"... a box you stick on to the bottom of a Wii remote to make the cute little video game system's motion controls spaz out less..."

I love how you put it, as a consumer blog, as opposed to a gadget blog, which would basically be lusting over it.

No doubt, they will still insist that it should have been free/included to begin with... but I like your lead-in much better :D

As neither a spoiled, fat 13 yr. old, clueless Soccer Mom or a ignorant Grandparent...I'm having a hard time caring about this. Does Gamestop really have any other type of customers?

Oh ok - THIS is the kind of article that requires personal research and hard-hitting journalism. We didn't need an interview with Continental when the kid was put on the wrong plane, or with Time Warner when they abused their customers and overbilled them for years. Yep, apparently if the new Wii accessory is overpriced at your local Gamestop, that gets the Consumerist cast pounding the pavement to verify the story.

>>"Suffice it to say if you want the accessory get it anywhere but GameStop."

But if I'm already at GameStop, it's worth the extra $5 to avoid driving someplace else that may or may not have it. Time is money, too. This is why convenience stores thrive. It's why brick-and-mortar stores like Microcenter can still stick around.

Granted, you've been forewarned, now.

"when I quizzed the clerk about the price gouging he just shrugged and shook his head"

You can't blame the clerk here. This drove me nuts when I worked in retail, the poor guy or girl at the cash register doesn't make the prices, someone much higher up the food chain does and the clerk has nothing to do with it.

I'm not surprised at this. They'd charge an entrance fee to the store if they could get away with it.

@heybtbm: Yes.

...and when I quizzed the clerk about the price gouging he just shrugged and shook his head.

I'm not sure what other response was expected from the Gamestop clerk. There is a less than zero chance that person was in on the pricing decision or was given an explanation for pricing decision.

Maybe the real story is that you got any kind of response other than a blank stare.

"I quizzed the clerk about the price gouging he just shrugged and shook his head."

Game Stop can charge any price it wants and you have every right to shop elsewhere. Shop around before you buy. Problem solved.

@balthisar: You shouldn't be at gamestop in the first place. Those places are about the worst place you can go to get video games.

@heybtbm: Um, yeah. It's a good place for used games. We've bought almost all of our PS3 games used, from Gamestop (they don't charge as much as other places).

Or just wait for Wii Sports Resort (aka Wii Sports II). Nintendo is bundling that with the add-on much like they bundled the original Wii Sports with an extra Wiimote.

@tinky XIII: "if they could get away with it."

They could probably get away with it in the months leading up to Christmas. Like a $2 "black friday fee" to enter the store, which you get back if you buy something.

@balthisar: This is exactly why Gamestop jacked up the price. If a halfway savvy mom or dad knows their kids are going to want a game while they're in the store getting the Anti-Spaz Wii Box, they can buy it for them used. Best Buy's used game section is ridiculously tiny. I bet they make more money off the brand new ones anyway, and don't actually do much to check out the used games before putting them back on the shelf.

"The fact that Nintendo is charging $19.99 for something that in a perfect world would be provided for free is bad enough"

When does Nintendo ever give away stuff for free? I'm shocked they don't charge us for the wrist straps!

@heybtbm: Basically anybody who has not heard of the internet. Otherwise, you have the entirety of their customer base.

@heybtbm: i'm not defending their markups but they are about the only place you can find older games at decent prices. throw in their buy two get one free sale, and you've got a deal!

@Geekybiker: Why? I've had good experiences with Gamestop, especially their used games.

@Gaambit: It's Wii Play that comes with a Wiimote. Wii Sports comes with the Wii itself.

@GMFish: I don't have the facts to back this up, so maybe I'm just detoxing from Nintendo fanboy-ism, but Nintendo is the one of the big 3 I WOULD expect to give away something for free. Microsoft and Sony seem to like to nickle and dime their customers.

@Radi0logy: Which is more difficult: travelling to the exact airport where the problem occurred, or to your local mall or anywhere else you have Gamestop?

If a consumer issue can be verified in the normal course of someone's day, in a few minutes, I call that a "quick win".

@steveliv: They're called eBay, Amazon and Craigslist. Check em out sometime! The internetz aren't as scary a place as they seem!

@Radi0logy: But you can't examine the quality of the disc on any of those places. You can when you meet someone off Craig's List, but since there's only one copy, what are you going to do if it's not up to snuff? Leave and go somewhere else? At least Gamestop usually has several copies.

@GMFish: They did give away the rubber wrappings for wiimotes if you bought the console early on when it didn't come with. You just had to go onto their website to tell them where to ship it to. Though they are kinda useless now with the motion control addon. Presumably new rubbers for the wiimote will come with.

I was at Wal-Mart last night and they had a huge stock of the Wii motion Plus so it's not a case of demand being greater than supply. I suppose Gamestop assumes that ignorant people won't know the price is higher or will want it so bad that they'll pay the extra $5.

"- after all, the accessory only fulfills the original promise of the console "

Um no it doesn't. Nintendo NEVER promised 1 to 1 control on the Wii ever.

And the honest truth is, if your developers are not lazy, and you respect them and dont force deadlines, you can get the Wiimote to work perfectly fine WITHOUT the Wiimotion Plus. Not one of my games I own (which are many) did I ever think, "hey this could use some more 1 to 1 support"

MAYBE Force Unleashed, but they did perfectly fine without it.

Stick to being a consumerism blog and keep the gadget comments to yourself, you look like fools when you dont.

Man, I hope "Anti-Spaz Wii Box" will catch on as the internet name for this device.

@pecan 3.14159265: I will always pay the extra $5 to get a new copy of a game and make sure that some of that money goes to the developers/publishers instead of sending the entirety of the money straight to Gamestop.

This is news? It has always been like that!!!

I remember when Mario Cart came out with the Wheel accessory. I wanted to get 4 wheel's so we could get everyone playing quickly.

I preordered the game from Gamestop (went to midnight launch to pick up game.)

But at around 11:30, I walked next door to Wal-mart and picked up 3 wheels for $5 cheaper each then what gamestop was going to be selling it.

(Wal-Mart would let me get the wheels before midnight, but not the game - so I then headed back to Gamestop to pick up the game - and have a big grin as I seen many others buying the $5 more expensive wheels from Gamestop then I did. When I picked up the game, they asked if I wanted any extra wheel - told them I went over to Wal-mart and picked 3 up for $5 less then what they were selling them for.)

Anyway, back to the point - Gamestop has always done this, haven't they? What is the news here?

@William Brinkman: Extra $5? I wish it was only the extra $5. I can't imagine spending $60 on a game anyway, so I am patient enough to wait until it drops by at least $30. If I get it new for $25 to $30, that's one thing. But if I want to get it used, it's not really a loss for the game developers because their product is still finding an audience, and someone had to buy that game in the first place. I understand what you're saying about buying a new copy so the money goes to the developers, cause buying a used copy means they don't get extra money - but I'm not sure that the $30 matters so much to them in the long run.

@Jim Topoleski: They don't look like fools at all by stating that. here's a description found on Best Buy:

Unique Experiences
Wii makes you feel less like a player and more like you're in the game. Frenzied sword battles are no longer confined to pushing a button. With Wii's unique freehand controller, Nintendo puts you in the middle of the action. Forget about pushing a button to start a golf backswing. Wii lets you swing the club! Don't push a button to swing a sword, actually swing the sword. Video games have always been a part of you, now you get to be a part of them. Step up to the next level of gaming.

Might not say 1 to 1 but the implacation is there. Swing your sword instead of pushing a button implies that it will respond at that moment (like the push of a button).. Nintendo released a more finely tuned product that is closer to that 1 to 1 goal. It's not unreasonable for people to wish it had been there in the first place. I can attest to that after countless frustating hourse of non-compliance from my wii.. but i guess that's development..

so in essence: chill

@coan_net: They may have been running a special, were they offical nintendo brand ones?

because gamestop's price is 14.99, as well as nintendo's

[store.nintendo.com]

I'm curious as to why it's 24.99 (I didn't even realize that nintendo's MRSP was 19.99 until this ad

I'm not gamestop fanatic, but if they want to charge $5 extra, let em. It's not like they have a monopoly on this item. If a customer doesn't know the price of something they are buying ahead of time, then they deserve what they get. It's not like this is a rare item that's hard to find a price comparison. 30 seconds on amazon would let you know what you should expect to pay.

@GMFish: I hate to agree with the peanut gallery, but the price is manufacturers SUGGESTED retail price...nothing saying the stores have to abide by it.

@GMFish: Does Nintendo even sell the wrist straps (the OEM ones with the locks and not the 3rd party crap)?

@pecan 3.14159265: Usually by the time a game gets to the "Greatest hits price" the different between new and used becomes either $3 ($29.99 vs $26.99) or $2 ($19.99 vs $17.99).

At a game store I used to work at, customers would ask me all the damned time why the price difference from new to used was so small. I just told them our pricing is determined by corporate and I had no control over it.

@catnapped: I think they'll send you them for free if you call and ask?

On another note:

NEVER EVER EVER TRADE IN ACCESSORIES AT GAMESTOP!

I saw a receipt from a buddy of mine and the accessory trade in values are even more of a rip off than the games.

A ONE dollar trade in value on a PS2 guitar that gets marked up to 14.99? Are you kidding me?

@Radi0logy:

Jet Set Radio Future on eBay? $19.99.
Jet Set Radio Future at GameStop? $3.99.

Yes, some of us do our research. Back when GameStop carried 16-bit games, it was the only way to get Earthbound or Chrono Trigger for under fifty bucks.

GameStop is hardly perfect, but sometimes they are better than online retailers, particularly when a game goes rare and the troglodytes hoard them in their parent's basements.

@tinky XIII:

They do make money just by having customers walk into the store. All the marketing GameStop bombards you with is a significant portion of their profit, at least when a store first opens.

@Skeetz:

Of course, note that your source is NOT Nintendo.

so in essence: read first, react second.

This is typical at Gamestop, actually... for some reason, certain Nintendo accessories, and many DS games, are increased in price by about $5. I never understood why in my 11 years with the company that this was the only instance that we sold things above MSRP, but it apparently is some sort of weird Nintendo tax.

The only thing I could think of... it may be because new games and first party accessories have a very small margin, and the Nintendo brand games and accessories have an even smaller margin. -shrug-

@GMFish: Given the cost of development of the new add on, I can see why they are charging for it. Most technologies improve as they are out for a few years - and we pay as we upgrade. Upgrades on the Wiimote are, I think, like anything else - you want, it, pony up. Nintendo admittedly has more money than half of the free world, but I think that is irrelevant.

I'm sure lots of people disagree, but the stuff costs a lot to develop - it's a lot of person hours. So...I think they are within their rights.

This is not the first time that Gamestop has done this. They were charging 5 bucks more than every other store for the Wii Zapper with Link's Crossbow training.

@StitchPirate: I strongly agree here. What did you expect out of a register clerk? As a retail employee myself, its incredibly frustrating to watch the kinda of abuse Consumerist always recommends customers should push onto us register jockeys.

You're asking a corporate drone to somehow have intimate knowledge of corporate markup strategy and then asking him to comment on it without thinking it will get him fired. We all know Gamestop has fired for much less, and employees making comments to 'media' is a hot issue with them.

Shame, consumerist. That was not fact-finding but simply abuse. There's no cause to treat minimum wage folk like they're so thoroughly below you.

They charge 5$ above retail for pretty much every new first party Nintendo DS game. Its funny when your shopping in a mall and there are multiple stores right next to each other (with lower prices than GS) and you still see people paying GS's overpriced prices because OMG my kid must have it NOW or they are going to die.

I just think they mark it up because they know people will pay it no matter what. They are preying on the consumer's ignorance. I will never understand people who have to go to GS to buy games, when you can buy the exact same game somewhere else for a lower price. Your getting the exact same product, just at a cheaper price.

Toys R Us used to mark up the price on Pokemon games probably because they know every soccer mom in town went there to buy the games. I remember seeing Pokemon Colloseum for 70$ there when everywhere else it was 50$ or less.

@pecan 3.14159265: I've had good experiences too. Recently they had a deal where you spent $10 on Guitar Hero: Aerosmith (new, which was marked down from the usual $30 price, I think), and you'd get both the game and a brand new guitar to go along with it.

I almost bought one in Gamestop last week but I noticed it was $5 more and went to Target instead.

@Radi0logy: Ability to get through to someone at Continental, slim to none for a blog. Asking Joe Smo at gamestop while they where already there buying something else, easy.