Announced in February of this year, Blockbuster's Games By Mail program is an extension of the company's Total Access movies by mail service. Competing with Gamefly the same way Total Access competes with Netflix. Now Seattle area Blockbuster Online customers can opt into the games service, which allows them to rent any number of games, 1 out at a time, for $7.99 per month.

"We know our customers in Seattle love games, so we're excited to expand our Games By Mail pilot to include this market," said Keith Morrow, Blockbuster CIO. "We hope customers will take advantage of the service and share their feedback with us, so that we can build on our key learnings from Cleveland and further refine the offering in preparation for a national launch."

Any readers in the Seattle area planning on taking advantage? Are any of you even renting movies from Blockbuster anymore?

And it probably wouldn't hurt if it boosted paid subscriptions for the service too.

The app, which requires Wifi or cell signal to work, lists games by platform in a number of ways, allowing gamers to browse or search for their favorite titles. Once a person finds the game they're looking for, they can check out the box art, look at game's controls and even read through user reviews for the game.

The service also has channels that allow people to read a feed of video gaming news pulled from Shacknews, which Gamefly acquired in February. And of course log on to their Gamefly account.

Gamefly co-founder Sean Spector says he hopes to continue to expand the 5,000 games included in the applications library and that he also plans to extend the reviews and news found on the program to include other video game news and review sources.

"The idea behind it is to be the all encompasing video game app for mobile devices," he said. "This is for everyone who is a gamer, not just Gamefly subscribers."

According to a listing from online game rental outfit GameFly, spotted by Siliconera, Monster Hunter will be published by Konami in January 2010, likely the first DSi-only game to hit North American store shelves. As previously reported, the game uses the Nintendo DSi's built-in cameras to snap pictures of collectible beasts in the vein of Pokemon and Sony's PSP game Invizimals.

Monster Finder [GameFly via Siliconera]

If you live in the Philadelphia area and had trouble receiving your GameFly rentals last year, odds are good that Reginald Johnson was to blame. Johnson worked as a mail-processing clerk at the U.S. Postal Service processing and distribution center in Philadelphia, responsible for unloading mail from the trucks that docked there. And unload he did...he just unloaded quite a lot into his own SUV.

Reports of missing GameFly shipments in the area began reaching the Postal Service's Office of Inspector General in 2007. In September of 2008, the inspector general set up a sting operation using test mailings, and Johnson was found to be the culprit. After a car chase that ended in Johnson crashing his car and fleeing on foot, authorities discovered 79 GameFly mailings in a backpack in the vehicle, with an additional 81 found in a duffel bag dropped during the pursuit.

And what was Johnson doing with all of these rental games? In his SUV authorities also discovered five Nintendo Wii Sports, three Wii Fits, a Playstation console, game controllers, and receipts from GameStop, where Johnson had been exchanging games for trade-in credit.

Johnson admitted to stealing 2,200 GameFly mailings over the course of his employment with the U.S. Postal Service in federal district court yesterday, and now faces between 12 to 18 months in prison according to preliminary sentencing guidelines. Sentencing is scheduled for January 13th.

I'm actually interested to know which GameStop he was bringing these games to. A guy showing up on a regular basis with a stack of caseless game discs had to have thrown up some sort of red flag, shouldn't it?

Ex-mail handler admits theft of video games in envelopes [Philly.com - Thanks David!]

Last month, GameFly filed an order to force the USPS to provide figures showing how many of its retail locations have Netflix, Blockbuster, or other dedicated mail slots for DVD-based mail. The Postal Service said, in effect, "don't know what you're talking about," and said such slots, if they exist, would be against USPS policy. GameFly came back with pictures taken in Alturas and Susanville, Calif. (Susanville pictured above; both towns are well in the northern part of the state) showing just such a thing. The Postal Service has refused to authenticate the pics.

Dedicated mail slots are just one facet of GameFly's overall complaint against the Postal Service, which includes hand-sorting of competitors' and peers' disc mail, to avoid breakage, and that USPS automatic sorters break $300,000 worth of GameFly games per month.

The case is still, as they say, pending. Still, has anyone out there seen dedicated Netflix slots at their local Post Office?

Update on Gamefly Complaint With USPS That Netflix and Blockbuster Get Preferential Treatment [Hacking Netflix via Game Politics]

The kiosks will cover the major consoles (PS3, PS2, Wii and 360) and the $2 per night doesn't blow the doors off Blockbuster's $9 for 5. But it does offer a different sales pitch - mainly, an impulse grab while you're out doing something else.

Unfortunately, selection seems to be an issue with just 13 360 titles offered. There are also no online reservations (naturally) so this is truly a grab-and-go model. But for those in RedBox's range, who use rentals as part of their playing habits and buying strategy, this extra convenience could prove useful.

RedBox Launches $2 Video Game Rentals [Zatz Not Funny, via Gizmodo]

Sqaure Enix reps told Kotaku "We cannot comment on a PS3 release at this time." However, they went on to say that the listing on Gamefly.com was "an error and had been taken down from their site."

Well, not completely taken down. While searching for the PlayStation 3 release of Star Ocean: The Last Hope doesn't return anything but the Xbox 360 version, Gamefly still has the title in its data base. We'll chalk that up to either a technical limitation or a preference to not have to upload the listing again should an announcement of a PS3 port be coming soon.

The Value Gamer: Play and Purchase Behavior in a Recession also shows that gamers have increased their purchase of used games to "record-breaking totals" since Nielsen began tracking used game sales.

"Overall, the uncertain economy has not hurt gameplay and may have accelerated it as gamers look to get more value out of the games they own," The Nielsen Company says.

More interesting, I think, is what type of gamers Nielsen seems to think is driving this increase in play.

"Primarily, we believe mainstream gamers are playing more of the broadly appealing games (i.e Wii Fit, Guitar Hero and Rock Band) pushing their hours of gameplay up," said Michael Flamberg, director of client consulting, Nielsen Games. "The social aspects of these games have engaged them. We don't believe hardcore gamers are driving up the usage averages we've observed. Second, gamers may be looking to stretch their entertainment dollar further through playing games they own more. The importance of value for them is evident in the findings on used game purchase."

Gamers are also making more use of rental services like Gamefly, according to the survey.

The results seem to show that developers need to continue to concentrate on making ways to extend the life of their games if they want to increase sales and lengthen the time a person holds on to a title. New downloadable content, episodes and, of course, strong multiplayer elements all seem to help that.

The Value Gamer: Play and Purchase Behavior in a Recession [Nielsen]

The Los Angeles-based company says that the United States Postal Service is responsible for breaking between one and two percent of 590,000 video games shipped each yearmonth with their automated sorting machines. That doesn't sound like a lot of games, but Ars Technica's done the math – putting the cost to GameFly for broken games at $295,000 a month.

Besides breakage, GameFly is sore about games being stolen out of the mail; though it does give the Office of Inspector General and the Postal Inspection Service credit for arresting 19 USPS employees in connection with the thefts. The company is also annoyed that working with USPS to find a solution has only cost GameFly more money as they experimented with heavier and bigger mailer to try and protect their product.

The final insult, though, is the claim that Netflix and Blockbuster have it better. According to GameFly, USPS manually plucks Netflix and Blockbuster DVD mailers from the sorting line en route to the machine to protect them from breakage. GameFly's complaint alleges that they've asked for comparable treatment for their game mailers, but that postal service hasn't done it. With Blockbuster renting out video games by mail, says the complaint, "GameFly now faces direct competition from a rival that is larger and longer established – and which, because of the preferential treatment given by the Postal Service, enjoys a substantial cost advantage in the distribution of its DVDs to consumers."

GameFly told Kotaku today that because this is a legal matter, they have no official comment at this time. Their complaint says in the Relief Requested section that GameFly wants the Commission to immediately hold hearings on their grievances and offer them "reasonable and nondiscriminatory rates and terms of service." Like now, before more games get broken and Blockbuster noms on the market.

Check out the full complaint here.

Gamefly: USPS handles DVD rentals with kid gloves, ignores us [Ars Technica via Voodoo Extreme]

GameAnswers is essentially the video game version of Yahoo! Answers. After a quick and painless sign up process, users can ask questions or answer questions to their hearts' content, climbing the ranks as other community members rate their answers in terms of overall helpfulness. Simple community functions allow you to follow other members or gain followers yourself, perhaps one day becoming to most informative gamer the world has ever seen.

GameFly founder Sean Spector explained to Kotaku why exactly they've created the GameAnswers website.

"Gamers want feedback from other gamers, but don't want to spend hours combing through message boards to find what they need. GameAnswers lets gamers get answers on their time line and not others'.

Spector hopes that rank system will help encourage good answers, rather than a page full of "First answer!" posts, and if that doesn't work there is always the report abuse button.

While there are currently no plans to integrate GameAnswers with the GameFly video game rental-by-mail service, Spector didn't rule out some sort of shared features appearing in the future.

If reading the comments section on Kotaku is any indicator, gamers sure love to show other gamers how much they know. With that in mind, we should completely crash the website's servers in a matter of minutes. We can do it. I believe in us.

GameAnswers.com [Official Website]

Ratchet & Clank fans may remember the previous PSP outing, Ratchet & Clank: Size Matters also went from the PlayStation Portable to the PlayStation 2 about a year after it first hit. The existence of the PS2 version was revealed via a similar retail listing at GameStop with an official announcement arriving one month later.

GameFly shows the PS2 version landing in May.

If true, Secret Agent Clank will join PSP hits like Silent Hill Origins, Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories and Grand Theft Auto: Vice City Stories as up-ported once-exclusives. It will also mean one more title stealth announced by GameFly, who excels at revealing games prior to official announcements.

We're checking in with Sony to see if they feel like confirming the game's existence.

Secret Agent Clank [GameFly - thanks, Baust528!]

Online video game rental leader GameFly takes a small step offline with the introduction of their G-Box rental kiosk, which allows gamers to swipe their credit cards for instant gaming gratification, much like the DVD rental kiosks that have been popping up all over the country lately. The G-Box will stock the latest games for the Wii, PlayStation 3, and Xbox 360, allowing players to rent as long as they want for $2.49 a day ($1.99 for Wii titles), with an option to rent-to-own.

"The kiosk program is a way to extend the GameFly universe into the physical world," said Sean Spector, co-founder and senior vice president of business development and content for GameFly.

The kiosk, located in the on-campus Barnes & Noble bookstore, is only the first step in building up GameFly's physical presence, with the company planning to roll units out around the country.

"I think it'll allow students who don't have the ability to get out to a Blockbuster to rent games," (Spector) said. "Students who live in dorms or are on campus more often will have the ability to get recent releases."

So what do you think? $2.49 doesn't seem like too much to pay for a day with a new game. If anything it makes for an excellent try before you buy opportunity for titles released without demos. Would you rent a game from a machine?

Gamefly G-Box allows students to rent video games on campus [The Daily Toreador - Thanks John!]

The story walks people through everything from trade-ins, to bartering, sales hunting and rentals. It's a fast, worthwhile read that introduces readers to half a dozen sites and services.

Here's the break down:

GameStop: The granddaddy of the used games business with more than 6,100 stores world wide.

Switch Games: A free website for online trading of consoles and games with a social network for game trade matchmaking.

Goozex: An online trading site for gamers that uses a special point system.

GameFly: The $16 a month video game rental service that also offers used game sales.

GameTap: Well-known download service for older PC games.

Good Old Games: Another download service for PC games, this one from CD Projekt.

Cheap Ass Gamer: Hive mind for video gaming deals world wide, makes it's money through a commission collected from online retailers for referral sales.

Have you used any of these services? Are there any you use not listed here?

New Web Sites Help Players Shop & Swap [Wall Street Journal]

The Q Awards look at GameFly members' GameQ, a list of games that members want to rent and in what order. More than 100,000 votes were submitted between mid January and early February.

GAME OF THE YEAR: Fallout 3 (Bethesda Softworks)
PS3 GAME OF THE YEAR: Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots (Konami)
PS2 GAME OF THE YEAR: Kingdom Hearts: Re-Chain of Memories (Square-Enix)
PSP GAME OF THE YEAR: God of War: Chains of Olympus (Sony Computer Entertainment)
XBOX 360 GAME OF THE YEAR: Fallout 3 (Bethesda Softworks)
Wii GAME OF THE YEAR: Super Smash Bros. Brawl (Nintendo)
NINTENDO DS GAME OF THE YEAR: Final Fantasy IV (Square-Enix)

It's interesting to compare this list of rental favorites to all of the other Game of the Year lists that hit over the past few months.

The 2008 GOTY GOTYs: The Best of the Best [Kotaku]

Blockbuster's Total Access rental program might soon have a distinct advantage over rival rent-at-home company Netflix with the introduction of video game rentals to the service. Having focused solely on movie DVD rentals since its inception, Total Access will soon begin offering select customers the option of having video games delivered directly to their door as well, as part of a pilot program that will lead directly to a nationwide launch of the service in the second half of this year.

"We already rent more video games than any other company, store-based or online, in the nation, so we know our core customer loves games as well as movies," said Bob Barr, Vice President and General Manager of blockbuster.com. "With this pilot program, we're laying the groundwork for offering BLOCKBUSTER Total Access customers easy online access to the movies and games they want, through an integrated subscription offering."

The move could give Blockbuster a leg up on rival Netflix, which currently only offers movies, as well as stirring up competition for game rental service GameFly.

This of course all depends on how well Blockbuster implements the service. I've found that Netflix generally has wider selection and better availability, and as many a Blockbuster game renter can attest to, the company tends to be rather selective when it comes to which games wind up on store shelves.

Still, some video games is better than none at all, and the added ability to trade in your online rentals for half-priced game rentals at your local Blockbuster is certainly a plus. Time will tell if the move can help Blockbuster persevere in the face of an increasingly hostile business environment.

And you know, to the best of my knowledge, that's news. Good news, I'd think, because the Wii and PlayStation 2 versions of the collection, full of classic pinball tables like Black Knight, Fun House and Pin*Bot were surprisingly well done. Here's to hoping they expand the list to include other Bally Williams pinball classics.

GameFly shows a June 12th release date for the North American version. We'll bug Crave Entertainment to see if they will admit to being guilty of publishing the thing. Oh, they'll talk. They'll squeal like stuck pigs.

Pinball Hall of Fame: The Williams Collection [GameFly via NeoGAF]

Gibson - who claims the move has nothing to do with money troubles for the site - says of the surprising deal:

GameFly has demonstrated a true understanding of and commitment to Shacknews' gaming culture.

We are confident [GameFly] will protect the legacy and community we've established, while at the same time providing much needed resources to expand into new and exciting areas that would not otherwise be possible.

Meanwhile, GameFly CEO David Hodess and co-founder Sean Spector say:

We purchased Shacknews because it's a great site. We believe we can help expand its reach—we're not looking to twist and turn the site into something else.

With its avid, engaged community and commitment to providing an independent voice for gamers seeking the most accurate and up-to-date news and information, it goes to the core of our vision as a company, which is to be the ultimate resource for the entire gaming community.

Two months into 2009, two game news outlets bought out. Stay tuned in March, see if the hot streak continues!

GameFly Acquires Shacknews [Shacknews]

"Sony Online Entertainment’s game, The Agency™, is still in development for release on both the PLAYSTATION®3 and PC platforms. The game sku has been reinstated to GameFly’s website. Feel free to add The Agency to your GameQ!"

There we go! Nothing at all to worry about. Just remember kids, retailers and rental establishments, while lovely places to visit and procure video games from, are no substitute for news directly from the game developers and publishers themselves. That's one to grow on.

GameFly is holding a "contest" to see who is the biggest GameFly super fan. The winner gets to show up on a GameFly television commercial. To enter, you just need to submit a 45 second video of yourself explaining why you love GameFly and why the character you are dressed as is your favorite. You can submit as many videos as you want from now till Sept. 30.

The video with the most votes between Oct. 1 and Oct. 31 will win a trip to Hollywood to appear in the commercial. Get on it, as of this morning there were only six videos submitted to GameFly for the contest... many of which sucked.

Hit the jump for visual proof of suckage.

GameFly Contest [Via Joystiq]