What happened Shares of video game retailer GameStop (NYSE: GME) fell sharply at the open of trading on Wednesday, dropping a painful 21% within the first 10 minutes of the day. The big news was the company's earnings release after the close on Tuesday. There was some good news and a fair amount of bad news. So what On a GAAP basis, GameStop lost $0.29 per share in the third quarter, with an adjusted loss of $0.53. Red ink is never good, but in this case, the Wall Street consensus was looking for a loss of $0.85 per share. Beating estimates like that is usually considered a good thing, but in this case, investors were not impressed. That's partly because the company's roughly $1 billion in sales fell short of expectations. And, perhaps more important, the company clearly continues to struggle as it tries to adjust to changing customer shopping habits. Image source: Getty Images. This was a problem before the coronavirus, as more and more video game content shifts to online distribution. The pandemic has simply made things worse -- fast. GameStop is shrinking its footprint and pushing e-commerce (where sales increased over 250% in the quarter) as it works to adjust to the changing times. But with comparable-store sales down by a huge 25% or so in the quarter, it is clearly not making much progress with its legacy brick-and-mortar operations. Investors reacted by selling the stock. Now what GameStop has been a turnaround story for a while at this point. The recent quarter is a material hint that the retailer is still struggling to find its way. Only aggressive investors should be buying shares. Even then, the still-weak sales trends and swift market drop suggest you'll need a strong conviction about GameStop's future to stick around. 10 stocks we like better than GameStopWhen investing geniuses David and Tom Gardner have a stock tip, it can pay to listen. After all, the newsletter they have run for over a decade, Motley Fool Stock Advisor, has tripled the market.* David and Tom just revealed what they believe are the ten best stocks for investors to buy right now... and GameStop wasn't one of them! That's right -- they think these 10 stocks are even better buys. See the 10 stocks *Stock Advisor returns as of November 20, 2020 Reuben Gregg Brewer has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool recommends GameStop. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.Source