Specialist Indian games store chain Games The Shop has begun trade-ins for used games. After CEX, it is the only brick and mortar retailer to allow customers to trade games in for store credit. It could also result in the firm selling pre-owned games in the near future.
At the moment six games can be traded in and for the PS4 only. These are Assassin’s Creed Origins, Call of Duty: World War 2, FIFA 18, Need for Speed Payback, GTA V, and WWE 2K18. The company plans to add other PS4 games soon, though it hasn’t said which ones exactly.
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The choice of games is interesting as it mimics some of the most popular titles in the country right now and are easily available new. In the past, the likes of Game4u and Landmark relied on trade-ins to make up for the shortfall in titles that were in high demand and low supply.
This mass approach could have repercussions, more so when Games The Shop is run by E-xpress — India’s leading video game distributor whose publishers include Ubisoft and Take-Two, both of whom make up half of the list with Assassin’s Creed, GTA V, and WWE 2K18. Game publishers have and continue to try to diminish the impact of the used game market, resorting to always-online titles, season passes, and one-time use downloadable content codes.
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And while the banner on its website suggests it’s available online and at its stores, this is far from the case. Games The Shop’s Facebook page states it’s restricted to its Oberoi Mall branch in Goregaon, Mumbai. Though it does have plans to expand the program to all outlets. You can’t check trade-in values either online, something services like Gameloot and GameXS offer.
Nonetheless, we’ve got in touch with Games The Shop for more details on this and will update the story the moment we hear from the company.
Update, December 10 2017: Games The Shop has replied to our request for comment. The terms of this offer differ wildly from what was initially put on its website and Facebook page, which has now been removed. Expect the new details to go up soon. Though, it's still limited to PS4 titles.
"This is an exchange program where a customer can bring in an old game and can get some value to purchase a new game like Assassin's Creed Origins, WWE 2K18, GTA V, Call Of Duty: World War 2, and others,"a representative for the company explained over email.
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