What good is a street date if I can’t walk into a store and buy a game ON that date? What good is it if the stores themselves don’t physically get the game until days later? Why the fuck would every major retailer state that the “release date” for R6V2 is 3/18/08 when they know damn well that that’s the “shippping date” TO them. Stores won’t have the game until tomorrow, or at the very earilest, some advance copies tonight.
Sure, you can “order” or even “preorder” the game online. I could do that right now. I still won’t have it until tomorrow. The Walmart, Target, Circuit City, EB and Gamestop websites ALL say that the game was released yesterday. When you click to see their inventory however, it’s a completely different story. Walmart and Circuit City say “not available in store”. Target says it’ll be in the stores tomorrow and EB and Gamestop simply list the local stores stock as zero. The kicker is that in some places there are in-store only promotions. Circuit City for example, says litteraly the following:
Rainbow Six Vegas 2 – Preorder Now – Available 3/18/08
Not Available for In Store Pick-up
Limited Edition : Free gamer’s energy kit and fuzzy dice only available in-store.
Well, isn’t that nice. I can go get a copy, travel back in time and get a RedBull and fuzzy MF’ing dice.
Seriously. The street date for DVDs is the day that it’s printed. I Am Legend’s street date was 3/18. Was it in the stores last night? Yup.
Why can’t game publishers play by the same rules? A date is a date is a date. A game comes out on the 18th, then it needs to be in the backroom of stores by the 17th, ready to be put out the next morning.
I called Target this morning and talked to my guy and he told me they didn’t get the UPS shipment last night and that they usually get it by 4pm. To make matters worse, if you buy the limited edition at Target, you get a free $10 giftcard (probably since you won’t get any fuzzy dice), but they only have 20 to give out and they’re not supposed to give them out after 6pm. I know my guy will save me one, but still, that’s complete crap too. Retailers using the gayness of game publishing schedules as a lure is pretty shitty too. “Here, come get free shit if you get it early, which you can’t”. WTF?
… on the upside. I had a chance to finish Army of Two last night. Now it’s all R6 goodness from here on in…. once I track down a copy of course.
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