retro_saikou ebay seller issues, just a fair warning for his Last Alert listings

[ProfessorProfessorson]

I have done 4 orders with this guy. The first two were not great, but not terrible. Neither disc arrived as described. Neither were top scratched though, and the second was worlds better then the first, so I just buffed them out with my buffer and left it at that. Given there isnt as many US sellers with a steady PCE game supply of anything more then RPG titles, figured I'd just give this guy another go later on. His feedback is fairly solid, so figured, maybe just flukes. Did my 3rd order of a couple Famicom games. They arrived exactly as described.

So 4th order is placed, and botched. Whats funny though is that right after he dropped the items off with USPS, he contacts me saying he sent me the wrong copy of one of the games. He sent me his worst copy instead. The one he uses to test his Duo repairs out with he said. So yeah, not cool with this shit. While I can appreciate the notice of the mistake as it were, it seemed all too convenient timing wise. He did offer a $4 refund if Id keep the worse condition copy.

He also offered to let me pay him again for the same game, as a retainer, and he would send the copy I originally purchased, then refund me the retainer when the wrong item arrived back. In other words, a temp loan. He insist on calling it a separate transaction lol. Not really cool with getting the wrong item, and not cool with paying out more money, even as a temp loan to get the item I originally purchased, so I opted to do a refund when the games arrive since trust was broken.

So the games arrive today. Neither is as described. The Valis 1 was listed in "A/Very Good" condition. Top of disc and its case and all was fine. Botton had heavy swirl marks from a shitty cd buffer. I am keeping it since I can get that out with my own buffer using the 2nd process. The other game though, the one he sent me the wrong copy of is Last Alert. This wrong copy was supposed to be his "B/Good" condition copy he had pulled his ebay listing off when he realized his mistake...

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Red-Alert-PC-Engine-Japanese-Import-PCE-Super-CD-Japan-TurboDuo-US-Seller-B-Good-/131618350218?nma=true&si=Jmz3nioPHx9irZLNB81FEhBjOXE%253D&orig_cvip=true&rt=nc&_trksid=p2047675.l2557

Notice in the details it does not list heavy bottom scratches or top scratches and nicks....

This copy that arrived, its not even in B/Good condition. Its heavily scratched on the bottom in certain spots. The top of the disc also has nicks and scratches. I imagine the guy will relist the game when it arrives, so just be sure to avoid any auction listing by him for this game if its listed in B/Good condition.

I already laid into this guy over this mess and told him he blew any chance of any future purchases from me, so not looking to send a gang bang his way or anything. Outside of just waiting for him to reply back to the dispute, I consider the matter dealt with and just wanted to give a fair warning.

[toymachine78]

That sucks. I pretty much stick with Hit Japan these days. Ive bought enough from him in the past that he accepts damn good offers from me now. He ships fast, packs well, and the items are usually in better condition than described.

Other good sellers I've dealt with is ryoplanshop and jumptojapan

[ProfessorProfessorson]

Yeah it's looking like for PCE stuff I will mainly have to stick with overseas sellers in Japan. The US side of things is kinda flaky. No quality standards.

[MrBroadway]

That sucks. I pretty much stick with Hit Japan these days. Ive bought enough from him in the past that he accepts damn good offers from me now. He ships fast, packs well, and the items are usually in better condition than described.

Other good sellers I've dealt with is ryoplanshop and jumptojapan

Hit Japan is great until something goes wrong. When it does, he'll block you at the first sign of a hat. What a piece of scummy shit.

[toymachine78]

That sucks. I pretty much stick with Hit Japan these days. Ive bought enough from him in the past that he accepts damn good offers from me now. He ships fast, packs well, and the items are usually in better condition than described.

Other good sellers I've dealt with is ryoplanshop and jumptojapan

Hit Japan is great until something goes wrong. When it does, he'll block you at the first sign of a hat. What a piece of scummy shit.

Believe me, our relationship didn't start out so rosy. He blocked me after I questioned him what exactly was wrong with his junk PCE CD units. It was my first interaction with him lol.

After buying from a few other Japanese sellers, I asked him to unblock me, that I planned to make plenty of purchases in the future, and that business could go to him. He promptly unblocked lol

[NightWolve]

That sucks. I pretty much stick with Hit Japan these days. Ive bought enough from him in the past that he accepts damn good offers from me now. He ships fast, packs well, and the items are usually in better condition than described.

Other good sellers I've dealt with is ryoplanshop and jumptojapan

Yeah, I can second that, I just bought Legend of Xanadu I & II and Gulliver Boy from HitJapan and all 3 CDs were in very good condition for used items. He accepted my low offers the 2nd time after denying me the first try, so that was good too.

[ClodBuster]

Just for fun, my top list of PCE game sellers:

1. Jap-Sai / Arcade Gear
Best. EVAR. Too bad they're out of business for a year now. Nobody can compare with Mike who's a great guy to deal with and sells games in excellent condition at astonishing low prices.

2. Hit Japan
Everything went smoothly so far. Was my 2nd bet when purchasing PCE games.

3. YJfuggyfucldafughlyf*ck
I can't spell his name right. I think I bought some games and art books from him. Game condition was as described, so he was honest. I usually buy from him when I don't need something pristine.

4. US and UK based sellers
Only sometimes for the odd game like Gate of Thunder, Ys and Blazing Lazers.

5. French and German sellers
No, please no! Unless you want your items to be covered in stains and smell badly like cellar mold or tobacco.

[SplatterTrigger]

I stopped doing business with that seller a while ago. His grading condition was no where near what the items were to be. Between him and say hit-japan it's night and day.

[_joshuaTurbo]

Windy Games has never done me wrong.

[majors]

I stopped buy the Saikou booth at AWA, they definitely had the best video game booth there price-wise and selection. Since I was able to man handle the games in person, there was no condition ambiguity on my purchases. It is unfortunate they have a bad deal go down, because google does not forget. Too bad folks to not take the time to post up good dealings as much...a few bad threads can hurt a business where there is a lot of vendors vying for the same customer base.

[Opethian]

Windy Games has never done me wrong.

co-signed

[BigusSchmuck]

pc_kwajalein is easy to deal with and is here in the U.S. Got a stellar deal on CD Genjin too.

[ProfessorProfessorson]

I stopped doing business with that seller a while ago. His grading condition was no where near what the items were to be. Between him and say hit-japan it's night and day.

You mean retro_saikou? Just wanted to clarify that since more then one seller is being talked about on this thread by people.

I stopped buy the Saikou booth at AWA, they definitely had the best video game booth there price-wise and selection. Since I was able to man handle the games in person, there was no condition ambiguity on my purchases. It is unfortunate they have a bad deal go down, because google does not forget. Too bad folks to not take the time to post up good dealings as much...a few bad threads can hurt a business where there is a lot of vendors vying for the same customer base.

You know, the thing is, this could have been fixed easily. The way the guy wanted to do it basically came off to me as a trust issue on his part. It basically felt like this to me: "Hey I f*cked up your order, but even though I expect you to continue to trust me that I will fix it, I don't trust you enough to send back the wrong item unless you give me more money for a replacement first, so that I can still have leverage over you."

That kind of stuff just strikes me as dumb and mildly insulting. You cant continue to expect people to trust you with their money when you're the one f*cking up the orders. Shit isn't going to happen. What he should have done was simply said, "hey man, I screwed up, let me email you a prepaid return label, and when the wrong item gets back I will ship the right one ASAP via Priority Mail to make up for the issue" or something along those lines.

Nothing he proposed though did me any favors however. Everything he proposed was to his benefit only. If I was going to have to throw out more money to someone to get the right item, I might as well just order the damn thing from someone more trustworthy at that point. I'm happy to just return it anyway. Nothing I have gotten from him cd wise listed in "A/Very Good" condition has actually arrived in said condition, so I have doubts that the copy of Last Alert I was supposed to get would have been as described either.

I really dont get it, his feedback is great, but then again, I mean I myself cut him some slack and left him good FB for the prior items, so that is partly on me. I think people just kind of decide to take a loss on the chance that they will get better deals down the road with him. I mean, like I said, he is one of the few US sellers with a decent selection of PCE titles. That in itself can be a reason enough to stay on a sellers good side.

That and some people simply dont care about the condition of their stuff when it arrives. For some people its just like "OH SWEET OMFG IMPORTS IM SO COOL !!!" (Facebook selfie of noob holding his prized imports that just arrived is attached to status post). They take those pics that they feel make them look cool, do their post, and toss the stuff on a shelf or in a box so it can go unplayed.

[Dicer]

That sucks. I pretty much stick with Hit Japan these days. Ive bought enough from him in the past that he accepts damn good offers from me now. He ships fast, packs well, and the items are usually in better condition than described.

Other good sellers I've dealt with is ryoplanshop and jumptojapan

I'll double on Hit Japan, when I have bought he accepts decent offers and ships nice and secure packages...

[majors]

... The way the guy wanted to do it basically came off to me as a trust issue on his part....

...What he should have done was simply said, "hey man, I screwed up, let me email you a prepaid return label, and when the wrong item gets back I will ship the right one ASAP via Priority Mail to make up for the issue" or something along those lines.

   I agree. I've dealt with a couple of sellers that just made a mistake and this^ is how they fixed it(or even just let me keep the wrong item and sent the correct one). Retro game sales is a niche with a recent rise of popularity with some media attention with some(stupid)high priced sales(that NES on Storage Wars, Blockbuster carts on ebay, etc). If some ppl are trying to jump on the bandwagon to ride the gouger price wave, they will not be in it for the long haul.

   Sometimes they forget, THESE are your customers...repeat buyers are the best buyers. And a PCE/TG buyer at that? Compared to NES and PS1 retro collectors, we number in the minority. I'm not defending Saikou but if I see then setup at a con, I'll look over the PCE stuffs. Like your post title said "just a fair warning".