Whether you’re a tramp having to make the change from Special Brew to Tesco value lager or an MP having to wipe your arse on £10 notes instead of £20 notes, the credit crunch has affected us all. Here are some tips to get more poorly rendered explosions for your bucks.
Import! The PlayStation 3, PSP and DS are region free while certain Xbox 360 games are too. Not only does the US get some games before us but when the dollar is weak against the pound they can be cheaper. Finding brand new DS releases for under £20 is not uncommon on sites like VideoGamesPlus, Play Asia, DVDBoxOffice and Tronix. Just be aware that you might get stung for customs charges. The sneaky sods.
Pre-order! Get your orders in quick on some websites and you may find yourself saving a few quid. Take Argos as an example – last week they had Halo 3: ODST for £26.99 but quickly upped the price as word spread. High street stores like GameStation and GAME offer extra reward points and occasionally free gifts such as t-shirts or downloadable content if you pre-order.
Bulk buy! No, not multiple copies of the same game, you silly sausage. Both GameStation and Blockbusters have 4 for £20 and 2 for £20 offers on pre-owned games. If lady luck is smiling you could walk away with four decent games for half the price of a new one. Recently I’ve spotted Eternal Sonta, Overlord, Gears of War and Oblivion in a Blockbusters 4 for £20 deal. It all depends though on what your local stores has in stock on the day you visit. Rows upon rows of sports games aren’t uncommon.
Price Match! If you only take one thing away from this feature, then let it be this. CeX is the only retailer that shows their cash and trade in prices on their website. This is ideal to use as a guide as to what your old games are worth, even if you don’t have a CeX near you. Now here’s the good part – GameStation will match their prices and beat them by £1 as long as you take a print out as proof. PC World also has a price match policy – find something cheaper within 30 miles of a PC World store they’ll reduce it by 10%.
Surf! Sites like HotUKDeals let members share their bargains with the World while Amazon Marketplace is far more efficient to buy second-hand games from than eBay. One top tip for Amazon is to change the search results to “Price: Low to High†– by doing so you can find stuff people have put on for literally pence. Another website I like to use now and then is US site SecondSpin that sells second-hand games for jolly nice prices and they re-shrink wrap them. They have free postage deals every couple of months but as mentioned earlier, be wary of customs.
If you shop regularly online then you may want to join Quidco too, and get cashback on some of your purchases. A lot of people swear by it. But not in a foul-mouthed way.