Three months after its kiosk partner bellied up, ending Walmart's first foray into used game returns, the retail behemoth is climbing back in the ring with another provider, and will offer more than just used discs.
Industry Gamers says Walmart confirmed that it is now partnering with Game Trade, a start-up company providing these types of services, to bring trading and selling of used games - plus "movies and entertainment hardware" - to five Walmart stores on an experimental basis.
Walmart is firm that this is just five locations and a look-see at how the business will perform for them. "There are no plans at this time to lease space for more locations in Walmart stores beyond these five until we understand more about customer response, which we will monitor with great interest," the company told Industry Gamers.
It's probably coincidence that this comes a week after Game Crazy's parent company decided to shutter all of those stores, leaving GameStop largely unchallenged on a national basis. These plans take time to spin up, after all. But iIf anything, Walmart's showing it isn't giving up so easily on a lucrative secondary market, which is comprising ore and more of gamers' spending as prices rise and options become available.
Walmart Confirms Entry into Used Games Market [Industry Gamers]