Finally, Blockbuster has made it possible to play Modern Warfare 2 and watch Runaway Bride in the same night from one all-encompassing subscription package. Stop panicking; your Friday nights are saved.
Blockbuster has added video games to its By Mail movie service, and starting today you can pick from 3,000 titles to rent via snail mail for Xbox 360, PS2, PS3 and Wii. There is no additional charge for renting games, which count against the total “disc out” limit just as movies do.
Blockbuster has been a slight ballbuster within the recent Netflix and Gamefly advancements, and it seems they’ve taken a while to catch up with consumers’ fast-paced, technologically-dependent needs. Is this Blockbuster’s saving grace, or another desperate plea for relevance? Let us know what you think in the comments!
If only videogame-rentals weren’t illegal in my country..
It’s funny… Blockbuster’s been so completely desperate to stay alive that they’ve actually been offering a far better deal than Netflix. I get three Blu-Ray discs at a time with unlimited in-store exchanges and a free game rental a month for $20. Plus anytime there is the slightest problem with anything, they shower me with free discs for fear that I might leave them.
I have huge doubts about whether they can actually handle this games by mail service. The fact that the website has been INCREDIBLY slow all day suggests they may have bitten off more than they can chew. But again, their desperation usually equals my gain.
This is cool. Blockbuster ships twice as fast as Gamefly. I’ll see how this goes. Blockbuster also allows discounted or free in-store exchanges ($1.99 for the former) and no extra charge for Blu-ray. I’d switch to Netflix for it’s PS3 app but it doesn’t upconvert. This is definitely worth a shot.
The only reason I’ll keep Gamefly around is for the discounts on keeping the games I like. Trying to rent newly released games from Gamefly is ridiculous. They never had enough. At least with BlockBuster I could go 2 mins down the road and get it from the store…
@ Erik: I too saw the site slow down. But this could just be for traffic to the site and maintenance. I’ll give it a few days on that. No biggie there. I don’t know if their library will be as big as Gamefly’s but I did see some PS2 games dating back to 2002.
I use Boomerang at the moment for all my game rentals, very happy with them.
Rentals.. ehhhhhhhh I’m not into “rentals” at all no matter where it’s from, Blockbuster, gamefly, this etc. Doubt you get fresh cds’ in the mail, and i don’t want a new game every week to have anothetr subscription fee to worry about.
If they had instant streaming I would make the switch from Netflix but my wife and I watch more movies than I play games.
My wife and I use Blockbuster and we have not had any problems with it. Get the movies fast by mail and the instore switheroo is equally nice. I just saw the addition of the games last night when we went to pick up some new movies and I might just upgrade my service.
thats kind of cool i guess.i recently down graded my blockbuster service from 3 movies at a time for $20, to 2 movies at a time for $14 and im considering canceling soon from that. i mean how many movies do i really want to watch and i could just go to Red Box and get the new movies for $1. id have jumped on this a few years ago though.
I prefer to buy my own video games but that is a good way to try new ones.