Pre-orders

[Noobc0re]

What do you think of pre-orders?

Which camp do you fall into?

The "Never pre-order!" camp?

The "Oh, I usually don't pre-order...but I can trust this dev..." camp?

or the "I don't have a problem with pre-orders." camp?

[Turnikman228]

I pre-order only those games which I care for and whose devs I like. I pre-ordered HATRED and 20+ hours played later, no regrets. Love it. If World War 3 had a preorder option, I would have done it too.

[Sirgeorge]

I have never preordered in my life. The logical case for it and against it are simple enough. The case for preordering primarily falls in two general groups. One is that it is convenient and two is that it benefits you in some way. The first group is easy enough to explain. In a world where we are constantly seeing a stream of opportunities run by us every day which causes us to be overwhelmed with the choices in front of us (this is called the paradox of choice). Preordering early is an easy way to overcome the issues with the paradox of choice. In essence, it takes the thinking out of deciding when to get your entertainment by simply getting the first thing that you see that strikes you well and since that first impression is when the game is nowhere near out yet you do the next best thing and preorder.

The second group of benefits for preordering is the extra benefits group. Modern business practice in the gaming space is to use preorder numbers as an early indicator for success. Since launch day/period is the best time for sales by far, the only way to get that kind of data early would be through preorders. How this benefits you is that it tells the company that you are buying a game from that the specific game they are offering is worth expanding on in future. Thus, they plan sequels and DLC, for the future, early. It means more content sooner rather then later, and if you participate in preordering but choose not to participate in a specific preordering for a game or another, you signal the opposite; that they shouldn't bother with further expansions or sequels and should dedicate resources to other games that would be better worth playing.

Obviously there are potential issues with the logic above that can result in these strategies backfiring. After all, you don't know what a game will be like before you play it and making that judgement call on first impressions can mean you make the wrong call if you don't like the future product. This can either mean you've signaled to the company wrongly that you won't want to buy the game and they should spend future resources elsewhere which results in delays when you decide to change your mind based on reviews rather then first impressions. This can also mean that you are stuck with a game you deeply regret preordering and aren't able to refund it. While this second point is changing slowly due to changing political shifts in the consumer rights section; preordering now can result in lost money on a poor game for you. This is the case against preordering.


TL;DR: It depends. I've never done it before.. Read above for more details.

[JackofTears]

That's one nice thing about Steam's 2 hour refund policy, at least you can get a feel for the game before committing to it. Unfortunately, I'm seeing more and more games pack its best gameplay into the first couple hours in order to combat that.

[NorthernNikki]

I don't pre-order. I'm not against them in principle, but I want to see some reviews from people I trust before I jump. I have bought pre-orders before, back when I had more faith in developers. Now, not so much.

[Valkenr]

Pre-order is now "Early purchase incentives" If they're good enough, and I know the dev well enough, I'll pull the trigger.

Pre-ordering used to be necessary when the market was younger, and launch stocks were limited. If you wanted to play Pokemon day 1, where I was, you had to pre-order, or maybe be there when the doors opened. Downloads killed that when bandwidths were commonly fast enough, especially when pre-loading pre-orders started.

I'll pre-order from developers I trust, if I ever do again, and they are few and far-between these days. CDPR and Nintendo are basically the only two publishers I would consider pre-ordering from. But there's no reason to do it without an incentive, and those all get packaged into "collectors editions" these days.

What I, and what "kids these days" consider a pre-order are completely different now.

[Flubbbs]

I only pre-order games I know will be good.

Resident Evil 2 Deluxe Edition

Kingdom Hearts III

RE is my favorite franchise so that's why ive got it and I've had my KH pre-order since early 2014 lol.

[TakahiroSama]

I'm definitely in the "never pre-order" camp.

[MadMummy76]

If i'm sure that a game is for me, then I make it my mission to avoid even the slightest spoilers about it, that means I don't even watch official release trailers, so reviews are out of the question.

So yeah, I regularly pre-order games. What difference does it make if I pay a month before release or 1 day after?

And most third party key sellers discount games regularly even before launch. I haven't paid more than 50 for a game for a very long time even with pre-orders. If I pay more then it is for the deluxe edition with season pass included.

I don't pre-order because of the included pre-order bonus weapon skins, or exclusive items, those are usually completely worthless clutter. I pre-order for the sake of convenience. And to get the game as early as possible.

[MarsBorn]

I think for me it largely depends on the game. I've been burned twice this year and am growing much more skeptical.

[Tago]

It depends. If it comes with quality stuff, like CD, artbook or such.
Of course, a company like Bethesda who misleads their consumers recently, and it's well known, I will never trust them again until they redeem themselves. If it's Nintendo, I know their pride is on the line, so I feel 80% sure that they won't mislead me off.

Edit: Besides that, wait for a sale especially those who have a little time. Unless if it's in limited quantity and if you desire it greatly, of course, you already have it!

[TheMightyWyvern]

I pre order the games I am excited for, I like pre ordering because it makes saving up for games easy

[zeorhymer]

I used to when they gave neat stuff for the pre-orders. Now it's all forgettable virtual items, so no, I never pre-order.

[Sylentmoogle]

Mostly don't pre-order, but there are some I do pre-order for. Mario, Zelda, Smash Bros. Basically, any of Nintendo's 1st part games have earned enough trust with me that I feel comfortable with pre-ordering them. For everyone else, I need to see some reviews.

[ryvrdrgn14]

I'd only pre-order something if I want to pick up a physical copy and there is actually a risk of supply running out before I get to the store or if I really want to support whatever is I'm pre-ordering. Neither of that is going on right now and it's much more interesting to see how a launch goes before getting something.