I will never ever pre-order a Game again. A Guide to no disappointment

[freighttrain]

I fail to see how any of this is a pre order issue. Have none of you bought a game without a pre order and been disappointed? All a preorder does is give you guaranteed access to a product when it launches. Most of the time you pre order from a middleman and those revenues do not make it to the game makers.

It seems to me this issue is more about buying bad games or having unrealistic expectations about said games. This is a typical PEBKAC problem and has nothing to do with bad developers.

[Luko]

I fail to see how any of this is a pre order issue. Have none of you bought a game without a pre order and been disappointed? All a preorder does is give you guaranteed access to a product when it launches. Most of the time you pre order from a middleman and those revenues do not make it to the game makers.

It seems to me this issue is more about buying bad games or having unrealistic expectations about said games. This is a typical PEBKAC problem and has nothing to do with bad developers.

Yeah don't bother. These types of threads are rarely logical and (as you can see) almost never stay on topic. Someone feels entitled enough to create an entire thread about his personal grievance while making sure to word it like it's some vast, easily relateable issue at which time (because there is no actual way to fuel a constructive discussion based on the biased OP vomit) it just spirals into debates about F2P and which MMOs are going to "fail."

[Quibble]

Age of conan OMFG gonna be so awesome >preorder >crap >> dead
TERA OMFG gonna be so awesome >preorder >crap > dead
SWTOR omfg this is so gonna be the best MMO EVER >preorder >crap > dead

I can agree with the first, but I personally I found both TERA and SW:TOR to be amazing, one due to the story and lightsabers, the other due to the unique combat style and BAM!

[StationaryHawk]

I'm not able to feel sorry for people wasting their money on pre-orders for every new MMO. There are people like the OP who praise every upcoming MMO to heaven without ever realizing those games are trash.

Age of conan OMFG gonna be so awesome >preorder >crap >> dead
RIFT OMFG gonna be so awesome >preorder >crap > dead
TERA OMFG gonna be so awesome >preorder >crap > dead
AiON OMFG So epic gonna bE THE next MMO >preorder >crap > dead game
SWTOR omfg this is so gonna be the best MMO EVER >preorder >crap > dead
LOTR MMO, OMG gonna be so the best MMO ever made >preorder >crap > dead
ESO OMFG this time for real, best MMO there will ever be >preorder >crap > dead
Wildstar OFMG but THIS time for real best MMO ever! >preorder >crap > dead

Ppl who don't get this pattern should lose money as a punishment for their weak mind

Except none of those MMOs are dead, and whether or not they're crap is too subjective to say.

I typically won't pre-order a game unless I've had the chance to play it (when it comes to MMOs). And if I do pre-order, I'm always fairly certain that I want to. Pre-ordering for me is rare, but I'm rarely disappointed when I do.

[Fortera]

You shouldn't spend money on something unless you're able to try it first.

[glycerethe]

I like people complaining about something they didn't even pay for.

[Thunderball]

It's very simple. If you preorder games based on hype - you are in for a disappointment. And I dont really get the ESO thing from you: it's very easy to try the game yourself and decide on your course of action.

[Gheld]

You shouldn't spend money on something unless you're able to try it first.

If the world had primarily smart consumers, you wouldn't walk into a store and see all the crappy over priced made in china shit that you see now a'days.

People would rather pay for something that hasn't been made yet and then save face after getting completely burned by saying "LEAVE THEM ALONE. THEY DID THEIR BEST AT MAKING THIS WONDERFUL PRODUCT. I WILL STAB YOUR FACE IF YOU TRY TO SUBMIT NEGATIVE FEEDBACK TO THE PRODUCTS CREATOR."

Soon when people are born, they will just have their organs removed and be hooked up to a life support machine. There will be one product called "the experience". Which will be the time you spend hooked up to life support.

[Dispraise]

Soon when people are born, they will just have their organs removed and be hooked up to a life support machine. There will be one product called "the experience". Which will be the time you spend hooked up to life support.

Phrased like that, that doesn't sound half bad. Would there be any pre-order bonuses?

[Valeron]

meh, just get a refund. I've never had anyone turn me down for one. Not a big deal.

[Rennadrel]

Some donkeys need to step on a ice more than once to realize that preoder is a bad idea in 95% cases. (kickstarter is not realy a preoder)

Considering I pre-order games frequently, it just shows how poor of judgment people have sometimes. I pre-ordered South Park: The Stick of Truth, love it, pre-ordered Yoshi's Island for the 3DS, loving it. I am going to pre-order Watch Dogs for the Wii U as well. I know what games I am buying when I order them. People pre-ordering MMO's are stupid though.

[Konker]

Pre-ordering is not bad, just understand what it is: Buying a game before playing it. Of course it is a setup for disappointment without being absolutely positive it's game you will enjoy. If a person judgement has fail them in the past, learn from it or just stop pre-ordering. It's fantastic for people who are pre-ordering a game they are sure to enjoy.

And to say the industry should focus on F2P and open trials is a bad idea. The discrepancy between large developers with capital to invest and small developers with no capital to invest is only becoming wider. To reduce options for developers to get capital is to reduce diversity in the marketplace.

[Faldric]

Rome 2, the last game I ever preordered.

I always considered it rather dumb to preorder and have not done it a whole lot, maybe 3-4 times. Usually just bought games where I liked the series.
But there seems to always be that point in time where all dignity gets thrown out of the window and publishers go full cashin with a series ruining it in the process.

So no preorders from me again.
Also this:
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/vide...red-Prescrewed

[Faldric]

To sum it up. I ordered something without doing enough research and now I am blaming the company for my mistake. I refuse to except any responsibility for my actions.

If every information out there is a blatant lie, how exactly do you make an elobarate decision?

[Edge-]

Naw, I'm good. Other than Defiance (Which I knew I'd regret pre-ordering but did so anyways), I haven't been disappointed by a pre-order in over half a decade.

[Deleted]

last pre-orders..

fire emblem, divinity original sin, space hulk, payday 2, lords of shadow, blackguards... non of those are disappointments. Will likely pre-order mario kart, dark souls II, and wildstar this month. I dont blame the games if youre disappointed by a pre-order...

[Jester Joe]

To sum it up. I ordered something without doing enough research and now I am blaming the company for my mistake. I refuse to except any responsibility for my actions.

Yeah, I think people fail to realize they can wait to pre-order until more information comes out about it.
Personally, every game I've pre-ordered I've never been disappointed with, except one...
Remember Me. And that was just because the controls. I could deal with Kid Icarus: Uprising controls, but not Remember Me.

last pre-orders..

fire emblem,

To add to this, if you didn't pre-order Fire Emblem and wanted a physical copy you were screwed due to massive shipping errors, so if you wanted to pick up a regular copy you'd have to wait a while. Not to mention the fact that you got a cool art book for not paying anything extra.

[Rennadrel]

Naw, I'm good. Other than Defiance (Which I knew I'd regret pre-ordering but did so anyways), I haven't been disappointed by a pre-order in over half a decade.

The only game I was burned on for pre-ordering was Duke Nukem Forever. But I think most people who bought it were as well. It was pretty bad to be honest.

[Deleted]

Preordering a game is always about trust. You trust that the publisher makes a great game. whether it is from past experience, from knowing the series or from watching promotional videos. The first two of these are okay. Past experience with the company shows if they have the ability to make games worth your money or not. Knowing the series is a hit or miss. Sometimes the next part of a series is just the same, only improved in certain points. And sometimes it's made by entirely different developers with entirely different ideas, turning the game into something you may or may not like (I had this problem with the Silent Hill series. While the first 3 were great, The room was not quite as good and homecoming was DOA.)
But if you believed the promotional videos and got fucked over because of that, you can ofc blame the developers (and you should!), but you are still partly responsible yourself. I mean, I know that my teeth won't give an audible 'pling' when a ray of light hits them, no matter how often I brush them with toothpaste X.

Now, if you got fucked over because the game was overhyped, you only have yourself to blame. Because you replaced the (possible constructed but oh well) evidence of the promotional videos with your own belief that the game will be good because everyone else says it will be good.
And while belief cannot move mountains, it CAN move mountains of cash, from us consumers over to the developers.

Btw, I never got fucked by preorders so far. Only games I preordered were Civ5 (which wasn't as good at the start as it was later, but by now it's more than it's money worth), SC2 (which was exactly like SC, just with prettier graphics) and D3 (not exactly preorder due to annual pass but w/e).
Other games I preordered were actually just ports from japan, so there were hundreds of gameplay videos on youtube long before it even hit the shelves. That's hardly buying a pig in a poke.

[Yriel]

I fail to see how any of this is a pre order issue. Have none of you bought a game without a pre order and been disappointed? All a preorder does is give you guaranteed access to a product when it launches. Most of the time you pre order from a middleman and those revenues do not make it to the game makers.

It seems to me this issue is more about buying bad games or having unrealistic expectations about said games. This is a typical PEBKAC problem and has nothing to do with bad developers.

The problem is that games often release very bugged (like BF4 or Rome2) and if people would wait a few days after launch and read the first reviews they would know that and maybe not buy the game. So this kind of disappointment is a preorder issue.
And the Publishers know this and actively try to get you to preorder their buggy games with all those exclusive stuff they give you for it. And thats a shitty business practice in my opinion. And it's sad that people still fall for it.