I guess what I'm really asking is does anyone here pre-order... and WHY?
Do you get anything out of it?
I guess what I'm really asking is does anyone here pre-order... and WHY?
Do you get anything out of it?
This gets asked periodically, and I have pre-ordered various title over
the years. Anything kickstarter is a pre-order, with the attraction being >actually helping a project you like get funded, such as System Shock Remake, >Overload, Woolfe. I pre-ordered Cyberpunk due to all the hype, pre-ordered >Stalker2 via a greymarket site to get a hefty discount. You can see that >some of these weren't in true release condition for years, was that a huge >deal, well not really. The last couple years in particular, with its
tsunami of 'free' games from retailers and release debacles has made us more >blasé and cynical, but pre-ordering can still be fun
I guess what I'm really asking is does anyone here pre-order... and WHY?
Do you get anything out of it?
This gets asked periodically, and I have pre-ordered various title over
the years. Anything kickstarter is a pre-order, with the attraction being >actually helping a project you like get funded, such as System Shock Remake, >Overload, Woolfe. I pre-ordered Cyberpunk due to all the hype, pre-ordered >Stalker2 via a greymarket site to get a hefty discount. You can see that >some of these weren't in true release condition for years, was that a huge >deal, well not really. The last couple years in particular, with its
tsunami of 'free' games from retailers and release debacles has made us more >blasé and cynical, but pre-ordering can still be fun
rms
On Fri, 7 Feb 2025 09:36:12 -0700, "rms" <rsquiresMOO@MOOflashMOO.net>
wrote:
... but the Rockstar offering at the time was that you got immediate
access to a particularly good horse if and only if you bought straight
from the Rockstar store. That turned out to be one of the best
decisions I could have made, because that horse had particularly good >performance characteristics that allowed me to win a lot of PvP races
in RDR2 online. Imagine the old motorcyle game "Road Rash" on
horseback... it is a tremendously fun game mode (or at least it was in
the first couple of years, not sure how active it is now). Horse
racing was one of the best ways to generate in-game currency, which is >required to have any kind of fun in the game and it is harder to come
by in some games. So by winning lots of races I was able to build
wealth in less time, and that made the game more fun overall.
On Fri, 07 Feb 2025 10:03:45 -0600, Zaghadka <zaghadka@hotmail.com>
wrote:
I recently went to Epic to get my weekly freebie hit and was asked in a >>banner at the top of the page if I wanted to 'pre-order' Civ VII.
Why would anyone do that with Civ? Civ has a storied reputation for being >>unfinished at release and only being worthwhile when DLCs drop.
In this case, you get an extra Civ that isn't even an exclusive. You can >>buy it in the Deluxe version. If I like a Civ game, I tend to eventually >>buy all the add-ons.
It's also a general question for any game at all.
It's based on the age-old "Fear Of Missing Out". You wouldn't want to
be the last one to get The Newest And Hottest Game, would you? Get it
now before it's sold out!
Of course, that tactic best worked when there actually was a
(sometimes artificially) limited number of games to purchase. Twenty
years ago, you _could_ miss out on a game just because there weren't
enough copies in-store for everybody to buy. These days, with digital >distribution making the number of available copies essentially
infinite, there's a lot less incentive to get a game Day One.
Not that stops the publishers from trying to push the scheme; they
just use different tactics. Exclusives are the usual bribe, from
various cosmetics, to included DLC, to 'early access' privileges. Of
course, the publishers then repeatedly shoot themselves in the foot by
making those bonuses a lot less valuable than they'd otherwise be:
often, your early-access save-games become invalidated on the game's
actual launch, or they sell the 'pre-order exclusives' become a lot
less exclusive after they're included in Game of the Year collections,
or the included season pass has no real content.
Then there is the argument about getting the game before anyone else
so you can get the Skillz to master the game ahead of the rest. And I
suppose for a very small minority, that actually matters but for most?
Unless you intend to play only against strangers, what's the point?
Just wait until your friends get the game too --which can be six
months down the way-- and start the clock then.
The TL;DR is that pre-orders are a hold-over from a previous age of
gaming, and these days it's mainly aimed at the young and the stupid.
Except for a vanishingly small number of people, there's no advantage
to getting the game early, and a lot of reasons not to.
But that's awfully judge mental.
On Fri, 07 Feb 2025 13:54:46 -0600, in comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action,
Zaghadka wrote:
But that's awfully judge mental.
Jesus spellcheck, really?
On Fri, 07 Feb 2025 13:54:46 -0600, Zaghadka <zaghadka@hotmail.com>
wrote:
An interesting analysis. I take it from your reply that you essentially >never pre-order. If you ever have, why, and what did you get out of it?
I pre-ordered exactly once in my life. I can't remember the game, but
I more or less did it on a whim; at the time, most of my purchases
were from a small brick-n-mortar store (this being back in the Age Of
Video Games That Are Released On Physical Media), and --as it was a
fairly popular title-- I figured probably would be out of stock for a
few weeks because everyone else would have rushed in to buy it before
me. And since it was a game I too had some interest in playing, when
the clerk asked me if I wanted to pre-order, I said, what the heck,
why not.
As it turned out, when I finally got around to reclaiming the game on
Day 1, they had so many extra copies I needn't have bothered. ;-)
Still, I wasn't really that upset. The pre-order wasn't really that important; even had I not gotten the game on launch, I'd just have
waited a few weeks, or gone somewhere else to acquire my copy if I
really wanted to play it immediately. Mostly, I did the pre-order on a
lark, and because I'd never done one before.
My overall impression of the procedure was annoyance, though, since I
had to keep the damn receipt as proof of purchase, and I am normally
AWFUL in preserving receipts.
So, yeah, my general opinion of the whole pre-order thing has been
that it's a bunch of nonsense that offers precious little benefit to
the customer. With the transformation of the market to digital sales,
what little benefit has all but evaporated, as I see it. It's a sales
tactic almost entirely designed to bolster the publisher's bottom
line.
[I did some digging into my old Usenet comments; it turns out
the game in question was "Grand Theft Auto 4". So that's one
mystery sorted ;-) ]
On Fri, 07 Feb 2025 19:01:55 -0500, Xocyll <Xocyll@gmx.com> wrote:
Zaghadka <zaghadka@hotmail.com> looked up from reading the entrails of
the porn spammer to utter "The Augury is good, the signs say:
On Fri, 07 Feb 2025 13:54:46 -0600, in comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action, >>>Zaghadka wrote:
But that's awfully judge mental.
Jesus spellcheck, really?
Oh I dunno, Judge Mental, Judge Dread...
it's all much of a suchness.
Plus I have seen so much worse spell check shit on professional News
sites like the New York Post. Great While Sharks anyone?
Fucking Millennial lazy asshats.
< feeling justifiably targeted by these comments >
< Because I really need to do a better job at spell-checking my
comments before clicking 'send'.>
<Especially the damn subject lines, which my NNTP client's spellcheck
does NOT look at>
<At least until I can get all my typos codified as alternate spellings
in my new language, Spallish >
<<not really feeling targeted, but I do apologize to everybody who has
to try and decipher my nonsense. It's hard enough to figure out what
I'm trying to say even when the spelling is correct>>
Although, in truth, my actual response was regarding the 'asshats who
don't spellcheck'* more than the Millennial thing. The entire
'generation' thing always seemed to much an artificial division
created by marketing dweeboids than an actual noticable
differentiation. In my experience, the bad behavior often assigned to
a particular generation transcends actual ages.
On Sat, 08 Feb 2025 19:26:08 +0000, ant@zimage.comANT (Ant) wrote:
Spalls Hurgenson <spallshurgenson@gmail.com> wrote:
[I did some digging into my old Usenet comments; it turns out
the game in question was "Grand Theft Auto 4". So that's one
mystery sorted ;-) ]
Heh. I should had done that for Diablo 2 from my local EB store. It was >>sold out! I had to wait a few days until it got restocked. I can't
remember if I finally bought it from EB or somewhere else though. My brain >>is broken. :(
Although I'm sure it happened, I can't really remember a time I walked
into a store intending to get a Brand New Game only to find out it was
out of stock. I'm pretty sure though, that if and when it did happen,
I just shrugged and bought something else (and then came back next
week to get the game I was looking for).
Although, in truth, my actual response was regarding the 'asshats who
don't spellcheck'* more than the Millennial thing. The entire
'generation' thing always seemed to much an artificial division
created by marketing dweeboids than an actual noticable
differentiation. In my experience, the bad behavior often assigned to
a particular generation transcends actual ages.**
On Sat, 08 Feb 2025 13:44:05 -0600, Zaghadka <zaghadka@hotmail.com>
wrote:
On Sat, 08 Feb 2025 11:31:43 -0500, in comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action,
Spalls Hurgenson wrote:
Fucking Millennial lazy asshats.
< feeling justifiably targeted by these comments >
Wow! I didn't peg you as a 40-year-old. I thought you were, like, 97.
Officially, I measure my age in Jupiterean years, so I'm still a
youngling if you go by that count.
Although, in truth, my actual response was regarding the 'asshats who
don't spellcheck'* more than the Millennial thing. The entire
'generation' thing always seemed to much an artificial division
created by marketing dweeboids than an actual noticable
differentiation. In my experience, the bad behavior often assigned to
a particular generation transcends actual ages.**
I guess what I'm really asking is does anyone here pre-order... and WHY?
Do you get anything out of it?
One I found amusing was a opinion piece in a paper making all the
normal claims of how the younger generation was lazy, unintelligent,
would be the downfall of society etc. The catch ... it was a hundred
years old.
Do we really want swathes of people thinking that the likes of Andrew
Tate make some good points and he's a intellectual?
For me? Baldur's Gate II. It wasn't in stock. It had a heavy box due to a >large, spiral-bound manual. Might have been harder (and therefore
riskier) to ship in quantity. Electronics Boutique let me reserve a copy
from the next shipment. They didn't charge me. Not even a deposit.
My other near addiction to a franchise has been GTA since Vice City but
I didn't preorder any of the titles. Unless you count buying the game
and the console to play on before the PC release and then buying the PC >release as well. But I didn't preorder either version.
Come to think of it, there are two more instances:
"Wing Commander III" and "Ultima IX: Ascension".
JAB <noway@nochance.com> writes:
One I found amusing was a opinion piece in a paper making all the
normal claims of how the younger generation was lazy, unintelligent,
would be the downfall of society etc. The catch ... it was a hundred
years old.
Yes. In fact, as I recall, it goes back to at least Socrates complaining about the same thing and he lived 470 – 399 BC.
Do we really want swathes of people thinking that the likes of Andrew
Tate make some good points and he's a intellectual?
I don't but for large swathes of people we're already there. And not
just young people.
It's a fun fantasy I have sometimes, what if there were a magical school system that makes everyone intelligent, analytical and mean? Meaning all bullshit artists and snake oil salesmen would just be ignored or
ridiculed and would have to do real work or starve.
On 2/7/2025 8:03 AM, Zaghadka wrote:
I guess what I'm really asking is does anyone here pre-order... and WHY?
Do you get anything out of it?
Nope, closest I've come is buying Fallout 3 on day 1, and I sure feel I >would've been better off waiting. I do have a lunchbox and bobblehead
for my trouble though as they only had whatever edition had those extras
at the Gamestop I bought it from.
On Tue, 11 Feb 2025 08:59:59 -0800, Justisaur <justisaur@gmail.com>2BvAoGJSGPq13tkTOcCWLX8SzqENh4QzGnLTlB8ugwdSN66jg4rUfHrfbrNRDE8WNxrk05PwmpVsnHDMk4a4wJ50WaLNWlX%2Fajiw6B7GT5ynYCCsw7dmjOuvc26YFWFMO59zibc7N6J9YPnPd%2BTrBVTUD%2BHWNNKqs3qYyfUl7Jr8zCQP2H7hHRDuo55%2FRpxFC9ulHWEu2EzXH5cGU1xGcdl0wga9r3LHgL4Kw8KfFk8OyN11i%
wrote:
On 2/10/2025 8:38 AM, Zaghadka wrote:
On Mon, 10 Feb 2025 08:35:56 -0800, in comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action,
Justisaur wrote:
On 2/7/2025 8:03 AM, Zaghadka wrote:
I guess what I'm really asking is does anyone here pre-order... and WHY? >>>>> Do you get anything out of it?
Nope, closest I've come is buying Fallout 3 on day 1, and I sure feel I >>>> would've been better off waiting. I do have a lunchbox and bobblehead >>>> for my trouble though as they only had whatever edition had those extras >>>> at the Gamestop I bought it from.
Please tell me it came in the lunchbox.
Looking up on ebay it seems it did, the lunchbox was contained in a
sleeve.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/286139393954?_skw=fallout+3+lunchbox&itmmeta=01JKTZ2CNSM7RKBHQE6FZPBTVZ&hash=item429f3ca7a2:g:L0gAAOSwhplnJP4C&itmprp=enc%3AAQAJAAAA8CodCO1vSDjg2xNOt8By6oDW4Nc%2FY9sSuu3Xc%2FltxObHheY5FnJmq3%
Yup. Still got mine in all it's near-mint glory. >https://i.imgur.com/m9wDHYz.jpeg
On Tue, 11 Feb 2025 11:52:14 -0600, Zaghadka <zaghadka@hotmail.com>
wrote:
On Tue, 11 Feb 2025 12:35:34 -0500, in comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action,
Spalls Hurgenson wrote:
Yup. Still got mine in all it's near-mint glory.
https://i.imgur.com/m9wDHYz.jpeg
Awesome! That bobble is very similar to the Fallout 4 "Charisma" bobble I
bought from the Bethesda store.
https://imgur.com/a/QlaiSdF
As far as I can tell, it's the exact same mold. Bethesda probably had
a bunch of 'em made and are still trying to get rid of the backlog.
Seeing as you already have the bobblehead, I'll let you have the
lunchbox for only a SIX FIGURE sum ;-)
On 2/12/2025 5:58 AM, Spalls Hurgenson wrote:
On Tue, 11 Feb 2025 11:52:14 -0600, Zaghadka <zaghadka@hotmail.com>$0.00001
wrote:
On Tue, 11 Feb 2025 12:35:34 -0500, in comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action,
Spalls Hurgenson wrote:
Yup. Still got mine in all it's near-mint glory.
https://i.imgur.com/m9wDHYz.jpeg
Awesome! That bobble is very similar to the Fallout 4 "Charisma"
bobble I
bought from the Bethesda store.
https://imgur.com/a/QlaiSdF
As far as I can tell, it's the exact same mold. Bethesda probably had
a bunch of 'em made and are still trying to get rid of the backlog.
Seeing as you already have the bobblehead, I'll let you have the
lunchbox for only a SIX FIGURE sum ;-)
I recently went to Epic to get my weekly freebie hit and was asked in a banner at the top of the page if I wanted to 'pre-order' Civ VII.
Why would anyone do that with Civ? Civ has a storied reputation for being unfinished at release and only being worthwhile when DLCs drop.
In this case, you get an extra Civ that isn't even an exclusive. You can
buy it in the Deluxe version. If I like a Civ game, I tend to eventually
buy all the add-ons.
It's also a general question for any game at all.
For competitive FPS, I get that you want to get to be part of the
community ASAP. Especially if you're a pro or semi-pro. Maybe for a
sports title too, as it's a seasonal thing and you might have a yen for
'live sports.'
But everything else? Why buy on day 0 when you can buy on day 1? Is it
really the ability to 'pre-download?' Is there value in being able to
click 'play game' the second the official release drops? How does this benefit anyone but the publisher?
I guess what I'm really asking is does anyone here pre-order... and WHY?
Do you get anything out of it?
I recently went to Epic to get my weekly freebie hit and was asked in a banner at the top of the page if I wanted to 'pre-order' Civ VII.
Why would anyone do that with Civ? Civ has a storied reputation for being unfinished at release and only being worthwhile when DLCs drop.
In this case, you get an extra Civ that isn't even an exclusive. You can
buy it in the Deluxe version. If I like a Civ game, I tend to eventually
buy all the add-ons.
It's also a general question for any game at all.
For competitive FPS, I get that you want to get to be part of the
community ASAP. Especially if you're a pro or semi-pro. Maybe for a
sports title too, as it's a seasonal thing and you might have a yen for
'live sports.'
But everything else? Why buy on day 0 when you can buy on day 1? Is it
really the ability to 'pre-download?' Is there value in being able to
click 'play game' the second the official release drops? How does this benefit anyone but the publisher?
I guess what I'm really asking is does anyone here pre-order... and WHY?
Do you get anything out of it?
On Mon, 10 Feb 2025 11:04:02 +0200, Anssi Saari
<anssi.saari@usenet.mail.kapsi.fi> wrote:
My other near addiction to a franchise has been GTA since Vice City but
I didn't preorder any of the titles. Unless you count buying the game
and the console to play on before the PC release and then buying the PC >>release as well. But I didn't preorder either version.
When you talk of 'franchise addiction' I immediately thought of Diablo
for me. I played the first three games to death. I never bothered
getting the fourth game though, so maybe my addiction has ended.
To bring my post back on topic, I have never preordered anything. I
just don't get the appeal of doing this.
On Fri, 07 Feb 2025 14:48:09 -0500, in comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action, Rin Stowleigh wrote:
On Fri, 7 Feb 2025 09:36:12 -0700, "rms" <rsquiresMOO@MOOflashMOO.net> >>wrote:
... but the Rockstar offering at the time was that you got immediate
access to a particularly good horse if and only if you bought straight
from the Rockstar store. That turned out to be one of the best
decisions I could have made, because that horse had particularly good >>performance characteristics that allowed me to win a lot of PvP races
in RDR2 online. Imagine the old motorcyle game "Road Rash" on
horseback... it is a tremendously fun game mode (or at least it was in
the first couple of years, not sure how active it is now). Horse
racing was one of the best ways to generate in-game currency, which is >>required to have any kind of fun in the game and it is harder to come
by in some games. So by winning lots of races I was able to build
wealth in less time, and that made the game more fun overall.
Hmm. I hadn't considered "pay to win." Is this a regular thing with pre-orders?
Zaghadka <zaghadka@hotmail.com> wrote at 19:58 this Friday (GMT):
On Fri, 07 Feb 2025 14:48:09 -0500, in comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action, Rin
Stowleigh wrote:
On Fri, 7 Feb 2025 09:36:12 -0700, "rms" <rsquiresMOO@MOOflashMOO.net> >>>wrote:
... but the Rockstar offering at the time was that you got immediate >>>access to a particularly good horse if and only if you bought straight >>>from the Rockstar store. That turned out to be one of the best
decisions I could have made, because that horse had particularly good >>>performance characteristics that allowed me to win a lot of PvP races
in RDR2 online. Imagine the old motorcyle game "Road Rash" on >>>horseback... it is a tremendously fun game mode (or at least it was in >>>the first couple of years, not sure how active it is now). Horse
racing was one of the best ways to generate in-game currency, which is >>>required to have any kind of fun in the game and it is harder to come
by in some games. So by winning lots of races I was able to build
wealth in less time, and that made the game more fun overall.
Hmm. I hadn't considered "pay to win." Is this a regular thing with
pre-orders?
With triple-a, I think.
Good thing too, I heard that the 4th game was microtransaction hell.
On Fri, 14 Feb 2025 06:00:04 -0000 (UTC), candycanearter07
<candycanearter07@candycanearter07.nomail.afraid> wrote:
Good thing too, I heard that the 4th game was microtransaction hell.
It is? Are you thinking of Diablo Immortal?
On Fri, 14 Feb 2025 06:10:03 -0000 (UTC), candycanearter07 ><candycanearter07@candycanearter07.nomail.afraid> wrote:
Zaghadka <zaghadka@hotmail.com> wrote at 19:58 this Friday (GMT):
On Fri, 07 Feb 2025 14:48:09 -0500, in comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action, Rin >>> Stowleigh wrote:
On Fri, 7 Feb 2025 09:36:12 -0700, "rms" <rsquiresMOO@MOOflashMOO.net> >>>>wrote:
... but the Rockstar offering at the time was that you got immediate >>>>access to a particularly good horse if and only if you bought straight >>>>from the Rockstar store. That turned out to be one of the best >>>>decisions I could have made, because that horse had particularly good >>>>performance characteristics that allowed me to win a lot of PvP races >>>>in RDR2 online. Imagine the old motorcyle game "Road Rash" on >>>>horseback... it is a tremendously fun game mode (or at least it was in >>>>the first couple of years, not sure how active it is now). Horse >>>>racing was one of the best ways to generate in-game currency, which is >>>>required to have any kind of fun in the game and it is harder to come >>>>by in some games. So by winning lots of races I was able to build >>>>wealth in less time, and that made the game more fun overall.
Hmm. I hadn't considered "pay to win." Is this a regular thing with
pre-orders?
With triple-a, I think.
I think the meaning of "pay to win" got lost in this discussion
somewhere.
Buying from the Rockstar store in that case didn't cost more than
anywhere else, so it was be more like "be cognizant to win"
(understanding what Rockstar was offering from the tradeoff to use
their game client instead of others). Horses that were equally as fast
could also be obtained in game.
So, while arguably a cheeky move on Rockstar's part, there was no pay
to win involved, and I certainly had no regrets. The online game of
that mode got more hours of my gaming time than any other game in the
last 15 years.
On 2/10/2025 1:54 AM, Anssi Saari wrote:
JAB <noway@nochance.com> writes:
One I found amusing was a opinion piece in a paper making all the
normal claims of how the younger generation was lazy, unintelligent,
would be the downfall of society etc. The catch ... it was a hundred
years old.
Yes. In fact, as I recall, it goes back to at least Socrates complaining
about the same thing and he lived 470 – 399 BC.
Do we really want swathes of people thinking that the likes of Andrew
Tate make some good points and he's a intellectual?
I don't but for large swathes of people we're already there. And not
just young people.
It's a fun fantasy I have sometimes, what if there were a magical school
system that makes everyone intelligent, analytical and mean? Meaning all
bullshit artists and snake oil salesmen would just be ignored or
ridiculed and would have to do real work or starve.
But that's SOCIALISM! (Or at least that's what the current US
President's minions in Congress would scream.)
It wasn't a game without merit.
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