FRESNO, Calif. (FOX26) — Thousands of dollars worth of gaming items were stolen from Blue Shell Gaming and Collectables on Sunday morning.
The gaming store was burglarized twice on the same night.
“By the time that we were made aware of it, as our store ownership was made aware of it, the store had already been burglarized twice,” said Kelsey Heater, store manager.
At around 4:30 a.m., two people broke into the front of the store.
Then, at 5:10 am, two different people broke in through the back.
As a gaming store that sells high-value items, they take security seriously, but there’s only so much they can control.
“Theft is always a thing that you have to deal with in retail, and all you can do is your best to prevent it, and we’re doing our best with what we’ve got,” said Heater.
The four people stole thousands of dollars’ worth of items.
“A lot of what was stolen was much of our handheld games. So Game Boy is Nintendo DS systems, 3DS systems. We had Nintendo 64s, a Wii, an Xbox 360, PlayStation 4s, a couple of Xbox Ones, and Nintendo Switches. So it was a mix of both modern and retro that they were after, it looked like,” said Heater
To address retail theft, the Fresno Police Department created a theft tactical team.
Since its creation last year, the department reports that larcenies have decreased in the city.
“2025 we had a reduction in just our larceny alone of 21%. With their investigations combined recovered over $1.2 million in merchandise just in 2025.”
Heater says they were looking forward to their last day, but instead were met with a somber ending.
“Unfortunately, a couple people decided they should have a blowout sale and get a lot of items for free and so instead of having our last day going out on a positive note we unfortunately had to end on a bit of a downer because what we’ve been doing is we’ve been telling everyone hey thanks for shopping with us,” said Heater.
Even though this location is closing, its other two locations in Clovis and Fig Garden will stay open. They will move the remaining items from this location to their store in Fig Garden.