Like a lot of people I am jumping up and down like a 6-year-old with a full bladder and a sugar high on Christmas morning with impatience for this game. To the extent where I might put in my first pre-order ever.

I was wondering - I have never used Amazon before - do their deliveries usually arrive on the day advertised? Do they ever come early?(I live in London if this makes a difference)

Do people think will get the game earliest by ordering through Amazon or going to a Midnight Launch?

(I have never been to a Midnight Launch before either - are they fun or just a lot of nerds standing in the cold?)

I pre-ordered The Last of Us via Amazon Prime and it came on launch day. Pretty sure they guarantee launch day for Prime pre-orders. Not sure if you don't have Prime, probably still get it on launch day if you order it early enough.

Amazon UK aren't nearly as reliable as their US counterpart is -- not without Prime anywhoo. They never arrive early for one thing, but regarding online retailers, I think that's a no-go regardless of which you use. Something about Rockstar demanding that the game is to not be sent out early or something.

I've always used shopto anywhoo. They're not as God-Tier as they used to be--regarding discounts and delivery speeds I mean--but they've served me well for a good long while all the same.

Midnight launches are alright. The last one I went to probably had 350 people and there is usually some interesting conversation among the people in the crowd. I showed up at 10 to midnight and stood in line for an hour and a half though. I'll probably go to the local midnight launch. The work season for me ends on the 15th so I got nothing else going on.

What made them God-Tie?. As far as prices go they are a lot more expensive than Amazon (£34.99 vs 42.85, hilariously ShopTo say that you are getting 22% off - was £54.99!!! Wut? May as well say it was £85.70 and its now half price) although this is no doubt because Amazon pay no fucking tax.

I think I might go to my local Game near Shoreditch and see what they are saying about their midnight launch - if it is guarranteed that I will get a copy I quite fancy seeing what the crack is.

Usually I can find some little shop which will sell the game early and sometimes CEX have games before street date, but R* seem pretty keen that no-one gets it early.

@leebmx: They often used to have games sometimes up to £10 cheaper than everywhere else, and they'd sometimes even send your game off three days earlier. I actually received Resident Evil 6 four days earlier than even the US release date. Which... OK, it's RE6 so it's not the best example, but the quality of the game itself is besides the point :P Unfortunately that's not the case anymore, and like you pointed out, Amazon are suddenly much cheaper by comparison for some reason.

Still, I've used shopto long enough that I'm a gold member, so I get £2-£4 back in credit. Plus they're still pretty good with the preorder bonuses, and will sometimes send me an extra DLC code besides the preorder bonus. Just recently they sent me a free code for that Presidential Costumes pack for SRIV for example. That, and I'll 9 times out 10 still get my game arrive on a Thursday.

Midnight launches can be fun. I've gone to a bunch with my friends even though my Amazon order was already placed. Very reliable launch day deliveries here in Chicago.

Yeah I'm actually a little bit curious to see what it would be like. My local would be right near the business part of the City of London so I don't know how busy it would be. What game was the last one you went to?

Also was nosing your biog - what job do you get to sit on a bench and read? Do they need anyone to open a franchise in London?

@yummylee: That does sound good I wonder why there service and prices have changed so much. It's a shame, there's something about getting a keenly anticipated game early which makes me feel I have just blagged my way into the VIP room of a club or something. Pathetic but true.

I'm going to a midnight launch, held by a pretty small local game store. It's my first one as well. Could be fun!

amazon uk are offering free first class delivery on all preorders (which they claim guarantees release day deliveries) considering youre in london odds are your chances of it arriving on release day are higher, that and from what I have read up about it (I did some research before i put my preorder in to amazon) it seems like their first class postage does arrive on the date. I remember Game being really quick with preorder deliveries, usually arriving the day before on most games (borderlands 2 and the last of us came that way) and my small ass town has a midnight launch but I have work they day after so feel it would be somewhat pointless to get it midnight, look at the box and go "ooh" before i have to go to sleep

The last midnight launch I went to was actually GTA IV. My city is small so there aren't a whole lot of midnight releases (or things open at midnight in general) and I don't play Call of Duty so there hasn't really been anything since GTA IV that I had enough interest in to go to a midnight release for.

My job is one of those jobs that wouldn't exist if unions didn't create pointless jobs to create more workers to grow the unions. I watch fishermen and fish plant workers weigh fish and then I fill out a form for the government. Basically the fishermen and fish buyers can't trust each other to tell the other accurate weights and the government can't trust either of them to tell them accurate figures so they need a third party to watch. Even if I have 10 minutes of work I get paid for 4 hours minimum, but they want me to stay at the wharf for those 4 hours in case another boat comes. So a lot of the time I'm sitting in my truck at the beach getting paid and I read or play video games. Other times I spend 12 hours standing in the freezing rain.

The down side to the job is that you are on call 24 hours, 7 days a week during the fishing season. You don't know if you'll have work on any given day until you get a call and you won't know if you have a day off until the day is over. Also, in the fall you might end up in court as a witness against the fishermen or fish buyers that you regularly work with.