Is pre ordering is a terrible idea?

[BiscuitTrouser]

Nah, I like to assume people have played a game before using it as a defense point instead of just blindly pointing at it without knowing what's inside the box. Gives me some faith in human intelligence.

Im not using the game as a defence point. Im using the reaction to the game as a defence point. There really isnt a need to be so insulting. People thought the trailer told them all they needed to know. And it didnt. Its pure observation. And many were angry. But if they hadnt of pre ordered this wouldnt have been the case. Again im using observation. Im not "blindly" pointing. Im observing a few things and drawing a conclusion.

The points you stated above were actually very good.

"That's the risk we should each enjoy taking because, with that risk, when you find quality, you remember it forever and cherish it." -

this particularly struck a chord with me. This is still something i can enjoy. But i feel pre ordering just makes the risk too risky. When games are this expensive and im this strapped for cash the reality of what a big leap of faith the publisher is asking you to take seems clearer.

 

[Yopaz]

Honestly when it comes to pre-orders I'm kinda stupid. I'll admit it, I've bought a lot of games that I've hated, but I've also bought a few games that I love that have shortly after become a real pain to get their hands on. Seriously I thought I didn't need to pre-order Tales of The Abyss. I have never been more wrong about anything in my entire life. That game was almost impossible to get my hands on, but holy mother of Jesus it was worth the wait. I just wish I wouldn't have had to wait...

 

[Something Amyss]

It doesnt apply a strong enough pressure to publishers who dissapoint their fans. Why SHOULD they make the third installment in any series good? At all? Pre order revinue will give them nice earnings no matter what the quality is.

And if a company wants to stop making games after that third one, it's all well and good. But if they ever want to make another game, there will be issues.

 

[Tuesday Night Fever]

I used to pre-order almost every game I got. Now I only really pre-order games that I have to play, regardless of reviews. Yes, I pre-ordered Mass Effect 3 - because I'd already played the first two, and regardless of whether or not the game was good or bad, I wanted to see what the end of the story would be. Was I disappointed? Sure... but the point is that I was planning on buying the game day-1 anyway. I'll be doing the same thing when the next segment of StarCraft 2 comes out.

For other games though... I don't generally pre-order for one of two reasons. The first is that I like to wait until gameplay videos are available and reviewers have gotten their hands on the game. That usually gives me a few days' window of opportunity where if the game looks good I can still pre-order and get any bonuses. The second reason is that I find game prices drop pretty significantly much faster than they used to. If a game is coming out that I want, but don't have to have right this second, then all I have to do is be patient for a month or two and then pick up the game at half-price.

I absolutely won't pre-order if there's no bonus, though. Stores around here generally stock enough copies of new releases that there's no real point to reserving a copy. All it does is add an extra step during checkout, which is usually going to be made needlessly complicated because Best Buy cashiers in my area seem to frequently be confused by how pre-orders work.

Captcha: Buy A Toyota.

I'll take it as a compliment that Captcha thinks I have the money to do that on a whim.

 

[DigitalAtlas]

Im not using the game as a defence point. Im using the reaction to the game as a defence point. There really isnt a need to be so insulting. People thought the trailer told them all they needed to know. And it didnt. Its pure observation. And many were angry. But if they hadnt of pre ordered this wouldnt have been the case. Again im using observation. Im not "blindly" pointing. Im observing a few things and drawing a conclusion.

The points you stated above were actually very good.

"That's the risk we should each enjoy taking because, with that risk, when you find quality, you remember it forever and cherish it." -

this particularly struck a chord with me. This is still something i can enjoy. But i feel pre ordering just makes the risk too risky. When games are this expensive and im this strapped for cash the reality of what a big leap of faith the publisher is asking you to take seems clearer.

As far as me being condescending goes, I'm only insulting when I feel insulted. Seeing as you edited in how silly I must feel, I took it as offensive. My apologies. As my mother always said, don't poke the tiger if you don't want to get bit.

Still, fans would've bought ME3 no matter what, on day one. It really isn't something to change a way of thinking over. Did they get burnt this time? They certainly feel they did (they didn't, do worry; they're just new to video games or are at least acting like it). The pre-order didn't lock them into the purchase. Every pre-order can be canceled with a phone call or even a mouse click. Saying we should wait weeks and weeks for one rich person to buy the game and describe if it ends well is honestly ridiculous. I know you're about to tell me that's not what you meant, but that's basically what's been implied as you feel people who bought and played ME3 didn't know the ending "sucked" (again, it was just incredibly average) shouldn't have bought it on day one. They wanted the game. They bought it. The only way to know if you're going to be fully satisfied with a product is go ahead and go all the way till the end.

Thank you, I've thought about those a lot with the recent entitlement debates around.

As for the risk, then you don't need to, that's the beauty. If you're strapped and don't want to take the risk, you caaaaan wait. It's purely subjective and has a lot to do with a person's spending limits. As for games being expensive, you should've seen it back in the Genesis days. Games have actually gotten cheaper, believe it or not. Back to the risk, it's for people who want to. I don't like gambling, thus I don't go to casinos. However, some people like the possibility of a pay off and risk everything for that new found excitement and love received due to a victory.

 

[Vrach]

I pre-order for the bonuses. You can get as much information out of beta testers as you can out of reviews and such. Every time you buy a product/pay to see a movie or anything such, you're going in there blind. You can get informed by external sources, but that doesn't mean you know anything about the product yourself, just that you trust those sources on what they're telling you, in which case you can get the same quality of information out of beta tests, marketing, watching gameplay videos and such (hell, some games will let you beta test and see for yourself if you want to pre-order).

No, it's not stupid. It's designed for people who KNOW they're gonna get a game even before it's out. They can know that based on several things and if they know what they're doing, they're not really at a big disadvantage against people who buy things on release day or later, unless you're the kinda person who waits until someone else gets a product, check it out for yourself at their place, then buys it.

For example, I can tell you I preordered Battlefield 3. I knew it'd be a game I'd buy and one I'd buy on release day. I've gotten to play it in an open beta, but even based on history/videos I could pre-order and know it's not a bad decision, because it's just the kind of game that would have to do a lot to disappoint me to the point of me regretting buying it.

Same for TOR. Now, to be fair, I'm not as pleased with TOR as with some other games, but I also don't regret pre-ordering/buying it. I wanted to play it and enjoyed it for a good while. It's not exactly the MMO I'd want to keep a sub active for, but as a purchase, it's not something I regret (something I wish I could say for my stupid decision to buy a 6 month sub right away that's now gathering dust)

 

[Something Amyss]

"That's the risk we should each enjoy taking because, with that risk, when you find quality, you remember it forever and cherish it." -

Glad you quoted that, because I didn't see it before. It's actually kind of interesting. I'm a roleplaying gamer. Tabletop as well as electronic. When I run games, I notice people tend to remember their massive successes more than their failures. for the D&D example, people always remember when they rolled a "nat 20," but not when they roll a 1. Even though there's an equal chance of rolling a natural 1, a natural 20, or really any other number (assuming an even die, which is somewhat unrealistic).

This may be a bad thing, because people tend to remember when they were rewarded for their purchases more than when they were not.

However, it certainly explains why people do it.

I do pre-order on occasion. I admit it. But most of the time, no.

 

[Rumpsteak]

A terrible idea, no. An outdated and mostly unnecessary concept, yeah probably. The days of stores running out of copies of the game you wanted are almost entirely gone so the need to pre-order from a consumer view point is no longer there. For publishers and developers however pre-orders can be a big deal. So its not a terrible idea its just a redundant one.

 

[Sonic Doctor]

Snip

Nope, it's only a bad idea if you are the type of person that gets mad about the small stuff.

In the last three years, I believe I've pre-ordered 9 games. I've found none of them to be straight up bad. The closest I've come to is one of that was pretty "meh", but that's it.

I'll list one I can remember off the top of my head:

Halo 3: ODST--Awesome
Star Wars: The Force Unleashed 2(Collectors)--Meh
Castlevania: Lords of Shadow(Collectors)--Awesome
Fable 3(Collectors)--Awesome
Halo Reach--Awesome
Dragon Age 2(Limited Ed.)--Awesome
Pokemon White--Awesome
Halo Anniversary--Awesome
Mass Effect 3(Collectors)--Awesome

Some of them have their small problems, but they don't detract from how awesome I felt playing them.

I think some people really overreact with how they look at games. I've heard a few people that said that the ME3 collector's edition was crap for having to pay 20 extra dollars. I find that downright insane. Considering what was in it physical and DLC wise, would have cost them at least 40 to 50 dollars more if they had purchased it separate.

As I've said before with how people complain about collector's editions: I bed if a collector's edition came with a bar of gold that was worth thousands of dollars and they only paid 80 for it, they would say that it is crap because the bar they got wasn't shiny enough.

 

[TaintedSaint]

If you preorder at gamestop you can cancel it anytime and get your cash back

 

[JediMB]

I can pre-order a game by a developer I trust, a game that has proven itself through some sort of demo version, or a game that I want to support on principle because of what the developers are trying to do with it.

BioWare used to fall into the trust category, but not so much anymore.

"Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning" is a recent example where there was a demo. No regrets there.

I've lost track of how many games I've purchased in recent years simply because I want to encourage developers to make more games like that. Can't recall being disappointed by the games either.

As for Kickstarter...
I've backed a few projects of type 1 and 3. Type 2 doesn't apply, obviously. The lack of publisher meddling appeals to me as well.

 

[Diddy_Mao]

I usually pre order my games. But I won't lie, my reasons for doing so have little to nothing to do with the game itself or the premiums I might get for ordering in advance.

I have a Gamestop that I go to. It's "My gamestop" I know the employees there and I like the store. I know that a lot of their performance revue is based on sales metrics and if I can help them out with a reserve sale I will.

Plus there's a bit of leftover fear from my days managing a video store.
I can't tell you how many times our store had a short supply of new release films because nobody pre ordered them.

Whoever was in charge of the ordering would use those reservation numbers to gauge interest in the product.
No reservations means no interest in the movie, which means fewer copies ordered which means less risk of stagnant product on the shelf.

That "logic" bit me right in the ass more than once as everyone and their dog came in to buy a movie we were given 4 copies of 3 of which were reserved.

So yeah I'll usually reserve my games. It doesn't cost me anything extra, it guarantees my copy (barring an unforeseen clerical error,) It lets me pay off my more expensive purchases over time and I get to boost the stats of a store who's management and employees know their shit and run a pretty fine shop.

Everybody wins.

 

[Epona]

Right now there are 16 titles featured on Steam (the scrolling images), six of them aren't even released. On Gamestops best seller list there are six games, THREE aren't even released yet.

I think it has gotten out of hand where it is hard to shop for games because of the number of games you can buy now but can't play now.

 

[Shoggoth2588]

Honestly I only see pre-ordering as something that helps Gamestop and the companies track how popular a future product will be. The only time it's really necessary to pre-order anything is when the game you're pre-ordering is going to be one of those small games that may end up being insubstantial in the grand scheme of things. If you really want Black Ops 2, it would be downright stupid to pre-order it since you're going to be paying $60+ for it depending on the edition*. If you play the Black Ops 2 waiting game, you'll find that it'll be cheaper to buy later on, more than likely after the holidays when whispers of the next one are starting to hit the interwebs. The only downside is the online multiplayer which could very well have turned into a ghost town in the mean time. Since it's CoD though you probably wouldn't have to worry about it but for a game like Sniper Elite 2 then you may be out of luck in a few months and are looking to join an online game.

Like I said though (tl;dr) if you want a game that will be popular don't pre-order unless you suspect the multiplayer will turn into a graveyard within the first 6 months. If you want a game that you think will fade into obscurity a couple weeks after its release then pre-order.

*=Also special editions, collectors editions, etc. Right now you can grab the Duke Nukem Forever: Balls of Steel edition for under $35 new on Amazon. This is by far the exception rather than the rule. If you're a collector and after these special editions then you are perfectly justified in pre-ordering that. AvP Hunter Edition on the 360 by contrast is $85 and, Halo Reach Legendary and, Skyrims CE are both $99.99 which I think are about what they were upon release...I think.

 

[Vegosiux]

This may be a bad thing, because people tend to remember when they were rewarded for their purchases more than when they were not.

That...depends. I'm actually inclined to argue that things going right is much more rarely noticed and registered.

But let me address this point differenly and in a slightly nasty way.

"That's the risk we should each enjoy taking because, with that risk, when you find quality, you remember it forever and cherish it."

Well to that I say. Want to gamble? Try a casino, and stop giving businesses ideas how to take people's money before they even have a product done.

 

[TheRookie8]

After ME3 I'm never pre-ordering again really.

Only game I'm ever pre-ordering is The Witcher 3 because I know CDProjekt will deliver.

You really came full circle there.

 

[scorptatious]

I mainly pre-order just to guarantee that I'll get the game I want on the day it comes out. How is that a bad thing? And if it has a special bonus for those who do pre-order, awesome! Again, what is so bad about that?

 

[yourbeliefs]

I rarely pre-order games. Unless a store gives a very compelling reason such as GOOD exclusive DLC or a discount (usually in the form of a gift card for the store) then I often don't, even on games that I know I'll want. Since I'm a Gamefly subscriber oftentimes I'll add what I want to play early in my queue and they arrive a few days after release. Then I choose to "Keep it" and with discounts and coupons it's not uncommon to get what is essentially a brand new game for around $20 off, which INCLUDES any online pass that the game has.

 

[Legion]

Like many others, I will never pre-order from Bioware since ME3. I simply do not trust their marketing or PR to the extent that I will take their word for anything.

Generally speaking I would say pre-ordering is not so bad, I normally only do it for games that I really want, or ones from developers that I trust to do a good job (hence why I used to pre-order from Bioware). If I am not anxious to play the game as soon as I can get my hands on it, then I won't pre-order.

 

[Gnoekeos]

How far in advance are you pre-ordering I don't generally pre order a game until I'm well aware of what the incentives are going to be since I once preordered a game at game stop waaaaay in advance and they only had a standard edition copy for me when the game came out.