EB Games Trade in Value Calculation Observations Due to Recent Deals

Lozchappy on 17/10/2018 - 14:15

After the recent EB Games deal where you trade in 2 games worth more than $10 in order to get a brand new $100 game, it got me to thinking just how good a deal that was. I then spent way too much time trying to figure it out and as it turns out, I was relying on bad data. I thought I'd read that NHL 15 was able to be traded in for $15, when they sell the pre-owned game for $18.

The other major surprise was that one of my favourite games, Metro: Exodus was also worth more than $10 as a trade in. This could simply because the new Metro game is coming out soon, or perhaps they just want more stock for whatever reason.

I didn't want the work I'd done to date to go to complete waste though, so I thought I'd put up what I had so far, albeit in basic text format just in case anyone else out there was considering wasting as much time on this as I have. It might come in handy for some other reason one day too, who knows.

Game Name (Price EB Offers) (Price EB Sells Pre-Owned For)

COD ghosts PS4 ($14) ($58)
COD WW2 XB1 ($16) ($48)
Far Cry 5 XB1 ($19) ($88)
GTA5 XB1 ($14) ($44)
Horizon Zero Dawn PS4 ($20) ($48)
Metro Redux PS4 ($14) ($38)
Uncharted Lost Legacy ($11) ($44)
Wolfenstein 2 XB1 ($13) ($68)
For Honor ($12.50) ($44)
The Last Guardian (???) ($48)
No Man's Sky ($12.50) ($44)
Minecraft: PS4 Edition (???) ($39.95)
Arms Nintendo Switch ($22) ($68)
NHL 15 ($5) ($18)
Watch dogs 2 (???) ($44)
Dead Rising 4 (???) ($44 PS4, $38 XB1)
Far Cry 4 (???) ($34 PS4, $38 XB1, $28 XB360, $28 PS3)
Destiny 2 (???) ($28 PS4, $48 XB1)
Assassins Creed Origins (???) ($38)
Final Fantasy XV (???) ($24 PS4, $28 XB1)
Forza Horizon 3 ($88)
Metal Gear Solid V (???) ($48)

If anyone could be bothered replying to the thread with the trade-in prices that EB offers for the games I'm missing, I'll add them in.

Not that it's any big secret, but I learned that EB usually marks up their trade-in games between 250% and 700%, no matter how new or old the games are. I found it surprising that if you buy a game for $100, return that same brand new game that just came out after a week or so, they'll offer you perhaps 10% of the price to trade it in, then sell it for $95 right next to the brand new $100 games. It's shameless and kind of reminds me of Video Ezy before they went out of business. At least EB has a decent website and occasionally good deals when you can get past the "SALE" signs and into the shops.

There's a definite reason I stopped trading in games to EB when I thought I could save some money on a new console a few years back as they had a sign out the front saying bring in X and save Y no a new console. So I brought a whole bag full of what they wanted, plus a large collection of decent, current gen games, accessories, controllers, aftermarket doohickeys - the lot. I ended up taking almost all of it home and selling it on eBay because I was so insulted by what they were offering me. It seems they have changed a little, but not a lot.

Poll Options expired

  • 8
    Did I spend way too much time trying to save at most $70 on a game my family really wanted?
  • 7
    Do you keep all of your old games, systems etc. to occasionally dust off and play again?
  • 4
    Do you regularly sell your old games at online auction or similar sites?
  • 3
    Do you swap or trade your games to friends, EB, or any other game trading/swapping website?
  • 0
    Do you think EB in its current form will last going forward the next 5-10 years?
  • 0
    Do you think EB is a better store for gamers now that it was say 5-10 years ago?
Gaming

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Comments

  • trustnoone on 17/10/2018 - 14:42
    +1

    "SALE" signs

    I always had the hypothesis that EB uses sale to be able to play around with prices, for example if a game comes out at $100 new, they'll sell for $120, they'll then do a "sale" to sell it at a proper price (say $80) and then they can always manipulate the price how they want by changing the "sale percentage" as opposed to the price.

    Another example is a game worth about $25 (say preowned) EB will sell it at $50 with 50% off, that will go for a few months effectively making it $25, they will then put the price back to $50, and have another sale but instead be a 2 for 1 deal for games under $50 making them effectively $25 again. Repeat to have infinite sales without ever having to drop the price. Thats just a hypothesis though, no idea if true.

    Which I think is why preowned and new prices are always kept so high.

    Still though as you say they do have some good sales now and then, but definitely feel like it was better when I was little (though that could be because I was little and parents paid for games haha).

    Though I find it funny that when a game comes out I'll probably check JB/Target/Gamesmen/Amazon etc first.

    edit —-
    Forgot to add, thanks for the list.

  • Strahany on 17/10/2018 - 14:53
    +6

    It's easy to look at their markups and assume that they're rolling in money, but they're taking on the burden of immovable stock. Think of all the games that will never get sold, with the yearly sports titles as an example. Would someone consider buying FIFA 15 (a 2014 game) in 2018? It would have been a hard sell in 2017 and 2016, let alone 2018, even if they halved their asking price to $4. Effectively no one would buy that game, yet EB would have hundreds, if not thousands of copies Australia-wide which they paid up to ~$35 or so on the trade in when it was still relatively new. This is before considering the storeroom and warehouse space required to hold them all, paying for the staff labour to trade it in, lodge in the system, sticker, and mark on the shelf, etc etc.

    And that's just for one game. Consider other years of FIFA, other yearly sports titles, old Call of Duty's/Battlefields and so on. EB provide a fast and easy way to offload your games (consider opportunity costs associated with listing on eBay, communicating with buyers, posting it, potential PayPal issues with scammers etc). In exchange for saving time, hassle, and absolving yourself of the burden of being stuck with a game you can't sell, you take a lower price. Depending on your situation, it's either a great trade off or a poor one.

  • ozchappy on 17/10/2018 - 16:12

    @trustnoone, that's probably illegal to do in such a simple manner, but I'm sure they have lawyers who work out legal ways to employ such tactics. Same shit different bucket I suppose.

    Since I am primarily a PC gamer I always check online comparison sites like cdkeys.com first, Steam of course have wicked sales at certain times of the year - mostly for indie and smaller developers but a lot of them are really good, polished games.

    There are plenty of other PC sales sites such as GOG, HumbleBundle, IsThereAnyDeal, /r/gamedeals and tons more, even the dodgy key resellers I won't mention but have occasionally used.

    Apart from the obvious Target, JB, Amazon, eBay (with discount codes), there's still a few decent discount sites for console games like ozgameshop.com and comparison sites such as CompareGames, CompareCdKeys, console-deals, even shopbot has deals every now and then but I can't really vouch for any of these since I don't use them myself. The best thing about Target having decent prices on new games is if the price is listed on their website, EB will price match them which is pretty cool.

    If and when I buy a console game it's usually for someone from the family and I do a quick search to find the best price and that's it. I take a lot more pride in getting my OzBargain fix for my own games, haha.

    @Strahany, I see your point with the sports titles - but those games pumped out by EA are really not very different year to year anyway except for the rosters. For some kids getting 4 or 5 sporting games at xmas, even if it is 2010, 2011, 2012 ,2013 & 2014 would be a good deal as they could see how their team evolved over those years. The trade in prices on those sports games are super-low compared to most games as well but I see your point.

  • zero23 on 17/10/2018 - 17:33

    Dam i got $19 for ARMS (albeit during the double trade-in). I'm guessing EB lower their trade in values during the double trade in periods or is it different from store to store?

  • Some Human on 17/10/2018 - 23:25

    Metro Exodus is the new Metro game coming out, probably why it has more than $10 trade in value.

    • ozchappy on 18/10/2018 - 06:28

      Can't wait for that one. I picked up Metro 2033 and Last Light for cheap one day and they became a couple of my favourite games. Exodus looks amazing too.

  • mrjaytee on 18/10/2018 - 00:15

    I'm almost wholly digital these days, I only go to EB for a contained single player experience that I can trade back a few weeks later for PSN credit. Spiderman would be the most recent example, they had a promo on where you got $50 (or $60 toward a pre order) if you had it back within a fortnight, combined with the $64 (from memory) that did it for on release day it worked out to be pretty good for me.
    I've also started to trade back some physical games if the digital get cheap enough, Street fighter 5 they other day got me $12, digital version cost me $14. Pretty happy to pay a $2 premium to never have to swap a disc I play regularly.

  • Rishy on 18/10/2018 - 00:57

    I see you dont have some of the right info, mainly when talking about trading in new release games let's take god of war for example:
    The game came out approximately 8 months ago, you can still trade that game for $30 not 10% of rrp. Plus add EB bonuses which kicks it to $33-$36 depending on lvl.
    Then new release games are sold for $88 pre-owned which if you ask me is pretty good considering all pre-owned means is someone else used it prior and you get literally the exact same thing as new.

    And then as someone else just mentioned they started doing trade within the fortnite and get $50 ($60 if towards pre-order) and then again you get EB bonuses on that so lets say you are lvl 4 and trading towards pre order you would get a massive $72 back, they then only profit $16 from selling that game pre-owned. (Even less considering their other expenses)

    I know sometimes people feel like they are getting ripped off but you gotta compromise somewhere, can't have really cheap games and high trade prices, they are still a company and have to make money somehow.

    • ozchappy on 18/10/2018 - 06:24

      I understand your points and may have gotten a little carried away with some slight exaggeration, but the general point I was trying to get across is the same, not to mention there are always outliers. Look at Far Cry 5 above Far Cry 5 XB1 ($19) ($88) I've found that even recent games that are still selling well will only get you a fraction of the cost they have on the pre-owned sticker - that's part of what let me to this exercise in the first place.

      I had't heard about the trade within a fortnight deal, but I'm not a console gamer, so apologies for not knowing about that one.

      I wasn't trying to make a thread simply to whinge about EB - I understand they have a business to run, I have a decent relationship with the manager of my store, probably because he knows how much I spend, but I still find that they could offer better prices for certain games and still make massive profits.

      At least in the console world you can get refunds/trade-ins. The best a PC gamer can do is get a refund if they haven't played more than a few hours.

  • ozchappy on 17/11/2018 - 20:20

    Woot, we learned I spent way too much time doing something! I'm going to spend more time analyzing why I spent so much time doing something that I shouldn't have spent doing to see how I can learn from my mistake of spending too much time doing something I shouldn't have been doing in the first place.

  • montorola on 16/12/2018 - 15:15

    Does eb still accept xbox 360 games and ps3 games? How much do they pay for them?

  • N1NJ4W4RR10R on 16/12/2018 - 17:14

    It actually hurts to see some of those prices…

    And yeah, vastly more profitable to just sell them on eBay.

  • smr23 on 16/12/2018 - 17:54

    Traded in 2 games on PS4-
    Sims 4 - $15
    Street Fighter V - $15

  • reeeee on 17/07/2019 - 21:17

    i would just like to say that is because of the money.

    if Eb games were to buy a preowned for 100 and sell it for 100 they wouldnt make any profit

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