At the beginning of this month, we were contacted by the company called LeapTrade.com; they wanted to know if we would be interested in trying their game trading service. Being one that consistently sells my used video games on eBay, I was curious to see what LeapTrade’s service was like. See, I know from experience that companies like GameStop will generally only give you a fraction of what your used games are worth for trade and even other companies like Amazon’s trading service won’t give you as much as you can get from selling on eBay. This is why I usually avoid trading and stick with selling online. The problem with selling one’s used games online is that it can be a hassle getting familiar with online selling companies like eBay and Paypal if you have no experience with them. These companies also charge outrageous seller fees.
LeapTrade may give used game sellers an alternative though. The way LeapTrade works is that you trade directly with other gamers instead of going through a hosting company like eBay, GameStop, or Amazon. This means that you essentially get to skip the “middle man” which means no fees! You simply list your item, ship it to the buyer, and you then earn LeapTrade credit without fees. LeapTrade guarantees a safe transaction as they track the progress of all trades and and will offer credit if things do not go right. LeapTrade also promises you’ll get far more credit for your games than the competition. Curious to see if their claims were true, I headed to their website to try out their service.
ACCOUNT SETUP
Setting up an account is easy, you just click on Registration and enter your personal information. That’s all there is to it really to get started. Now you need credit. LeapTrade offers the option of trading in your used games for credit and you can also exchange real money for credit using a credit card. For purposes of full disclosure, LeapTrade provided me credit as a journalist so that I could try out their service. For people new to the service, you’ll have to trade in your old games for credit.
LeapTrade offers set prices for their games. That is, the seller and the buyers both pay or receive the same amount of credit for a game. For example, Ryse for the Xbox One is currently available and going for $45. The buyer will pay $45 worth of credit and the seller will then receive $45 worth of credit.
REQUESTING GAMES
So I was ready to try their service out. At the top of their website they list each plaform in which there are games available for. They haves games for new systems like PS4, and even handhelds like the 3DS. You can even find old games like Super Nintendo. They offer a wide variety of games and platforms. You click on your platform of choice and then you can view the games currently available, that is, games that other games are currently trying to sell or trade for LeapTrade credit. You have the option of choosing to get the game, the game and the case, or the game and the case and the manual. The website states that you will get games faster if you choose only the game.
Using my credit I decided I wanted to see if they had any Wii U games available. I looked and it didn’t seem like they had any currently that would interest me. However, LeapTrade has a feature that allows you to request games from other sellers, so that if a gamer has that game they can see that somebody is willing to buy it from them. So I put in a request for Pikmin 3, and I also decided to try and get the somewhat rare Metroid Prime Trilogy on the Wii. I requested the full package, the game, the case, and the manual. About three days later I got a notification that a seller was willing to sell me Metroid Prime Trilogy for $60 set credit. Score!
BUYING GAMES WITH CREDIT
On the website on the right-hand side is your avatar as well as options you have. The trade button had a “1” next to it so I clicked on it. It took me to the trade section where I could complete the trade. I chose to accept the trade and was notified the seller would be told to ship the game to me. LeapTrade tracks the progress of the trade right there on the website so I am able to check the tracking number right there and can see when the seller ships the game. The seller shipped the game the next day. About three days later my game arrived in the mail. Everything was in great condition! I was quite happy with my purchase. I then left the seller positive feedback. LeapTrade holds on to the credit until the buyer leaves feedback. So now the seller received their $60 credit for the game.
SELLING GAMES ON LEAPTRADE
Next I decided I wanted to try their selling games service for credit. I decided to sell my old game, Fallout 3 Game of the Year Edition for PS3. LeadTrade is currently offering sellers $15 credit for the game. I was curious to see what I could get for the game at other places. GameStop was only willing to give me a couple of dollars in credit. Amazon was willing to give me about $3.50 in credit. I also checked on eBay and the game is selling for about $12 or so. So I was going to get more at LeapTrade for my game than anywhere else.
So I listed my game by just typing the title of the game in the search box, and then I was given the option of listing the game for trade. Now I just needed to wait for a fellow gamer to take the trade. About two days later I got a notice that a gamer wanted the game for $15 credit. I accepted the trade.
I now needed to ship the game. It cost $3.50 to ship a game on LeapTrade, as you have to use their shipping service. This is a bit high to be honest, because in my experience you can ship a game for about $2.25 or so. So you are paying about an extra $1.25 to ship the game. LeapTrade claims this is so that packages can be safely shipped and at the right amount of weight. In other words, if you ship a game and do not pay enough because it is heavier in ounces than what you paid for , the US Post Office will return the game to the seller. This would obviously make the experience bad for both the seller and buyer so LeapTrade prevents that from happening by making the fee high enough to prevent this.
So I paid the $3.50 and put the game in a bubble mailer envelope that I already had. You’ll remember that I said I sell games online regularly. I bought a case of 100 such envelopes for about $25 or so on Amazon so I would always have a supply. But you can purchase these envelopes at Walmart or an office supply store for not too much.
I then needed to wait for the buyer to receive the game and then leave me feedback. This took a couple of days, but then I received my $15 credit. LeapTrade also has a promotion going that you will receive an extra $5 credit on your first trade. So I actually received $20 credit instead of the $15. Nice.
Had I sold the game on eBay I would have gotten $12, minus about $1.50 for Ebay and Paypal fees, and had to pay $2.25 for shipping. I would have got $8.25. Now that is cash and it is instant, which some might prefer over having to wait a week or two and for LeapTrade credit only, but nonetheless I was happy with what I got for the game. Especially when Amazon and GameStop would have given me about $3. I did have to pay $3.5o out of pocket for shipping though, so all said and done I received $11.50 in credit for the game after subtracting shipping and the $5 bonus. Still much better than anywhere else!
TRADING
It should also be noted that LeapTrade offers a trading service where you can trade games directly for another game that a seller has as opposed to selling for credit. However, you need a score of 4 achieved from both buying and selling. I had a score of 3 from what I had put into it, so I wasn’t able to try this service out at this time.
MY THOUGHTS ON THE SERVICE
So I tried the service out and now feel like I have a pretty good idea on how it works. I like the service that LeapTrade provides. It’s an easy and convenient way to get credit for your used games that can then be used to purchase other games from the website. One could just keep trading/buying/selling used games on LeapTrade with only ever having to spend $3.50 when they ship a game to the buyer. Essentially, you could take $50 worth of credit you got from trading in old games, and use it to trade for a game you have yet to play, and then when done with that, trade it in and play another game, and you essentially would have access to unlimited games with only having to spend $3.50 per game. It’s a pretty good deal if there are a lot of games that LeapTrade has that you are interested in. I kind of think of it as a cheap rental service.
LeapTrade offers fair prices for their games. Their prices seem to be about what you would get for selling on eBay, but without the seller fees. It’s a great deal. You are limited to LeapTrade credit though as opposed to cash. And unlike GameStop and Amazon, the credit can only be used to purchase other used games. Right now their selection is somewhat lacking. The reason being is that the service is new. See, the service only works well if a lot of people are using it. The more people selling games, the more games there are to buy which means a better selection.
I RECOMMEND CHECKING IT OUT
Overall I think that LeapTrade has HUGE potential, even if it’s just not quite there yet due to limited available games, especially newer games. I would however recommend checking out the service if you have games you are wanting to get rid of that can be traded and used for other games you want to play. It’s relatively quick and easy and will give you lots of credit for your old games. It should be an option to be considered for all used game sellers. Afterall, the more people that use it, the more games that will be available. They are also constantly making changes based on recommendations from their users in their forums that you can participate in. In the three weeks or so that I used the service they made an update to the website that improved the service.
I am excited to see what LeapTrade looks like in a year or so. They won me over now though as their prices are great and you can save a lot of money on games by selling/trading using the service . I look forward to using LeapTrade to try out some games I missed out on with my $20 credit I got from my first trade.
Again it’s www.leaptrade.com
