X-rated shift

A man came into The Store to buy an Xbox 360 for his 7-year-old daughter. As he was looking at games, he asked me:

"Do they make X-rated games yet?"

"Well, they exist- the rating is AO, for "Adults Only"- but there's not a big market for them, because none of the major retailers will carry them."

"So I could go online and buy them?"

"I mean, your daughter would be able to see everything you'd been using the 360 for. She'd be like, "Daddy, what's the XXX achievement?""

"And I'd say, "NONE OF YOUR BUSINESS!""

I still don't know if he was serious or not. He was probably serious- that's the kind of people who shop here.

Later on, a guy was buying a bunch of Skylanders toys, for Christmas presents. They come in bulky, awkward packaging.

"Those must be impossible to gift wrap," I commented.

"Oh, they are. I always make my wife do it."

"That's why I don't have any kids," I said. "I'm terrible at wrapping things."

"Or maybe you don't have any kids because you're really good at wrapping things," he said.

I laughed really hard.

NEW FAVORITE CUSTOMER.

Deadbeat Dadurday

I walk into the store and am greeted by a small child waving one of our displays around and shouting nonsense, while his dad preorders a DBZ game.

This does not bode well.

A thank you would be nice

The other day, I dropped by the store on my day off because I'd left some stuff there. On days where I don't have to go to school or work or hang out with anyone, I generally dress like a hobo. This particular day, I was going to the craft store, so I was wearing sweatpants and a t-shirt, because when I'm shopping for craft supplies I need to be COMFORTABLE.

I walk in, and Lezzie Free-Shirt is on her own, because bossbro is on break. I arrive at the same time as a ridiculously over-the-top douchey family trying to do an out-of-policy system exchange. That's taking a while, so a crowd is gathering, and Lezzie Free-Shirt is getting visibly frustrated. My store is pretty small-scale, so you're able to do transactions without clocking in. I hopped onto the other register. It's a mom and a little kid.

"Hi," I said. "I'm obviously not working today, because I'm literally wearing sweatpants, but I can ring you out."

The kid just accosted me with Pokémon questions. He wanted to know why Pokémon X and Y didn't come out on the DS, and he wanted to look at all the Pokémon games we have, and then he wanted to complain about how expensive they are. During all this, the mom just stood there and did nothing.

LADY, I AM LITERALLY WEARING MY FUCKING PAJAMAS.

They finally bought Pokémon Platinum and left without thanking me.

Offering to help does not mean you're entitled to my help. 

On parents who buy Grand Theft Auto for their tiny children

I hate Kotaku.

I hate everyone who reads Kotaku.

I hate it every time someone mentions to me something they read on Kotaku.

The Veteran is always texting me links to Kotaku articles he thinks I'll enjoy. (And, ok, I usually do enjoy them as long as there aren't any naked people, but I still hate Kotaku.) I mentioned this to Awesome Sauce, and he started sending me Kotaku links all the time, too.

So, what happens when there's some breaking video game news that I would be interested in?

The day it was announced that Tales of Xillia 2 was coming to the U.S., this is how my morning went:

First, I get a text from Awesome Sauce, saying "Hey, Tales of Xillia 2 is coming to the U.S."

About five minutes later, The Veteran texts me a link to a Kotaku article about how Tales of Xillia 2 is coming to the U.S.

I walk into work, and bossbro greets me with a "Hey, Tales of Xillia 2 is coming to the U.S.!"

THANK YOU FOR YOUR ASSISTANCE, GENTLEMEN, BUT I THINK I CAN HANDLE IT.

All of the above is to highlight the extreme reluctance with which I am posting a link to a Kotaku article that was recommended to me by AsS:

I Sold Too Many Copies of GTA V to Parents who Didn't Give a Damn.

The other day I mass-texted everyone I know:

"I'm really tired of explaining to parents that Grand Theft Auto is basically softcore porn."

"Just write those exact words on a sign," my friend Wolfie* wrote back.

But seriously.


The list of warnings on the back of GTA is ridiculously long. Blood! Gore! Extreme violence! Strong language! Nudity! Strong sexual content! Mature themes! Whenever I read through it for a parent who's in the store with a ten-year-old kid, they yawn and wave me through.

"You literally torture a guy. You waterboard a guy on screen."

"He's already seen all that stuff on TV." (What the hell is your kid watching!?)

"You own and manage a strip club."

"WHAT!?"

Extreme violence hasn't fazed a single person. But the minute you mention the boobies, everyone freaks out. And even then, they still want to buy the game, so we encourage them to flip through the strategy guide and see the screenshots.

And even then, literally only one person ever has opted not to buy the game at my store since the release.

Without fail, every time I start mentioning the extreme violence and sexytimes, all of these people ask:

"They can put that stuff in a game!?"

"It's not designed for kids," I say, every time. "The average gamer is in their 30s. And the people who played the original Grand Theft Auto are in their 40s now."

I think some people hear the word "game" and immediately assume "children's toy." People who ramble about games like Grand Theft Auto V ruining kids are missing the point that there are games that are not meant to be played by children. After all, it's impossible to get access to an R-rated movie or an M-rated game without parental consent.

If you buy something that says "Strong Sexual Content" on the packaging, you should also be prepared for your child to come up and you asking what "pimps" and "hos" are.

I understand that children are different, and what's appropriate for one child might not be for another. I played Grand Theft Auto III when I was ten, and I turned out ok. It was my 17-years-old-at-the-time-now-he's-old brother's game, and I would play it when he wasn't around. I would drive around in the cars and follow traffic laws. I was a well-read child, with two older siblings, and I wasn't unaware of the existence of sex workers, nor was I ever really taught to demean or dehumanize them, so I wasn't confused or bothered by what was going on.

Extreme torture, though? That would even bother me now. There were several parts in my first playthrough of Borderlands 2, which I loved, where I had to stop playing because it was too intense. (Maybe I'll write a post about that someday.) And that's sci-fi/fantasy, not true crime. And I'm almost 25 years old.

The Grand Theft Auto franchise has been about pushing limits, both in game design and in storytelling, for years. It's supposed to be edgy and controversial. And even if you find the story trite and silly (ahem), you can't deny that GTA is a poster franchise for Games As A Grown-Up, Edgy Storytelling Medium.

Controversial entertainment isn't typically accessible or appropriate for kids.

For example, this one time, a dad and a little boy, no older than six or seven, came in looking for a game.

"He likes playing Grand Theft Auto at his uncle's house, but we don't want to buy it for him, so we're looking for something similar but not as... bad," said the dad. "He likes having a big open city to run around in."

"Ok," I said. "How about Batman: Arkham City? You have a pretty open area to explore, and it's Batman, so you still get to beat up bad guys."

"Does that sound interesting?" the dad asked the kid. And the kid immediately turned to me, and asked, with a perfectly serious face:

"Does Batman shoot cops?"

I was so taken aback by the question that I just squeaked out:

"Batman doesn't shoot anybody."

Kids who play games like Grand Theft Auto are, at best, the equivalent of a kid bragging about how he watched all the Saw movies and didn't get scared, and at worst, miniature sociopaths who like to shoot cops, with a lot of poorly delivered sex ed in between.

Please, people. Listen when some bitter, disillusioned register jockey is telling you that what you're purchasing might be a bit too much for your kid.

Because when you're furious that your 8-year-old suddenly knows the meanings and usage of a dozen different racial slurs and the term "Dirty Sanchez," well, you've got nothing to blame but your own hands-off parenting. 

*My only friend who had the decency to already have an internet alias before I started blogging. Seriously, my funny nickname muscle is tired. 

No GTA for you!

A tiny kid- seriously, less than four feet tall- who I've never seen before just came up and asked if we could put Grand Theft Auto V in the demo system.

"No, because you're not allowed to play it," I said. "We need parental consent to even sell you that game."

He stuck his tongue out and flounced out of the store.

I'm devastated that we lost such a valued customer.

I am not a guard dog

Whenever anyone tries to intentionally leave something here (their kids, unfinalized trades, their wallet, and so on), I always say the same thing:

"We're not responsible for anything that happens to [him/her/it/them] while you're gone."

Sometimes people get mad about it, but hey, it's true. I'm obviously not going to let someone hurt a child in front of me, but there's nothing I can do if I'm not watching, or the kid decides to leave the store. There's a reason you have to pay babysitters to watch your kids.

We get people leaving their stuff here all the time, without even telling us, too. We had someone once who plugged his PSP into the wall to charge it, left it there, and freaked out on us when it got stolen.

Unless one of us stole it, that's not our problem. You abandoned your property in a public space.

Why do people think they can leave shit in a store, anyway?

LITERALLY ANYONE CAN COME IN HERE AND TOUCH ANYTHING!

THAT'S THE WHOLE POINT OF STORES!

Sunday

A mom is in here with a little kid who won't stop singing the Mario theme. They're looking for a case for the kid's DS. The mom just came up to the register with all of our DS cases.

"I just wanted to look at these up here so you'd know I wasn't trying to steal anything," she said.

Then she opened up the packaging for every single case, dumped them out all over the counter, and started rifling through them.

Well, I guess they can't all be winners

Today, a kid wearing a SWAG shirt came in and announced that he wants to play Grand Theft Auto V because the lady on the cover has an iPhone.

Hey, I haven't mentioned the white board in a while

Lately, grubby little kids have been ruining my drawings.

A bunch of LEGO Marvel characters, drawn by moi.

The LEGO Marvel Super Heroes crowd lasted a surprisingly long time. Part of LEGO Hulk's face got erased, but other than that, it all stayed more or less intact. Ladyboss even went out and bought new dry-erase markers for the store, hence the glorious return of the color red.

I got bored of that, though, so I moved on to a title that's not on the board and never will be:

Tidus and Yuna, from Final Fantasy X, drawn by moi.

If I could draw characters for the Kingdom Hearts 1.5 re-release, why not Final Fantasy X and X-2? Mere days after I drew this one, though, poor Tidus and Yuna were completely destroyed due to the actions of an aggressively unsupervised child who ladyboss named "Captain Destructo."

I didn't want to do anything complicated to replace it, so:

Now it's a piranha plant! Hooray!

As of this writing, Mr. Piranha Plant's pipe and stem have been almost completely erased by little kid fingers.

Why, children!? Why!?

Hellspawn alert #2

Right before I left today, a kid came in who was thinking about pre-ordering Call of Duty: Ghosts. I would peg his age at approximately Old Enough To Know Better. He asked me when Call of Duty comes out.

"November 5," I said.

"Oh." He thought for a moment. "What month is it now?"

If his parents were there, I would have stared at them incredulously. But alas, he was alone.

"June," I said.

"Oh." More thinking. "How many months until November?"

I held up my fist, uncurling my fingers to count for him.

"July. August. September. October. November. Five months," I said, displaying five fingers.

"Oh."

He left and didn't come back.

Hellspawn alert

Someone just dropped off four tiny children in here, said "I'll be in the van, take your time," and left.

Texts from bossbro

It was too long for a screenshot:

"I just dealt with the most horrible family ever. 5 children under 12 all infused with mountain dew and I would guess amphetamines. Running around the store for a whole fucking hour destroying every wall and the mom was just yelling the entire time stop don't touch that where's your sister I'll give you something to cry about. I'm not even kidding people left the store because of these kids. It was a mad house. And then as I ring them up the bitch is pregnant with a 6th hellspawn! I swear to god [Miss Blog Lady] this is going to sound awful but I wanted to offer her an abortion. I have stared into the abyss and seen the demise of the human race and it starts with that fucking family."

Just another day in retail.

I love a good Facebook throwdown

This is just fantastic. People like this are always making up some way that a business "victimized" them so they can complain and try to get free shit. I think some of this woman's comments were deleted, so some of the responses don't fully make sense, but it's still an epic pile-on. 

PRO TIP: The real world is not kid-friendly, and the store isn't responsible for the fact that a lot of its customers, such as yourself, are total assholes.

[IMAGE DESCRIPTION: A Facebook conversation with pictures, names, and places blocked out. It's a long thread, so it's split into two images, because I ain't got no skills. 

OVERBEARING MOTHER: Today my family went into [name of store redacted] located in [name of city redacted] to purchase a screeb protector for our tablet, while my husband was taking the tablet to get the screen put on by one of the employees my 5 year old and I were looking at the other tablets. While I was looking at the ipad2 my son walked over to another one and said daddy look at this... what is it. To our horror it was PORN!!! We immediately told the manager and he merely said "oh" and started doing whatever to the tablet. He never apologized nor did he tell us that he was going to fix the problem. I asked his (while he was clicking away on the tablet) this is a family store correct? He said yes. Then I said this should never happen right? He said yeah... its not like we did it on purpose. Never once did he even look up at me. We were going to buy a protective cover for our tablet also but after this I will not be putting my money into a store of such filth and horrible customer service. I can just order from [name of store redacted] from now on.

THE STORE: [OVERBEARING MOTHER]-

I'm very sorry to hear about this, and I can definitely understand your frustration. You're right in that this is something that shoulder never happen, and I apologize that our store manager didn't show concern over the situation.

- [SOME POOR SAP WHOSE JOB IT IS TO RESPOND TO CRAZY PEOPLE ON THE CORPORATE FACEBOOK]

OVERBEARING MOTHER: Thank you but can you ensure that this will not happen to anyone elses family? I know there are programs that limit sites and if you indeed consider your store a family store then there should be something setup so no other child should have to see this kind of filth ever in your public stores.

DISGRUNTLED FORMER EMPLOYEE: Nobody can ensure that. Other customers can come in and download other content and leave it there. I don't really see any way that any retailer can prevent this unless they kept the items under constant observation or under lock and key.

Constant observation sounds like a good idea but is unworkable in real life.

Basically, yes it sucks for you that some immature pranksters put porn on a tablet and your 5 year old saw it. But the effect it has on your 5 year old is up to you. If you freak out about it, it becomes a taboo and something that human nature will prod your kids at some point to become even more curious about.

I once observed two kids in Germany in front of a magazine rack reading a comic. Right near them was a Penthouse magazine with full frontal nudity. The mother was right there also but the kids didn't pay it any notice. They don't freak out over it over there so the kids don't become so enthralled with it as American kids do when they find something that is considered taboo. 

When you freak out about it, you make it worse.

DISGRUNTLED FORMER EMPLOYEE: Their network does have filters on it, but there are ALWAYS ways around them.

DISGRUNTLED FORMER EMPLOYEE: Also, he may not have looked at you because he may have been embarrassed at this incident. 

ANOTHER DISGRUNTLED FORMER EMPLOYEE: Short of having an associate monitor the customers testing every piece of electronics in the store, there's no way to fully prevent this. Do I think he might have handled it a little differently? An apology would have been nice, but I was in a similar situation at my old store one time and I was too flabbergasted to say anything.

TROLLOLOL: I am more than sure that video games with some violence will just straighten up your kid!

REALITY CHECK: What do you expect them to do, give you a $500 gift card? Call in detectives and make them get fingerprints off the iPad to try to pinpoint who looked at porn on the device? I mean, maybe you should avoid letting your 5 year old kid mess with in store demo units? I mean it seems like you were too busy playing around yourself and wasn't paying attention to what he was getting into.

MY NEW BEST FRIEND: It doesn't hurt a business to tell them your just going to go somewhere because you didn't get something free... ]

Team Awesome

My boss (henceforth "ladyboss") had an unusual habit. Whenever she had to deal with someone especially irritating, she would turn to the nearest employee and say:

"They're on your team."

Eventually, we decided these willy-nilly team accusations were a little disorganized, and so we delineated the teams for easy reference. Each employee is assigned a team, and we now had an effective shorthand code for referring to our problem customers. "That guy's on bossbro's team" is much less suspicious than "I just watched that guy try to shove an entire controller in his pants."

Ok, that'll make more sense when you read a little further.

For your reading pleasure, here are our teams:

1. People who are jerks for no reason.

[IMAGE DESCRIPTION: A Condescending Wonka meme. "Oh, you're a customer? Please enlighten me on how to do my job correctly."]

Some people are just huge jerks. For example, we have this one regular customer I'm gonna call Michael Bolton, because he shares his name with a celebrity. He's also a huge jerk. It's kind of a chicken-and-egg situation. Was he always a huge jerk? Or did he become a huge jerk because his name is Michael Bolton? We may never know.

Common subtypes: People who demand to speak to a manager just to try to get something for free, people who shout "NOTHING IS FREE!" when offered our free rewards card.

2. People who can't function in public.

[A Basement Dweller meme. "Real life? Never heard of that server."]

These are the people who refuse to ask for help, but just wander aimlessly through the store muttering under their breath about how they can't find what they're looking for. These are the people who ask questions about "FPSes" out loud. The guy who asked his mom to go ask me if I was single? This team. The guy who came into the store in sweatpants, then revealed he wasn't wearing underwear when he bent over to pick something up, thus exposing his enormous, pasty, pock-marked ass? This team.

Lest you think only men can make it onto this illustrious team, don't worry- women are just as bad. Let's talk about the lady who told me she had explosive diarrhea, ran out of the store, then came back half an hour later to shop some more.

Common subtypes: Neckbeards, bronies, anyone who asks you to repeat yourself more than once, people who still write checks.

3. Bros and criminals.

[A photo of a print-out sign from a store. "Shoplifters: Will be thrown into the pit of Carkoon to be digested over 1000 years by the almighty Sarlacc." That's a Star Wars joke. Old school.]

This team combo is efficient, because it covers everyone who hides their weed in their game cases. Seriously, a lot of people do that. After an ordinary day of work, I smell like an ass and I probably have enough of a contact high to get arrested for driving under the influence.

(Psst! This one is bossbro's team.)

Common subtypes: Potheads, drunkards, shoplifters, people who are openly selling their games for beer and/or drug money. People on this team usually travel in packs of three or more.

4. Unattended children and deadbeat parents.

[A tin sign that says "Unattended children will be given espresso and a free kitten." Darn skippy!]

If your kids are being annoying, what better place to take them than the Free Arcade? At least once a day we have some unleash their spawn on the store for the purpose of "keeping them entertained."

"Can I leave my kid here while I shop elsewhere?"

"Well, we close in five minutes, so as soon as we lock the doors we'll have to call the police to come pick up an abandoned child."

"Can't I just leave him here?"

Common subtypes: All of Deadbeat Dadurday.

5. The Wiiple.

[Some Wiiple. From a collection of hilariously awkward Wii marketing photos posted by Game Informer.]

Now, I get it. People shopping for Wii games are often shopping for little kids, which means they're not the ones using the Wii, so it's understandable that they might be a little clueless. I can deal with the fact that when someone says, "I need to buy a Wii game," there's a 50% chance they're talking about the actual console. But there's something about being out of their element that causes the Wiiple to freak out and have no idea what's going on. It always starts out pretty normal:

"Is this game appropriate for a 6-year-old? Will my daughter be able to play with her friends? What's it called? How much does it cost? Wait, how much does it cost again? What's a Wii game? Who are you? Where am I? What year is it?"

Common subtypes: People who only want bowling games, people who ask for Mario on the Xbox 360.

6. Team High Maintenance.

[An Annoying Customer meme. "Oh, you close in 5 minutes? I'm just going to browse."]

Salespeople exist to help you make purchases.

Salespeople do not exist for you to corner them like an animal and ask a million questions that no normal person would ever memorize the answer to. If you want ridiculously detailed system specs, guess what? We have Google for that. For the love of God, we have Google for that. See, look: I can Google that for you! Otherwise, I'll just read the text on the box that you apparently can't read, and I will judge you so hard.

Salespeople are not personal shoppers. Modern stores are designed specifically for independent browsing. If you're like "Hey, I came here to buy Hyperdimension Neptunia and I can't find it," I will happily find that shit for you. If you're like "Hey, I'm interested in one of these games but I want to know which one is the best game," I will happily give you my opinion. If you're like "Hey, I really like Hyperdimension Neptunia, what other games are like that?" I will offer suggestions. If you're like "Hey, I need you to stand right next to me and give me a full synopsis of every game I touch and haphazardly guess what my 8-year-old son would like the most even though you know nothing about him because I don't know how to Google (Hyperdimension Neptunia) and I have no independent thoughts also could you carry my stuff and hold my hand and stay late," then fuck you.

Common subtypes: People who interrupt you when you're helping someone else, people who freak out when they can't use our bathroom. (We're in between three restaurants and a huge grocery store, all of which have public restrooms.)

Well, those are the teams. More to be added later? Most likely.

"But blog writer lady," you might be saying. "If people figure out they can do all of this on their own, won't you be out of a job?" To which I say:

Whatever. My job is piss.