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zip code list for gamestop store search


Lincoln

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I'm trying to put together a list of zip codes to cover all (or pretty close) gamestop stores using their 100 mile search. Does anyone have a good list for this? 

I started with the 100 most populous zips but it skews pretty heavy and there are a bunch that look redundant with clustering. 

image.png.237f084d50faaaf17dd27d80048b5c4f.png

this was a free map tool i found online but the radius feature is included in the paid version. if anyone can recommend a free tool to plot points+radius i'd appreciate it

willing to put together a shared doc if anyone wants to help work on it

Edited by Lincoln
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1 minute ago, Tabonga said:

This is supposed to allow you to download an excel file of all the gamestop locations.   Assuming there is column for the just the zip codes you should be able to sort by that.

https://www.scrapehero.com/location-reports/GameStop-USA/

i came across that, it's $75 to download

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I haven't done that, it might help to have a complete list but it would entail a lot of cultivating. I'm trying to find zips that cover the bulk of the stores while eliminating those that are redundant. May end up having to figure out point to point distance eventually but I'm hoping for something better to start with.

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5 minutes ago, Lincoln said:

I haven't done that, it might help to have a complete list but it would entail a lot of cultivating. I'm trying to find zips that cover the bulk of the stores while eliminating those that are redundant. May end up having to figure out point to point distance eventually but I'm hoping for something better to start with.

If you can get a sortable file from them the clusters should stand out - since the zips are assigned geographically you should be able to put in the mid zip code from each cluster to give you something resembling a 100 mile radius.  

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Administrator · Posted
3 minutes ago, Lincoln said:

gamestop website lets you search. for example contra

https://www.gamestop.com/video-games/retro-gaming/nintendo/games/products/contra/10122770.html

is apparently in stock at a store near me

image.png.78b246a2e189e5c7c2f24ea7a3e5a6b7.png

I'm not sure, then, that I understand what you're trying to do here? Why not just literally use their website's search?

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4 minutes ago, Gloves said:

I'm not sure, then, that I understand what you're trying to do here? Why not just literally use their website's search?

it only does 100 mile radius. so, assuming there is one of something in some store somewhere in the country, you have to find a close enough zip code to get the location with the item. i'm trying to come up with a minimum list of zip codes that I can run to check all/most of the stores.

afaik there's no way to search all stores at once, only by the radius thing.

Edited by Lincoln
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Administrator · Posted
Just now, Lincoln said:

it only does 100 mile radius. so, assuming there is one of something in some store somewhere in the country, you have to find a close enough zip code to get the location with the item. i'm trying to come up with a minimum list of zip codes that I can run to check all/most of the stores.

Why not just centralize on city in that case? A list of cities is easy to obtain.

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2 minutes ago, Gloves said:

Why not just centralize on city in that case? A list of cities is easy to obtain.

that would be more comprehensive than what i have now. but, there are lots of cities in the country, and very many of those will fall within 100 miles of the next city. you're looking at thousands of zip codes, versus maybe a few dozen i think i could get away with when optimized. as i'm feeding this into the gamestop website, which is garbage and slow as shit, execution time is a consideration. 

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Administrator · Posted
2 minutes ago, Lincoln said:

that would be more comprehensive than what i have now. but, there are lots of cities in the country, and very many of those will fall within 100 miles of the next city. you're looking at thousands of zip codes, versus maybe a few dozen i think i could get away with when optimized. as i'm feeding this into the gamestop website, which is garbage and slow as shit, execution time is a consideration. 

With a bit of math you could always just find the central point for circles on a globe every 200 miles and feed in the latlng value.

The USPS API is free to use apparently, and if it provides similar information to the Canada Post API you could use that for your initial data gathering. You just have to create a matrix and get the data once, then iterate over it when making calls in future.

Google Maps, last I checked, has some simple "Get X within Y Radius" features. Have you looks into the Maps API recently?

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6 minutes ago, Gloves said:

With a bit of math you could always just find the central point for circles on a globe every 200 miles and feed in the latlng value.

The USPS API is free to use apparently, and if it provides similar information to the Canada Post API you could use that for your initial data gathering. You just have to create a matrix and get the data once, then iterate over it when making calls in future.

Google Maps, last I checked, has some simple "Get X within Y Radius" features. Have you looks into the Maps API recently?

i haven't worked with google maps that i remember, so i'm putting that option off as it means learning something new. i might get there eventually, but i was hoping for a shortcut to get started. 

thanks for the tip on the usps thing, i might look into that.

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I wish they just had a search all option. “I want this ds game. Search all the stores in the country so I can have it shipped to my store.” 
 

it’s extremely frustrating and time consuming to go through all the zipcodes. When I had lots of time I remember going through every 1000 zipcodes, so start with 01000 then 02000 03000 and so on all the way up to 99000. For every....single.....game.....

it was worth it though. Ended up getting a couple games I really wanted but boy does it take a while. Good luck @Lincoln!

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Administrator · Posted

@Lincoln

FYI, the Gamestop internal API looks to be not particularly strict. You can edit the value of the Option tag on the dropdown for radius, and it'll actually pass that value to their server call. Looks like you CAN go too high, but this might help you do more at once at a wider radius, if nothing else.

image.png

 

1000 was too high (500 internal server error), but 110 worked fine:

image.png

 

So somewhere between 100 and 1000, there's a "highest possible" number, likely due to some timeout or something server-side. Find that sweet spot number and your life is that little bit easier.

 

EDIT: 500 worked fine:

image.png

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18 minutes ago, Gloves said:

@Lincoln

FYI, the Gamestop internal API looks to be not particularly strict. You can edit the value of the Option tag on the dropdown for radius, and it'll actually pass that value to their server call. Looks like you CAN go too high, but this might help you do more at once at a wider radius, if nothing else.

image.png

 

1000 was too high (500 internal server error), but 110 worked fine:

image.png

 

So somewhere between 100 and 1000, there's a "highest possible" number, likely due to some timeout or something server-side. Find that sweet spot number and your life is that little bit easier.

 

EDIT: 500 worked fine:

image.png

that is an excellent find, thanks. will simplify things considerably. too bad i can't hit that service url directly, that would make it so easy. i was doing that for quite a while but they got smart about it.

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Social Team · Posted
16 minutes ago, Gloves said:

@Lincoln

FYI, the Gamestop internal API looks to be not particularly strict. You can edit the value of the Option tag on the dropdown for radius, and it'll actually pass that value to their server call. Looks like you CAN go too high, but this might help you do more at once at a wider radius, if nothing else.

image.png

 

1000 was too high (500 internal server error), but 110 worked fine:

image.png

 

So somewhere between 100 and 1000, there's a "highest possible" number, likely due to some timeout or something server-side. Find that sweet spot number and your life is that little bit easier.

 

EDIT: 500 worked fine:

image.png

This is the best way by far.  You can do a few searches.  Hell you could probably write a script to open a web page for each search with the specific key word search.  This seems like a fun project.  I'll keep this in mind when I pick up learning Python again.

 

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Administrator · Posted
1 minute ago, Lincoln said:

that is an excellent find, thanks. will simplify things considerably. too bad i can't hit that service url directly, that would make it so easy. i was doing that for quite a while but they got smart about it.

If you can help it, do it on a VPN. If they see these API calls they're likely to IP ban.

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3 minutes ago, Gloves said:

If you can help it, do it on a VPN. If they see these API calls they're likely to IP ban.

i hammered on their site for like 5 years before i had any issues. i got temp banned for a while, and now i can access the site again but i believe they've locked down all their services to prevent direct calls. so i'm doing it the hard way through a headless browser, we'll see how long it lasts.

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Social Team · Posted
2 hours ago, Lincoln said:

gamestop website lets you search. for example contra

https://www.gamestop.com/video-games/retro-gaming/nintendo/games/products/contra/10122770.html

is apparently in stock at a store near me

image.png.78b246a2e189e5c7c2f24ea7a3e5a6b7.png

So goes GameStop actually have good prices for old cart games?  

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