Stop Pre-Ordering Games!

Giving the publisher, or a developer, huge amounts of money before a game is even out is not good for the consumer. You are effectively giving away your hard earned money without knowing if the game is good or not. There are no advantages to pre-ordering a game anymore, you might get some extra content but is that worth the full price+ of the game before its quality is known? It really isn’t, especially if you’re even a tiny bit patient, you will likely get the DLC you missed out on with the myriad GOTY editions and re-releases that come out later on, sometimes mere months later.

There is no advantage whatsoever in this day and age of actually pre-ordering a game. You, as a consumer, don’t get anything that won’t be bundled up for sale later on. Money speaks volumes and the gifting of millions of dollars before launch says it’s alright for these companies to release broken or even bad games, the disastrous Battlefield 4 and Sim City launches being notable examples. Thankfully, the advent of Steam Refunds may have enough of an impact to dramatically reduce those types of game launches but we’ve seen this way too many times by now and it just needs to stop. We as consumers have all the power in the world, we can choose which companies we want to get behind. By not giving our hard earned money at launch, we will send a message that gamers will only accept the best from them.

The mess that pre-orders have created is also getting out of hand. When you need a huge map just to go over all the content different pre-order versions will get you, that is totally unacceptable. Just look at the example with Watch Dogs:

We’ve seen the deals they’re trying to push to lure people to buy it early, but, as we’ve stated, there’s no appreciable advantage to buying games on day 1. Any extra physical items will most likely be on sale on Ebay or Amazon within days of launch. With all of the broken games and patches that get added on release, the games are quite often not in a state that is acceptable. This toxic combination of bad business practices and cheap “bribes” has created an awful situation for consumers as a whole.

The solution is simple: Wait until the game is out and has been patched to a working state and the reviews are all updated to reflect its current condition, if you are satisfied then go get it. You can get the game cheaper, in working condition and often with more content if you’re patient. Unless the game is always online or has draconian DRM, it’s always going to be a gamble if you can even play it or not. For the most part though, the advantages of being patient far outweigh the short-sighted “advantages” pre-ordering a game can deliver.

Do you agree or disagree?

I mostly agree, but some cases are different. SE is gauging US interest in possible future Dragon Quest releases based on pre-orders and sales of the upcoming Dragon Quest Heroes for PS4, so I'm definitely pre-ordering that because I want localizations of DQ VII & VIII for the 3DS, and DQ XI for PS4 and 3DS.

You're a little late to the whole "stop pre-ordering" trend, honestly. I get where people are trying to say, but I don't like people trying to tell others what to do with their money. Nor do I think that pre-orders are all-that harmful. It's not like a game developer is going to be like "Well, we've already secured enough copies. Better stop trying to make our game better LOL". No. If a game has enough problems or is that bad to piss off enough people, then that's going to reflect on the sales numbers of the sequel or next iteration in the series. So it's just obviously bad for business if they just "stop trying" because one of their games has already sold enough.

Personally, I very rarely pre-order. The last game I pre-ordered was GTA V. I pre-ordered it because I had gift card money saved up and I figured I may as well use it so I can have the game day one. I know it's not necessary to secure a copy of the game day one. But if I know I'm going to want the game day one, why not just make the purchase ahead of time? I just don't see the big deal. I don't care when other people decide to buy their games. If the game has issues day one, then that sucks for them. I tend to wait a while before buying a game after it launches. But once again, it's not my concern as to what other people decide to do with their money.

No. I pre-order whenever I feel like it.

I don't pre-order for the special offers, ever. I couldn't care less about them. I treat pre-orders as a sort of layaway option when I can't pay for a game right away. If there are extras, fine, but I'm only doing it to slowly pay off a game I've been waiting for.

"You are effectively giving away your hard earned money without knowing if the game is good or not."

You are doing that regardless of whether you pre-order or not. There are no guarantees. Not pre-ordering may de-incentivize companies from holding back exclusive content, but it will have no say on the enjoyment of the game or the state that it's released in.

I'm pre-ordering less & less... I only really pre-order now if it's a special edition or something.

I have never even pre-ordered a game before. lol

@speedfreak48t5p: Same, however do sometimes pay for early access games on steam,

I agree, but I also disagree... I agree that companies are taking out more and more to sell later as dlc, but I disagree about the part where you think nobody should preorder a game.

No I disagree. I pre-order because there are obvious benefits to pre-ordering, e.g. limited stock (in the case of Xenoblade Chronicles in 2012) or a reduced price (in the case of Kingdom Hearts III and Uncharted 4 which I preordered for $40 last year). If there is something wrong with the game at time of release, then I'll return the game for a full refund (pre-ordering doesn't relinquish my rights to return the game or reverse a transaction that has never happened). I don't see the downside that video game enthusiasts harp on about. Extemporaneous content given as exclusives to pre-ordering to specific stores isn't really a deterrent because most of the content can be purchased at a later date and as said before most of it is an afterthought.

As someone who rarely buys games on release date and does wait months to years for a game to be less than $20, I'm glad pre-ordering is an option and would be extremely disappointed if that option no longer existed.

I never have. I never will.

I only pre-order specific games if I know that I'm going to love it, whether it comes from having played a demo/beta of it, or just having had great experience with the developers in the past.

For instance, this generation the only games that I've pre-ordered were Sunset Overdrive, Rare Replay, and I put 150$ towards the Yooka-Laylee Kickstarter which I guess technically counts.

This thread also reminded me to pre-order Xenoblade Chronicles X. If I hadn't pre-ordered the first one, it would end up costing me around $100 just to get it later on.

i pre-order all the time. It only costs me $5 and I can always transfer that $5 to something else if I end up not buying the game. In today's news cycle, I can usually gather the info I want on the game before I can actually pick it up, but getting in on some of the free perks is a limited window. I figure, no harm securing myself a bonus in the case that I actually follow through and purchase the game when committing to a preorder isn't really much of a commitment at all.

Now if you're paying full price before you ever see product with no chance at refunding that money, well...just gotta be smarter with your money.

One thing I've noticed is that usually the bigger the pre-launch bonus is, the worse the game.

It really depends on the price and the game/publisher: all games don't necessarily become cheaper soon after release (e.g., Ubisoft's do, while Activision's don't). And it may be worth pre-ordering expensive PS4 games rather than less costly PC ones, for instance, where I do get 20% off the release price when I reserve it early enough. So, when I'm *sure* a game interests me, why not placing a timely pre-order and having it the very launch day? There are other games I'm less interested playing asap and where I can wait for the price to lower, so I guess in the end my game purchases do compensate each other :[]

Never pre-ordered a game myself as there has never really been any real incentive for me to do so. If Tales of Zestiria reaches the 3rd pre-order goal on Steam and you get the Tales of Symphonia remaster free though I will be pre-ordering my first game. A free outfit or weapon etc. though? No thanks.

This is the correct answer. I however do a lot of research on the game first before I decide to pre-order to make sure know what I'm getting into and so far, it all pays off when digging more info. on a game before buy. That said, never ever do pre-order on digital console games if and only if you know for sure if this is the game you want and for me, I already pre-order Halo 5 Limited Edition cause it's the game I want to play on my Xbox One.

Agreed! I rarely if ever pre-oder, but that's based on a game by game case! Arkham Knight would be a perfect example for me.

It's the first game I pre-orderd in a loooooong time! I did enough research and knowing the developers history...I knew it was something I wanted on day1! I got the standard edition and it did come with a few extras but my main reason was to have it pre-loaded on my system.

Patience, very few of us have it. Only then will things begin to change.

I don't preorder games but if it's made by rockstar or naughty dog I buy it on day one.

I remember when pre-ordering got you free physical goods. It was an enticement to get one to purchase the game. Usually given when the game was paid for and picked up. I got a big plush Conker in leather army gear and smoking a cigar when pre-ordering Conkers Bad Fur Day on the N64. It was free! I got a neat metal (metal gear) notebook and dogtags when pre-ordering Metal Gear Solid. (the PS one). I got a Sonic anniversary CD and anniversary coin when preordering one of the Sonic games. I got a cool Castlevania timeline map and anniversary book, along with a DS cart case and extended Castlevania sylus for free when preordering Castlevania: Portrait of Ruin. Anyway, nowdays all you get is a digital weapon, clothes or maybe a DLC map (which they just pulled from the game). The only physical goods you get are by paying for the deluxe editions. What happened to the freebies to get you to buy? That's what it should be about. Otherwise I only pre-order if I think a game might not be widely available and I want it day one. That just ensures I get my copy. Other than that, what is the point?

I agree that pre ordering games is not good for the consumer. I rarely pre-order games except on some instances. Such as Rodea The Sky Soldier Which is to be released in October 2015. By pre-ordering you get an extra game. The original Rodea the sky soldier game that was made for the Nintendo Wii. Which was finished but never released in 2012 because the Nintendo Wii U was about to be released in November 2012. By 2012 the original Wii was dead with no games released in the later part of 2012. So instead a Rodea the Sky Soldier game was made for the Nintendo Wii U starting from scratch resulting in a new game.

So 2 different versions of this game exist. The only way to get the 2 versions is to pre order. So that is what it did. But I don't pre order games usually as it does encourage developers to rush release broken games such as Battlefield 4 which was broken at release.

Well that's kinda a special case there, i am more refering to the games that offer shitty DLC as incentive

I would like to second this, fully agree with it and make a case for the DQ version of Theatrhythm as well.

I am not telling anyone not to buy any game, all i am waiting for is to wait a week to see if the game actually delivers what it promised. You can not trust a game to be finished these days. Unity, Halo MCC, Driveclub, Simshitty, Diablo, GTA V Online, etc. They stopped fixing Arkham Origins as an example. Your logic is flawed, because you can not get a refund for that game, so the money is already gone and people get screwed.

So what is so hard to wait a week?

What? If I pre-order and don't open the game, then I can return the game. If I pre-order and later decide to cancel the pre-order, then I can get a refund (if there was even a charge to begin with). Most online retailers don't charge you until the game has shipped.

I preorder not because I´m hoping for a bonus, I preorder because in my case is the way I can get the game in easy, interest free, small payments I can do every week.

@The_Last_Ride: You're kind of missing my point because you're still trying to tell people when they should spend their money. I just don't like how preachy this comes across, which is why I've always had a problem with the "no pre-order" movement. But for what it's worth, I think that's a very reasonable approach to buying games- waiting a little while to see how others, such as reviews, think about the game, especially as far as any possible issues go. I don't know if it's already been mentioned, but you're always taking a risk when purchasing a game because you don't know how much you will personally like the game unless you had a chance to play it before.

I'm not a fan of business tactics like pre-order bonuses and what have you, but I don't let those sort of things affect me. I buy games when I feel I'm ready to buy them, and I don't give a care in the world what other games people buy and when they buy them.

Nope. I pre-order only when I feel like the developer or publisher has earned my trust.

Right now, there are only two companies I trust that much with my money, Atlus and Nintendo, and barring a catastrophic failure on the level of maybe The Order 1886 or something, nothing will make me lose faith in them, and stop pre-ordering their games.

few games are always worth pre ordering , like uncharted , metal gear solid. but when it comes to this gen games, yes i think that pre ordering is a bit problematic,few games are being released even before completing, so many bugs in them which is making em unplayable.

but still i pre ordered the metal gear solid 5 the phantom pain :)

@The_Last_Ride

While I generally agree against pre-ordering, I think the whole pre-order thing needs to be taken with a grain of salt.

I believe that 95% of the time, people should avoid pre-order. Most pre-order bonuses are not worth the risk of pre-ordering; and devs and publishers get too comfortable once pre-order numbers are high enough. So in some sense, in most cases, the more pre-orders is equal to lower quality. And we have seen this with several games over the past year (e.g. AC Unity generally and Arkham Knight on PC).

But, there are those few instances where pre-orders are justified. I will use a personal example to explain this (although i don't own an Xbox One so it's not an option to me). I'm a huge Fallout fan. Fallout 3 has been one of my favorite games of all time. However, I could only play so much Fallout 3 since when I was young I had a mediocre PC with no dedicated graphics card; the graphics were terrible, accompanied by low framerate and in-game lag. So at some point I had to give up on Fallout 3. So, if I owned an X1, I would have had ordered Fallout 4. I wouldn't have pre-ordered Fallout 4 for the sake of pre-ordering it, but because the bonus to pre-ordering is good enough to topple the risk included (I would be getting a full game with most bugs ironed by now as a bonus). In this case, the worst case scenarios are: (1) Fallout 4 would be very buggy on release, but I can enjoy Fallout 3 for a good month until updates start rolling out or (2) Fallout 4 would suck (albeit doubtful) but I would have still gotten Fallout 3 (true, at a $60 price instead of, let's say, it's $20 current price). The latter, to me, is a calculated risk: chance of F4 sucking, in my opinion and based on Bethesda's Fallout 3, Bethesda's E3 show and Bethesda's other games, is 5% (give or take). This translates to my risk having an "impact" of $3 ($60 * 5%). So, based on my rusty knowledge of risk management, by getting Fallout 3 for free, I'm theoretically saving $17 (if it's current price is $20).

Again, risk taking, while calculated, is partially gambling. If F4 is great, then I would have saved $20 as is, if I'm so unlucky I fall in the "%5 chance of game sucking", then I would have been $40 down the drain. But again, it would have been a calculated risk with the overall impact's odds on my side.

Now, purely specific to how I buy my games, I'm one of the people who do the opposite of pre-ordering. I buy games late (usually). How late I buy them depends on the nature of the game. I buy multiplayer games a few months after release, while I buy singe-player games sometimes years after release. I like to wait for me to finish the current games in my library that I haven't finished, wait for bugs to get ironed out of newer games, get lucky with sales and price drops and buy GOTY editions or such.

~ Deut

As I stated before, pre-order is a good way to support some games and some studios and also a good way to invest. At the end it is similar to stock. Of course it could be risky but most of the time a good tittle can be predict in the trailer and predict good because of the studios that make it.

@gmak2442

Honest question, though: how much would preorders support a game? From what I've seen, pre-orders usually launch around 6 months before game release. By then, shouldn't the game be locked down and at the bug-fixing stage?

I do approve of the idea of supporting trustworthy devs and publishers, but giving my question above, is it worthwhile?

~ Deut

I agree with some of the points made regarding the risk of buying something which is rubbish but I still preorder some games if the additional content/ hard bonuses I feel are worth it (besides, I rarely go back to games after I have played them so waiting for pre order bonuses to come out later anyway is no big deal in my book).

I agree that pre-ordering is an unhealthy temptation that people seem to give in to. The only reason they do it is because other people do it, and that is a terrible motivation.

I never pre-order. But I certainly appreciate all of you who do.

The only game i've ever pre-ordered was Ultima IX Ascension back in 1999, and it ended up being the most buggy unplayable games i've owned. I should have waited for reviews. Never again, no matter what extra things they claim you will get will i do a pre-order again.

The newest Batman games dlc is quite the scam. I saw a playthrough of the Harley story dlc yesturday, and it took less then 8 minutes to finish. How do you make a 8 minute long expansion and think you can sell it to people?

@deuterium:

Very good point. I did not know or though that pre-order was only 6 month before release.

So than I'm not sure if it could give support.

They aren't. I preordered Uncharted 4 which is more than a year away and I've preordered Kingdom Hearts 3 which is multiple years away from being released.

Well I can't tell if it can support the dev and studios than...

It's not a finalized sale, so the only way it could help developers is allowing publishers to gauge the market's interest and possibly expand budgets or as stated before indicate whether they should bother releasing the series in the future in other territories.

@gmak2442: But if you do it on Amazon or Bestbuy.com, then you don't pay a dime until release and can cancel anytime. Only at Gamestop and BestBuy in store do you have to put 5 bucks down. The advantage of Best Buy is pre-order online for instore pickup, you don't get charged until your pickup and they keep it for you for a week or two as well. If you just don't pick it up your order is cancelled and your not charged anything. Gives you enough time to decide if you want the game and get any pre order bonus's plus the gamers club rewards. And with both if you don't open it up right away you can return the game if your unsure about it. Best Buy gives you gamers club perks so that's an additional incentive if your part of that.

i never said you couldn't

Your thread title says otherwise. Also your entire first post is basically trying to convince people to stop pre-ordering games.

I don't remember those expansion packs for the Mona Lisa - where they specific to the States?

I disagree and i will pre-order games if i find it to be worth the cost.

Do some games come out broken and horrible, sure ubisoft proves that almost every release and so did Rocksteady who royally messed up their Batman, but the reason for that is not because some people pre-ordered the game, its because of shit management and people in charge who knows jack shit about game development and just look at numbers.

Having to decide whether or not I'll get Fallout 4 at launch.

It's a HUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUGE decision because I'm a MASSIVE fan, but if I'm very patient then I can get the complete edition with all or most of the major bugs ironed out.

And let's face it, there WILL probably be substantial bugs for at least a few months after release.

I only do it for Collectors Edition, like stuff with an awesome statue