Must be nice to be the only dog in the race....

[RTSDaddy2]

Sticker shock tonight- went to Blockbuster just to ask how much it costs to rent games for the Wii - and was promptly told by the lady there that all video games are $9.62 for rental.

Nearly 10 dollars for rent? I walked out - I could buy one, try it out, and trade it in and not lose any more money than that if I do it all within the same amount of time.

[protokatie]

I'm suprised that rental places even still exist. How many people here still bother to go to a rental store?

Still, 10 bucks to rent a game is retarded. I don't know how rental stuff works these days (as I havent rented in years), does blockbuster still do the "return it whenever your want, no late fee  thingy"?

[Epyx]

does blockbuster still do the "return it whenever your want, no late fee  thingy"?

No they dropped the "no late fees" but in fairness they do have a video game rental policy that let's you rent for $30 *any* one game at a time for 30 days...so you could rent 30 different games within the 30 days or keep 1 for 30 or 2 for 15 days each as long as you only ever have 1 in your possession.  

That's honestly not that bad...particularly for FPS type games that you can win in 10 hours and never play again.  You really end up just paying $1 a day and on a weekend for example you could rent Uncharted 2 for PS3 on Friday win it by Saturday afternoon...then go grab another and return it Sunday etc and even just doing this weekends would be a good deal for $30 not to mention have the weekdays as well.

[ChadTower]

does blockbuster still do the "return it whenever your want, no late fee  thingy"?

They never had that policy.  It was more like "return it whenever you want, but if it's more than a week late, you bought it" and they got class action sued over the advertising campaign.

[Ginsu Victim]

I did the 30 days thing when I first modded my PS2. I was making multiple trips a day. I eventually copied every game they had.

[syph007]

Ya to rent 360 games where I live from blockbuster, it ends up being almost 11 bucks with tax!  I found a local mom and pop shop that rents them for 5, so I only go there now.

[ChadTower]

I did the 30 days thing when I first modded my PS2. I was making multiple trips a day. I eventually copied every game they had.

Around here they were limiting people at "manager's discretion".  Basically if your account came up with "too many rentals" they'd turn you away for a few days with a note on your account.

[ChadTower]

I'll go in occasionally and buy used movies when it's 4/$20, but that's it.

That's all you'd be able to get anyway because they only carry 4 different movies at a time.  1000 copies of each but only 4 of them. 

[Ginsu Victim]

Other than when I ripped all their PS2 games, I just avoid that place. I hate it with a passion. I'm always happy to hear about their financial troubles. I'm hoping our local BB gets closed down soon. They killed the mom and pop stores.

I do rent movies at Hastings, though, but I'm a former manager anyway...

[massive88]

I havent rented a game in forever.  With demo's and so many more reputable review sites out there now than just 5 years ago, I haven't really had the need.  I actually played my first rented game in several years at a party where someone rented Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2 for the weekend.  I was shocked that you could still rent games.

If I was a consummate renter though, Id probably do it with Gamefly - http://www.gamefly.com/Features/HowItWorks/

[Malenko]

I used to rent at Hollywood video, it was cool that I signed up in Delaware and when I moved to Texas they had all my info on file (used same membership card). Instead of renting I usually just borrow the game from a friend to see if I like it, and friends borrow mine to see if they like it.

I think Blockbuster is doing Wii rentals like the movie theaters do the concession stands; renting out less items at a higher cost

[ChadTower]

That does sort of make sense, though.  They had to eventually give up on the need to rent a game 10 times before breaking even.  The discs are usually trash after only a couple of rentals.

[ChadTower]

Heh, I remember that.  The cashiers were never trained in how to flash a cart in under 15 minutes.  Every time someone wanted to rent a game the whole store came to a stop.  Then the writers would break down.  A few times we rented games that just didn't work when you got them home.  That was not a process suited for min wage retail workers.

[Ginsu Victim]

Wow, that's nuts. We didn't have BB in our area back then, so this is the first I'm hearing of this.

[ChadTower]

It was actually a decent idea that could have worked.  It was implemented so badly, though, that it actually crippled a our local BB's ability to rent games for a while.

[Cakemeister]

We're going to try Gamefly for a while.

[Ginsu Victim]

Could've just walked back in and gave an excuse ("oh, this is the wrong game" or "oops, I've played this one" or "my mom said this is made by Satan")

[RayB]

BB isn't THAT bad... What I hate is the lack of obscure stuff.  But they ARE desperate. THey're one of the top 10 companies most likely to file for chapter 11 this year.

http://articles.moneycentral.msn.com/Investing/Dispatch/blockbuster-on-the-brink.aspx

[Ed_McCarron]

As soon as Blockbuster couldn't charge rewind fees anymore, they were boned.

What?  They've been charging me for years to rewind my DVD's... I just figured I was forgetful.

[Ginsu Victim]

Excerpt from the July 14, 2002 edition of Rober Ebert's Movie Answer Man:

Q. "Be Kind--Rewind!" I've seen this label on rental DVD cases at my local Blockbuster. I asked a person who worked at Blockbuster why rewinding would be necessary on DVDs, and was told, "DVDs can be rewound so please rewind it." I asked the manager and he told me, "DVDs can be rewound like VHS." I e-mailed Blockbuster. They told me, "Most DVD players have a 'Rewind' button. What it does is spin the DVD the opposite direction from the play mode. It's similar to the rewind feature on a VCR." I emailed them and told them they were wrong, Blockbuster e-mailed me, "Sir, you are very wrong, please don't contradict what we say, we know more than you do about DVDs. Please don't e-mail us regarding this topic again." They were very rude. But I know that a DVD cannot be rewound.

Kun Sun Sweeley, Baltimore

A. Your message first appeared on a Web site devoted to "useless warnings." It sounded like an urban legend to me, but when I contacted you, you replied: "This is true. I have seen labels on DVDs at my local Blockbuster, asking for the DVDs to be rewound. The post that I wrote is true." I asked around, and columnist/critic David Poland supplied the likely explanation: The stickers double as magnetic security tags. The tags for VHS ask you to rewind. When they run out of DVD tags, they just use the VHS tags. What that doesn't explain are your phone conversations and e-mails with Blockbuster. Is it possible the chain has employees who don't know the first thing about DVD? Judging from their cluelessness on letterboxing, I think it's a possibility.

[ChadTower]

It's also possible they're just being ---Deutsche Frankfurters--- half the time.  You can "rewind" a DVD - the playback function does still exist even if the name no longer matches the medium.

[Samstag]

I don't know what the fuss is about.  DVD rewinders are dirt cheap nowadays.

[massive88]

I don't know what the fuss is about.  DVD rewinders are dirt cheap nowadays.

Yeah cause they arent Blu-ray compatible...

[Samstag]

I don't know what the fuss is about.  DVD rewinders are dirt cheap nowadays.

Yeah cause they arent Blu-ray compatible...

You don't want to go cheap on your Bluray rewinder.  Spending anything under $50 is just asking for a problem.

[shmokes]

I was doing Blockbuster's DVD mail thing (Netflix style) and it was a much better deal than Netflix.  And I'm near a distribution center so delivery times were excellent, usually next-day.  They also gave me one coupon per month for a free in-store rental, which could be used on movies or games.  And I was only paying $16 per month for three movies at a time.  But after a while they raised the price to $18.  Then they changed the in-store return policy.  At first when I returned a mailed DVD in-store I could trade it in for something free-of-charge right then and there AND the moment it was scanned in the movie registered online as returned and the next DVD in my queue was mailed.  Then they changed it so that if I traded a movie in-store the next movie in my queue wouldn't be mailed to me until the in-store DVD was returned.  Since I'm so busy with school right now that I almost never used the game-rental coupons, and the price went up, and the perks went down, and actually shipments started taking longer, I finally went back to Netflix.

BTW, that story about the guy being told by Blockbuster employees to rewind his DVDs is ---That which is odiferous and causeth plants to grow---.  If any of you believe that . . . good lord your teenagers are going to have a heyday with you, lol.

[ChadTower]

Coincedence:

A friend of mine just found one with an apparently unknown label variation.  He is getting offers in the thousands for it from folks in the Genesis maniacs community.   

[Ginsu Victim]

That's awesome.

[ChadTower]

Well, that demographic is squarely in the established professional age range now... consider the Genesis crowd the current version of the pin collectors.