If you thought it was a joke, we don't blame you, but GameStop and its “Trade Anything Day” promotional event is a real event and it took place on Saturday.
GameStop later clarified the promotion to let people know that everyone would receive a flat $5 in trade-in credit, no matter what the item was. That means trading 10 rocks won't magically get you a Nintendo Switch 2. But imagine if that were the case.
The promotion drew the ire of fans and employees alike, and seemed to go viral overnight due to its extensive list of “do's” and “don'ts” that somehow allowed taxidermy trading. Even before the event began, employees naturally began to fear the worst.
This brilliant Scalper disaster ended Gamestop's Pokemon distribution plans.
Players don't have to go to the store to get free Shiny Pokemon.
But now that the event is well and truly over, we can officially say it went as you expected. This means that although no one was in the taxidermy trade, people were trying to pass on huge amounts of junk.
Most of these items were to be donated to charity. About that…
On GameStop's subreddit, employees and gamers shared the types of items they were able to trade in the store. One employee's store had phone cords, a Skyrim map, a board game, and what looked like a birdhouse.
Elsewhere, someone traded in what appeared to be a Kinect, a baseball figure and an unused Jujutsu Kaisen figure. Another photo in the thread shows the Switch Lite buried in a pile of clothes, but it's unclear whether the console is actually working.
In a separate post, someone reportedly tried to trade two cans of the Pokemon x Campbell's Soup collaboration, but employees reportedly laughed at the items.
The intention of the event seems to be built around people donating items they wouldn't otherwise use, such as clothes that don't fit, board games, old video games, and pantry staples that can be donated to charity.
Unfortunately, when you tell people you have staff who can trade anything and want to do anything but stop by their local charity centre, you get that combo with all the crap we've seen.
Of course, this was a one-time transaction and you were supposed to leave the event with $5, but that didn't stop enterprising “entrepreneurs” from sharing their escapades on Reddit and social media: visiting multiple GameStop stores to receive $5 in credit.
For the cutest deal, a child along with his or her parents traded in a handcrafted piece of Among Us x GameStop artwork. I hope that $5 will help you get everything on your holiday wish list.
Finally, someone tried to trade a “friend” named Bobby, a leaf with a face made out of markers. Unfortunately GameStop didn't accept the leaves and if they were actually your “friends” why would you trade them for $5? Aren’t friends more precious than that?
All of this was probably just another day in the life of many people working at GameStop.
Fortnite has once again proven why it is the future of video games.
Epic Games delivered one of Fortnite's best live events with the fantastic Zero Hour.
