Gamefly

Jdubrx

Anyone use it? If so, how do you like it? How fast do games come?

Septus

I did not like it, despite having a distribution center in my own city. Processing time at their center seems to be slow, not the same-day turnaround that Netflix has, and I rarely got a game shipped to me that was in the top 3 or 4 of my queue, even when 1 or 2 of those titles were not new.

I'd say don't use it unless there are a bunch of older games that you really want to play all the way through, and your estimated play time on each would be at least a week. More perhaps if you live far from a distribution center.

JWashke

I pretty much had the same experience as Septus, I also lived close to a distribution center apparently, though I didn't have problems with time, rather I just never got the top games in my queue.

I was hoping to use it as a way to play games that I might want to play but not enough to buy, but It would take weeks to get a new game. I would just have like 2 or 3 games in my queue that all came out recently and go for a week or more without them shipping anything.

Just like Septus said it depends on why you want it. If you want to play a bunch of older games, or maybe even less popular newer games you might like it. But if your hoping to play new releases regularly be prepared for long waits.

Septus

Oh and I remember now why the shipping(in addition to the processing) took so long. At least half of all the games shipped to me came from a different distribution center, which was very far away.

FightTest

Agreed on it being pretty bad compared to Netflix. Slow shipping turnaround and you'll never see any game even relatively new. Even when games showed as ready to ship I'd still get things further down on my queue for some reason.

Canceled it after my first month.

mastrius

Rough. I still use it. And I get games in around 3 days after I ship em back. Not really that big a deal. And if you dont want the game 3 or game 4 in your game queue just simply dont put anything there and wait for the game. It can be a bit though in which they ship a very new game. Ive always had great luck on getting the new ones but it can take a bit at times. Nonetheless I do like it and its cheaper than buying just one game in a month.

Bionic Monkey

You've got to know how to game it, and have patience. I get new games fairly regularly, but what I have to do is put nothing but that game in my queue, and then wait. I usually don't have to wait more than 4 or 5 days, and I'll get it shipped to me, which then takes another several days. I get probably two or three brand new releases a month this way.

aBlank

Bionic Monkey wrote: »

You've got to know how to game it, and have patience. I get new games fairly regularly, but what I have to do is put nothing but that game in my queue, and then wait. I usually don't have to wait more than 4 or 5 days, and I'll get it shipped to me, which then takes another several days. I get probably two or three brand new releases a month this way.

This is what I heard most people doing.

I on the other hand, play almost everything and there are plenty of "bad" games that I don't want to buy, but want to play anyway (Enchanted Arms, Transformers, Conan, etc etc). So my game queue is mostly full of bad games. There are a few decent games in my queue, but they are games I'm not really in a rush to play.

It takes about 2 days for the disc to reach a shipping place and another 2 days before I get another game. I dunno where I'm even sending or getting these games, but the turn around time hasn't been that bad for me. I'm in Connecticut so I'm not sure if that matters or what.

I've only had one problem overall. They sent me Fable 2 and I couldn't install/play it. I sent them a message (same as netflix) that the disc came broken/scratched or whatever, and got a replacement in about 3 days... but the replacement didn't work either. I've since given up on it and just sent it back to get another game. It's the only game I've gotten from them that hasn't worked but meh.

SyphonBlue

I've had no problems with the service. It's saved me hundreds of dollars.

maximumzero

I used to use it. I thought it was great. I made a list of a bunch of Gamecube, GBA, Xbox, & DS games I missed out on either by not buying them or in the case of the XB & GC not owning those systems.

Unfortunately I don't stick with a game for long so It'd sit on my shelf for 3 weeks at a time while I either played other stuff or I wouldn't play videogames at all for like a week. So in the end it wasn't cost effective so I axed it.

Camui

I use it and I'm happy with what I have experienced so far. I'm in the Dallas area and our mailing point is in Austin, so it seems to be the games take 2-3 days to go to and from me to them. Basically if like the others say, if you can beat a game within a week and send it off on friday, you'll get it the next week to burn through. So far I gotten 5 games within 2 weeks so I saved alot of money already.

Think about it like this, if you are a person who is happy keeping games you buy forever, then don't bother. If you like to get games, play em, beat em, and sell em, you'll save alot of money doing this.

If I rented theses 5 games, it would of cost me about 35-45 dollars depending on what place I go to, and if I actually bought theses games, it would be easily over 200+. So I'm getting my money's worth for 20ish a month.

Omeks

The trick to getting new releases, as Bionic Money mentioned, is to micromanage your rental Q.

Lets say I want to rent Halo ODST next week when it comes out. It's a popular game, so if GF doesn't ship it out on the Tuesday when it comes out, I'll have to wait for another copy to come in, which usually means a couple days wait time. The trick is to send back one of my current games so that it reaches the distribution center either the day before or the day of the game's release. The usual time it takes to reach there is 2-3 days, so you'll want to send it out the Thursday or Friday before. In addition, you want to clear your Q of everything BUT Halo ODST to ensure you don't get something else. This essentially means you'll get a brand new copy fresh out of the box.

This strategy also works really well if I want to buy Halo ODST, because you'll be charged almost $15 less than a shrink-wrapped copy (more if you have GF benefits). Since nobody else has played the game, you're basically getting a "pre-played" game that really isn't pre-played.

As for the service itself, I've had it for years and I'm still happy. You'll get a lot of benefits the longer you stay a member which give way to a lot of savings. These include:

After 3 months: $5 coupon for purchases, issued every three months (remains through all levels).
After 6 months: 5% discount on all purchases.
After 12 months: 10% discount on all purchases (upgrade from previous 5%).

I will say that lately, my games have been taking a day or two longer to get to and from the distribution center, which has screwed up the earlier strategy on more than one occasion (most recently with Guitar Hero 5).

FuriousJodo

I used it for about a year, I really liked it at first but as time went on it seemed like I had to wait logner and longer to get games. A few people I know seem to agree on the theory that they give priority to new customers, and old ones get kind of shafted.

Though I may start it back up soon just because there are a lot of games I want to play but don't want to buy.

projectmayhem

I used it for a while and really enjoyed it. Just make sure you dont load up your que with like 50 games, because you will only ever get those games that are never the ones you really wanted.

FuriousJodo

Yeah, though I finally cancelled after having an empty spot and having three games in my queue for 3 weeks and never getting anything.

VanityPants

Gamefly really is hit or miss, and like everyone has said, a lot of it can depend on your patience and ability to manage your queue.

I was using it for a while but ended up canceling it because the wait times between sending games out and getting them in was ridiculous. It was about a week of turn around, total, between sending out my old game and getting the next -- and I live about an hour and a half away from a shipping center.

I have to agree, it really does seem like when you first start using Gamefly you get your games a lot faster. After about six months of using the service it seemed like it was crawling. I also had a couple of infuriating incidences where I neglected micromanaging my queue and the game at the top of my queue was at High or Medium availability but they'd send me number 5 on my queue for some reason (I'm guessing because the game I wanted was in High availability at a further away shipping center).

It's worth trying out, but in the end I'd rather spend the extra money and not have to deal with the hassle.

Local H Jay

i knew a guy who scammed gamefly out of so many games
he would buy the disc insurance, and then the disc would 'break' and you needed a replacement. then you canceled before the two weeks were up...
so yes, my friend has a cd binder full of 360 games

luckee

Yeah. That sucks. Your friend is making it more difficult for the rest of us. Games aren't cheap and a scammed game is a game that doesn't get sent out to another customer.

Renting is definitely my best alternative right now since. I can afford to play as much as I want and whatever I want - that wasn't happening for me before I started gamefly.

Get a two game plan, play one while the other is on the way and you're set. I pay something like $200 a year for that and never am without a game to play. I probably played 30+ over the last year and bought a few from as well as. their used game prices are ridiculous sometimes.

btw: If you have games you don't want, you can trade them in and get rental credit. I got a couple months free doing that.

SyphonBlue

Local H Jay wrote: »

i knew a guy who scammed gamefly out of so many games
he would buy the disc insurance, and then the disc would 'break' and you needed a replacement. then you canceled before the two weeks were up...
so yes, my friend has a cd binder full of 360 games

Punch your friend in the dick for me.

maximumzero

Omeks wrote: »

The trick to getting new releases, as Bionic Money mentioned, is to micromanage your rental Q.

Lets say I want to rent Halo ODST next week when it comes out. It's a popular game, so if GF doesn't ship it out on the Tuesday when it comes out, I'll have to wait for another copy to come in, which usually means a couple days wait time. The trick is to send back one of my current games so that it reaches the distribution center either the day before or the day of the game's release. The usual time it takes to reach there is 2-3 days, so you'll want to send it out the Thursday or Friday before. In addition, you want to clear your Q of everything BUT Halo ODST to ensure you don't get something else. This essentially means you'll get a brand new copy fresh out of the box.

This strategy also works really well if I want to buy Halo ODST, because you'll be charged almost $15 less than a shrink-wrapped copy (more if you have GF benefits). Since nobody else has played the game, you're basically getting a "pre-played" game that really isn't pre-played.

As for the service itself, I've had it for years and I'm still happy. You'll get a lot of benefits the longer you stay a member which give way to a lot of savings. These include:

After 3 months: $5 coupon for purchases, issued every three months (remains through all levels).
After 6 months: 5% discount on all purchases.
After 12 months: 10% discount on all purchases (upgrade from previous 5%).

I will say that lately, my games have been taking a day or two longer to get to and from the distribution center, which has screwed up the earlier strategy on more than one occasion (most recently with Guitar Hero 5).

Yeah, the member benefits are rather neat. I managed to get a copy of Phantom Hourglass for like $10 after a sale + discounts.

solsovly

I really hated the service. I'm in CT. It took 3-5 days for them to ship a game and a variable time for them to receive it. I never got new games (expected). Most discs were playable but some not which wasted a huge amount of time. Since it's hard to get new releases anyways, I would, I'd rather just buy/trade games on Goozex or just buy them straight up.

I guess it depends on if you are the type of person to buy a new game every week and then trade them to gamestop for huge losses. If yes, get gamefly.

SyphonBlue

I've never gotten a game from Gamefly that wasn't playable.

Dirty

I've used GF on and off for a few years now (not using it currently as I'm trying to clear out some of my massive backlog). Even if you take the time to micro-manage your queue, the turnaround time can be pretty crappy (shipping took 2-3 days for me, meaning my turnaround time could be up to a week, even with currently available games in my queue).

However, for me its more about saving money. I would always do the math at the end of the year, because I was curious exactly how much I was paying per game. It would always be in the $4-5 range. That's cheaper than renting from Blockbuster/Hollywood Video* or just buying and selling the games on my own.

*Plus the selection at BB/HV is terrible, and they have the same problem of never being able to get newer games.

Ganluan

I've been a member for almost a year and a half, and I've completely stopped buying games. According to their records I've rented almost 50 games since I joined, many of which were brand new at the time... that's a hell of a lot of money saved.

I always focus on a single game at a time, so I'll play through one, send it back, then play the other while I'm waiting for the next game to arrive.

It takes 2 days for a title to get to them, and 2 days for one to get to me, so the total turnaround isn't bad at all. With Fast Return I've actually gotten the next game 3 days after shipping back the last one.

The only downside is so many games with DLC coming out now... not owning the game means either needing to buy it later or rent it again. Of course, by then you can usually get the game for cheaper if you do choose to buy it!

Sir Carcass

I've been a member for 2 years now and I love it. I really can't afford to buy new games, but I can swing $16 a month. Like mentioned, if you manage your Q correctly, you shouldn't have a problem getting games. I have a distribution center in my town and have about a 3 day turn around.

I also use them to purchase games. I'll wait until they've been out a while, then combine my $5 reward with my 10% discount and get good games for $15 or less.

Ganluan

Sir Carcass wrote: »

I've been a member for 2 years now and I love it. I really can't afford to buy new games, but I can swing $16 a month. Like mentioned, if you manage your Q correctly, you shouldn't have a problem getting games. I have a distribution center in my town and have about a 3 day turn around.

I also use them to purchase games. I'll wait until they've been out a while, then combine my $5 reward with my 10% discount and get good games for $15 or less.

That's another great feature... I got The Darkness for $6 and Bourne Conspiracy for $5. They're in great condition too.

luckee

Sir Carcass wrote: »

I've been a member for 2 years now and I love it. I really can't afford to buy new games, but I can swing $16 a month. Like mentioned, if you manage your Q correctly, you shouldn't have a problem getting games. I have a distribution center in my town and have about a 3 day turn around.

I also use them to purchase games. I'll wait until they've been out a while, then combine my $5 reward with my 10% discount and get good games for $15 or less.

I hear ya. I listened to the naysayers for awhile but the bottom line speaks for itself. I play more and am having a lot more fun playing whatever I want instead of worrying about how much games costs every time i want to play a new game. the perks are there too, gamefly $$, trade ins for rental credit, super cheap games for sale. spend less, play play is all it gots to say.

Uselesswarrior

I still use my brother's gamefly account to purchase games from them with the 10% off. Great place to buy cheap used games.

I'm kind of tempted to sign up again, but the turn around time was at least a week before.

Also there is not many PS3 games that I don't have that I want to play and for the Wii my brothers pick up every major release and then I just turn around and borrow it from them a few months later (just got punch out).

EDIT:
They currently have a magazine offer when you sign up. I assumed it would be a gaming mag, but no, your choices are Sport Illustrated and Entertainment Weekly. Weird.

Omeks

Uselesswarrior wrote: »

I still use my brother's gamefly account to purchase games from them with the 10% off. Great place to buy cheap used games.

It's probably worth noting that Gamefly's used game prices can usually be a lot lower than Gamestop's.

Current Gamestop Price for Used Guitar Hero 5: $49.99

Current Gamefly Price for Guitar Hero 5: $51.99
Gamefly Price with 10% Discount Added: $47.99
Above Gamefly Price with Coupon Added: $42.99

I've seen some older used games (by older I mean a couple months, have dropped in popularity a bit since release) go for ten or more dollars less at Gamefly as opposed to Gamestop.

Pacifist

Like has been said, it's not nearly as fast as Netflix, but if you have a title at the top of your queue a day or two before release you're almost guaranteed to get it.

I think it's a great service and a very proper try-before-you-buy system.

Ganluan

They just shipped me Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2 this morning, so that's pretty impressive. Of course, it took me a week and half to get Batman shipped :P

Allforce

I've been a member for over 4 years now and never have had an issue with getting a brand new game shipped to me the day it release. Takes 2-3 days to get to me. As stated before the trick is just to clear out your queue and keep the one new release there and make sure you have a game back. I'm sending Dead Space back today and will have Halo ODST shipped Tuesday when it releases pretty much guaranteed. I got Beatles Rock Band last week the same way and the "Keep It" price on what is in all honesty a brand-new game is 44.09 and they ship you a perfect box and manual for it no charge.

If the OP wants to sign up please PM me so I can set you up with a referral. I get a 20 dollar Amazon gift card for every person I sign up which comes in handy.

torian

Anyone know how good the service is in the Cinicinnati area?

Allforce

torian wrote: »

Anyone know how good the service is in the Cinicinnati area?

I'm 90 minutes from you (if that) in Columbus and I get games in 2-3 days max.

luckee

I assume the distro for Cincinnati is PA like mine. I average around 3 days. Having enough games to play has never been problem with renting for me.

torian

hmmmm, I might try the coop 14 day free trial. Thanks guys

Sir Carcass

I should also point out that in my experience, if you buy a game that has some sort of unique code (like the RB2 code for the 20 free songs), it won't have been used when you get it. Good luck getting that from GameStop.