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Pre-ordering + exclusive content = total dick move

Article written by KatanOmega on 5/20/09
Last edited on 5/20/09

As the Gaming Industry grows, and the revenues for retailers soar. Executives that have probably never picked up a controller sit behind their desks and think of new and interesting ways to separate you from your hard earned cash.

Their first idea was the pre-ordering itself. The use of pre-ordering is not evil. It is actually a very good way to track how many copies of a certain game you might need upon release. The evil little bastards in their towers made of money figured out that the customer should get the honor of paying five dollars to help the Game Stops, EB Games, Best Buy, Wal-Mart, etc........ with their inventory. That is essentially what we are doing. The Developers do not get a cut of any pre-order income at this point, it is all straight profit for the retailer. Most retailers do not even use this system to track how many copies they need anymore, they will always order enough to make sure everyone gets their game most times.

Then came the pre-ordering gifts. Publishers, desperate to get a better idea of how their game is going to sell and give people more of an incentive to buy their game offer extra incentives for pre-ordering their games at certain locations. These would come in the form of beta keys, trinkets, t-shirts, etc. Most gamers are younger and the thought of something extra coming with their five dollar pre-order sounds very appealing. The system here falls apart at the point of sale. More and more we are not getting our promised tchotchke, or we are told that we will receive a beta key in our email that we never receive. Or we are just flat out told "Sorry, we do not have any. Would you like to pre-order Madden 2010 today!"

All of these tactics used by retailers are shitty, but I also believe that a informed consumer is a smart consumer so if you are participating in any of these practices by pre-ordering games and get burned you have only yourself to blame.

Now that we got all that out of the way, we can get to the fucking purpose of this article. Developers designing content and putting it in game while making deals with retailers for exclusive rights to that content all in an attempt to get a piece of that pre-order pie is the biggest dick move in history. Let's not get into the fact that it makes me ashamed of the gaming industry as a whole. I used to think that while still a business, the gaming industry was not inherently evil like so many other leading industries. We let the vultures in though and now we have come to this. Selling people unlock codes to features and items on a disc that they already own. If you buy anything, especially anything with a fucking $60.00 price tag, it is yours to do with as you please. Telling people that while they paid for the game they have no right to use certain content in the game because they did not pre-order at the right retailer is a dangerous precedent. We are seeing the lines being pushed even further with developers jumping on the bandwagon and charging for multiplayer modes, YEAH FUCK YOU CAPCOM!

Even though this will fall on deaf ears, and most of you will still get a chubby at the thought of the shiny-shiny new armor, bfg, or exclusive content your going to get for pre-ordering at your local Gestapo Stop. It is my greatest wish that those of you out there with a brain will read this and not participate in these companies clever ruse. I'm not saying do not buy the game, but be smart enough to realize that pre-ordering is unnescesary, and that your paying for content you already own. Today I have a better idea of why a pirate does what he does, and that is sad.

BTW, if you have a local independent Video Game retailer in your area, FUCKING SUPPORT THEM! Well as long as they are not assholes anyway.

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