Those attempts seem full-assed to me; it’s just that none of them worked, from ThinkGeek to mobile devices. They had some pilot stores in a few locations, tragically rolled out just before lockdown, to see what kinds of concepts might stick. The one that seemed the most promising was one where it was like a gaming lounge, sort of like a LAN center but with consoles and such as well. There’s a non-Gamestop location like that near me but with way more floor space than your typical Gamestop. Given that most retail has gone online and digital, and brick-and-mortar is transitioning into services and experiences, this one made the most sense to me.
I remember Dallas-Ft Worth had one of those and it was awesome. Something like 20 bucks an hour, and I could go play any game there while waiting for a plane. There definitely needs to be more “Group gaming” areas, and that would be something I’d invest in.
In our suburban nightmare we live in, kids don’t have enough places to go be kids, and one of the things I did was lan/group game with people. Now there’s no space for that, and a rentable place would be ideal
There’s a lan/vr arcade near me, has like 40 super high end gaming rigs… they only get busy when there’s a big event like a non-local tournament or something. We also have multiple pinball/arcade bars, and most of them also have some retro consoles set up. One of the 4-man arcade machines at one of the places even has something like a retropi installed in it and you can pick between hundreds of games up to GameCube era, but nobody really ever plays those either. (The pinball is the draw).
Can’t see this doing a lot better, at least not in places with options.
Yeah, if it worked, it would not be as prolific as Gamestop was 20 years ago, but they’d survive as a business named Gamestop, potentially. Brick and mortar dedicated to video game sales doesn’t make sense anymore.
Those attempts seem full-assed to me; it’s just that none of them worked, from ThinkGeek to mobile devices. They had some pilot stores in a few locations, tragically rolled out just before lockdown, to see what kinds of concepts might stick. The one that seemed the most promising was one where it was like a gaming lounge, sort of like a LAN center but with consoles and such as well. There’s a non-Gamestop location like that near me but with way more floor space than your typical Gamestop. Given that most retail has gone online and digital, and brick-and-mortar is transitioning into services and experiences, this one made the most sense to me.
I remember Dallas-Ft Worth had one of those and it was awesome. Something like 20 bucks an hour, and I could go play any game there while waiting for a plane. There definitely needs to be more “Group gaming” areas, and that would be something I’d invest in.
In our suburban nightmare we live in, kids don’t have enough places to go be kids, and one of the things I did was lan/group game with people. Now there’s no space for that, and a rentable place would be ideal
There’s a lan/vr arcade near me, has like 40 super high end gaming rigs… they only get busy when there’s a big event like a non-local tournament or something. We also have multiple pinball/arcade bars, and most of them also have some retro consoles set up. One of the 4-man arcade machines at one of the places even has something like a retropi installed in it and you can pick between hundreds of games up to GameCube era, but nobody really ever plays those either. (The pinball is the draw).
Can’t see this doing a lot better, at least not in places with options.
Yeah, if it worked, it would not be as prolific as Gamestop was 20 years ago, but they’d survive as a business named Gamestop, potentially. Brick and mortar dedicated to video game sales doesn’t make sense anymore.