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How Smart is Your Game Store Clerk?
by Alec Matias, Jun 15, 2005 7:12am PDTI'm sure that every single one of us has a story regarding the ineptitude of our local game store clerks. Well, EGM decided to do some investigative reporting to see how informed (or misinformed) their local clerks were about videogames. They sent in a "clueless girlfriend" shopping for her boyfriend, asking the clerks questions like "My boyfriend says more polygons are better. What are those?" The results are quite hilarious.
Spy: And for portable games, should I get a DS or wait for PSP? Clerk: [The PSP] has music; it's like an organizer. It's a Palm reader - you play your PS2 games on there, you can download from the Internet. I would recommend waiting for it. Everyone's waiting for it.I remember once I was told a game was canceled despite there being a stack of the strategy guides sitting on the counter. Share your stories!
Comments
On a side note, what I like to do is pre-order a few games and never pick them up. Then months later come back and ask for the money back. Hilarity ensues 90% of the time.
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What possible excuse is their for making something up instead of saying you dont know ?
If your district managers/Corporate offices are telling you to lie then you shouldnt want to work there anyway - so it's either that or you have such a chip on your own shoulder you refuse to admit you dont know
Seriously I am not talking about the constant hounding of trying to get me to buy an overpriced extended warranty or the latest Ent Weekly (which do annoy me ) but the worst thing are the outright lies you can hear EVERY day from any Best Buy/Comp Usa around the country
Why should it surprise you that there is so little respect for these stores when its so easy to find someone in the computer dept at each one who will pull such ridiculous statements out of the air instead of just admitting the truth?
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In Case Of Emergency Contact: The Hospital
true story..haha
You don't expect Walmart people to tell you which pillow is best?
Still, some funny stuff to read :)
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Last week I went to a different EB where I picked up a used copy of Thief 3 for PC, got home to find the guy didn't pack any of the CDs in the case. I went back, he put some CDs in it, and I should've checked it right there. I was at a stoplight on the way home when I found out he had given me Thief Gold, so I had to go back again.
Remember, if you buy a used game, check the case right away, do it right in front of them, make sure it's all there.
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*sigh*
The DS was on the top shelf so one of them got a fold-up ladder and didn't open it, just leaned it against the wall and started climbing. He couldn't really reach the DS as the ladder was tilting, so he climbed down.
Clerk#2: "Jesus, you're going to kill yourself."
Clerk#1: ...
Clerk#2: "That's why you can open them."
Clerk#1" "Shut up, man!"
Clerk#1 opens ladder, climbs up and gets me the DS + game. He did ask me about a warranty but then remained silent when I just said no.
Nope, not really rocket scientists but I prefer the silent types over the smartasses.
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Me: "For better conductivity huh?"
Them: "Yep!"
Me: "It's optic fibre. They don't carry electricity you idiot."
Them: "........."
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In another side, Gamestop is bad, is just is. I took some off-work time to go to the near-by Gamestop to check a game, and here's what happend:
Me: "Hello, do you guys have Gundam vz. Zeon DX"?
Clerk: "Let me check. *pulls a cabinet, goes through some used games, walks to the room on the back, comes back* Sorry we don't have it"
So I deciced to go back to work and forget about it, 1 hour later, I called the store to see if they got any, and here's how it when:
Me: "Hello, do you guys have an extra copy of "Gundam vs. Zeon DX"?
Same Clerk: "Let's me check...Wow, we have 10 copies with us, would you like me to hold you one"?
Seriously, what happend there?
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No one knows what's in boxes, no one knows when restocks arrive, no one knows ANYTHING.
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Well in this guy's defense he was probably referring to the fact that there have been a few instances (the Mega Man collection comes to mind) when a NES game can be played on the PS2 or Xbox. But yeah, it's funny how the corrolation is still that Nintendo "came out" with all the NES games.
letting me know I can have 8 free issues of two horrible magazines EVERY time I go in there and by multiple persons also
and
letting me know I can pay 5 dollars to extend the warranty on the 10 dollar mouse I just bought for a kids computer and then asking AGAIN to make sure I really realize the implications of my decision.........
(one day I will shoot the person who offers me the extended warranty one too many times :) )
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<me> Hey, do you have any 4-mouse button?
<clerk> *stares in disbilief/disgust for 5 seconds*
<clerk> Such a thing doesn't exist.
I was pretty pissed by this, and later got pretty angry because most of the stores had a similar attitude, although not as strong.
When I gave up on my search and was going home, I saw a last store that actually had a Logitech Mouseman+ on sale (it has 4 buttons, without a wheel). I bough it on the spot and it was the best gaming mouse I've ever used; I still miss it a lot.
Everytime I go shopping for anything computer-related I still fear someone will say "this doesn't exist" when I'm buying something. I don't care when people don't know something, but when they don't and they act like they know... it annoys the hell out of me.
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The guys at Game XChange are pretty damn cool and they usually have a much better selection of used games.
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It's the fault of the company for threatening their employees if they aren't high-pressure salesmen for stupid promotions that don't benefit the customer. If I ran a company I might pressure my employees to be *pleasant* or *helpful*. Imagine that.
I realize these companies rely on low-wage high-pressure workers to make their money, but I don't care. Find some other way to make it work. The dozens of companies gobbled up by GameStop and EB were doing O.K. before all this. The reason GameStop and EB do better is because of all the typical reasons big corporations do better than individual proprietorships: good high-volume relationships with suppliers.
All that said, the guys I've dealt with lately have been pretty cool.
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usually these guys are such morons ... and then when i see a p.o.s. eb employee leave eb and go work at the local circuit city store i know that these guys are the kind of people with no future. then i feel bad for them.
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It disturbs me greatly. But then again I did buy Kirby Canvas Curse from EBGames so I guess I am just a whore.
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I guess it comes down to the employment market these companies cater to. Someone who is genuinely interested in games is likely to work at a used game store, whereas the Best Buy / Toy's R Us crowd are typically people just looking for retail employment and may happen to be stationed in that department.
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"What?"
"Kata-Mari Dama-Shii"
"What's that for?"
"It's. Right. Behind. You."
friggin EB.
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I was at Compucentre in Montreal, Canada.
"Hey, I'm looking for a TV Tuner card and.."
With a big WTF written on her forehead, "What do you want to do? Watch movies on your tv? No you need a new video card for that."
"Eh.. No I want a svideo-in actually"
Breathing aloud, as if I was the worst annoying client ever; "No, actually to listen to movies from your computer to the tv you need an s-video out" Note That I never fucking mentionned watching movies on anything!..
I'm a pretty shy and patient guy, so; "No, I'm pretty sure I know what I need, do you have any of those?"
"Pffff.... (calling for backup..) John, can you come here and take care of this?"
I crossed the street and bought the damn thing to their competitor, who was probably more expensive, but didn't treat me like shit.
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I applied for a job at "Spaceworld" once, and I am kinda happy that they didn't respond :D. Coder 4 teh win!11
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What's next, a story on the dumbest Denny's waitress?
Those jobs breed out competency, because the people who excel quickly move on to jobs where they can actually use their knowledge. The ones left holding the torch are generally NOT the most skilled or knowledgeable.
It's like this - would you expect someone working at McDonalds to give you a reasonable answer on nutritional advice, a romantic place to take a woman for dinner or what kind of wine goes with pork?
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They should have asked everyone the same questions. So it wasn't really fair actually.
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plus, I've very jealous, they (the company) had an incentive program where the store in each regoin that sold the most copies of WoW would get lifetime subscriptions for all the employees.... yeah, they won. We talk WoW all the time.
http://www.shacknews.com/ja.zz?id=6167349
keywords: Flawless Cowboy, EB customer-rat, lingerie, uh... games.
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Him: "The graphics don't look very good."
"I hear it's fun."
"They look very blocky."
"Well, if the gameplay is good..."
After the money transaction he made another comment on the graphics. Geez man enough!
The rest of the staff at that GameStop are really laidback though. Each of them asked me about the subscribing to the magazine or whatever it is they try to sell, but after that they haven't said anything. They saved me some money once, and have been helpful with XBox game selections. They're good people.
The game crew at the Best Buy though, cheezopizza. Talk about trying to shove a warranty down your throat.