Stores for Time Wasters

[The Holy Saint, Grand High Poobah, Master of Monkeys, Ehlers]

Just a little rant space for those stores where you spend money to help you better waste time. I was inspired by disparate opinions on the state of gaming stores. I'll go first.

Movies:
Springfield 10: The movie theater is a nice place. I was recently double charged for tickets (I will NOT buy online again). When I asked for a refund, the ticket booth guy, rather than wait for his manager, who was taking a year and a day, just handed me some cash. I was pleased.

Games:
Wizards of the Coast: Ambivelant. I like the clean store and the discounts to get rid of all their non-WOTC products (Gregory Horror Show expansion minis are only $4! WOOT!). However, they're always crowded and the employees literally YELL at the 14 yo kids THE STORE invited in to play games. Except the one lonely girl who tried to flirt or something. No, it didn't get me to buy the lead dice, you freak.

Game Parlour, Chantilly: Perhaps a little too friendly. The guy I usually deal with is cool and helpful, but too chatty. We don't game together. Let me get my books and LEAVE. Thank you.

Game Parlour, Potomac Mills: Perfect. Wide open clean store, helpful employees who didn't go weird on me.  Both Game Parlour locations have GREAT selections of games and comics.

GDW:
I've only been in once, as I don't play Warhammer, and that was to ask a question about the price of paints. They answered it quickly and didn't make me a) ask them for help first or b) stare at something till they found out what I wanted.

Comics:
Burke Books (now gone): Joe Gumbinger was a gentleman and a scholar, even if he was fat and bearded and old. He always came through. Got me a first printing Supergirl #1 six months after it had sold out and only charged me cover price.

Other:
That Anime Store at Springfield Mall:
Kind of creepy. Never talked to anyone, but they have some funky stuff. The end.

[Entsuropi]

Got me a first printing Supergirl #1 six months after it had sold out and only charged me cover price.

No wonder it is gone...

As for me.

The first 4 all have friendly, enthusiastic, knowledgeable staff.

Something Wicked this way Comes (Huddersfield); RPG's, Warhammer, Airfix models.
Friendly staff, even if they do need a haircut. Kinda dark - needs more lighting. Bad layout, but it has a horrible store space so there is not much they can do about it. Not nearly enough RPG's, and their warhammer selection is kinda iffy a lot of the time; no Space wolves, never more than one of any box.

Travelling Man (Leeds): Comics, RPG's, Wizkids, CCG's, wierd toys like spawn action figures. Brightly lit store, nicely laid out, BIG selection of RPG's, more wizkids models than even a habitual horder like me could ever need. Their online site is nice but not terribly useful for buying stuff.

Games Workshop Leeds; Warhammer (dur...). Par for the course for GW shops - nice lay out, tables with introduction games running, very small selection of Fanatic stuff.

Games Workshop (Leeds White Rose shopping centre); same as above, but slightly smaller than a shoe cupboard. Fat people are discouraged from entering .

Movie: UCI. Not much to say here. UK movie theatres suck in general.

Games; a small selection. Not very friendly staff on the whole (but exceptions exist). The indie stores have much more knowledgeable staff than the others.

[Mad Dr Jeffe]

So sad about Burke Books I loved that store and the owner was very cool.

Another Universe: Gone but not forgotten, your giant replica statue of the Predetor live on in my memory.

Eagle and Empire.... The store I love to hate, id go more often if it wasn't the size of a postage stamp, didn't have Rush Lindbaugh blaring all the time and had more games and a less opinionated staff, but thems the breaks.

C&W Used Books(Woodbridge) 14583 Potomac Mills Rd

The Friendly Staff
$5.50 an hour,

Gas Money to get there
$2

Finding out that someone brought in all of their old West End Games Star Wars Books so that  a used bookshop can sell at 1/8 of the original cost.
Priceless.

[The Holy Saint, Grand High Poobah, Master of Monkeys, Ehlers]

I thought about commenting on AU, but they really didn't give me an impression other than being convenient in the mall.

There are also three stores worth commenting on in Provo:

ImageNation (also gone, owner got an inheritance or soemthing and closed up shop). Clean, well lit, friendly staff but they didn't follow up with special requests, even when they said they would. However, they were MUCH less scary than

Dragon's Keep:
This is your typical nerdy comic shop. the guy from the Simpsons works here. They argue VERY loudly about Vulcan ethics. Their customers dress incostumes for NO reason. They sell pornographic comics. it's dark. It's smelly. However, they have a more complete selection and hlp you better, even if they are kinda jerks about it.

That Game store in Provo Towne Centre (yes, that's how they spell it):
Helpful, but preferencial to certain games. They also had really cool bundles of loose Magic cards, for like 2 bucks. Usually had more than one rare and at least three uncommons in each. Really nice if you didn't care what expansion your cards were coming from (and I rarely did).

[Fellfrosch]

To that list I add Games People Play, which is in the other mall and has a superior staff, location, and selection for everything but RPGs (if you want those, you're kind of stuck with Dragon's Keep). A fine store, and will become even finer in a few weeks when they move across the hall to a much larger store.

[stacer]

Movie: UCI. Not much to say here. UK movie theatres suck in general.

When I went to Scotland last year, I spent a few evenings in the UCI  (or is it UCG?) downtown Glasgow (early sunset, I was traveling alone, got bored...). Nice that they had stadium seating--or maybe I'm thinking of the other theatre. There's one that's 7 stories tall, and you get a great view of Glasgow at night. The other is dirty and smelly, especially the restrooms (but at least they're free, which is more than I can say for the train station).

At any rate, I was appalled at the number of commercials before the movie started. It's worse than the U.S.'s commercials before movies, and those are getting numerous lately, too. I arrived at the ticket desk right when one movie was scheduled to start, and asked if I could still get in before it started, and got the funniest look--of course I'd still make it, because there's a half hour of commercials before the feature!

In Boston, the Loews downtown reminds me a lot of the UCG building--you get a nice view of the common. It's a nice new theatre, stadium seating, but it's so expensive to go to the theatre around here--$9.50 for evening shows.