Sunday, January 21, 2007

Customer seeks Mario 360 game at EB Games.. an Employee recounts the Story

 

Where to begin...

I've been in retail for five, almost six years, this April will mark my sixth year in retail (yay!), and I've got plenty of stories to share.. but I think I'll start out with one of my absolute favorite stories.

Electronics Boutique is such a fun place to work for. Especially when your customers don't know what the hell they're talking about.  Case in point, people who don't know what games are for what system.

Why do I say this?

I walked into my previous place of retail enjoyment in the mall in which it was situated, punched in and had a normal day until she arrived.  Mother of three or four, two of them tagging along with, and completely certian she knew what she was after was the correct item.

What was she after?

A Mario game for the X-Box. Let me say that again. A Mario (as in Super Mario Brothers) game for the X-Box.  I know what your thinking, "Mario games are for Nintendo systems.", well, when I casually explained "Mam, Mario games aren't avalable for the Microsoft X-Box.. I can happily show you where they're at, if you'd like." The lady looked at me as if I'd castrated her favorite animal with a rusty knife.

"What do you mean, they're not avalable for the X-Box?" she asked with a glare that could be mistaken for daggers directly into the heart of the retail associate. At this point I'm thinking "Oh ____. She's dense as ____ and her (more than likely) son has told her that his favorite game has come on the wrong system."


I slowly, and carefully explain "Mam, Mario games are a licensed item under the Nintendo brand name, until Nintendo sells the Mario name to Microsoft, the owners of the X-Box, there will never be a Mario game on the X-Box or X-Box 360," at this point she looked at me and told me "You don't know anything about these games, my 11 year old son told me he wanted Super Mario -Whatever- for his XBox 360."

I was extremely offended by this, because I've been collecting a gaming magazine since 1989, the first year of their publication, and I pride myself on being a walking encyclopedia of games, knowledge, and trivia about games. However, the wonderful world of retail's unwritten rule states that "you must remain calm at all times when dealing with customers" what it doesn't say is "you must remain calm at all times when dealing with customers, dispite how stupid they may be." Again, I casually remarked "Mam, if you'll follow me to the Nintendo section I will be happy to show you where you can find any Mario game your heart, or your son's heart so desires, maybe you'll even recognise the one he's after by the name. I can't promise you anything though," emphasis on the Nintendo portion. At this point the lady started bubbling up and looked the color of freshly billowing lava./

 

"Look you stupid ___ing retail peon, I don't need you to show me the ____ing Nintendo section, I need to know where the ____ I can find the God ____ Mario XBox 360." I said "Alright mam, I'll show you where you can find all of the Xbox 360 games, and if you locate it, I'll ring you up and you can be on your way." the lady stared at me like she was looking at an on-coming train. and said "About ____ing time." I slowly guided her to the X-Box 360 section and let her go about her means in her persuit of the elusive Mario 360 game.

Ten to thirty minutes later, she came up to me, and proceeded to tell me that she couldn't find it. I wonder why...

At this point I loaded up the search engine for our stock, and pulled her around when I searched for "Mario", and searched in the X-Box and X-Box 360 sections, knowing that I'd find nothing.

A few seconds passed and nothing turned up. Again, I wasn't suprised. I turned to her, and I admit, probably said the wrong thing, but I said "Mam, I told you, there are no games for the X-Box systems, however if we look under all known Nintendo related systems, you can see that there are plenty to choose from, if you would like to pick from those I'm sure you could find the one you're looking for."

She turned to me and screamed, about then, the manager got back from lunch and asked me what was going on, and I carefully, and quickly explained the situation. At this point, the manager carefully explained to her (again) that Mario was not avalable for the X-Box systems. She got extremely angry at this point, and asked for our district number, of course, being the associate who'd taken (so far) two hours with her, I happily complied and gave it to her.

She pulled out her cell (why didn't she pull it out in the first place and ask her son what system the game is for is beyond me.. and unfortunately for me I couldn't ask her to do that), and called district.

District, for the third time, told her that she was SOL when trying to find a Mario X-Box game. She got so angry she threw her Motorola Razr on the ground and stormed out of the store. I quickly gathered the parts and put it behind the counter, and ten minutes later she came back for it, and screamed at both myself, and the manager that she was going to go to another store in search of the game.

I bid her a wonderful day, and wished her luck in her search.
I never saw her again, athough, I will mention she tried going to another EB, which promptly called us to ask if I'd assisted her (because apparently she'd told them she'd had "horrible" service from us), and I acknowledged that I had, the associate on the other side of the phone said "Okay" with a tinge of laughter in their voice.. and hung up.

Thirty minutes later they called back, and let me know that she couldn't find it in their store either, which, frankly didn't suprise either of us, but we still get a laugh out of it to this day.
Makes me wonder if she ever found it...

Source: Digg - Customer seeks Mario 360 game at EB Games.. an Employee recounts the Story

Monday, January 15, 2007

News: X360 HD-DVD sells 100k (Xbox 360)

 

In the US.

Source: News: X360 HD-DVD sells 100k (Xbox 360)
Originally published on Mon, 15 Jan 2007 09:28:00 GMT

Introducing XBList 3.0 -- XBL on your desktop

 

 

Good news for all the desk bound 360 fanboys out there, the newest version of XBList has just been released. For those unfamiliar with the program, XBList 3.0 puts your Xbox Live friends list right on your desktop in the style of an IM buddy list. It lets you check out what your friends are playing (with their gamer pictures intact), access your incoming messages, see incoming friend requests and game invites, and it will even take you directly to your messages or Live profile page. So, you may be stuck behind a desk all day, but at least you'll know what your buddies are up to. And with game invites intact, you'll never miss a match because you were checking your porn email. As if all that wasn't enough, the program also supports quick links to Achievement comparisons, Friends' Live profiles, and Halo 2 stats.
It really is a spiffy little application. We recommend you check it out. Also, the app is supposedly Vista compliant. Anyone with Vista let us know if it works.
[Via DCEmu]

Read 

 

Source: Introducing XBList 3.0 -- XBL on your desktop
Originally published on Mon, 15 Jan 2007 12:30:00 GMT

The Texter reinvents typing on consoles

 

It's a fact -- playing MMOs on a console often sucks for a variety of little annoying usability reasons. Among my top gripes is slow text input. The only real alternatives are using a daisy chain of USB cords to bring a PC keyboard into your living room or use the slow-as-molasses onscreen keyboard at a whopping average 6 keys per second. This is one of the reasons MMOs are a niche PC market.

We've seen weird attempts to solve this problem (bulky 3rd party hardware and awkward controllers, remember the Jaguar?) so it was a pleasant surprise to happen upon The Texter, a little dongle adapter manufactured by a Florida company exhibiting at Otronicon in Orlando this weekend. It is essentially a USB keyboard emulator -- you use the analog buttons to enter text as specified on the two guide ring stickers. We spent some time with their new 360 version and found  it rather easy and unobtrusive to use for Phantasy Star Online. Alas! There is hope yet for MMOs on consoles!

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Source: The Texter reinvents typing on consoles
Originally published on Mon, 15 Jan 2007 14:06:21 GMT

Easter Egg Ads

 

Crouched in military fatigues, you peer through night-vision goggles and brandish a semiautomatic gun as you hunt down terrorists who've overtaken Las Vegas.
Incongruously, while patrolling a neon-decorated side street in the video game "Rainbow Six Vegas," you spot a jar of body wash. You spray the container with bullets, and voila! A 60-second video of whimsical bloopers pops up, and billboard advertisements of scantily clad women hawk Unilever Corp.'s Axe shower gel: "Score with Axe."

-- That Easter egg in video game may just unlock an ad
It's sad that when the game industry is showing record sales that they feel the need to bend over backwards to whore themselves out.
tagged: game, gaming

Source: Easter Egg Ads
Originally published on Mon, 15 Jan 2007 14:25:00 GMT

You Call This An Adult Games Festa?

 

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Boy, I must be sooo jaded! Microsoft held its Adult Games Festa last week in the Akihabara UDX 3D Theater. The event featured the Xbox 360's CERO Z rated games-as-porn titles like Gears of War, Dead Rising, The Godfather, Onechanbara vorteX and the upcoming Vampire Rain. A steady crowd was in attendance even though the Festa was 18-and-up and a photo I.D. was required to enter. Bikini model Mariko Okubo put in an appearance and uttered what every idol does at Xbox Japan events: "I haven't touched an Xbox 360 before this." While campaign girls on the street has "Xbox 360" stamped on their backsides, shiny leather gloves and a plaid corset is about as racy as it got for Ms. Okubo. She did put on the Xbox Live headset, and there were foreigners. How exciting.

Hit the jump for more "adult" gaming action. Brian Ashcraft

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Adult Gaming [Game Watch Impress]

 

Source: You Call This An Adult Games Festa?
Originally published on Mon, 15 Jan 2007 15:20:15 GMT

Microsoft Looking To Launch Xbox 360 In China?

 

SORRY, MAOAccording to Reuters and their unnamed sources, Microsoft is looking to start selling the Xbox 360 to the Chinese within "the next few months." Maybe even as early as February, according to some Shanghai retailers.

While it may seem like they're a little late to the game, it should be noted that the PlayStation 2 was released in the country as recently as three years ago.

Microsoft has planned to penetrate China since 2005, but has had to meet with approval from Chinese governmental regulators to begin shilling their chill white console onto the masses. When it does happen, it'll go a long way in helping Microsoft reaching their goal of "touching" 1 billion people with their machine. Michael McWhertor

Microsoft to launch Xbox 360 in China soon: sources [Reuters]

Source: Microsoft Looking To Launch Xbox 360 In China?
Originally published on Tue, 16 Jan 2007 00:40:24 GMT

Specialized 360 for IPTV in the works?

 

Filed under: News

Speaking with Major Nelson in his most recent podcast, Microsoft's Aaron Greenberg spoke of the possibility of a specially configured 360 built with IPTV and DVR functions in mind. When questioned about DVR functions and the possibility of a larger HDD, Greengerg said, "clearly the current way the Xbox 360 is designed is not for that ... we did not build this box to be a High Definition DVR." Greenberg further states that it's possible that consumers will eventually purchase some kind of IPTV upgrade (possibly referring only to a larger hard drive) or purchase an IPTV specific 360 "configuration" from a service provider. Greenberg points out that a larger hard drive is really only necessary for DVR functions and that it's possible to run IPTV without a hard drive at all.
While this doesn't necessarily mean we'll be seeing an entirely new 360, it may be the first time an MS representative hasn't outright deflected the possibility of a larger HDD, and that's saying something.

Read 

Source: Specialized 360 for IPTV in the works?
Originally published on Mon, 15 Jan 2007 16:15:00 GMT

360 problems? Throw in the towel

 

Filed under: Fan stuff

Coming from Mike at the Xbox Domain is a new method for dealing with the Red Ring of Death(R). It's called the "Towel Trick." According to several readers, all you have to do is wrap your 360 in a towel (completely), turn on your 360 for a few minutes (up to an hour), turn off the console, remove the towel and let the 360 cool for a while, turn it back on, and voila, a revitalized 360. Keep in mind that your 360 will be hotter than bakery fresh cinnamon rolls when you remove the towel, so be careful if you try this. For that matter, if you do decide to try this, know that 360 Fanboy is not responsible for any evils this trick may bring you (setting your fabulous drapes on fire, for instance).
Our resident 360 is (knock on wood) still working fine, so we've been unable to determine if high quality Egyptian cotton will yield better results than garden variety water soppers. Again, try at your own risk, but let us know if it works.

Source: 360 problems? Throw in the towel
Originally published on Mon, 15 Jan 2007 17:15:00 GMT

Play Xbox 360 on a pimped out toilet

 

Filed under: Culture, Hacks, Microsoft Xbox 360

What do you take with you when you go to the bathroom? A book? A newspaper? A portable game system? How about an eight-pound Xbox 360?

Yes, as NBC news reports, the "pimped out john" you see to the right includes an Xbox 360, as well as a flat-screen HDTV, a laptop, DVD player, Tivo, iPod dock and more. The one-of-a-kind super-toilet will be given away by plumbing company Roto Rooter to "re-introduce itself to a new generation." Not a bad start, but if you really want the new generation to pay attention, you really should get Christina Aguilera or Britney Spears involved somehow.

[Via Xbox360Fanboy]

Source: Play Xbox 360 on a pimped out toilet
Originally published on Mon, 15 Jan 2007 17:15:00 GMT