Best Buy Canada, recognizing the obscene profits to be made by reselling used games, has decided to adopt the practice at its subsidiary Future Shop stores.The Globe and Mailgoes on to tell us what we’re already intimately familiar with, that the markup on used games is enough to give any retailer an immediate, throbbing, dew-tipped erection.
In spite of the fact that we all know we’re being robbed at smile-point every time we sell a used game to a brick-and-mortar store — not to mention the better options readily available — a large number of gamers continue to allow themselves to be taken advantage of. Best Buy is simply making a wise business decision, and to be perfectly honest, I can’t blame them for it.
But what’s the solution here? If a game itself is so unimportant to a person that they’d happily trade it for fractions of a penny on the dollar at the first opportunity, it seems reasonable that the same person doesn’t care about things like box art or packaging. I submit that for these people, who go through video games like toilet paper, a version of a game lacking box art and special packaging (and thus subsidized, resulting in a cheaper purchase price) would be perfectly acceptable. Let’s get cracking.
