Gaming Retailer Apologizes for Violating Packaging
Affected Customers to Receive Gift Card, Coupon
Last week saw the highly-anticipated release of the new video game Deus Ex: Human Revolution. Available for Microsoft Xbox 360, PC and Sony PlayStation 3 (PS3), the game received positive reviews from critics and gamers alike after hitting store shelves Tuesday, August 23. Unfortunately, one of the industry's biggest retailers didn't get such high marks for the way it chose to sell the game.
GameStop is that major retailer in question. When it received copies of the PC version of the game last week, GameStop told its employees to open the package and remove a coupon for a free digital streaming version of Human Revolution through a cloud-based gaming service called OnLive. Why? Because the coupon, which was packaged with the game by Human Revolution's publisher, Square Enix, essentially promotes a service (OnLive) that directly competes with GameStop's own cloud-based game streaming service, which is available through the GameStop web site.
GameStop not only removed coupons placed in the game's packaging by the publisher, but it also sold the copies of Human Revolution it violated as "new" and not "used". In essence, this meant gamers were paying as much for a game that had been opened and de-valued as a consumer who, through some other retailer (like Best Buy or Amazon.com), would have received the full package, including the game and the coupon together.
Once the gaming media learned of this debacle through a leaked email, all hell broke loose. GameStop management was inundated with emails demanding customers be compensated for the loss of the coupon and the fact that the game they had purchased was not really "new" in the traditional sense of the term.
When the retailer realized it had a major media nightmare on its hands earlier this week, it decided to offer affected PC gamers a $50 gift card and "buy two, get one free" coupon for future purchases of used games.
It also offered this apology:
"We regret the events surrounding this title release and that our customers were put in the middle of this issue between GameStop and Square Enix, the publisher of this game…And for this, we are truly sorry."
According to new reports, GameStop employees confirm that they are offering the gift card and coupon to PC gamers affected by the issue.
Despite the company's efforts to compensate angry Deus Ex fans, many gamers remain frustrated and annoyed with GameStop. Certainly this is an episode tech consumers are unlikely to forget the next time they decide to purchase a game.
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