Can anyone help me understand why there are kids lined up/camping out in front of the Nintendo flagship store in NYC, weeks in advance? Don't they have school? I don't get it - is this game worth waiting in line for weeks? Is there some benefit?

@hawk456: To be a part of something big? I don't know; seems irresponsible for parents to allow their kids to do that.

I hadn't heard of anyone lining up yet. Seems a bit odd, but I do suppose it's only a week away. I guess these people are taking a little vacation to celebrate something they care about. The Pokemon fandom is still rather large, and hardcore fans will go to some great lengths in their devotion to it.

Maybe it's like Willy Wonka and there's a golden ticket in some of the retail packages. If someone gets one of these golden tickets they get wisked off to NIntendo Land by the one and only Shigeru Miyamoto. There they will spend days upon days playing all the latest and hottest Nintendo WiiU games such as... such as...

Weeks in advance? Are you saying that it isn't coming out within the next three days?

Delivery truck heists maybe?

Wait, it's coming out in three days? Where at?

Maybe I've gone crazy, but I've heard/seen rumblings that certain retailers are going to start selling the game this weekend. I'm totally skeptical about the whole thing, but I couldn't be bothered to look any further into it. As hype as I am for Pokemon Y, I'm not bout to line up with the Pokemon fandom a week in advance.

Think of all the EV trainers that're gonna be there.

Nowhere. It's out on the 12th worldwide.

Yeah...Nintendo has to stick to their weird weekend release schedule for all first party releases.

Okay, so VGK was just boldly misleading me! The fiend!

Yep! And I'm out of town that weekend so....shit. Hopefully I can find the time to get to a Best Buy or something and get my copy.

Their friend's cousin's dad's coworker's son's friend told them the game would be releasing early for the first 10 people.

Because video games drive people to do crazy irrational things in support of their hobby. Also, hype.

I was going to say it might be cool to camp in front of a store for a day and play some pokemon or whatever, but then I remembered that most people who like Pokemon are children, and I don't want to be the one adult at the Pokemon store who doesn't have a kid. Anyways shame on any parent who would let their kid camp in front of a store for a week. It's not like there will be a shortage or anything, they should be in school.

Lining up way in advance is almost always extremely stupid (the only exception being console launches with limited supply) because they are never going to run out of a game, same with iphones. When you can just walk into a store day of launch of buy the product with no hassle whatsoever, it seems incredibly dumb to waste days beforehand sleeping outside a store.

heh. If it makes you feel any better, most of the people lined up in New York for Pokemon X and Y are in their twenties. And apparently, the 15 year old there is still going to class for a few hours and then returning to his spot for the rest of the day.

Some dudes got leaked copies already, screenshots of mega evolutions and new pokemon are popping up everywhere.

@dystopiax: I'm aware of the leaks, but I'm talking about additional retailers getting into the mix. A quick search on the web has led me to believe that a number of stores in Canada and Italy will be breaking the street date.

Pretty sure they were lined up for Wind Waker HD. They had some sort of event for the game yestreday at Nintendo World.

At least one of the leaks said he got his copy from a retailer, no way to know if thats true though

What stores in Canada? I need to get my fix asap. Plus I'm having a competition with a friend to see who gets to the elite four and beats them first.

All these guys getting leaked copies need to start telling us all the version exclusives so I can decide which one to preorder, it can't be just the legendaries and like 3 others like it says on every site that are version exclusive.

Any sightings of Triforce camping out?

So you think they have nothing better to do? Does Nintendo do some special give-aways to these people? The weather has been pretty nice but I still don't get it.

I was gonna get X as soon as I saw the version legendaries, Mewtwo X and Charizard X just make my decision that much better.