#computer exchange

CVG #168, November 1995 - British mags saw a lot of Toby, an ad for the Computer Exchange!

CeX Sauchihall Street Accepts Bitcoin

Computer Exchange, the second hand electronics and game (and music, movies and assorted geekery) store in Glasgow’s vibrant Sauchiehall Street, is to accept Bitcoins for a limited period, instead of the pound.

According to CeX:

Championing the pioneering digital currency, CeX’s exclusion of the pound will turn the Glasgow high street into a Bitcoin laboratory, showcasing a possible alternative…

CeX is expanding! Last year, the company released a statement saying that they were interested in expanding in Scotland, with plans to open shops in every major city in the country. Last week, this affected me, as a new branch opened up in the city I'm unfortunate enough to live in; Dundee.

This is a great thing. A really great thing, now. Why? Well, Dundee only has one games shop, and it's the worst chain in the UK. GAME. Not Game. GAME. The obnoxious uppercase letters, implying that's the way their idiot target audience spells things. I hate them. Their focus on exploiting customers' ignorance is sickening. Their staff are only required to know enough about games to be able to advertise an upcoming one to somebody who's never heard of it, to secure a pre-order

If you're into your games, dealing with the staff is an agonisingly patronising experience. The last time I bought something from them, I had to explain to the guy at the checkout WHY I wasn't going to pre-order Borderlands 2. Imagine that. I was being pressured into buying something I didn't want, and if I hadn't known about it, the guy might have convinced me to pay for a game I didn't like. GAME aren't worried about that, though. If you don't like the game, you can bring it back and get store credit, or some of your money back. GAME will go on to sell that copy purely for profit. No money to the publisher, or the developer. Horrible.

Worst of all, GAME are incredibly popular. Their success has caused every other dedicated game shop in Dundee to close, and for Gamestation to merge with their horrible company. Gamestation used to be a wonderful company. They'd support consoles long after their death. Their walls were covered in Mega Drive and SNES games, well into the mid-2000s. They don't do that now. Why not? Because when GAME bought them, they literally binned everything that wasn't on a list of big franchises. That means the country has lost, potentially, thousands of super rare games to lazy business, while shite like Sonic R gets saved. Couldn't they have given them to charity shops? I'd quite like to pick up a copy of Panzer Dragoon Saga for a couple of quid, thanks.

CeX are a remedy to this kind of behaviour. For a start, they've got credibility. They're born of silly, punky nineties UK gaming culture. That's why their name sounds a bit like "sex". Did you know Charlie Brooker used to write comics for their adverts? Before he was famous? Those used to be some of my favourite bits of Mega Magazine when I was a kid. They were funny, dirty, violent and satirical. I loved all that. I instantly thought CeX were the UK's cool games shop. I still base much of my opinion of them on those comics.

[One of Charlie Brooker's old CeX ads, featuring a decomposed Jimmy Saville and the chance to buy Charlie's own comic, because CeX were cool enough to do that]

Best of all, CeX is the hardcore gamer's choice (excuse the ad-execky phrase). Gamers know that if they sell their games there, they'll get a fair deal, because CeX aren't concerned with shelf-life. Their shelves are covered with huge selections of PS2, Xbox, Gamecube, DS, PSP and old PC games, as well as competitive second-hand PS3, 360, Wii, Vita and 3DS selections. Games are priced based on general value, not availability. That's why there's about 14 Gamecube copies of Resident Evil 4 all at a relatively high price in the Dundee shop. The sellers got a good deal for selling one of the best games ever made.

Now it may seem hypocritical of me to condemn GAME for focussing on second-hand sales when the cool guys, CeX, deal exclusively in pre-owned electronics. I'm going to try to state why that isn't the case. CeX are doing second-hand games well. I believe this because I've been lucky enough to go to my dream game shop: A-too, Den Den Town, Osaka, Japan. A shop that deals exclusively in second-hand products, with the most impressive selection of games I've ever seen in one place.

[the front window of one of my favourite places in the world]

A-too has become massive due to Japanese culture. Japanese people generally tend to use something a couple of times and then pass it on. Den Den Town is a place for massive geeks though, so their branch fills up with a huge selection of super-rare games. Ever seen a full selection of Famicom Disc System games for sale, for cheap? If you went to A-too, you would have. Their staff really care about the games they sell. Buy a PlayStation copy of Policenauts there and the guy behind the counter will give you a knowing, wistful look of approval, as if to say "You've just picked a fucking corker, my friend". That sincerity makes a hell of a difference. Makes you feel like games matter. Like each good purchase is the start of something great. I'm pretty sure that the guy would give me a warning if he knew I was going to buy a shiter.

That's the kind of place CeX is. Not entirely, of course. I mean, there's nothing older than last-gen games, but we have to make allowances for what works in a high street shop in Britain. It's still a big room full of games you might want to buy, and people who know why you might want to buy them. They respect the games as much as they respect the money. That attitude, and that respect is invaluable. That's why CeX is going to be the only highstreet games shop in Dundee that I'm going to use from now on (at least until they fuck up and bin a load of great games). If I want a brand new game there's places online, like ShopTo, that will get it to me before release, and much cheaper than I could get it in GAME. If I want a new game that's been out for a little while, I can search the whole internet for a good deal. If I want a cheap oddity that day, I'll go to CeX, who will probably have what I'm looking for, and if they don't, they'll have some equally valid alternatives.