[Chewbacca]

Hopefully you still have your receipt. I would take your case directly to store managment. I work in retail management selling video games at Gamestop. Returned PC games that are opened should never be resold, particularly if they use serial numbers or CD keys. The potential for fraud is vast.

At my store, we only offer an identical replacement for open games and defect the returned games out even if we make an exception to the idential product policy. Our POS system prompts us with serial number verification phone numbers for returned MMOG's to insure we do not take back registered games.

Since HMV is not a dedicated game store they might not have the safegaurds in place that we do or there may have been a mistake that cause returned product to get back on the shelf that shoudln't have.

Anyway, if the unlikely event that the store manager wont help you, go to the DM. DM's hate to say no to customers with legitimate complaints who do not clearly appear to be attempting fraud. They hate it even worst when corporate gets a call. If it goes so far tha the DM wont help, threaten to call corporate as leverage.

Good luck!