I had some time on Tuesday, so I decided to do a couple of quick checks at some nearby stores. Didn't find anything much of interest, but I know going earlier in the week is the best thing to do, so I gave it a shot.

My first stop was Target, they didn't have anything good, everything was still higher than I'm wanting to pay.

From there I went to Kmart and Game Rush, again, no good deals. No new markdowns at Kmart and Game Rush had a handful of games you could buy for each system, but nothing of interest and no great prices on the ones I was considering.

From Kmart I headed to Toy's R Us to check for some more Buy One Get One 50% off deals. Unfortunately their prices were so much higher compared to Amazon there was no savings, so I didn't get anything from them this time. I was hoping to find some good clearance games to take advantage of the deal, but couldn't find anything but a couple of games I was not interested in. From Toy's R Us I walked over to Best Buy to check what clearance games they had at 50% off, nothing new and not much of interest. They had Pop Star for $20 and then 50% off, but I'm waiting for it to drop more since I hear it isn't too good, would be interesting to try it. They did drop Rock Revolution from $19.99 to $4.99, so I decided to grab a copy, for $2.50 I figure it is worth a try. So I ended up with:



Rock Revolution $2.50

The cashier told me that almost every person he had checked out that day was buying the game for some system, seems a little odd since most people don't like the game and I don't believe the others were on sale.... I've always been curious at this Best Buy if anyone has ever tried to get full price games at the 50% off price. All they use to mark the game is one of those round colored circles, the kind you buy in the plastic case, like 500 for $2.50. Each system has its own color, i.e. DS yellow, Xbox Green, Wii Blue, etc. so it seems to me with such a simple system people would come in and stat putting those stickers on full price games. They do have it set up so that the manager has to come over and put their info in to get the discount, but every time I have bought the game all they did was check to make sure the sticker was there (by quickly glancing) and then typed their code in. They were usually more interested in joking with the employee than anything. Just doesn't seem like a very solid system, especially since most of the managers don't seem to be as knowledgeable with the games.

So, from Best Buy I then headed to Sears. They still had a couple of games left over from the beginning of August markdowns, but nothing of interest and nothing worth anything for trade, so I didn't get those. They did, however, still have the lone Eye of Judgement kit for $19.97 with the PS3 camera and everything. I'm a little surprised they can't get rid of it, considering they are charging $39.99 for the camera alone. I did get:



Tiger Woods PGA Tour 07 $2.97

I like golf games and I figure I would get $3 worth of play out of it. Plus, there is a story behind why I got the game as well, but I won't go into that since my blogs are always so long anyways.

From Sears I headed to F.Y.E. I was planning to go to Gamestop but my quick shopping trip ended up taking several hours due to slow transactions when paying and bad traffic, so I had to skip it, never find anything anyway. Was going to skip F.Y.E. as well because I was at another one Sunday and they didn't have any good specials running. However, when I was there I did see that they have the 3rd Generation iPod Nano on rebate (as well as other iPods and MP3 players) They had the 4gb ones for $39.99 after rebate, so I was going to grab one, but when I went to get it I realized they only had 8gb models left, which were $89.99. I would have got it, but I already have three MP3 players, plus my phone, and I don't listen to that much music anyway, so it wasn't worth spending $90 and I don't get why they charge $90 instead of $80 anyway. I've always liked that version of the Nano so I was pretty excited, plus I found a matching iHome dock for $19.99 after rebate and a couple of cases for $10 a piece, so I was a little disappointed when I realized all that was left was the 8gb. I was hoping I could find it at this store, but they didn't have any iPods left, so I have one more store I can get to pretty quickly and I'm going to see if they have any, but at this point I'm not too hopeful because for $40 for an iPod, I'm sure they were snatched up pretty fast. But, if anyone is interested, there are some pretty good deals on the previous generation iPods, I believe the only other popular one was the Zune, but I believe that was only the 80gb(?) Pink model and then a couple of other no names. I think that the first generation iPod touch was $99 for the 16gb, but can't remember for sure, it was close to that.

So back to my gaming purchases. Did a quick run through not expecting to find much because I had been to another on Sunday, as I mentioned, and they just had all the games on rebate from the previous month. However, it seems they started a new rebate period on 8/20. So while I was browsing I managed to find:



Smackdown Vs. Raw 2009 $26.99 and $30 rebate
Saints Row 2 $23.99 and $30 rebate
Rockband $26.99 and $30 rebate

I figured I should get them while I still had my backstage pass since I'm going to cancel it this week. The pass makes getting free games a no brainer because there isn't even tax, so they really are free . None of those are games I would normally buy, but I figure for free I will give them a try and if I don't like them trade them in and move on. If anything, I could use a couple of the cases anyway. Used one of my $3 off coupons from being a member of the pass as well, so all in all a great deal. I was planning to skip any games that were gutted, kind of like my "sign" to not get the game since I have so many anyway and didn't need them, but they ended up having all the games sealed except for Saints Row 2, which also happened to be the only game I was somewhat interested, so I ended up getting it too!

I originally had purchased Smackdown Vs. Raw 2009 for the 360 as well, but when the manager checked my receipt after he checked me out, he noticed that the rebate didn't print out for it, so he said they must have took it off rebate. Since they had it marked for FREE on the sticker, I probably should have asked for something since it was their mistake, but figured it wasn't worth the hassle and I was running out of time anyway. Plus, the manager there is great, always really helpful and things and pretty cool to talk to about movies, games, etc. kind of your typical "rocker dude" type of guy, but really knowledgeable on what he sells. Since he is getting to know me I didn't feel like making a scene.

The rest of the week was a little dry, until Saturday. I needed to pick up a few items at Target, so I ran back to Electronics, not expecting to find anything. Fortunately, I was very lucky and found quite a few things. They even had Ghostbusters for $9.98, unfortunately I don't have a PS2 so I had to leave it :( But my Target finally managed to knock the prices down on a couple of games I've been waiting to drop for some time. I left a few games that were still a little high and I had no interest in, but I did pick up:




m&ms Adventure $9.98 (I purchased it before for $13.98, so I decided to grab the only copy they had left and will return my higher priced one)
Tak and the Guardians of Gross $9.98
The Conudit $24.98
Original Frisbee Disc Sports Ultimate & Golf $4.98
Mystery P.I. Portrait of a Thief $9.98
Spectrobes Beyond the Portals $9.98
Sonic Unleashed $14.98

I was pretty happy to see m&ms Adventure drop because it doesn't get good reviews, but it seems like a decent game, if not it doesn't hurt as bad when the price is under $10 I've been looking at Tak and thought it looked like fun and for $10 it seems like a good deal, I had it at Best Buy for that the other day and forgot my gift card at home, so decided to leave it and it was gone when I went back the next time. I'm not sure about the Golf and Frisbee game for DS, but I figure for $5 it should be some fun. I don't have a golf game for the DS, so I think it will be interesting. I've been waiting for Sonic to drop in price at my store for a while now and was so thrilled it finally did. I like Sonic games and liked the demo, but everyone said it was so bad I hated to spend $25 or more on it. My PS3 game collection is really lacking, so I'm glad I found a game I like for the system.

Now, the other games are all games I'm still questioning. I learned the hard way with the August drops at Sear's, if you don't get the game you want the first time, don't expect it to be there when you go back. Since Target is a lot closer to me, I grabbed all the games I thought I would like so I had them in case. Once they go through my rigorous review process I will decide if I keep them or not. I have no idea what Spectrobes Beyond the Portals is, but I heard about the new game for Wii from a friend who said I should check it out. It doesn't really look like my type of game, so I'm thinking I may give the DS version a try to see what it is. For $10 it might find me a new series I like, but if not, at least I'm not out $50. I'm still thinking on this one, but I'm going to watch/read reviews and game play footage. I've been interested in Mystery P.I. since it came out, but figured I didn't need it at $20, so since it dropped to $10 I thought I would get it. Now that I have it, it looks more like Mystery Case Files Millionheir, which was an okay game, but way too easy and short. Mystery Files was not what I was expecting and really had no sleuth elements to it at all. So again, I need to look into this a little more before deciding. Finally, the Conduit. Now, this is a game I normally wouldn't get. I don't really like shooters, I can't seem to get the hang of them and I recently tried Lost Planet and Halo 3 thinking maybe I would like them more now that I'm a bit older and trying something other than just a demo, but I hated them. So, when the Conduit came out, I figured it would be a game for me to skip. After watching video of the game, I still felt this way, but then I started hearing from people that also didn't like shooters that they liked this game. So, since then I've been on the fence if I should try it or not. I noticed the price dropped to $34.98 at Target and I kept my eye on it because that was still a little too high to try the game for. When I noticed the price dropped to $24.98 on Saturday I decided to grab a copy. I'm going to think about it before opening it and if the price drops to $14.98 I will definitely get a copy, but I'm still going to think about it at $25, cause that still seems a little high. I'd like to try it before I get it, but when the game is only $25 to begin with, I think it would be a little silly to rent it and, at least right now, if I try it and don't like it I can basically get all my money back if i trade in to Amazon, so now is a great time to give it a try, I just hate spending $25 on a game that normally isn't my style when I'm trying so hard to get all these cheap games

Overall it ended up being a surprisingly successful trip to Target and one I wasn't expecting. Not only did I manage to get several games I've been waiting on, but I also was able to pick up a couple of Christmas gifts I've been wanting. When I was at the Apple Store last weekend I had picked up two iPod cases for my sisters with the Paul Frank Monkey on it. My plan was to get them that and the headphones that Target got in with the monkey, but they had been out of it since a few days after it came in. After checking a couple of stores and even looking online, I was unsuccessful finding them. Finally, I go last night and they had about 6 more in, so I was able to pick those up as well. I thought it was pretty funny that all the stuff I've been waiting for for several weeks all managed to show up on the same night.

I went on Sunday to Best Buy hoping to pick up Banjo Kazooie Buts and Bolts and Viva Pinata Trouble In Paradise during the Buy One Get One 50% of 360 games. They had the one lone copy of Banjo left, but no Viva Pinata and I could not find any other games I wanted that would be worth getting during the sale. So, I decided to leave it. I figure I can get it for less from Amazon because there is no tax, but if Best Buy has a special soon I can get it there. Most of the stores around me don't have it anymore, so I'm thinking Amazon is where I will end up getting it anyway. I also went to Target to see if there were anymore clearance games I missed, but everything was what I thought it was, so I got everything I think I may want. It appeared as though the clearance games had been attacked since I was there on Saturday. Half the games were off the little racks, everything was out of order and I would say half the games were gone already, it seems I wasn't the only one waiting for a decent drop

I also managed to pick up a few Toy Story items to add to my collection this week (man, I love it when a new movie is coming out!) and actually got a few good deals as well . But, since I think I'm the only adult that actually likes Toy Story and/or collects Toy Story items, I will leave the details out

So that was my week of pick ups, all in all, a pretty decent week. This is my first actual "Deal of the Week" blog with pictures, so hopefully they turn out and everyone enjoys.

Until next time