Mr Zeros — Local services in Roseville

The owner(Mr zero) seemed very angry. I'm not sure if he was just having a bad day or what but he made the group very uncomfortable. When I asked him about ps3 games his directions were unclear where to find them and he got very angry when I didn't immediately find where he was telling me to go. the game selection was hard to look through and very disorganized. I get that these local tech stores go though a lot sifting through inventory but it was just a mess. I asked him about his psp inventory and after looking through them he was very pushy, literally asking"so which one are you going to buy?" this caught me off guard as I was worried he was expecting me to buy one. Only after being pushy did he mention that the psp's had not had their batteries replaced. He should have been more upfront. The systems were also very overpriced for not having a replacement battery. I really do like stores like these and we don't have enough of them, however Mr. Zeros is poorly managed and seems to lack control over their inventory. I see that negative reviews get met with whining and excuses for his bad pricing (which I forgot to mention) and poor service. He tries to make Strawman's argument's about his prices when there is literally no excuse. wether it is a local business or not, his prices are ridiculous and worse than GameStop, which I might add is a very low bar to sink below. Him trying to act like he is not ripping people off is absolutely despicable. He complains about shoplifting and has some quite clever signs around his store such as that his pet bird eats shoplifters. These would be funny if he wasn't a total hypocrite and didn't rip people off. Don't waste your time with this guy, there are better vinyl stores around Minneapolis. If you are looking for games however, try level up games, it's not far from Mr zeros crack den of a shop and the employees there were much nicer. I can't guarantee that all the employees are nice but even still, they had a much better selection of games which, Mr zero, as you are angrily typing your response to this review, Do not bring up the fact that you are a vinyl store and that you do not have a great selection of games because that is not your main focus, you advertise that you sell games. However I am not holding that against you. Lastly I will say that maybe you will get less break ins if you were a little nicer.

-Cheers Josh S

P.S: if you want an idea of his inability to face criticism, just look at his reply to...

The only reason it didn’t get 1 is because there’s a lot of neat stuff in there and the Mr. Zero custom music playing was cool as well

Unfortunately I should’ve read the signs telling me not to buy but I thought I’d support a small business. Asked about Sega Saturn games he had some loose ones I bought, little higher but supporting small business. I asked about returns and he said no returns because he’s been scammed in the past with people swapping stuff and returning. Told I get people are scummy but just want to be sure they work. He said they were tested and resurfaced by him so they work. He also said if they don’t work it’s probably my Saturn but he knows a guy that’ll fix it. I told him I repair consoles and I can get it working if it broken. (Yes I actually do this and have the proper tools, I’ve repair dozens of consoles) he empathized he was a record store that also sold games and not a video game store. We had a decent chat about other things but he seemed to complain a lot about being scammed or haggled.

Brought them home and only 1 of the 3 work, annoyed because I paid over $50 with the 5% credit card fee he said these were tested and I look at the discs and despite being mostly clean they still have scratches and don’t look like they were resurfaced. Despite his no return policy I call him to see if he’ll work with me based on our conversation but after he found out I removed the stickers he said “this what people do is swap the discs for bad ones!” Like I’d swap 2 $15 games… basically said I could exchange for the same games but doesn’t have one of them and doesn’t have a Saturn there to test. I asked if he’d swap for something else and he said no. Not worth the 45 min drive back to swap one game to hope it works and be stuck with another that doesn’t work. I’ll cut my losses.

Looking at the reviews you can see he empathizes how it’s not an “eBay, Amazon, etc. so don’t expect market price” he also said how the “video game haters” are unhappy with his prices. Looks like I’ll be one as well. You could earn more business with working with someone who even said they’d love to come back and look more at the cool stuff because they didn’t have the time today.

If you like paying more for stuff that doesn’t work and no return policy shop here. If you don’t like that shop somewhere...

Came here about a months ago, ton of inventory, depending on what you are specifically looking for you can find a good deal and I am sure there are good deals on some of the other segments of the store, but yeah as many commenters have put it the video game pricing does leave a lot to be desired compared to other options available in the Cities.

I did take the time to compile some of the owner's thoughts and replies, mostly on the topic of video games, and you, as a game collector like myself can decide what you think. Tried to craft a nice narrative here with some solid quotes pulled verbatim from the seller's replies:

Mr Zero is a passionate owner. If you give him a critique, he'll give you a response. Some have said "Mr.Zero Mr. Zero! Your pricing is too high". But what does he thing about this?

"Are we More expensive than other Video Games Shops, You Better Believe We Are, Why? Simple, We are NOT Just A Video Game Store, Our Focus Is MUSIC, TOYS, MOVIES and Lastly "Video Games"," Zero says, "In order for us to Buy Certain Games from the Public, we have to pay considerably more just to get them in stock, Therefore we have to Charge Way more to make some money to pay our Overhead on Our Retail Shop."

And on the topic of finding a good game deal, the thrill of the hunt, one might say - Mr Zero is not a believer in feeding that thrill, evidenced by his pricing strategy: "it wards off all the other potential "Internet Flippers" that we do NOT have "Goodwill, Ebay, Amazon Pricing"

And what does Mr. Zero think of video game purchasers - as owner of a store that sells video games as a core piece of the store's business model, as noted by its presence on the sign? "we have learned when someone comes in looking for something to complain about they will find it, and usually it is "The Gamers"".

In any event, Mr Zero's goal in providing such detailed replies to reviews is clear - educating prospective buyers on what they can expect when they come into the store, and understand his unique operating circumstances.

"Hopefully this information will help you & others understand running a "Retail Business" is vastly different than a "Collector's Forum" or "Craigslist" or...