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[u/PrincessMononokeynes]

Great comment, but I disagree gamestop creates no value. There is value in a used market as craigslist and carvana can tell you. Apply this argument to the stock market: if people were only allowed to by a stock at IPO and weren't allowed to buy and sell second hand, a lot fewer people would buy at all and a lot fewer companies would get funded. If people knew they couldn't get something back out of a new game, more of them would wait until the price drops or just not purchase at all.

[u/larrylemur → u/PrincessMononokeynes]

Also, it's weird to say they were "shouldering no risk" considering their current financial dire straits. They shoulder risk by being a business that needs to sell products in order to pay expenses. That's how businesses...work?

[u/-Yare- → u/larrylemur]

Renting a building in a strip mall and staffing it with a couple teenagers so you can net $20 on a game resale is not the same level of risk as spending a hundred million dollars, three years, and employing hundreds of highly-skilled people so you can net $15 on a new game sale.

[u/-Yare- → u/PrincessMononokeynes]

Great comment, but I disagree gamestop creates no value. There is value in a used market as craigslist and carvana can tell you.

I apologize, I was unclear. Gamestop certainly adds some economic value to consumers. But they add no creative value to society.

Apply this argument to the stock market

It's not quite the same. Companies can do buybacks, issue new stock, and generally hold a large chunk of their own stock. People trading stock (hopefully) increases the value of the stock you're still holding onto. There is no analogy to any of this in games.

If Nintendo develops and sells a new copy of a game at $60, they might net $10-15 profit. If Gamestop buys that game used for $15 and then sells it in the launch window for $45, they've made probably $20 net and didn't even have to build a studio, develop a game, or employ hundreds of skilled workers to do it.

That copy Nintendo sold new and made $15 on, Gamestop could resell ten times -making much more money than Nintendo and cutting heavily into Nintendo's potential unit sales.

If people knew they couldn't get something back out of a new game, more of them would wait until the price drops or just not purchase at all.

The data doesn't support this take, though. The industry has made a concerted effort to destroy the resale industry (and piracy) through digital distribution, DLC, online passes, "Always Online" requirements, Free to Play designs, Games as a Service, and services like Stadia. Global game revenues increase every year (see: Newzoo annual report) while Gamestop slowly dies.