On Saturday, my wife and I decided to check out our local game and comic shop. We've been in the neighborhood for just under four months and it was time for us to meet the locals.
The Gamex convention, which I previously discussed, has a list of "local game shops" all over the Southern California area up on its website. So, my wife and I picked the three nearest cities and decided to go for a little day trip. We decided on just the closest two as we had more to do that day. I plugged the address into my TomTom and off we went.
We arrived in a small strip mall for the first. The sign had a picture of a cartoon dragon next to the name, so we knew we were in the right place. As I pulled up to the ample parking, however, it said, "Space for Lease." No one was home. It looked like that game shop had been out of business. Not to be deterred, we traveled on to the second destination. Pulling in to a similar strip mall, again we found an empty building and a "For Lease" sign.
So that the day wouldn't be a total bust, we decided to travel on to the last shop. We found ourselves in a little downtown area (the quaint downtown of a suburb) and briefly saw the address and a store with lights on as we passed it. Success! We found parking and then walked back to the store. As we approached it, we knew something was wrong. There were no games or comics in the windows - no advertisements for Magic or other collectible card games.
When we entered, it was a very sparse toy shop. Not awesome battle toys, but regular old toys. In fact, many of their wares were things like toy soldiers, wooden horses, slinkies and other 1950's era fun. It was a neat little place and we did mosey around it, but there were no games.
All in all, the trip was a bust. And these aren't the only shops I know that have closed down. Do you find that the current economic climate is hitting your local stores as hard as my poor town?
