GameStop has been all over the news in the last few days and not for a good reason. The retailer was opening every PC copy of Deus Ex: Human Revolution to pull out the included coupon for a free OnLive version of the game. The story has now gotten even more interesting as GameStop has decided to simply not stock the PC version of the title at all.
Originally GameStop management had been instructing employees to open all PC copies of Deus Ex: Human Revolution and remove the included coupon for a free copy of the game via the OnLive service. GameStop considers OnLive a competing service to its Impulse service. Impulse currently sells digital versions of PC titles and is currently beta testing on-demand streaming, very similar to the service OnLive provides.
After it was revealed that Gamestop was removing those vouchers, resealing the packaging and selling the product as "new", an internal email surfaced that reads as follows;
"At this time please pull all Regular PC editions of Deus Ex: Human Revolution and place them in your backroom. These will be recalled at a later date.
As GameStop is developing a streaming service in our Spawn Labs Cloud Computing Division, the coupon that was included is for a competing service. We are returning all copies of the PC regular edition to the vendor in agreement with Square Enix.
Any unfulfilled reserves of the Regular PC Edition should be taken care of with the inventory set aside in your backroom.
Please honor any returns with a receipt."
GameStop is going to return all of those PC copies of Deus Ex: Human Revolution to publisher Square Enix. The reason for returning all games isn’t explicitly mentioned but it’s likely due to the backlash from consumers over the OnLive codes being removed. This could very well be happening as a result of conversations between the publisher and GameStop, although that is purely speculation.
Square Enix has published a statement about the issue saying,
“As part of Deus Ex: Human Revolution’s boxed offering on PC, Square Enix included a third party coupon," said Square. "GameStop was not made aware of this inclusion and Square Enix respects the right of GameStop to have final say over the contents of products it sells and to adjust them where they see fit in accordance with their policies."
"Square Enix invites gamers who want to purchase the PC version of Deus Ex: Human Revolution without additional coupons to buy the game at any one of over 4000 GameStop stores in North America," continued the statement, "or purchase a digital download copy online from www.gamestop.com. “
It seems that Square isn’t particularly upset that GameStop chose to pull out the coupons. This points to customer backlash as the reason why GameStop might simply pull the game from store shelves all together. The company doesn’t want to point customers to a competing service via included coupons but they don’t want to deal with angry customers when they pull the codes out.
This whole business is slimy on GameStop's part. As a consumer it’s difficult to pay full price for a product that is neither complete, nor in factory packaging. This whole debacle pushes me further away from GameStop as a company I might go to for my game purchases. What about you? Do you buy games from GameStop? Will you continue to make game purchases there after all of this nonsense? Let us know in the comments.
