Does Gamestop Reprint Rare PS2 Games?

[wingzrow]

So I took advantage of their buy two ps2 games get 2 free day yesterday and got two copies of fatal frame III, shine megami tensei nocturne, and shin megami tensei digital devil saga.

Great right? Well not quite. I noticed these games look VERY new and realized these games were all missing the memory card holder they usually have.

Are these all reprints? Where are they coming from then?

[skaar]

Uh... the RETAILER will not reprint.

The PUBLISHER may reprint if demand is there.

[Kitsune Sniper]

Didn't GameQuestDirect reprint some of those a few years ago?

I also recall reading that Atlus had reprinted SOME games one or two years ago, probably around the same time PS2 cases stopped having memory card holders.

[wingzrow]

Well I meant more in the areas of, "does gamestop commission companies to reprint ps2 games"

I remember hearing something about that when all those Gitaroo Man copies popped uo at every gamestop a few years ago.

[LaughingMAN.S9]

i know for a fact noctourne was reprinted right after ebay prices skyrocketed to around 120 for a copy, i got fucked over on this when i found a copy for 75 then 2 months later game is going for 30 :(

[Robocop2]

Its also possible that they are generic cases. I assume they have the correct artwork in my response. And the discs could just have been well taken care of. I know I have some PS2 era stuff I've owned since new and they still look that way.

[CRTGAMER]

This is a puzzler. I noticed a lot of gamestops received all the Fatal Frames a few days into the last Buy 2 Get 2 Free. I'm leaning towards that they got reprinted by the publisher, maybe contracted by Gamestop.

Now if only this could happen for Wii Metroid Pime Trilogy.

[Rickstilwell1]

A gamestop employee told me that when they get disc only copies of games, if they are a more popular title, they print out the artwork on a new piece of paper and put them in a generic case, but only if the title is really popular

[Bojay1997]

Well I meant more in the areas of, "does gamestop commission companies to reprint ps2 games"

I remember hearing something about that when all those Gitaroo Man copies popped uo at every gamestop a few years ago.

No, Gamestop has never reprinted, however, Gamequestdirect did reprint Fatal Frame 1-3 and they sold them in bulk to Gamestop. Atlus did the same with their reprints on those games and that's why you got the newer style cases.

[The 1 2 P]

This is a puzzler. I noticed a lot of gamestops received all the Fatal Frames a few days into the last Buy 2 Get 2 Free. I'm leaning towards that they got reprinted by the publisher, maybe contracted by Gamestop.

Gamestop has to have some deal going on with the publishers. I've noticed several copies of Fatal Frame games in several of my local stores too. And the same thing happened back in the day when Rez was going for $70 on ebay. All of a sudden every Gamestop/EB near me had atleast one copy for $30.


Now if only this could happen for Wii Metroid Pime Trilogy.

Trust me, you don't want that to happen. Gamestop currently sells USED copies of Metroid Prime trilogy for $70. And pretty much any game thats going for good money on ebay has a jacked up price tag at Gamestop. I don't know how long ago they started this but it's been happening since atleast Marvel Vs. Capcom 2 on the Xbox and PS2.

[Smashed Brother]

The reprint of SMT Nocturne is missing the soundtrack CD. It is an awesome soundtrack, too, so it would definitely be worth seeking out the first print of the game.

Did Digital Devil Saga have a soundtrack? I can't seem to remember. If it did, is it in the reprint?

[wingzrow]

If it did, It's definently not in the reprint.

[Trebuken]

I'm guessing, but I believe Gamestop witholds copies of some popular games from stores. It allows each stoere a copy and replaces them if/when they sell -- this keeps the retail on these games high. What seems odd to me though is that these Fatal Frames are being sold as preowned in almost all the stores...

[wingzrow]

I'm sure they are gutting new copies they get from these reprinting companies. If my memory is right, this was the exact case with gitaroo man's reprinting.

[Kyle15]

The reprint of SMT Nocturne is missing the soundtrack CD. It is an awesome soundtrack, too, so it would definitely be worth seeking out the first print of the game.

Did Digital Devil Saga have a soundtrack? I can't seem to remember. If it did, is it in the reprint?

The original boxed version does have a soundtrack. I don't think the regular copies do.

[crazyjackcsa]

I'm guessing, but I believe Gamestop witholds copies of some popular games from stores. It allows each stoere a copy and replaces them if/when they sell -- this keeps the retail on these games high. What seems odd to me though is that these Fatal Frames are being sold as preowned in almost all the stores...


Gamestop has to have some deal going on with the publishers. I've noticed several copies of Fatal Frame games in several of my local stores too. And the same thing happened back in the day when Rez was going for $70 on ebay. All of a sudden every Gamestop/EB near me had atleast one copy for $30.


Well I meant more in the areas of, "does gamestop commission companies to reprint ps2 games"

I remember hearing something about that when all those Gitaroo Man copies popped uo at every gamestop a few years ago.

You guys don't really get how retail works. A retail company like gamestop doesn't withhold games from thier stores to keep prices high.

They don't "comission" companies to reprint games, they don't print games themselves. They don't get disk only new games.

It's not like gamestop calls up "Mr. Publisher" and says "Hey Mr. Publisher, we need like 47 more copies of the game, cause the ebay has it like totally expensive right now, and we can sell them."

Here is how it works: Company "A" makes a print run of a game. Game sells pretty good, but the company "A" doesn't think it's worth it to make another run of games.

So company "B" comes along and says "Hey! We think we could make some money with another print run of this game! How 'bout we give you 2k monies, and you give us a licensing deal?"

Company "A" agrees, cause there isn't any downside, and Company "B" prints the game, and ships it to stores. Sometimes the case is different, sometimes the colors are off. Sometimes it's identical

TaaDaa!

[raptor94k]

I went to Gamestop about 3 hours ago and took advantage of the buy 2 get 2 free deal. I bought quite a few games, but one of my sets of four was SMT: Digital Devil Saga, SMT: Digital Devil Saga 2, SMT: Nocturne and Fatal Frame III. The guy behind the counter was super nice and we started talking about all the games I was buying and the PS2 in general.

Finally, unprompted, he told me that if I ever saw a Pre-owned PS2 game that was in exceptionally good condition (as all four of mine were, in the new non-memory card holder cases) it was a special deal where "a game publisher will find some back stocked games in their warehouses that they never sent out for whatever reason, so they would ship them to Gamestop, and because they are old games and not in plastic wrap Gamestop has to sell them pre-owned."

[Leo_A]

Finally, unprompted, he told me that if I ever saw a Pre-owned PS2 game that was in exceptionally good condition (as all four of mine were, in the new non-memory card holder cases) it was a special deal where "a game publisher will find some back stocked games in their warehouses that they never sent out for whatever reason, so they would ship them to Gamestop, and because they are old games and not in plastic wrap Gamestop has to sell them pre-owned."

That doesn't sound right, to me. Wouldn't they of been shrinkwrapped during the manufacturing phase? I've never heard of unshrinkwrapped games being sent out to a publisher for storage (Not that I have intimate knowledge of how these things are done, maybe it's commonplace).

I remember some PSOne reprints that GameStop stocked and would remove the shrinkwrap from and sell as used copies back 4-5 years ago despite being brand new. I suspect this is a similar case and that these games were shrinkwrapped at one time. I forget the rationale for that decision. but the reason was discussed here if you want to do some digging (So they could maintain the high preowned prices for games that were supposedly out of print and in demand, despite a new production run having just happened?).

[raptor94k]

That doesn't sound right, to me. Wouldn't they of been shrinkwrapped during the manufacturing phase? I've never heard of unshrinkwrapped games being sent out to a publisher for storage (Not that I have intimate knowledge of how these things are done, maybe it's commonplace).

It is possible, that they were shrinkwrapped at one point and that Gamestop pulls it off before selling them as pre-owned. I could've misquoted what the guy said exactly.

My only reason for mentioning it was because he told all this information to me without me asking for it. My point being...why would he lie to me if he brought up the topic? I guess it is also possible that this guy was lied to by an employer or something.

[Leo_A]

I don't think you misquoted him or that he lied, I was just wondering if perhaps he was mistaken. It's not like he knows what state these games were in prior to arriving at his store, so perhaps he just assumed they had been sitting unshrinkwrapped all these years when a bunch of seemingly new condition games just arrived without any shrinkwrap.

That's all I meant. :)

[Oobgarm]

I'm of the firm belief that all of these higher-end titles are reprints that GameStop either commissioned with this particular B2G2 sale in mind to help move product, or they've been sitting on them for a while now and decided to unleash them right before the sale started.

[skaar]

You guys don't really get how retail works. A retail company like gamestop doesn't withhold games from thier stores to keep prices high.

They don't "comission" companies to reprint games, they don't print games themselves. They don't get disk only new games.

It's not like gamestop calls up "Mr. Publisher" and says "Hey Mr. Publisher, we need like 47 more copies of the game, cause the ebay has it like totally expensive right now, and we can sell them."

Here is how it works: Company "A" makes a print run of a game. Game sells pretty good, but the company "A" doesn't think it's worth it to make another run of games.

So company "B" comes along and says "Hey! We think we could make some money with another print run of this game! How 'bout we give you 2k monies, and you give us a licensing deal?"

Company "A" agrees, cause there isn't any downside, and Company "B" prints the game, and ships it to stores. Sometimes the case is different, sometimes the colors are off. Sometimes it's identical

TaaDaa!

Yep.

Well sometimes they'll print more if they get an order themselves directly. I've seen requests for popular titles come back from retail.

[theclaw]

I don't either see any reason to think Gamestop wouldn't on occasion ask publishers about the possibility of reprints.

[Oobgarm]

I was thinking more along the lines of the whole GameQuest thing that happened back with Rez and Gitaroo Man when prices for those shot through the roof.

[Flashback2012]

I went to Gamestop about 3 hours ago and took advantage of the buy 2 get 2 free deal. I bought quite a few games, but one of my sets of four was SMT: Digital Devil Saga, SMT: Digital Devil Saga 2, SMT: Nocturne and Fatal Frame III. The guy behind the counter was super nice and we started talking about all the games I was buying and the PS2 in general.

Finally, unprompted, he told me that if I ever saw a Pre-owned PS2 game that was in exceptionally good condition (as all four of mine were, in the new non-memory card holder cases) it was a special deal where "a game publisher will find some back stocked games in their warehouses that they never sent out for whatever reason, so they would ship them to Gamestop, and because they are old games and not in plastic wrap Gamestop has to sell them pre-owned."

I don't imagine it to be the case but did your Digital Devil Saga games come with the cardboard slipcase?

I've heard a plethora of stories/theories in my tenure at GS. The Games Quest Direct reprinting is the most common one though I'm clueless as to how negotiations went about on who requested the reprints to be made. I do know that GQD was in the business of reprinting rare releases prior to the PS2 as they were responsible for the reprints of Saiyuki, Persona 2: Innoncent Sin, and others on PS1. I not completely certain of it but I could swear they were not limited to just Sony platforms and did reprints on Xbox and GC as well.

I've also heard and know of stories about GS buying up excess NOS (new old stock) that publishers have on hand. The stock is accumulated for their annual summer sale (if you ever noticed, the titles for the sale are usually from the same publishers every year). I remember when they first did the sale; each store would get in a few hundred copies of new games for said sale and they would task us with gutting every single last copy. @_@ I think it was last year or the year before that, they had copies of Persona 4 as part of the sale. I'm not sure if they were GQD reprints or unsold NOS Atlus had on hand but it was definitely the highlight of the sale items that year.

There's a way to tell by the stickers if a title is a trade in or was NOS/Reprint converted to Used inventory and when I worked there, I used that to my advantage many a time when checking in shipments from the warehouse. :)

[Bojay1997]

I don't imagine it to be the case but did your Digital Devil Saga games come with the cardboard slipcase?

I've heard a plethora of stories/theories in my tenure at GS. The Games Quest Direct reprinting is the most common one though I'm clueless as to how negotiations went about on who requested the reprints to be made. I do know that GQD was in the business of reprinting rare releases prior to the PS2 as they were responsible for the reprints of Saiyuki, Persona 2: Innoncent Sin, and others on PS1. I not completely certain of it but I could swear they were not limited to just Sony platforms and did reprints on Xbox and GC as well.

I've also heard and know of stories about GS buying up excess NOS (new old stock) that publishers have on hand. The stock is accumulated for their annual summer sale (if you ever noticed, the titles for the sale are usually from the same publishers every year). I remember when they first did the sale; each store would get in a few hundred copies of new games for said sale and they would task us with gutting every single last copy. @_@ I think it was last year or the year before that, they had copies of Persona 4 as part of the sale. I'm not sure if they were GQD reprints or unsold NOS Atlus had on hand but it was definitely the highlight of the sale items that year.

There's a way to tell by the stickers if a title is a trade in or was NOS/Reprint converted to Used inventory and when I worked there, I used that to my advantage many a time when checking in shipments from the warehouse. :)

I know for a fact Gamequestdirect reprinted a number of PS2 games including .Hack Part One, Fatal Frame 1-3, etc...They also sold part of their excess stock to Gamestop. Back when they still had several retail stores, I used to go in once a week and frequently spoke to the manager and he was pretty up-front about the whole process. The owner essentially contacted the publishers and offered a minimum order in excess of 10K units in exchange for a per unit royalty up front. Obviously, with limited retail stores (they were down to three locations at that point) and a low volume web business (although they do sell through Ebay and Amazon now as DealTavern), they couldn't move that many units. So, the excess was sold to Gamestop. I'm still not sure why Gamestop guts them and sells them as used as they were clearly all sealed when Gamequest had them.

[maxlords]

GQD did reprint all of those. I have a friend that runs an independent game store and he was buying all of them direct from em. There's no question they're GQD reprints. There's no other place they could have come from.