Game Over for Game-A-Palooza

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Earlier this week, I stopped by a retro game store to see if they had anything come in that would catch my eye. Upon pulling up, the only thing that caught my eye was the sign in the picture you see above. “Game-A-Palooza” will no longer be open.

“Game-A-Palooza” actually started out as a PLAY-N-TRADE, opening in the fall of 2009. It was the first new retro game store to open up by me with a 15 minute travel distance. I bought a ton of used games from the store because there was a unique amount of rare and fun games coming in for VERY CHEAP. MUSHA for $2.99? Yes please! Nintendo Game and watch for under 5 bucks?! Hell yeah! Nester’s Funky Bowling for $3.99? Yup. The owners caught on to this whole retro crazy though and prices started to increase.

How much you ask? How about $39.99 for a copy of China Warrior for TG-16! I laughed at the thought of someone even paying that price for the game. Good games were drying up at that point though and the staff service started to get pretty poor, so it was off my “always visit” list. The owners must have figured out that they had a sinking ship on their hands as well, because they eventually sold the place to another couple. The staff complained that the original owners were never there and that they liked their new managers much better. Good for them!

Not so good for them was the name: “Game-A-Palooza” It sounds like an STD you can get by touching someone’s dirty game controller.

The first major let down with this store was that they were not accepting the Play N Trade discount card that the previous store had. I had a friend who renewed his card two weeks before the store owners changed hands and now he couldn’t use it. The second was that while their were new owners, certain members of the staff could still care less about doing their job. What led to the store closure though? Was it due to the economy or did something happen to the owners? We may never know, but I believe this is just the start of retro game stores making an exit across the States.

What comes up, must come down…

3 thoughts on “Game Over for Game-A-Palooza

  1. Israel

    I have a couple Play N Trades here in Orlando. Ive only been to two of them tho. One is very disorganized dark and ghetto, while the other one is the complete opposite. Very organized, bright, and great customer service.
    youtube username: israelpacheco89

  2. suiton629

    This is suiton629 (YouTube) again.. =)

    Ah~ A shame that a store specializing in retro game closed down! I’m not a retro collector, but I know how this kind of thing feels! There’s always eBay and Amazon for retro stuff, but it can get expensive…

    To those who collect and retro games, tis a sad day indeed…

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