Gamer Oasis — Local services in Winchester

I looked forward to the visit. My wife and I always visit game stores when we travel to try to find something to purchase and keep the local shops going. We looked at the reviews and thought it would be a great stop. As we left my wife summed up the visit with the best statement,

“Gamer Oasis… more like Gamer Mirage”.

The store entrance is a bit hidden when in the parking lot, this is no the fault of the store. Just how they shopping center designed it.

You step in and find a well-lit wide-open space with gaming tables in the center and items to buy on the walls and a few cubes shelfs as well with items.

Very promising, we looked around and spotted the small section of board games. Appeared several people were playing Pokémon at the tables. Still a good sign of an active, engaged community.

They have Warhammer and some stuff to paint it with, not my thing so I can’t really provide feedback on it.

I noted Magic the Gathering and Pokémon cards and assorted accessories. I was not in the market for MTG so did not look, so again can’t provide feedback.

The board game section was MEH… some current games for a hobbyist but unless you really new nothing here worth getting. The prices did seem pretty on par.

The amount of Anime Plushies and Pop Culture Merchandise etc is not what I am aware most gamers go into a store like this for. A whole wall seemed dedicated to stuff like this. While to me it seems like a waste, it is very possible they may sell a ton of it. If this is your thing, this would be the place to go it would seem.

Now if you took the time to read this far, this is where the real rating comes in.

A lot of the reviews noted an Amazing Staff, Helpful, Super Nice and Knowledgeable. I am not sure where that staff was because outside of the folks all sitting at the tables playing Pokémon. We did not have that experience. As a matter of fact, my wife and I walked in, looked at the display with video games, walked pasted the folks’ playing games to the small segment of wall with board games. Walked pasted the section of Warhammer to the MTG area.

We then left with NOT A SOUL in this space even acknowledging we had been in the store. Disappointing!

This is not even close to the experience to the shop we visited just down the road a touch off South Street near the Rural King in the Royal Plaza...

It's sad that I have to put this here. Essentially Gamer Oasis never restocks their miniature painting supplies; thus all of the supplies people ACTUALLY want have been gone for months. When I asked the employees why they stopped restocking it was because the stock has not decreased to a point where the owner deems it necessary to restock, even though what is left is the dregs of the paint supplies.

What I see in this store is a stereotypical example of high level management being completely out of touch with their customers and not listening to the boots on the ground workers - who do know what the customer actually wants. I would go here today and drop $50-$100 on Citadel paints, but instead I'm going to have to drive 40 minutes to the closest Warhammer store in Winchester to give them my money.

I'm happy to rescind this review when restocking of the store happens on a regular basis 🙂 the staff here is nice, the game tables are always welcoming if you want a place to play outside of home, but the stock, particularly with the paint supplies but also with board games in general, leaves much to be desired.

Edit 3/6/23: Still no restock on paints or other items customers want 😔

Edit 3/31/23: Still no restock on paints, primers...

Kind staff who are very sociable and knowledgeable about most relevant topics you could ask about their products. This location has at least one large table for D&D and four long tables for groups to play various games of different types while also allowing customers to borrow game mats if they don't have any, all in excellent condition. Has a large collection of POP! dolls and memorabilia of various popular anime and comics ranging from figurines of characters from Inuyasha and Kimetsu no Yaiba to POP! Dolls of Galactus among many others as well as booster packs and starter packs on top of specific cards for Magic...