Game Informer RIP

 

There is a state of being where the dead are all but confirmed, but not quite in the ground. A moment of convalesce, one might say, from one world to the next. Not just for people, but for brands too. Which I'm pretty sure are legally people somewhere in America, so soon we'll be holding funerals for that I'll imagine. It is within this state that Gamestop has existed for so very long, ever since they had their decline artificially inflated by the Crypto boom from a few years back and the famous 'GameStonk' debacle which set off so many financial institutions to the pure chaos of the crypto currency market. It also inflated Gamestop with enough money to think they might survive into the near future. They even brought abroad ex-Nintendo superstar Reggie to save them. But it was never going to work. Because physical is dead.

I think it really hit home for me when I found myself bouncing from Game to Gamestop all across England for months looking for anyone who had a next- now current- gen console and coming up blank. Sure, a lot of that was the wanting supply issues that were exacerbated by global events- but some of that was the fact that physical stores just weren't being entrusted with these consoles when the online retailers were more likely to push units. My current modern console is the very first console I've ever ordered online and the feeling was deeply wrong- I still don't feel like I crossed that current generation threshold as I did the day I carried my fresh Xbox One home. With the writing on the wall like that, it was only a matter of time before these stores began shuttering.

Just a few months ago I was getting emails telling me how all of my online point privileges were being revoked like I was a criminal, I guess it was around about then that I should have been logging on to Game Informer to save all of my favourite articles. Then again we're talking about Game Informer here- I had no favourite articles. But it's still a bit of gaming media history that stretched back near eons within the gaming world. Because yes, as I'm sure you've heard, Game Informer was pronounced dead not so very long ago. A little bit abruptly to those that weren't directly connected- I didn't even hear word of an impending shutdown. I expected we'd be resting atop Kotaku's grave first, truth be told. But we're here now and we'll mourn if we want to.

Existing as an actual physical magazine all the way back in 1991, Game Informer was one of the very scant real examples of tangible culture that the video game world has, dating back to the foundation of what became the modern games industry after the crash of the old one. Covering the latest games, spreading what counted a virality back then, signal boosting the big hits- that could only be done in print back in the day, and it was publications like Game Informer which bridged that information gap back in those dark ages before standardised Internet. Personally I'll admit never to having enjoyed Game Informer itself, but physical publications were my holy text for a very long time as a budding gamer- of course, that alone was far from Informer's only life.

Game Informer was probably best known in these years as a website providing coverage of everything that the magazine used to, only on a grader scale. And curiously, they were one of the few out there that weren't currently finding themselves in hot-water for rage baiting every other week. They just kept themselves busy actually talking about games, which was preciously rare within the games journalist space, wherein more and more these website pages exist as public blog pages for writers to expunge nonsense about their completely vapid experiences to aid of nothing. I read one such recently about someone experiencing 'the Darkspawn Chronicles' DLC for Dragon Age Origins after avoiding it because they were scared of being the 'what if the bad guys win' scenario. Isn't that the kind of trite better saved for a personal blog such as mine? Game Informer at least kept some standards here and there...

Now if you mosey on over the website you'll find yourself directed to the reason for their downfall- and it's not due to their own inability to keep on track like for Kotaku. Instead it's simply being tied to closely to a sinking ship that has been their downfall. Gamestop is spiralling, losing the little bit of time that the Internet has brought them, and apparently even selling off assets is beyond their capabilities. At this point a full bankruptcy is inevitable and the cost is many losing their jobs. At least this isn't one of those vapid 'cost cutting measures' things we've seen across the rest of the industry, but rather a more desperate 'ventilate the ship before we all drown' kind of scrambles. There's something a tad more respectable about that somehow.

If we were to take this into a bit more of a depressing meta direction we could see this as an indication of the age of media as a medium. Afterall- when personality is being drained out of the surviving outlets because their staff regularly abused that privilege, and sites like Game Informer aren't being considered culturally valuable enough to be shopped off at the very least, and more and more hobbyists to the world of gaming are finding their fixes off free Youtube channels- maybe there just isn't a space for old school journalism set-ups anymore. Afterall, games journalism only really made sense as a kind of reaction to generalised infantilism of the hobby with the assertation that gaming was legitimate enough to warrant enthusiast press coverage from real companies. Now gaming is big enough to sustain itself, perhaps we've outgrown these platforms that once held us up.

So we mark the end of Game Informer and considering the death of the website I'd imagine the erasure of the many years of coverage they provided. Seriously, was anyone archiving all of this before the shut down or did we just lose years of articles? They erased the inbuilt archive so I guess unless someone was already on the ball here we may be out of luck. What a terrible loss for such an important piece of the games industry and it's journey. I truly hope something comes out of this on the other end and maybe the lost former employers come together to start something smaller but a bit more independent. Get with the times a bit, you know?

The dissolution of retail

 

So after recently completing my dis-track against all thing retail- which is to say penning my blog about the failures of retail in regards to the isometric genre of games from the viewpoint of old school isometric legends - you'd have thought I would be done talking about brick and mortar in the gaming space for a while. Afterall, it often seems like the rest of the industry is good and happy to leave physical retailing middle men in the past as an inconvenience of the yesteryear totally redundant in this new digital age within which we live and 'thrive'. If you count 'thriving' as shivering in abject terror over the possibility that everything you have can be snatched away in the blink of an avaricious eye. (And people wonder why we're so standoffish about new markets entering the selling space, as though we don't see entire game catalogues vanish often enough to be worried.)

Digital is far from being the ideal front of ownership thanks to frankly lax laws pertaining to digital ownership, but as legislators around the world slowly become more familiar with the bare basics of the Internet, I personally squeeze my fingers together and pray a come-to-Jesus moment will shake some sense into those areas of lawmaking sooner rather than later. In the meantime, however, we have publishers like Ubisoft eager to take advantage of the frank disconnect that currently exists between game ownership and game sellers through it's newest initiative- changing the name of Uplay for the one hundredth time! (Seriously, I stopped keeping track of the name at least two console generations ago.) This shift counts attempt number umpteenth of Ubisoft pushing for 'innovation' in an anti consumer fashion.

Subscription services for access to games in a manner similar to gamepass but with a much reduced library and a presumed inability to access this media elsewhere. (Ubisoft does like their platform exclusivity whenever they can pull it off.) All in an attempt to get consumers familiar with this style of delivery, as their head of subscription rather frankly conveyed in an interview on the matter. "That’s the consumer shift that needs to happen.- it’s about feeling comfortable with not owning your game." About as damning as a sentiment can get, and fairly bare-faced in the manner to which Ubisoft want to overpower the right of the audience to play what they want, when they want. Because afterall, that is how a mediocre vampire of a publisher like Ubisoft can continue sucking the blood out of the playing public for the right to play their games.

But retail doesn't seem like it wants to put up a fight as it goes extinct to the meteor, or at least that's the impression I'm left with after witnessing the announcement that the UK retailer 'GAME' is moving to discontinue their second-hand game business entirely! In the past people could pass their games in at Gamestop and proceed to be robbed blind by the shocking trade-in value there- but at the very least somebody like myself, more interested in amassing a collection than being thrifty, could pick up a cheap second-hand game from the shelves. Recent developments have made that an increasingly less worthwhile pursuit, not least of all for the fact that nowdays second hand physical titles from GAME retail for about the same amount as a fresh copy, and the fact that buying from Amazon is generally cheaper and more convienet. (Jeff Bezos looking like he's about to murder another retail store right now!)

There's not a lot in the way of competition when it comes to GAME down here in England, outside of regional franchises and private owned gaming enthusiast stores. The only reason GAME could possibly have for shutting itself up in this way would have to be the lack of income available to be able to make such a market work- presenting clearly the disappearing market of Second Hand. We all forsaw this, all warned about it, but now with the chaos happening before our very eyes there is little else to do but stare on in sad horror as the fortold comes to pass. Soon digital storefronts will have even more power over the consumers then they already, lamentably, do- and there's nothing worse for consumers than to be caught beneath a monopoly. Except, perhaps, to be caught between the pulling weight of two monopolies. Yes, that does sound worse actually...

And on the far end of the spectrum we have the sad story of Gamestop, who found itself insnared within the very same trap that saved them all those years ago. We all remember the rags to riches tale when a bunch of memers managed to out-short a firm betting on Gamestop's demise and make thousands in the doing. But we try to forget the fact that Gamestop then pivoted to making themselves all about cryptocurrency and decentralised markets and, lamentably, the NFT trend. That's right, in an act of transparent desperation, Gamestop tried to launch its own chain of mindless NFTs in the hope it would pop off and make millions for them just like... hardly any of these NFT collections actually do. They might as well have gone gambling on the stock market for all the good it would do them.

That they actually lasted this long before pulling the plug on their NFT collection is actually a little bit scary. The market completely crashed, several exchanges well pulled over in the wreck and Bitcoin plummeted to insane lows. In fact, Bitcoin was actually on it's way back up (Relative to it's cataclysmic collapse) by the time that Gamestop realised the NFT market was well and truly dead, demonstrating a shocking lack of awareness of the world around them. Heck, maybe there were a couple of Reddit Stock-advice chuds feeding the project just enough to justify it's existence before going broke and leaving Gamestop high and dry. Who knows?

Ultimately this isn't exactly the healthiest doctor's check-up on the absolute state of the retail market in 2024. As Jeff Bezos prances slowly through the streets with his reaper's scythe, eyeing up his next victim, it's seeming more and more likely that highstreet game stores are just offering up their neck begging to be put out of their misery. And maybe while we're at it, perhaps we might sneakily slap Ubisoft's painfully redundant storefront on the chopping block too? You know, clean up the market, so to speak? At least we have the championing efforts of people like Sven Vincke to impress that even if physical does end up lamentably going the way of the dodo- some vague image of ownership exists within digital purchases. And who knows, maybe with people like him staving off the greedy ghouls long enough, we might get some of those law reforms we need so badly.

Retail is dead

 Long live Retail

When I went out this morning past I saw a peculiar sight. As I travelled on my normal journey towards the bustling heart of the town I live near, cloaked by the torrential downpour that somehow always seems to come out for my singular benefit each and every day, I spied upon the highstreet. Ever the busy port of call no matter what time of day, week or year it is, fit to bursting with so much more people then, I'd bet, the modern health guidelines would recommended. And yet no where near as many from years past, and I don't just say that with rose-tinted glasses. In memory I recall a suffocating crowd, the kind of which you'd have to haughtily fight your way through to have any hope of reaching your store, umbrellas and walking sticks became batons and spiked bats in that arena of bodies, and no quarter was spared for either women or children. 'Twas a bloody ordeal, for which boys were made men. Yet that was no more in this relatively barren, yet still uncomfortably full, highstreet of today. Of course, that was but the salve pre-applied around the wound I was about to receive when I turned the corner and saw, to my dismay, the empty spot where once was my local Gamestop store.

Now I know I've not exactly been kind to Gamestop in past, though I endeavour to affirm that they absolutely deserved every inch of my scathing chagrin. Theirs was a business model built around "We're the best and we'll always be around, do your best to keep all Online endeavours as surface level as possible, deals as skewered as possible and general customer experience just south of spitting on them." If I had alternatives, I'd never have gone to Gamestop. But I didn't, and there's the key. Retail stores have been dying off left right and centre and for my town I'd reached the point where the only serious retail gaming shop was Gamestop, which is now no more. Sure there are a smattering of understocked second-hand stores, but all of those are small chain stores anyway, nothing with character left in the area. But what is the real reason I lament the loss of my Gamestop? The Hardware.

Good lord, if there's one thing we all lose out on with this new age of online marketplaces it's access to easy hardware. Well, that and a lot of esoteric and societal issues are raised such as security of jobs, homogenisation and monopolisation all atop of a general erosion of local economy, but none of those real topics really have much of a place here so I'm sticking to the Hardware talk. Do you have any idea how hard it still is to get ahold of the next gen consoles? Of course you do, because it's still nigh-on impossible and relying on the respective developer store fronts is unreliable because- oh yeah, they decided not to bother with them this generation. The physical stores were my last hope to get a next gen console without having to do battle with an Entire Yakuza sub-division's worth of scalpers, but now I guess I need to start stocking up on Staminan X and practising ripping off my shirt with one hand. (How many shirts do the Yakuza cast go through in the series do ya think? And what about the cost; they always dress designer, afterall, yikes...)

But perhaps most depressingly of all is that loss of sense of community that you had the chance to interact with. As a gamer, there's not really a lot of others out there who are involved enough with the genre to entertain the odd casual chat about the titles you're looking forward to and the ones you're working through right now. Unless you're crazy enough to try and find someone to talk to on the Internet, but man; they're all crazies on that thing, I wouldn't touch it with a barge pole if I were you... There's not really another place you can look at other players in the face and know that someone out there does play games too, for someone like me who really doesn't have anyone to talk to or interact with, all of that meant- something at the very least. It made me feel, at all. Which is more than what I can say about most things in my day-to-day. I felt.

And now that's gone. Or at least around my neck of the woods. And I'm solemn in that realisation. This time I can say that I'm not just bemoaning things changing, as it's often quite easy to get lost between the act of witnessing change and just seeing something die. I think we're watching physical retail die, and the Online space just isn't built to take over wholesale for it. At least not today. It's like a members-only club where the majority of key services are either run by a regional bully or split between two or three. You want a meal delivery service, pick from the three. You want a job search site, pick from the three. You want to order something that isn't food or specific tech; it's pretty much just Amazon. Just bite the bullet and pay Jeff his blood money so he can fuel his next trip to space, everybody; don't worry, he'll thank us at the next press interview! (Dick.)

This was an inevitability, however. No one can stare around in confusion and wonder how we got here because we all saw this coming from a mile away. (All except the executives at Gamestop, that is.) Reggie from Nintendo was hired to be part of the board of directors a while ago, as I covered in a creative little blog that I liked at least even if no one else did, but little has come of that. The man may be a legend but he's no miracle worker, and I bet even the Messiah would have his work cut out for him at this point. The Gamestop stock debacle from earlier this year was fun and it redistributed some wealth in a net positive direction, but it's just drop in bucket against the tsunami that is the changing times. There's nothing to be done to save retail, perhaps there never was, the new age is upon us and it has been for a while now. Part of me knew I was clinging to the safety net of having a nearby store from an entity that didn't realise it was dead yet, but that doesn't make the cold shock of seeing it's corpse sting any less.

So with this new age really should come some consumer rights. Yeah, I'm turning this right around into a complaints blog, because online ain't perfect by a long shot. Why are there still no revisions to purchasing laws so that buying software is actually, you know, buying the software? We're 'licencing' under the good graces of our penny pinching overlords, hoping that they'll always be benevolent down upon us because they have kind-of been up until now. We know that these developers and storefront owners have full control over our library of games, and there's already a least one documented case of a company, EA in this instance, nuking someone's entire library of games that he had purchased. Now did he deserve it? Sure. But that sort of power isn't really ethical for EA, or anyone, to be holding anyway. When we buy a game, we should own that game, and trade laws need to be updated to support that most basic of consumer rights. Don't wait for that loophole to screw us all, fix it now!

Unfortunately little can be done for the Hardware situation many find themselves in, but we're working with baby steps as we try to make Online storefronts more sensible and hospitable. Until 3D printing technology improves to the point where we can scan and copy new hardware into our homes, something which I'd like to think can't be too far off in the grand scheme of technological advancement, we're stuck with Amazon. Personally, I'm already waging up the further afield Gamestop stores for the time being, seeing which are worth the trek to get the new consoles at the very least. But such is a limited-time endeavour and I can't imagine it'll be long before official gaming hardware accessories will go 'order only'. And on such a dark day I can only hope that manufactures learn to respect us enough to at least provide the product themselves. (Wouldn't that be nice?)

Mathmatical Moron tries to understand the Stock Market

 Help

'Outside my wheelhouse' doesn't even begin to describe what I see presented in front of me here. I ain't no Stock trader, trading analyst or anything of the sort. I posses none of the perquisites to get involved in such, not least of all basic knowledge and/or interest. So when it comes to what the going-ons at Wall Street mean, I have no earthly idea and they might as well all be talking moon language to me, however, this is showing up on my blog anyway and there must be a reason for that, no? Well that's because this whole situation does have a tangential link towards the world of gaming, and given that it's one of the most important stories to come out of this sort of thing in forever, I find that irresistible. Wall Street is mildly fascinating as this sort of overarching entity that seems to indirectly and confusingly influence the way we live our lives, and when that entity gets challenged, by Memers no less, how could I not talk about it?

Now I should probably continue but first I should mention, I have no idea if we can really trace this all the way back to Memers. By now a lot of people who really have an axe to grind have entered the discussion and for all I know it was them that got the ball rolling in the first place, but all I know is that I became aware of the situation through the Memeing angle. All I heard was a bunch of people talking about Gamestop Stock and thought, "Now that's a name I've not heard in a long time. A long time". The last I heard, and I thought I'd ever hear, from Gamestop was in relation to Reggie coming over to try and work his magic, but I didn't except anything to actually come of that. And as far as I can tell nothing really has. That is, unless, Reggie managed to sprinkle his fairy dust over Wallstreetbets and set this whole thing in motion. (But that would be magical market manipulation, so I'm going to assume he didn't.)

So although I'm sure you all either already know the situation or are capable of getting a much more indepth explanation elsewhere, (which I highly encourage) I apparently have a fetish for introductions, so here we go. As far as I can tell, the situation started when someone noticed how pitifully low the Gamestop stock was, in relation to how it's a brick and mortar retail store in a world that's heading increasingly digital by the minute. Now at this point I don't know if it was public knowledge about the hedge funds and their short selling operations, but I do know there was a push of the Reddit page 'Wallstreetbets' in order to flood the stocks for Gamestop. Now when I first heard it explained to me there was the meme angle of this, the company was obviously heading off a cliff but if enough momentum was thrown their direction then it might encourage normal investors to spot the trend and assume something big was coming without doing any basic research themselves. (Which, as far as I can tell, happened.)

 

And so, in the way of miracles; Gamestop became one of the most heavily traded stocks of the week and managed to shoot up, I'm told, 1000% percent. Which is just a stupid amount to climb. Now does this mean that the business itself is any less screwed? I don't know. Again, stocks and their relation to the real world is some sort of eldritch Arcanum that I struggle to untangle, but it certainly made enemies quite quickly. I heard of one 'old establishment' source who scoffed at the idea and offered to hold a live stream teaching these 'kiddies' about the basics of portfolio assessment, only for the Gamestop momentum to barrel into hyperspace and send those guys retreating with their tail between their legs. This was just normal people, operating through easy-access commission free traders such as 'Robinhood', who were sticking it to the stuffy coats who've sneered at them for what feels like decades. (But especially the last 13 years, if you're picking up what I'm putting down.)

However, there is a much more impactful, and hilarious, angle to all this and that is the Hedge fund guys. Oh lord this is where the story gets interesting. Again, total moron to all these financial terms so I've had them explained and reexplained to me through several sources, so I think it goes something like this. These guys are ultra rich scumbags who have a scheme, known as 'Short Selling', wherein they borrow stocks and sell them off, betting on the stock to lose value so that they can then buy it back and return that stock with a profit. It's a scummy system which forms a self-fulfilling prophecy of sorts, because not only does it rely on the failings of a company but it encourages anyone who recognises it happening to stay away from that stock, because richer people than you want that stock to go down. And it's these people that really caught the bad end of this whole situation.

Because, you see, when they borrow the stocks they are legally obligated to return them, thus if some sort of shenanigans happen in between the selling and rebuying of them, such as a surprise 1000% increase in value, well- let's just say there's going to be a lot of very unhappy billionaires by the end of the day. (And isn't that all anybody wants for Christmas; unhappy billionaires?) These are the sorts of people that relish in the financial death of entire companies, so you can imagine how much everyone started to pile on once it was realised that Gamestop was once such stock undergoing Short selling. I'm talking about even guys like Elon Musk throwing their weight behind the matter, because these are the parasites that literally have no one's best interest to mind except for themselves. These would also be the same folk that you see going on the news in order to demonise the grassroutes rebellion against them by claiming everything from how these people are uninformed morons, (Which, given the volume of people involved, is statically likely to be true for some folk, not entirely sure how that helps their situation though. You got duped by morons; what does that make you?) and even entirely baseless accusations of market manipulation.

That last one is ironic. Especially given that on the tailend of this whole back and forth, which has turned some of the Wallstreetsbets folk into millionaires off the back of these Wall street goons, (Good on them) there has occurred a little situation which some folk, though not myself for legal reasons, have described as overwhelming textbook market manipulation. Now full disclosure, I don't know the letter of the law in this matter and given I'm in no way involved it doesn't really matter all that much to me, all I know is that it's incredibly revealing how things played out. Yes, by now you likely know; one key commission-less broker that a lot of the Wallstreetbets people were using, Robinhood, ended up cancelling the ability to buy Gamestop Stock (As well as other classically bad-bet stocks which had started to gain attention in this wave of retail rebellion) so that it can only be sold now. Thus forcing the stock to go down. Hmm... I wonder why they did that? Could it be because of 'system overload' like they claim, or maybe because of their own financial ties to the Hedge funds involved in the scheme? Your guess is as good as mine...

So yes, at the end of the day we've got a potential meme that started as 'Huh, I wonder what happens if we drive Gamestop stocks up', which has turned into a spitting match against the traditional dragons of finance and I can't help but applaud from the side-lines. As an uninvolved and entirely confused observer, I find all of this has the air of something incredibly important to it, and I wonder what real life actual movement might be inspired by, at least somewhere along the way, a bunch of gamers. (Just more evidence that gamers are some of the least passive consumers out there and I love it) Heck, even famed 'Among Us' streamer AOC is getting involved on the side of the underdogs, who knows where this momentum will lead us? And, of course, the US stock exchange effects us across the pond, and I'm sure those across the world, so this could be the start of something... I don't want to say magical... but at least new. Or maybe it'll all amount to nothing and just be more evidence, as if we needed anyway after the timeless philosophy by Lemar, that 'There ain't no justice in the world'.

This could be the end of everything

So why don't we go...

Not too long ago I spoke about a world in lockdown, although that was technically just a hair before I entered Lockdown myself. (We're a slow country over here sometimes.) and now I've found myself wandering down empty streets singing to myself. (Yes, I actually do that. It's how I get my exercise.) Everyone appears to be reacting to their old 'epidemic-caused social distancing' thing differently, and I've found that incredibly fascinating to watch from the sidelines. I, for one, have scrubbed my hands raw due to the amount of times I've ventured outside, but apart from that it's pretty much business-as-usual for me. Not everything is taking this situation as flippantly, however, and fewer people still have even the luxury of my insouciance.

In the ever-out-of-touch world of celebrity there's seems to be a certain mania that has swept across the acting populace. Or at least, that's the only thing that I can assume is responsible for that train-wreck of a sing-along conducted by Gal Gadot yesterday. It truly is worrying to think that but 5 days into America's lockdown her celebrities are virtually gathering to croon 'Imagine' (horribly out of tune) from their million-dollar abodes. I mean, I know I joke about how this is the apocalypse and all but I am honestly joking, I truly wonder if these folk do believe it is their last hurrah. Some speculate that this is the fallacy of actors, they have such a yearning desire to perform that they'll willingly embarrass themselves on the global stage for the wider world to see. Or perhaps this was the intent of the whole affair, to provide a silly video for everyone to laugh at in these trying times. If so then I applaud them, for it's surely better than whatever Evangeline Lily is hawking these days.

But that's enough from the traditional celebrities, this is a blog about gaming, and thus the latest machinations of Gamestop is much more my cup of tea. This week past you might have seen my little dramatisation of Reggie's acquisition by Gamestop, twas a fun little story that I wanted to spice up a bit and I thought it might have been the herald of smoother seas for the folk over there, although it seems I was a little mistaken. With my never ending faith in Mr. Fils-Aimé, I can only imagine it was above his station to make the decision to obstinately force Gamestop stores to remain open in the midst of this pandemic, although I'm still miffed this happened under his watch. For those who didn't catch it; most stores have been forced to shut their doors for the foreseeable future and revert to home-working where it's possible. Only essential stores are allowed to remain, such as food providers and medical stores. (I hear that restaurants are allowed to stay too, although I'm much too poor to acknowledge what is so essential about them.) This would have spelled the closing of Gamestop's stores too, had they not magically classified themselves as 'Essential'.

It's a shocking move that reeks of an opportunist's scheming rather than the steps of a concerned employer looking to protect it's workers. And that is because it is exactly the work of an opportunist. Gamestop's sales have risen during this crisis and management were unwilling to give that up, regardless of the possible optics. In their mind, they became an 'essential service' due to the relief that they provide folk who are stuck indoors, but even for someone like me that explanation rings a little hollow. Bear in mind that I positively live and breath games, and even then I'm very aware that they aren't actually necessary for continued function of my body. (Just for my higher functions as an individual.) Although even if we were to discard that most obvious of facts, in what way would that make Gamestop a necessary institution? The digital world of gaming is alive and fine today and nowadays it's honestly just as expensive to shop there as it is in the physical stores. (Which is part of the reason why Gamestop have been in such dire straits recently anyway.) Nothing about their story adds up and it paints a terrible picture on the world of gaming for the clueless mainstream. (For the love of god, don't give them more ammunition!)

Seems that those of the local government have agreed, because according to some leaked correspondence that was distributed to Gamestop staff, the high-ups were specifically providing documents for rebuttal against demands of closure from police that were apparently being made. It wasn't just the police that were pleading for these stores to abide the lockdown, however, the employees seemed just as upset. A few managers complained about how lacking they were in the basics to run a store in the midst of a virus, like the necessaries to prevent contagion to their staff. Sanitary gloves and disinfectants were running in short supply before the lockdown stuck and Gamestop warehouses have none in stock to ship to their desperate stores. Some stores weren't even allowed to close up their public play areas, despite the obvious risk for contagion such stations presented. Worst of all, employees were strictly required to come in for their shifts or risk having their absence marked down as 'unauthorised'; quite the dictatorial stance for the Gamestop command to take in such times then, huh?

The consequences of these actions were predictable and swift, huge and overwhelming public backlash. Seems that despite the constant attacks about how 'entitled' gamers are, we still apparently care about human decency enough to be offended when something so grossly misjudged occurs. (Especially when done so for our apparent 'benefit') Folk rallied to make Gamestop aware of just how dumb they were being and honestly right on them, If Gamestop really wanted to make the most out of the situation then why not spend their time revamping their business model like they really need to do to survive? What better time is there to make vast changes to your core structure then when none of your staff or stores are functional? But then, what do I know, I'm just another serf... The Gamestop employees, on the otherhand, were in a much more tangible position to let the higher ups know about their displeasure and they made it so, by quitting in a lot of cases. (If there is any more solid of a middle finger to your boss, I don't know what it is.)

Ultimately this campaign has the required effect, to a point. Gamestop have shut down all their stores in California, although it's unclear if this trend will pick up elsewhere. (Although Cali was where the majority of stores that were forced open were situated, as I understand it.) They did ensure to go full 'Foot-in-mouth' however, by delivering an insulting statement regarding their own conduct. During this address they thought it wise to include how "The health and safety of our employees and customers is of utmost importance", which is just provably false given their actions over the past week. Forcing and threatening their employees into putting themselves in harm's way whilst actively encouraging consumers to do the same isn't exactly the sort of move that lands one on the shortlist for the Nobel prize. For the time being, however, the official Gamestop stance is that their remaining open is of essential public interest and that appears to be the hill that they are willing to, and seemingly are about to, die on.

So 'stir-crazy cabin fever' has affected all of us. From the humble nobody typing on his computer in the dark at half past midnight, to the clueless celeb in their multi-million dollar garden, to the desperate corporate megalomaniacs. Call it the 'great equaliser' that puts us all on a level playing field. Only some folks delusions are markedly more dangerous than other's. I think it'll be interesting to discover how people choose to cope in the weeks to come, as well as how crazy things will start to get once weeks start becoming months. (Which, at this rate, it looks like they will.) For me, however, the most fascinating thing to observe will be the way things end up once the dust is settled and we all start coming out of our bunkers of self isolation. What will be changed, who will be impacted and, most relevantly, will Gamestop still be allowed to exist? Magic eight balls says: Outlook not so good.