Given the dreadful nature of the joint EB Games/Gamestop Black Friday deals -- 2 Player's Choice games for $30 instead of $25? Buy 2 get 1 free ... for only five hours? -- I think it's clear that the era of EB Games' great sales are over, and likewise Gamestops. In the past, neither has been shy about a B2G1 weekend, especially when prompted to do so because the other was. (And, to be clear, it was usually EB Games leading and Gamestop lagging, or at least it was for the past year.) So to curtail the B2G1 goodness for only five hours, rather than luxuriating in it for the entirety of the biggest shopping weekend of the year, suggests to me a rather significant change of course. Certain mega-popular games, like Spider-Man 2 and X-Men Legends, would, at the end of their shelf life, get sold off for $10 new at a certain EBGames weekend; see also the $10 Final Fantasy: Crystal Chronicles or $10 DK Bongos or what-have-you. I was sort of hoping on that same mentality to get King Kong, Ultimate Spider-Man, etc. for those kinds of prices if I were just willing to wait long enough, but now I have a feeling no amount of waiting will be long enough for EB Games to get that mojo back. It seems apparent now that the major reason for the merger was so that each store could stop cutting margins in an attempt to draw in your business -- when EB Games had trade in 3, get $10, Gamestop came out with trade in 3, get +30%. Without that competition ... well, a lot of people consider trading to EBGames and Gamestop to be a ripoff anyway, but the occasional deal really did favor the customer. Those days looks like they're over.