GameFly or Blockbuster; who provides the best game rental service? With the growing number of passable video game titles, it’s becoming more and more expensive to stay up on our favorite pastime. Both GameFly and Blockbuster offer video game rental services that attempt to fill this need, but which is the better service?
I grew up with Blockbuster. I couldn’t begin to estimate how many times I’ve visited the store whether it be for movies or video games. Throughout that time, in the neighborhood of 15 years, I grew a real love/hate relationship with the company. I’ve always enjoyed video games and movies and really appreciated the opportunity to so easily have access to them. What always pissed me off were the late fees and the sometimes lack of selection or availability.
As you can imagine, when I discovered Netflix I was immediately hooked and to this day maintain a subscription to the service. Netflix beats the pants off of Blockbuster’s movie rental service in every way. You’d think I would have immediately fallen in love with GameFly when I first heard of it. Well, I actually did, until I subscribed to the service. At this time, over a year ago, GameFly was still somewhat in it’s infancy as a company. Netflix has spoiled me with amazing selection, availability, and wait times of a single business day. If the movie is shipped today, I will absolutely get it tomorrow. GameFly, on the other hand, had a great selection but very low availability, unless you knew how to work the queue system, and a shipping time of days. If a few release came out on a Tuesday, I’d be lucky to get it by Friday, lucky. I unsubscribed pretty quickly.
Only 2 months ago I decided to check back in on GameFly as they had opened more distribution centers and I figured had better availability by now. Knowing how to get new games, I was able to get the new releases shipped the day they came out and in some cases the Monday before. The shipping times had gotten better, but it’s still no Netflix. The average was 2 business days for me. I did have some issues, such as one release coming in the mail but missing the actual game itself. That was annoying, after having waited 4 days for it to come in the first place. As I began to pick up World of Warcraft again, I unsubscribed to GameFly.
Well, now I’m looking into the various offerings and wondering which makes the most sense. With my experiences with GameFly, I feel like I pretty much understand what I’m getting with that service. It’s $23/month for 2 titles out, decent shipping times, some potential for longer waits if it has to come from a distant distribution center, and a good selection of titles. On the other hand, you have Blockbuster. I stopped by my local Blockbuster to get information about the GamePass program, since so little is available on their website. It’s $15 for the first month, then $22/mo after that, includes 1 title out, is exclusive to the store you start it at, and it’s entirely in-person. I went through the racks in the store and their availability of new releases was actually pretty good.
So, which makes more sense? With GameFly, you’ll get 2 titles for the price of 1 at Blockbuster. But, you’ll have instant access at Blockbuster instead of waiting days, and even a week in some cases, with GameFly. With GameFly, you’ll support an up and coming business that simply focuses on gamers, and effectively help put those final nails in Blockbuster’s proverbial coffin for all of those years of late fees. I haven’t made up my mind yet and I’d really like to get some feedback. Do you use one of these services? If so, what do you think, as an active customer, about the service?
