for selling my steelbook special edition back then, which was beautiful. I'm not a collector but a very few olde editions I wish I hadn't sold.
"One of the most underrated stealth games..." and then he shows a clip of Sam running around doing flips and shooting 5 guards out in the open and in the next clip Sam is holding an AK-47🤣
Another previous GameStop Employee here chiming in with their two cents: People will literally trade in the disc by itself. To my understanding of policy, we would technically just accept only the disc. And I hate to say it but depending on the employee and whether the trade in was with the disc itself/case and game or complete in box, it wouldn't change the value of the games being trading in. So people realistically had no incentive at all to bring everything in. When it comes to actually taking in retro games themselves, depending on if they changed procedure or not, the same rules generally apply. If there are no heavy deep scratches and the game looks playable or in at least good to like new condition, they take the disc in. As a retro gamer myself I get the frustration I really do, but some of these things are out of the hands of the company at least at store level. 9 times out of 10 anything old is sent to the factory and they attempt to do whatever it is they call refurbishing and then call it right there. I have personally ordered retro games online from GameStop at least twice last year.I received games like FF7-9 all came in fully generic cases, and in my case these were the bubble mailer. The reason you're getting as many blank cases most of the time because, we had to provide customers with a case and they couldn't just hand them the game and call it that, we had to make case and cover art just as you recieved games like Splinter Cell Blacklist.
I did that with ps1, it was an official playstation game case that game with the official ps1 carrying case,still have them all and everything still works, hard to believe I have had it for 24 years
I work at gamestop and people trade in games with absolutely nothing at times and we are just stuck dealing with using our own method of creating cover art. Sometimes its sold without but that's if there's no other option. That pre owned sticker actually isn't us too. It's coming from the place that ships the product to us. We have our own stickers though and they're much better and easier to take off nowadays
Unfortunately I was someone that got rid of cases and put them in a CD binder. Back then my older gamer cousin who gamed in the 80s always had his old loose cartridges in a box, and his PS1 games in one of those binders. Obviously as a kid I had no say, but to my parents the boxes were a waste of space. So at the end of the day I think most of these kids did it because they didn't know any better at the time, it was more normalized, but it's usually a space concern. Of course nowadays I completely regret it all! I even used to hold on to some manuals as bathroom reading materials as a kid, never understood how important the CIB packaging would come to be growing up. Not even just for resale but for personal nostalgia.
My sister was one of those psychos that put our shared PS2 and Gamecube games into a binder. She kept the cases though, but of course eventually lost the binder. So now I have about 30 empty PS2/Gamecube cases. It makes me cry every time I see the cases on my gaming shelf. Thankfully I didn't let her put my favorite games in the damn binder. She did it with all her CDs and DVDs too. It was a true compulsion. A am also an old-school God of War fan, when it took place in ancient Greece. Those were the real games IMO. And I have those discs in their original cases!
I moved way too much as a kid and all those game cases took up too much space, so my collection has all moved into a disc book. Moving every few years makes you see what's really important and what isn't.
Yep that’s also why I moved to digital and sold all my retro shit besides the Pokémon games. As I get older I find having bookcases full of games I’ll probably never touch again. Saves me from getting all bent out of shape like this dude does every video
2:10 oh God I have a friend who is just like that even to this day and we’re in our 30s. I go over to his house we play stuff. He leaves the discs all over the place. It drives me nuts and I have to grab them and put them back in the proper case other times his cases would be broken and then he has to use DVD cases from movies from Blockbuster he has laying around
2:05 I remember we used the nes boxes but constantly opening and closing, we eventually would throw them out. Cd wallets were for people who had ALL the games
chronicles of riddick is badass. At the time of release, butcher bay was a budget game, I remember it being priced low and getting it for like 10 bucks or something. Great game. Good bumpmapping made it look like the game had sick lighting. I will never understand Escape from Butcher Bay being sold as a budget title, it's so good.
I’m from the uk and we have a shop called “Game” which runs the same business model as GameStop but they aren’t the same company. Anyway they were selling their 360/PS3/Wii/3DS games without manuals as one store found some drugs in a manual. They just binned all the manuals so I’m not sure if something similar has happened at GameStop 🤷♂️
I also like to look at the collector bubble in the USA. But one thing always strikes me - the condition of the games, regardless of the era, is mostly really bad. So many are also sold/bought "loosely", whether in stores or on exchanges. In my small but fine collection of 500 games (from SNES to PS5), condition was and is always the top priority. CIB is a must. But of course it is always a question of your own budget. In any case, it is exciting to see how differently people collect everywhere. Best wishes from good old Germany 👋🏼
Pro tip for removing stickers from cover art: Ronsonol/Zippo lighter fluid. You can literally soak it in the stuff and it won't stain. Evaporates super quick and leaves no odor. Dab/soak for a couple minutes and it will be super easy to peel. Just make sure you wipe, don't scrub any adhesive off.
I heard about them bringing back their retro program to the stores and got hopeful. Even more hopeful when I learned the store by my house is the main location for the retro games in the whole city. I went in only to see a tiny section on the back wall. It had multiple sections for different consoles but the entire display was so small,. they had like 10-20ish games for each. and most of those were crappy gamestop boxes too. It was really sad. Thankfully i didnt waste too much time. but its a shame they didnt have a way to appeal to retro collectors when they launched the retro program. instead it feels like their last ditch effort to sell warehouse product before all gamestops close down.
I don’t work at GameStop and never had, but if you watch real legit GameStop dumpster diving videos they throw game cases away and replace them with GameStop cases whither they’re in good condition or not.
I was a smart kid who loved the cover art of SNES games and kept everything mint. My parents recently found in the attic a box of SNES games. Super Mario RPG, Mega Man X and X2, Mega Man Soccer, Rocko’s Modern Life, Star Trek, Final Fantasy, and Killer Instinct all CIB. They were just gonna sell them for like $20 on Marketplace and I flipped out haha. For real though, I had those all when I was 6yrs old and treated them like they were treasure
Blame Gamestop for not taking more for CIB over loose not the customers. Only an idiot would do that when there is a legitimate market for replacement cases online, specifcally ebay. Not only that Im pretty sure Gamestop Warehousing (at least at one point in time) was throwing cases away for most platforms to "save space" again, cause they sell it for the same price regardless. Come on now, you know better Matty!
I bought 19 games (18 used and 1 new) from GameStop all the used games came out this year and they all were missing the game case and the new game came open with a “new sticker” on it
I did that game binder thing with every single game I ever owned until I switched to almost purely digital. I kept the cases on my book shelf in my room but the game binder was essential for bringing games to sleepovers as a kid
i live in finland so we dont have gamestops (anymore, like 12 years a go we did) but just by watching these videos where people buy gamestop games online, it seems more often than not they just send a loose game, i wouldnt even order from there if i lived there and could
I don't know if they also have retro games in-store in the US (because here in the EU it's only ps4-ps5 and switch games, not even ps3, I mean GS is literally shutting down stores here). Anyway my point is that sometimes people just steal the cases, like everyone knows that GS has the actual games back at the counter but you just walk in, snug the case and walk out and resell it on ebay or whatever. For instance I ordered a few new games online from them recently, and well turns out it's gamestop's "new", but the game I ordered might have been the only copy they had left which was at the stand so naturally it won't be sealed yet it's fair to say that it's new. So when that happens you might find yourself with incomplete packaging. I would say, with what I read online from ex-employees, I'm not going to even bother with a return or cause any trouble, you gotta deal with what you have at the end, imagine what the dude was thinking when he packaged that shit lmao. Some transparency when making online purchases would be greatly appreciated tho, I hope the new company to which GS sold their local chain would actually do this like sending a photo of the product or something.
In my defense for not have cases, I traveled for the Marines/Army for 10+ years. But I still own my disks & manuals. I just saved space and weight by discarding the cases... Which I do regret a bit. Thank you for doing this video. You have helped me decide on not purchasing from the GameStop website. I do hit up my "Retro" Gamestop in my town for SNES-PS3 games. But I can decide in person if I should buy the Game (Disc, Manual and Original Case).
No point in GameStop. You’re better off buying local so you know what you’re getting or paying up for Amazon because those have to be flawless or you can just return them.
I’d put all my games and movies in a binder LOL I was very organized and extremely careful. BUT I was also a serial collector so I’d either keep all my movie cases in a box and store it or all my game cases I’d display in my room while keeping the games in the case in the living room (mostly because my mom didn’t want clutter). Anytime I’d trade in or sell my games I’d get the case and manual and make sure it was included.
The main problem with this is their sourcing all of these retro games from specific GameStop locations So when the order comes in whatever GameStop location has the game picks it out and then sends it out (if not from a warehouse) I’ve been retro hunting at GameStop for the past couple months and out of 100 or so retro games maybe 20 have the original cases and artwork That’s the main problem with buying online. Do not know what you’re going to get. Always try to support local games and local game shops by going in Also, that makes it a bit more fun in my opinion More like a hunt instead of an online gamble
For those stickers on the case art, pick up a cheap heat gun or hair dryer and blast it with heat for 45 seconds and then peel it off. Should come off clean
Sooo I'm guilty of taking my discs out and putting them in one of those binders... BUT! I still have all the cases with manuals in great shape. Those multi-disc PS1 cases were so fragile, the first time I had a hinge crack I decided I was going to take them out of the equation.
Oh, man!! Matty, PLEASE do a retrospective on Riddick's Escape from Butcher Bay. The sequel you have in your hand there is a bit of a stinker, but it includes the OG on the same disc.
I was about to order some retro games through the buy 2 get 1 free deal but I just knew that if I did, I'd get my games in the same condition as you. I went with PS5 & PS4 & to my surprise they all came complete in box, or mostly. Cyberpunk 2077 came nearly complete, it was just missing the stickers & postcards which I don't care about. I mostly bought niche stuff like King of Fighters or Yakuza & they were all in near mint condition. Even came with the DLC codes for some reason & still worked.
I don’t blame GameStop for the cases and art since people trade them in that way. However, when you buy online it should tell you CIB or otherwise and there should DEFINITELY be a discount on incomplete game cases.
It was me who left the stickers on the games. My heart is full of evil for video game collectors lol… Being serious I hate rolling the dice on GameStop sometimes. I have an order coming hopefully they did me right but…ya never know. That NBA Street 2 looks interesting. I have Lords of Shadow 1 and 2 CIB. 2 took me a little while to find.
My biggest complaint about the "GameStop Retro" initiative would have to be its employees. They lack video game knowledge. Most of them can't even read a GBA cartridge.
Previous GameStop employee from 2012-2019, so the reason you would get a situation like the Viewtiful Joe game you have is we would very often get people coming in and would trade in the game with the OG case and cover art but the case itself would be a mess like the plastic tearing off etc, so we would put the good cover art in one of our generic cases the company would provide. Also they only have cases now that fit more modern discs so they wouldn’t have any GameCube cases. Also, yes, some people are insane and just chuck the cases and would literally bring in old music cd folders full of their game discs to trade. It made me cry every time lol.
I would also think some people would steal the case and the cover art? GameStop would have the disc behind the desk in a drawer. Then the game would be without a case.
@ yes that was also really common. But most people (at least in my area) knew that the cases were empty and the games were actually in the drawers behind the counter.
Also I remember when I worked at gamestop around 2009 to 2021 and we would throw out cases to save room.....
I've had people come in to trade stacks of just discs before. like in one of those 2000s CD holders. 90% of the time, if a game doesn't have a proper case its cuz it never had one to begin with
GameStop employee here, can confirm this
That edit of you taking the price tag off was HILARIOUS lol
I recommend he buy a heat gun
It was funny until he replayed the same clip of him peeling off the first cm like 15 times lol.
You need a heat gun or that glue remover that smells like chemical oranges.
With that yakuza music
@@pegasuskiller9905 So that's what the game was. The main song he's using during the vid is from Persona 2 Eternal Punishment but it was funny when it transitioned to the Yakuza riff.
dude that was the funniest shit ive seen from this channel lmaooo
I never threw away a single box for any game I’ve ever owned, but after I graduated HS and moved out of my parent’s house, my mom yanked my N64 box (inside of which were the boxes to my games) from the attic and threw it away without me knowing.
I’m the type that even tucked the purchase receipt in behind the booklet.
I would've felt so devastated. I'm really sorry your mother did that, thinking it was trash. 😢
@@RosyTheRascal15I hear you. Boomer parents thought anything that they didn’t personally care for was worthless.
@@tcsutton9121 it is worthless. It just have value for sentimentalists.
I am guilty of this myself 😅
@@FlorianMarkuh no those items fetch a high price lol. Especially rare games and cases
we can cry together dog, my mama made me give away my massive ps2/360 library bc she didnt want me "hoarding"
If you really want those stickers off the artwork you should use a hair dryer to heat up the adhesive. It won't work on the ancient stickers but it helps
8:58 Matty....my dude. Not the man juice. WHY DID YOU TOUCH IT 😭😭😭💀
When it’s on the spindle, it’s likely residue from corporate’s crappy resurfacing machines.
The problem is that people will trade in the disc only because they get the same money no matter what, then sell the manual and cover art online its really scummy to be honest
That makes absolutely zero sense.
This is the right answer.
@@RudyBagels How does it make no sense? I've traded in games while keeping the manual & box art precisely due to how gamestop doesn't care & pays you the same price no matter what. People do actually buy the original art & manual online & plenty of times they'll pay more for pieces of paper than gamestop does for the entire game.
There are youtubers who promote this as well. It is scummy for sure, but people just need to stop ordering retro from Gamestop online.
Maybe but by doing that you're part of the problem. @HereticHydra
Around a year or so ago after buying several used 3DS games that would come in to my local gamestop, after asking why so many had no cases or manuals, the cashier told me they were instructed to throw them away because they took up too much space 💀
I remember when they began phasing out the space for PS2 games in the store and they eventually just started putting all the PS2 games in the paper sleeves and thats all you got.
Great video, cant believe this was the 1st one of these I caught but very fun and nostalgic. Thank you Matty
18:40 Didn't you buy NFL Street and they sent NBA Street?
Just watched the video and was gonna say this 😂
I saw that in the video too and I was wondering did he buy NBA street and they put the wrong item on the receipt or did they screw up so badly and send the wrong game
I grew up saving money and selling my used games to buy new ones.
I regret selling every single one of my games. I wish i preserved the games with the cases and manuals.
I feel like Gamestop should at least offer the option at checkout to buy the game full CIB, with original case, any case, or loose for incrementally decreasing cost for each one. Then everyone could (Hopefully) buy with a lot more confidence
You mean like DKoldies does?
At the prices they charge now, they should. But I'd rather they just bring the prices back down and let me gamble :) It's fun when the prices are low and you can return them, but market price with boring sales = it's not fun anymore.
The sticker peel was EPIC😅😅
Assault on Dark Athena, the sequel to Butcher Bay, includes a remaster of Butcher Bay, the game that released on Xbox.
ordering from gamestop is like opening a pack of trading cards.
except your not even guaranteed a holo.
Where’s the best place to buy xbox 360 games?
@@YesNo-yl6ws local mom n pop shops, garage sales Or Ebay. if your looking for a game in a certain condition ebay is the easiest but you will pay a premium. goodwill is also often overlooked.
@@YesNo-yl6wslocal retro stores in your area
@@giraffegiraffe810 ok thanks.
2:05 our mom made us lmaoo
My mom made us so the same, but thankfully it was only for our PC games. Our actual disc-based consoles (too many to list here) were allowed to keep their boxes. 😂
GameStop always fails to impress. 😂
I am subbing because of 7:03
Most likely the case on that Viewtiful Joe 2 was water damaged/contaminated, so the employee took the cover art & game & put it in the replacement case.
I'm so sorry, Matty 😅
It's painful to watch but your editing and narration smoothes it out.
I have all the gamerscore in *Castlevania LoS* and it was absolutely phantastic. The amazing soundtrack by Oscar Araujo won an award as well. There's also a DLC which was great and challenging.
I've also played *Prince Of Persia* 2008 and have all the gamerscore in it. It's my favorite POP, for its wonderful narration and esthetics, even though the gameplay is lacking somewhat. I also recently repurchased this on ebay and I'm still a little mad at myself for selling my steelbook special edition back then, which was beautiful. I'm not a collector but a very few olde editions I wish I hadn't sold.
Remember, boys and girls, Mattie gets to write these off as a business expense. Don't feel bad for him, this is good content...
"One of the most underrated stealth games..." and then he shows a clip of Sam running around doing flips and shooting 5 guards out in the open and in the next clip Sam is holding an AK-47🤣
Secret Castle Toys And Games. They do mystery bundles and free shipping for orders over $100. You will hopefully not be disappointed with them.
Another previous GameStop Employee here chiming in with their two cents:
People will literally trade in the disc by itself. To my understanding of policy, we would technically just accept only the disc. And I hate to say it but depending on the employee and whether the trade in was with the disc itself/case and game or complete in box, it wouldn't change the value of the games being trading in.
So people realistically had no incentive at all to bring everything in. When it comes to actually taking in retro games themselves, depending on if they changed procedure or not, the same rules generally apply. If there are no heavy deep scratches and the game looks playable or in at least good to like new condition, they take the disc in.
As a retro gamer myself I get the frustration I really do, but some of these things are out of the hands of the company at least at store level. 9 times out of 10 anything old is sent to the factory and they attempt to do whatever it is they call refurbishing and then call it right there. I have personally ordered retro games online from GameStop at least twice last year.I received games like FF7-9 all came in fully generic cases, and in my case these were the bubble mailer.
The reason you're getting as many blank cases most of the time because, we had to provide customers with a case and they couldn't just hand them the game and call it that, we had to make case and cover art just as you recieved games like Splinter Cell Blacklist.
I did that with ps1, it was an official playstation game case that game with the official ps1 carrying case,still have them all and everything still works, hard to believe I have had it for 24 years
The sticker edit is PURE CINEMA!
I work at gamestop and people trade in games with absolutely nothing at times and we are just stuck dealing with using our own method of creating cover art. Sometimes its sold without but that's if there's no other option. That pre owned sticker actually isn't us too. It's coming from the place that ships the product to us. We have our own stickers though and they're much better and easier to take off nowadays
Unfortunately I was someone that got rid of cases and put them in a CD binder. Back then my older gamer cousin who gamed in the 80s always had his old loose cartridges in a box, and his PS1 games in one of those binders. Obviously as a kid I had no say, but to my parents the boxes were a waste of space. So at the end of the day I think most of these kids did it because they didn't know any better at the time, it was more normalized, but it's usually a space concern.
Of course nowadays I completely regret it all! I even used to hold on to some manuals as bathroom reading materials as a kid, never understood how important the CIB packaging would come to be growing up. Not even just for resale but for personal nostalgia.
When you order online do they not state the condition of the game? Eg: complete, disc only, missing manual etc…if not I wouldn’t even bother
My sister was one of those psychos that put our shared PS2 and Gamecube games into a binder. She kept the cases though, but of course eventually lost the binder. So now I have about 30 empty PS2/Gamecube cases. It makes me cry every time I see the cases on my gaming shelf. Thankfully I didn't let her put my favorite games in the damn binder. She did it with all her CDs and DVDs too. It was a true compulsion. A am also an old-school God of War fan, when it took place in ancient Greece. Those were the real games IMO. And I have those discs in their original cases!
I moved way too much as a kid and all those game cases took up too much space, so my collection has all moved into a disc book. Moving every few years makes you see what's really important and what isn't.
Yep that’s also why I moved to digital and sold all my retro shit besides the Pokémon games. As I get older I find having bookcases full of games I’ll probably never touch again. Saves me from getting all bent out of shape like this dude does every video
2:10 oh God I have a friend who is just like that even to this day and we’re in our 30s. I go over to his house we play stuff. He leaves the discs all over the place. It drives me nuts and I have to grab them and put them back in the proper case other times his cases would be broken and then he has to use DVD cases from movies from Blockbuster he has laying around
2:05 I remember we used the nes boxes but constantly opening and closing, we eventually would throw them out. Cd wallets were for people who had ALL the games
Note to self, never buy from Gamestop online.
Your hard work deserves a fantastic Friday- enjoy
chronicles of riddick is badass. At the time of release, butcher bay was a budget game, I remember it being priced low and getting it for like 10 bucks or something. Great game. Good bumpmapping made it look like the game had sick lighting.
I will never understand Escape from Butcher Bay being sold as a budget title, it's so good.
I’m from the uk and we have a shop called “Game” which runs the same business model as GameStop but they aren’t the same company.
Anyway they were selling their 360/PS3/Wii/3DS games without manuals as one store found some drugs in a manual.
They just binned all the manuals so I’m not sure if something similar has happened at GameStop 🤷♂️
This video is exactly what I needed as I’m about to sit and eat lunch thank you sir.
I have a feeling it is more Gamestop tossing the cases in the trash then people trading in just the discs.
I fundamentally will never understand people who throw away game cases
No wonder GameStop died here in Denmark.
We're better off without them.
Alot of times with disc only games or Nintendo ds/3ds loose games where because gamestoppe destroying the game cases to make more space
Please never stop doing this....this is a valuable PSA.....plus it's hilarious
I also like to look at the collector bubble in the USA. But one thing always strikes me - the condition of the games, regardless of the era, is mostly really bad. So many are also sold/bought "loosely", whether in stores or on exchanges. In my small but fine collection of 500 games (from SNES to PS5), condition was and is always the top priority. CIB is a must. But of course it is always a question of your own budget. In any case, it is exciting to see how differently people collect everywhere.
Best wishes from good old Germany 👋🏼
Pro tip for removing stickers from cover art: Ronsonol/Zippo lighter fluid. You can literally soak it in the stuff and it won't stain. Evaporates super quick and leaves no odor. Dab/soak for a couple minutes and it will be super easy to peel. Just make sure you wipe, don't scrub any adhesive off.
I heard about them bringing back their retro program to the stores and got hopeful. Even more hopeful when I learned the store by my house is the main location for the retro games in the whole city. I went in only to see a tiny section on the back wall. It had multiple sections for different consoles but the entire display was so small,. they had like 10-20ish games for each. and most of those were crappy gamestop boxes too. It was really sad. Thankfully i didnt waste too much time. but its a shame they didnt have a way to appeal to retro collectors when they launched the retro program. instead it feels like their last ditch effort to sell warehouse product before all gamestops close down.
Edit for the sticker peel was top tier
4:04 so real and people don't even know
I don’t work at GameStop and never had, but if you watch real legit GameStop dumpster diving videos they throw game cases away and replace them with GameStop cases whither they’re in good condition or not.
My advise with retro at gamestop is buy in store, but NEVER buy online. Ive got some good stuff in store but online always disappoints
Granted buying in store is abysmal during b2g1 sales. Slim pickings
Marty was so broken 😂
That peeling battle made me feel so seen
And the worst part is the riddick game you got a full case for
runs terrible on the ps3
the framepassing is off so it feels so heavy to play.
This is the universe correcting itself after that insane haul from your brother in law 😂
A video on Symphony of the Night would be so sick. That is one game that will not disappoint you, it's brilliant.
I wish I had your gamestop. These games are AWESOME!!!
6:30
Give that editor a raise 😂
I was a smart kid who loved the cover art of SNES games and kept everything mint. My parents recently found in the attic a box of SNES games. Super Mario RPG, Mega Man X and X2, Mega Man Soccer, Rocko’s Modern Life, Star Trek, Final Fantasy, and Killer Instinct all CIB. They were just gonna sell them for like $20 on Marketplace and I flipped out haha. For real though, I had those all when I was 6yrs old and treated them like they were treasure
My ex boyfriend did that...I judged him so hard when he pulled out his binder telling me to check out his childhood games.
The best series on RUclips
I could look past an aftermarket case and no instruction manual, but stickers on the cover art? Unforgivable.
Blame Gamestop for not taking more for CIB over loose not the customers. Only an idiot would do that when there is a legitimate market for replacement cases online, specifcally ebay. Not only that Im pretty sure Gamestop Warehousing (at least at one point in time) was throwing cases away for most platforms to "save space" again, cause they sell it for the same price regardless. Come on now, you know better Matty!
9:59
This hits hard. 😔
My local game stop opened in 2004 it's closing down on January 11th now my nearest game stop is 60 miles away
You're basically forced to use Amazon. "Capitalism is freedom of choice."
Sorry to hear about your situation.
that happened to me here too, gamestop killed all the local competition in the early 2000s and then about 5 years ago they all of the locations here
… uh, “Man juice?”
Gross. (lol)
11:25 you’re right… old-school *God of War* (PS2/PS3/PSP era) is far superior to the new *God of War* .
I never do sticker peels, I always do a heatgun removal instead
I bought 19 games (18 used and 1 new) from GameStop all the used games came out this year and they all were missing the game case and the new game came open with a “new sticker” on it
I made it to 15:20 before realizing the RR meant Retro Rebound and not Red Ribbon
Oof, I actually have Blacklist complete in box for 360. That one hurt. 16:10
Ebay is better for complete in box
Sticker peeling segment goes hard
Exactly why I rather go in person! You can check it out before purchasing… if you live close enough to one
I did that game binder thing with every single game I ever owned until I switched to almost purely digital. I kept the cases on my book shelf in my room but the game binder was essential for bringing games to sleepovers as a kid
Lmao the edit was very fitting with it being a DBZ game.
DBZ skit so fire ngl killed it broski
i live in finland so we dont have gamestops (anymore, like 12 years a go we did) but just by watching these videos where people buy gamestop games online, it seems more often than not they just send a loose game, i wouldnt even order from there if i lived there and could
Retro Rebound and GameStop a friendship and rivalry that will last forever
I don't know if they also have retro games in-store in the US (because here in the EU it's only ps4-ps5 and switch games, not even ps3, I mean GS is literally shutting down stores here). Anyway my point is that sometimes people just steal the cases, like everyone knows that GS has the actual games back at the counter but you just walk in, snug the case and walk out and resell it on ebay or whatever.
For instance I ordered a few new games online from them recently, and well turns out it's gamestop's "new", but the game I ordered might have been the only copy they had left which was at the stand so naturally it won't be sealed yet it's fair to say that it's new. So when that happens you might find yourself with incomplete packaging.
I would say, with what I read online from ex-employees, I'm not going to even bother with a return or cause any trouble, you gotta deal with what you have at the end, imagine what the dude was thinking when he packaged that shit lmao. Some transparency when making online purchases would be greatly appreciated tho, I hope the new company to which GS sold their local chain would actually do this like sending a photo of the product or something.
Plot twist all the complete game are now in "GameStop retro"
How can they sell retro games without disclosing the condition and what is included with the games? Its crazy to me.
In my defense for not have cases, I traveled for the Marines/Army for 10+ years. But I still own my disks & manuals. I just saved space and weight by discarding the cases... Which I do regret a bit.
Thank you for doing this video. You have helped me decide on not purchasing from the GameStop website. I do hit up my "Retro" Gamestop in my town for SNES-PS3 games. But I can decide in person if I should buy the Game (Disc, Manual and Original Case).
Brother, for the love of God stop buying from them. They don’t deserve anyone’s business.
I came for the roulette and left with the man juice and disappointment. Keep it up, I love them!
No point in GameStop. You’re better off buying local so you know what you’re getting or paying up for Amazon because those have to be flawless or you can just return them.
I’d put all my games and movies in a binder LOL I was very organized and extremely careful. BUT I was also a serial collector so I’d either keep all my movie cases in a box and store it or all my game cases I’d display in my room while keeping the games in the case in the living room (mostly because my mom didn’t want clutter).
Anytime I’d trade in or sell my games I’d get the case and manual and make sure it was included.
The main problem with this is their sourcing all of these retro games from specific GameStop locations
So when the order comes in whatever GameStop location has the game picks it out and then sends it out (if not from a warehouse)
I’ve been retro hunting at GameStop for the past couple months and out of 100 or so retro games maybe 20 have the original cases and artwork
That’s the main problem with buying online. Do not know what you’re going to get.
Always try to support local games and local game shops by going in
Also, that makes it a bit more fun in my opinion
More like a hunt instead of an online gamble
The price sticker edit was peak
top tier tag peeling edit
I try not to order from GameStop online because 8 out of 1- games I buy new from them are sent "as new" and are actually used and missing stuff.
For those stickers on the case art, pick up a cheap heat gun or hair dryer and blast it with heat for 45 seconds and then peel it off. Should come off clean
try dragon ball z sparkling zero. its pretty much number 4 of Budokai Tenkaichi
Sooo I'm guilty of taking my discs out and putting them in one of those binders... BUT! I still have all the cases with manuals in great shape. Those multi-disc PS1 cases were so fragile, the first time I had a hinge crack I decided I was going to take them out of the equation.
Was not prepared for the tense anime battle.
Oh, man!! Matty, PLEASE do a retrospective on Riddick's Escape from Butcher Bay. The sequel you have in your hand there is a bit of a stinker, but it includes the OG on the same disc.
The gamestop in my town just closed down and the nearest one now is like 30-40mins away lol
I wonder if game stop sends their best games to the brick and moter "retro" stores?
I was about to order some retro games through the buy 2 get 1 free deal but I just knew that if I did, I'd get my games in the same condition as you. I went with PS5 & PS4 & to my surprise they all came complete in box, or mostly. Cyberpunk 2077 came nearly complete, it was just missing the stickers & postcards which I don't care about. I mostly bought niche stuff like King of Fighters or Yakuza & they were all in near mint condition. Even came with the DLC codes for some reason & still worked.
I don’t blame GameStop for the cases and art since people trade them in that way. However, when you buy online it should tell you CIB or otherwise and there should DEFINITELY be a discount on incomplete game cases.
It was me who left the stickers on the games. My heart is full of evil for video game collectors lol…
Being serious I hate rolling the dice on GameStop sometimes. I have an order coming hopefully they did me right but…ya never know.
That NBA Street 2 looks interesting. I have Lords of Shadow 1 and 2 CIB. 2 took me a little while to find.
Oh snaps, we got rid of the GameStop commercial and got a new opening?!
My biggest complaint about the "GameStop Retro" initiative would have to be its employees. They lack video game knowledge. Most of them can't even read a GBA cartridge.
Next time you go to peel a sticker warm it up with a hair dryer, itl heat up the glue for an easier removal without tearing.