After 28 years and seven generations of video game consoles, Jay Denis is calling it quits.

The owner of the Microplay video game store in downtown Ottawa is shutting down his operation on Friday.

"It just made sense for me to close the store while the store still had its head above water," Denis said, adding he isn't confident the store would be still viable in the next five years.

Denis points to the store's costs rising faster than its revenue, which he said is in part due to increasing competition from online retailers like Amazon.

Microplay itself is a small franchise that originated in Ottawa. Now stores stretch from London, Ont., to Quebec City.

A second Ottawa location in South Keys will stay open, but Denis said the downtown store was one of the originals.

'I have spent over $30,000 in this store'

Denis bought the store a few years after it first opened on Bank Street. An avid gamer himself, he said he never could have imagined how video games would evolve in the last 28 years.

The first system Denis owned was an Atari 2600, which he describes as "blocks shooting blocks at blocks."

"If you look at some of the modern games — I mean really, it's movie quality," Denis said.

The store's manager, Kyle Matthews, said he was devastated to hear the news of the closure. Not only because it meant he was out of a job, but because he was one of the store's biggest customers.

"I have spent over $30,000 in this store — my account kept track. I am not joking, I am rounding down," Matthews said.

Kyle Matthews has worked at Microplay for a decade, but has been a customer for even longer. (Darren Major/CBC)

Matthews started shopping at Microplay as a kid, and was fortunate enough to eventually be hired on. He's worked there for 10 years.

When he found out in May that Denis would be closing, it was a shock, Matthews said.

"I had a dark couple of weeks," he said.

But his attitude began to change when news of the closure started spreading among customers.

Over the past few months, gamers who started shopping at Microplay well before Matthews worked there began pouring in to say goodbye, sharing hugs and memories.

"Every single day since ... we made the public announcement, people have been coming in talking about the times that they shopped here," he said.

"People feel more upset about us losing our jobs than we do, I feel."

For Denis himself, he said serving a fantastic customer base has been one of the highlights of owning Microplay.

"It makes me feel very blessed to have been in a business that resonates with so many people," he said.