Scalpers will likely always remain a pernicious problem in our consumer-focused video game industry, with the fate of the gorgeous 30th Anniversary PS5 Pro bundle a recent example. Michael Douse, director of publishing at Larian Studios, isn’t a fan of the practice, however, calling out a particularly egregious example.
On X, Douse put one eBay reseller on blast, who was trying to get £2.9K for a Baldur’s Gate 3 Collector’s Edition (thanks, Eurogamer). The Larian director lamented that this CE “isn’t a commodity; it’s designed to make someone happy, not rich. If you’re buying it to trade, you’re only making someone sad.”
Plenty of frustrated fans sounded off in the comments section, but Larian is hardly alone in this. Sony is trying out some rather novel ways to combat scalpers currently in Japan, but until technology can solve this issue for us, there’s always the good-old-fashioned name-and-shame, which, if nothing else, is somewhat cathartic.