Which game / fiasco caused you to stop pre-ordering?

In moments of weakness I'd still pre-order occasionally, until No Man's Sky. That cut wounded me deep enough that I'll never pre-order again. Which game was it for all of you?

I don't think I've pre-ordered anything in a long time, mostly just because we exist past the realm of time where not pre-ordering might mean that you didn't get the physical copy of the game due to GameStop not ordering enough. Now that that's no longer an issue with digital downloads I honestly can't remember the last time I actually did pre-order something. The bonuses just don't ever seem to be worth it to me.

Nothing has changed for me. I still pre-order games I know I'm going to buy day 1. (Especially now that I can save like $20 with Amazon Prime, it's more than just a minor convenience.) I almost always wait until within a few weeks of release to pre-order though, so I have plenty of time to do my research.

Even after like 15-20 years of buying games I've never felt truly burned by a game I've pre-ordered. Honestly, I find I have regretted buying games I've bought during sales long after release far more often.

It was that one time... a long time ago... when some game I pre-ordered came out, Gamestop called to tell me it was in store, I stopped off on my way home from work that same day... and my copy was not there... it had been sold to someone else and they told me it would be a few days before resupplies came in.

Also, the person they sold my copy to was someone that didn't preorder the game.

Also, fuck Gamestop, always.

Yeah, No Man's Sky. I hardly ever pre-order, but I was so pumped for that game I just couldn't help myself at the time. Then the reviews came out.

Cancelled that pre-order and that was the last time I ever pre-ordered a game*

*unless it's the occasional Nintendo first party title on the Switch and I get a $12 discount on Amazon. I don't count those.

I don't pre order games. If I want a game on day one, then I will go buy it on day one.

Resident Evil 6. I still remember sitting in my Music History class in college and seeing the scores for that game come in before immediately frantically cancelling the preorder. Now I don't preorder unless I'm 100% sure I want the game regardless of its quality (which is honestly the only right strategy for preordering anyway)

I still preorder from PSN. I only buy digital and I usually preorder so I can pre-load a game. I don't usually care about bonuses, I just want to pre-load so I can play the game asap.

I don't know if I can blame any game for me not pre-ordering anymore, I just stopped seeing the need to. However, if I was to point my finger at any game, it would be Halo 2 or Perfect Dark Zero cause those are 2 garbage games I pre-ordered and had zero fun with.

I don't remember actually, but at some point in the last few years I snapped and I have a very low tolerance to that bullshit now. I didn't pre-order No Man's Sky but hearing the complaints of others was quite vindicating. Full disclosure though, I bought NMS one year after release, after their big update, in a PSN sale for like $20 and I had a pretty good time with it.

Steam refunds have gone a long way to mitigating the risks of pre-ordering so if it's on PC then it's not a big deal for me, but also broadband internet is fast enough now (for me at least) that I can download an 80gb game in about 20 minutes (true story). So there's little harm in me waiting and then just buying whatever I want digitally immediately after reading a review. I remember I used to have to order my games on Amazon so that I could get them delivered on the morning of release, but that isn't an issue so much any more.

I think shitty business practices/microtransactions have also recently jaded a lot of players, especially where online games are concerned. As games are increasingly no longer a finite cost, I think a lot of people are resistant to preorder a game before they fully know how much time/money they're going to have to invest to play.

It was Fallout 4 for me. I fully convinced myself that there's no way I'd regret pre-ordering because... it's Fallout and it's Bethesda. That taught me it doesn't matter what the game is or how high profile the developer, any game can disappoint you.

I still pre-purchase the odd game here and there but only on Steam so you're covered with refunds.

I've never preordered a game, ever. It just never made sense to me to pay $5-$10 for a reservation for something I don't know for sure that I'll want. And these days, with all the games I buy being digital, it truly doesn't make sense. There are no shortages, I can buy the moment a game comes out, if I ever want to (which I might, if I'm really interested and was just waiting on reviews to hit).

Spore, which was the No Man's Sky of its day.

I only pre-order on PSN and only a day or two before whatever game I wanna play comes out. But that’s only if reviews come out and it sounds like something I know I’ll enjoy. I could care less about pre-order bonuses. I also just have a list of companies I’ll only buy games for half the price because of shitty business practices, like say Warner Bros. When I found out about the microtransactions in Shadow of War, I decided it was a game I’ll buy for $30 or less. Vote with your wallet and all that. Besides, I have a huge backlog as it is and am busy enough to not really feel like I’ll miss out on a game if I decide I won’t be pre-ordering it.

RE6

I will only preorder something I already know I'm going to buy, and I'll typically wait until the last possible second to do it. As a result I only preorder 1-2 things a year. The digital preload of something you're really excited to play is nice, though with the way most things launch (ie a technical mess) it's getting less and less worth it.

I don't think it was any one occurrence, I just started pre-ordering less and less until I stopped doing it, especially for physical copies. The last pre-order I remember putting money down for was Pokemon X and Y, though there may have been one or two digital releases I pre-ordered a day before release to pre-load. At one point I was pre-ordering a lot as a reaction to limited print runs - who wants to run around the city trying to find a copy of Halo 2 or San Andreas? But as companies have gotten more savvy with their physical distribution, and embraced digital, it became less of a needed thing. Then, tack on all of the very negative and gross pro-pre-order culture shit that started to show up like pre-order bonuses, Gamestop fiending over you putting your money down weeks or months in advance, etc. It made me very jaded, in a good way, to what pre-ordering was doing to the medium.

I very very rarely preorder games. It wasn't any one game that soured me on it, I just don't see the need to really. I only do it now with Nintendo first party stuff that I know I want like Super Mario Odyssey. Their games never come down in price it seems, so getting that sweet 20% discount on a game I was sure was going to be great seemed worth it.

I like preloading and I like saving 20% and getting launch day shipping on physical games from Amazon. If I know I'm going to buy a game day 1 I will do one of those two things, and I can't say I've ever felt burned. Even with notable disappointments of the past year like Destiny 2 and Mass Effect Andromeda, I don't regret buying and playing those games at launch in the slightest.

To be clear, I don't pre-order every game I have a passing interest in, but for those handful of games a year I know with certainty I want to play at launch, pre-ordering just makes sense from a convenience and monetary perspective. Until someone can make a compelling argument against saving 20% or playing the second a game unlocks at midnight, I don't see the problem with pre-ordering. I know myself and I know whether I'll like a game or not, and honestly it's funny to see so many people saying "reviews are pointless these days, make up your own mind" and then also see people saying "never pre-order, wait for reviews!"

Obviously it's not all the same people expressing these sentiments, but if I know my own interests and know I want to play and will enjoy a game, no one should have a problem if I lock in that purchase before the game releases to save some money or to play the game as early as possible.

This. Pre-orders just don't make sense anymore for me. I guess if you absolutely want a physical copy and live in a smaller town without many locations to get a game from then maybe you could justify it. But these days so many games are broken at launch and patched up over the next several months that I find waiting 6 months is almost always the better option. Outside of the odd highly reviewed indie with no planned DLC or post-launch support I don't even buy games day one anymore.

Watch Dogs.

I got burnt out by that game so fucking hard.

I don't really preorder and if I do it's because they have very early reviews up and there is universal acclaim. I wouldn't say I've been burned hard by a preorder before.

I've only pre-ordered two games in my lifetime: 3D Dot Game Heroes and LittleBigPlanet 2.

No regrets.

Mass Effect 3 is last game I pre-ordered, and the only game I have ever taken a half day off for.

I don't think I've ever pre-ordered a game.... there's never been a moment where games are sold out everywhere day-of release.

I can't actually remember. Pre-digital certainly. It was far enough back that you needed to get a physical ticket from the store and then redeem it on launch day.

. . . I had to walk uphill to the store both ways. Through the snow.

Batman: Arkham Knight

I only buy digital these days and tend to wait for sales. I'll pre-order here and there and accept the risk when I do...I'm looking at you, Destiny 2...

I generally always pre-order any MegaTen or Persona game from Atlus, same as Yakuza but I’ve grotten a bit wary of the latter after Yakuza 6. I see myself preordering Hokuto though.

I pre-ordered Deus Ex Invisible War to get a free shirt from Best Buy...then the shirt was way better than the game. Stopped pre-ordering since.

Dead or Alive 5 on PC.
A simple task you may think, the game was being re-released for the 3rd time on the PS4 and Xbone and a PC version was finally on the way, we were told before release that the online modes would be added a few months down the line, which is an early warning sign for a game which was feature complete on consoles since its vanilla release years before, we were also told that the game would not include the updates that the new consoles would be getting including some new stages, which is fine as long as i can play the majority of DOA5 on PC. After many more months of delays and beta testing it was finally updated, with the Ranked Match mode and nothing else, no way to invite friends, no online lobbies, no online practice mode, the only updates the game received from that point on would be the DLC characters and costume packs.

I actually convinced a friend of mine who isn't into fighting games to pre-order it, i wanted to support great fighting games on PC to help bring more to the platform, now i can't convince him to try ANY fighting games because he was so burned by DOA5, luckily the genre did grow on PC and now Tekken 7 is here to fill the huge void that is 3D fighters on PC.
I still pre order things that look to be sure bets, but DOA5 taught me a huge lesson on publishers and their unwillingness to support certain projects.

@turboman: I remember when that wasn't the case, though. I think it was somewhere early the 360 generation, once the Best Buys of the world got more in in games, when you could reliably find games on launch day.

I remember being 22, between jobs, and driving all over creation for a copy of Morrowind. I think it took about eight stops.

I also remember skipping a class in college to catch the UPS truck as it dropped off the new AKI N64 wrestling game (probably WCW/NWO: Revenge). They only had 2-3 copies or some nonsense...

Gears of War...I remember Epic announcing that it was being shipped with no street date. I found a store the next town over with copies, but they were only selling one per customer. The place was crazy, and as I was leaving, I learned that they had been selling other people's pre-orders...

Hell, midnight launches...I remember those being a thing. We'd all take the next day off from work and play Halo 1am - 5am or some nonsense...

Nowadays, if my friends are all in on something, I click the purchase button on my Xbox app and it waits for me...no decent stories. If it's single player, I tend to wait for a sale (I don't have the time to get to games these days anyhow)...

I'll still preorder games for that Amazon discount but they are reserved for sure things like Nintendo first party stuff and Rockstar games or stuff that has already been released in Japan like Persona 5 and Yakuza 0.

I use to be all about preordering everything and going to midnight launches at Gamestop until Assassin's Creed 3 broke my heart. Hell it even got me off a franchise until I saw the Quick Look of Assassin's Creed Syndicate and picked that up along with Black Flag.

I preorder FIFA. I know what that game is going to be and I know I'm going to play it for better or worse. It's a sickness. With other games, I have enough of a backlog of good games that I'll just wait until I know a game is really good to play it.

None so far, though I rarely do it and if I do it's only if they're allowing pre-loads and I'd get it on release day anyway. I think the only exception (that I can remember, anyway) has been Persona 5.

I don't do it too often anymore. Maybe 2 or 3 times last year? Only with things I know I want to play. Destiny 2 was the last game I did this with, and while I'm sure many of you will balk at me saying "That trainwreck? That's why you don't preorder!" I was actually happy I did. I got it Day 1 and had so much fun running through the campaign and talking about it alongside the duders here. There was a real zeitgeist I would have missed out on if I had waited. Even with the negative aspects, Destiny 2 was my most played game last year hands down.

I think preordering is okay, sometimes, despite the popular opinion. Just be sure it's with something you absolutely know you want to play. The difference of pre ordering and not pre ordering something like a Destiny 2 or Persona 5 (another example of mine) is 1 day. 1 day of waiting till it's "live" and maybe a couple of reviews are available that I won't read anyway. I'll also have to wait longer to play it. So in some cases it just doesn't make sense to forego the preorder so I can pretend "I'm being an upstanding consumer and putting my voice against the longstanding tragedy of buying things before I know more about them." Good on ya if you have a strict policy with that stuff, (and despite my tone, I don't even do it that often) but sometimes it makes the most sense for me to just buy the damn thing so I can play it right away. I'm a big boy. If I regret my purchase I won't blame anyone but myself.

If it's something I'm gonna play on day 1 anyway then I'll always preorder it for either the preload or cheaper Amazon price.

You get burned sometimes but eh whatever, not the buyer's remorse type.

Dragon Age 2. The first and last game I will ever pre-order.

After Dragon Age: Origins, Mass Effect 1 & 2, I thought Dragon Age 2 was a can't miss. Boy... I was wrong.

Rule 1: Only pre-order Nintendo.

Rule 2: Only pre-order games that run the risk of not being there later when you want them or that need the support (Metroid).

So I haven't stopped pre-ordering, I've just gotten smarter about it.

I haven't pre-ordered for at least 10 years. I stopped when there wasn't a point anymore. Every game is digitally available (if I want). There's no need. Its an old system that doesn't make sense it todays day and age.

There doesn't seem to be any worthwhile benefits of doing so. I also never go into a shop to buy a game. If I am getting a physical disk, its still ordering online.

Devil May Cry 2. That game was a hot mess. I had played the crap out of DMC1 and figured there was no way they could mess it up.

Devil May Cry 3 was a return to form.

No Man's Sky is a great example, and Agents of Mayhem really hammered the point home for me recently (yes, I should've known better). That said, I've also found that sometimes I like a game in spite of all the criticism; a recent example is that I've been playing Persona 5 lately and really loving it, though by no means is it in the same camp as the former two games in regards to critical opinions, I would think.

No Man's Sky was the last game I ever preordered. I got burnt so hard by that game that until reviews come out from good sources, I will actively hold off making a purchase until I see the game delivers.

Only idiots preorder

Spore. >_<

.......... ON PC! UGH

I've never preordered a game. I feel pretty confident that any game I want to play when it comes out, it'll be available on launch, especially now that we can go digital.

It's dumb, but I remember the exact moment I stopped preordering. I walked into a Gamestop in 2010, and this kid who couldn't have been more than 6 minutes old kept bugging me about preordering Modern Warfare 3 while I was trying to buy something else. It was so off-putting that I now associate all preordering with that experience, be it online or in a store. That was actually the last time I set foot in a GameStop.

I've been pre-ordering games since the late 90s. Of course, back then pre-orders were something you did for niche JRPGS for which the only copies that were likely to shipped to stores in within 200 miles of me were 1+pre-orders..and then sometimes the 1 game that got shipped got tagged as the pre-order. Before that good luck finding something like Lunar 2 for PS1. (Thank god a Toys-R-Us in my area somehow was in the business of getting a single copy of every single PS1 game released, and no one else in my area interested in such games seemed to be aware of it! Before pre-orders that was the only way I found the stuff I loved back then.)

Since then, sure I've been burned once or twice on pre-orders. But I only ever pre-order games I know I want to play ASAP. I pre-order to be able be able to pre-load them on my PC so I can hit play at 12:01 or whatever, the moment they unlock. There are so few of those released every year (1..maybe 2) its no problem. More over, steam's refund system is amazing. If I do end up getting burned on a pre-order, I know I can get my money back.

So..there is no risk, as long as I do it through steam (which I would Re:I do it purely so I can pre-load games I MUST play ASAP). If its bad, I refund it and get my money back. While I am fully aware companies are doing very scummy things regarding pre-orders, things I utterly do not support. I do not pre-order based on those tactics. In my mind, if I am able to use pre-orders to get things I want, fully aware of the risk I am taking and of the mitigating factors that exist to get me to do it anyhow..then anyone can.

Companies might be doing scummy things with pre-orders, but if I am able to be a fully informed consumer, and still choose to pre-order when I decide I wish too..surely I should not assume most other consumers are incapable of that same level of informed decision making. I.E. at some point the companies taking advantage of people via scummy pre-order tactics become a statement about the people who allow themselves to be taken advantage of, as much as the company doing them.