Farenheit 451: Dark Days At Gamestation...

Ah! Gamestation. Once a hallowed Mecca for three of the five members of the DCJY team. For myself, Tomleecee and the Gagaman(n), Gamestation represented a high street store that until as recently as eight months ago, you could walk into and gaze upon a neat display of Dreamcast or Saturn games or secure yourself a classic Sega console and assorted peripherals . A high street store which seemed to recognise the value of Retro gaming and applaud those who still celebrated the might of systems past. It's where I purchased the vast majority of my Saturn and Dreamcast collections. Standout moments would be the purchase of Shenmue 2 for £25 when I knew nothing about it... All of the other games were £2.50... It's high price alone hinted that it might be something special. I was entranced by it for months after. It's where I also bought my rare copy of House Of The Dead for the Saturn, again for the high price of £25. Yet it proved to be an essential purchase...

Then came the takeover by the giant corporation that is 'Game' and all of a sudden, the Saturn and Dreamcast (plus all the other Retro consoles) games were swept aside. Cast randomly into bargain bins, the once proud products of times past now looked like a load of charity shop (thrift store) crap. Covers gone, cases cracked, discs and cartridges without their boxes, the whole thing was a sorry mess. But as Games TM magazine reports, the company has now gone a step further. I'll repeat the article for you, copied out and hand typed and see what you make of it...

(From Games TM magazine) "Gamestation Burns Retro Stock"

"Internet rumours this month suggest a shocking trend within the UK's second biggest retail chain. reports from consumers claimthat the over 200 strong chain has pulled most of it's retro games from the shelves and has destroyed all but a few select desirable titles.

Gamestation itself has not released an official statement at the time of writing, but an anonymous source within the company has confirmed the rumour to Games TM.

Several retro cartridges and CDs have apparently been removed from sale and destroyed. The bulk of these games are highly unlikely to sell - such as very old sports games- but there are also many under-the -radar classics that have been inadvertently been destroyed.

Our source tells isthat an official list exists that outlines exactly which games to preserve. These are mostly from recognisable franchises like Sonic The Hedgehog and Final Fantasy and will continue to be sold in Gamestation stores. There are, however, a number of less obvious, but nevertheless desirable games that are not accountable on the list. We've personally heard of two highly collectable Saturn games that are not intended such preservation, which would boil the blood of any retro enthusiastif they knew exactly which games they were.

The notion that a high street retailer as well respected as Gamestation might even think about destroying potentially games, especially those that have not been re-released or emulated, is as bad as burning books in our view. The company's supposed preservation list is a good idea, but it really needs to be as thorough as possible to avoid mistakenly eliminating lesser known titles from history. And we'd also like to know if the destroyed cartridges are being recycled or simply thrown away. Gamestation will hopefully make an official comment in the future and shed more light on these distressing allegations."

So there you have it. I think its a fucking outrage... Could Burning Rangers, now with a degree of bitter irony, be literally burning? There are some classic "older football" titles that I still play to this day. Why not give them to charity, or offer them as freebies to their loyal customers? The cunts...

What do you think?

Dreamcast Game Price Drop...

I've already posted about this over at the Saturn Junkyard, but I'm a little traumatised by recent events over at Gamestation. To cut a long story short, previously Retro friendly Gamestation, has been bought out by Blockbuster and the much blander Game... The high street stores are now owned by Game and the ones nestled in the back of Blockbuster video stores have been bought out by Blockbuster...

Now, my local Gamestation was one in the back of a Blockbuster. It holds many happy memories for me, it's where I collected most of my Dreamcast software. Its where I bought Shenmue 2, when I knew nothing about it, only to be entranced by it for the following year.

It's where I picked up my Dreamcast steering wheel, keyboards, light guns and mouse... where I bought my replacement Saturn when the last one conked out, where I bought my entire Master System software collection and my Game Gear. Its been the mainstay of my expansive video game collection and a place I knew I could always go to browse and maybe score the odd bargain.

Now I know that Caleb recently scored an extensive Dreamcast haul from a major US videogame emporium that had claimed for years it didn't stock Dreamcast stuff. But what I saw on my last visit to 'my' Gamestation, that this place was now dead as a source of Retro Treasures. For there, in a lowly basket was every last piece of Retro kit that the shop had, just dumped and with prices slashed for a quick sale... No dignity, no display, just a random skip full of Dreamcast, Saturn, Megadrive, Gameboy software etc... Had you walked into the store a couple of months before, you would have seen a 'Dreamcast section' and occasionally amongst the mass of WWF games, the plethora of Chu Chu Rockets, the score of Tee Off Golfs and the host of Soul Fighters, you could pick up a pearl...

So what was in the basket then? Well uniformly priced at £1.99 was the following selection...

Loads of Virtua Striker 2, Pod Racing, Virtua Athlete 2K, Aerowings, Sega Bass Fishing, Tomb Raider: Last Revelation... But these weren't always in there boxes... Some were bundled in a plastic sleeve with an elastic bands wrapped round them... One of the interesting items was Aerowings at £1.99... In June that would have cost you £9.99... Now they have decided it is worth £8 less... Go figure!

Now I had been told by the shop's staff that Retro section would still be a feature, but when I saw the devestation layed before me, I was forced to ask what the future of Retro gaming at Blockbuster would be... The answer was that there would not be one... and for me that's just sad.

Sure there's Ebay... we can always go online and boost our collections... But for me personally that's not the same as going into a shop, checking out and thumbing through the selection and walking away with a much coveted title or a piece of hardware... For me it's the end of an era, and another nail in the coffin for our favourite undead console...

Even more worrying, is the fact that a similar fate has befallen the Dreamcast (and Saturn) at Chips, a smaller independent franchise, that previously boasted a Dreamcast and Saturn section, has now moved the games to a Retro cabinet, locked behind glass and unavailable for 'hands on' perusal... That means that in my town, there is no longer a shop where I can pick up Dreamcast goodies... And that's bad...

I know that both Tomleecee and The Gagaman(n) have enjoyed the bounties of Gamestation, but it seems that our shared experience is coming to a close... Let's kick a 40 oz to the curb in honour of our fallen hero... On a positive note, (I always look for a positive spin to any negative situation) on my last visit to Chips, I got a burnt copy of 'Rival Schools' from the nice guy behind the counter, in exchange for the burnt copy of Ikaruga that I gave him a few months before...

So its all good! This is Father Krishna signing out, and saying "Goodnight Children, Wherever You Are..."