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KazeoHin

KazeoHin

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I've seen it discussed in other threads. I've seen it mentioned here and there. But lets get straight to the point and give this the full topic it deserves.

In the modern, digital age: there are few reasons to pre-order video games; In fact one can argue that pre-ordering a video game is a form of self-punishment. I'm not directly a developer, though I do align myself VERY closely with the opinions and needs of full-time developers, and my secondary source of income is directly tied to the video game industry, or as I like to call it: Interactive Arts. So allow me to be the guy who basically tells you to stop doing the thing that the industry is trying so hard to make you do, even if it means going against what a LOT of publishers tell developers to communicate.

Pre-Order culture is hurting the players. This form of economy actively rewards publishers to rush out half-baked content as quickly as possible, take all of their pre-order income to the bank, and start on another would-be 'snatch and run' project. You'll hear publishers talk about how a game will make more money in its first week of availability than the rest of its lifetime during their seminars and lectures. Essentially advising to chop up a game into as many pieces as possible to be available as day-one DLC, or pre-order/retailer bonuses, basically putting more time and effort into getting pre-orders and DLC awareness than into product QA. The publishers sell Pre-Orders, not games: the games don't need to work. As soon as you've deposited your money into the publisher's account to purchase a product that has yet to be released, you've communicated to the publisher that their marketing is more lucrative than their software. This is why you see E3 In Game™ trailers that are completely pre-rendered. This is why you see entire sections of voice-acted, narrative relevant gameplay chopped up and sold as day-1 DLC. Every time you pre-order a game, any game, from any studio, large or small, you are telling the publisher, not metaphorically suggesting, not 'might as well be telling them', but objectively and literally communicating to them that you care more about a game's marketing than the actual quality of the game.

Just don't pre-order games. It does not make sense.
 
The last game I pre-ordered was Half Life 2.

Most of the games I buy are the GOTY version with all of the DLC's. It just isn't worth it to buy new games until they've had a patch or three anymore.
 
Wife made me pre-order Star Wars Battlefake which ironically I didn't get to try out during the beta so really had no clue how it was going to be.......FAIL

So never again.
 
Decibel said:
The last game I pre-ordered was Half Life 2.

Most of the games I buy are the GOTY version with all of the DLC's. It just isn't worth it to buy new games until they've had a patch or three anymore.
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To supplement this: The Witcher 3 is coming out with a "GOTY" style "Includes everything" version soon. I have not purchased this game yet, and have been itching to try it.
 
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Although, I will say that I bet $20 that if Half-Life 3 was announced tomorrow that half of the folks swearing they will never pre-order again will pre-order that bad boy!!!
 
I can't agree with this enough.

I haven't pre-ordered a game in nearly ten years (a port of GTA3 for the PSP) and I've never regretted it. There have been a few collector's editions of games that I almost crumbled and pre-ordered, but I have almost always found out that these 'special editions' are not that rare and can be picked up even months after launch.

In the age of digital releases the scarcity argument for pre-ordering has almost gone out the window, unless you insist on physical copies, which are hardly ever sold out.
 
You know what you get for preordering a game?

Ask Eric Cartman for the answer. :)
 
Only game I regret pre-ordering is Battlefront 3. The rest I've been fine with. Including No Man's Sky which IMO has exceeded my expectations.
 
Only game I have ever pre-ordered was Jane's F18 and I pre-ordered that based on my like for Jane's F15.
 
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pre-ordering is OK for certain games that you know you're going to play regardless...for me that's any Dark Souls game, Witcher, Half Life and possibly Elder Scrolls and Fallout...but for new ip's or games you're on the fence about there's no point in pre-ordering...I'll give Hello Games credit for being honest about No Man's Sky gameplay from the beginning...the game looked boring with no depth from the first trailer...I thought they might be keeping all the good stuff hidden but nope that's the entire game- fly into space, explore same-y planets with different color schemes and get to the center for your big reward of...of...of...probably a new warp drive
 
Mchart said:
Only game I regret pre-ordering is Battlefront 3. The rest I've been fine with. Including No Man's Sky which IMO has exceeded my expectations.
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So you've recently told EA games that they don't need to make a fully featured game in order to get your $60.

The point of this is not to save yourself from bad games (though it will), it is to tell the industry the Battlefronts, SimCitiys and Arkham Knights of this industry are not acceptable.
 
After being burned by Castle Story in Early Access way back when, I've been very wary or EA/pre-ordering in general.
 
Normally, I would agree with this sentiment, if the publisher offers absolutely no incentive for anyone to pre-order, then I will not pre-order, as, like you said, it makes ABSOLUTELY no sense. At worst, make it a day one purchase, at least have people's initial opinions count.

The problem I personally have with pre-orders are the pre-order bonuses that are not available, even with GoTY versions that includes all of the DLCs (yes, some do this, I can't remember off the top of my head which game it was, it might have been DX:HR actually, though I can't remember exactly), which basically makes the game 'incomplete', and I abhor incomplete games, especially games that are touted 'complete' (since it is a bloody lie).

So I pre-order games that comes with sizeable pre-order bonus, TW3 is one such example, and DX:MD is getting really tempting for me at this stage.

Call me stupid, moronic (I'd totally accept "you'd pay $60 for a couple of in game skins" comment), unfortunately it's an obsession I have.

I tend to cut my pre-orders down to strictly only those who have a proven track record of releasing good games (CDPR for example).

No Man's Sky never caught my eye, simply because I don't have the time to invest in another open world game when I have 3 others I still want to play through (Skyrim, TW3, FO4, FO:NV etc).

I only discovered later that NMS was actually made by a small studio, which makes even $60 asking price less palatable (granted, the price available to me is closer to $40) and above all, too ambitious for a studio with unproven track record with many lessons yet to be learned.
 
chenw said:
Normally, I would agree with this sentiment, if the publisher offers absolutely no incentive for anyone to pre-order, then I will not pre-order, as, like you said, it makes ABSOLUTELY no sense. At worst, make it a day one purchase, at least have people's initial opinions count.

The problem I personally have with pre-orders are the pre-order bonuses that are not available, even with GoTY versions that includes all of the DLCs (yes, some do this, I can't remember off the top of my head which game it was, it might have been DX:HR actually, though I can't remember exactly), which basically makes the game 'incomplete', and I abhor incomplete games, especially games that are touted 'complete' (since it is a bloody lie).

So I pre-order games that comes with sizeable pre-order bonus, TW3 is one such example, and DX:MD is getting really tempting for me at this stage.

Call me stupid, moronic (I'd totally accept "you'd pay $60 for a couple of in game skins" comment), unfortunately it's an obsession I have.

I tend to cut my pre-orders down to strictly only those who have a proven track record of releasing good games (CDPR for example).

No Man's Sky never caught my eye, simply because I don't have the time to invest in another open world game when I have 3 others I still want to play through (Skyrim, TW3, FO4, FO:NV etc).

I only discovered later that NMS was actually made by a small studio, which makes even $60 asking price less palatable (granted, the price available to me is closer to $40) and above all, too ambitious for a studio with unproven track record with many lessons yet to be learned.
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Hey, I can understand that, but at the same time, By actively pre-ordering because of those incentives, you are telling the publisher "Please chop up even more future game content and sell it as pre-order bonuses, as this is what I'm willing to pay for."

At first, PO bonuses were just one or two different skins for a weapon. Now, because of people communicating thoroughly with their wallet, Publishers feel capable, nay, entitled to rip out core content in order to coax you into depositing $60 into their accounts without ever having played their game.

I don't like the feeling of doing that. But I'm not you.
 
KazeoHin said:
Hey, I can understand that, but at the same time, By actively pre-ordering because of those incentives, you are telling the publisher "Please chop up even more future game content and sell it as pre-order bonuses, as this is what I'm willing to pay for."

At first, PO bonuses were just one or two different skins for a weapon. Now, because of people communicating thoroughly with their wallet, Publishers feel capable, nay, entitled to rip out core content in order to coax you into depositing $60 into their accounts without ever having played their game.

I don't like the feeling of doing that. But I'm not you.
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For me, the choice is either that I must submit to the marketting strategy of the world, or just not buy the game.

Often, if I am in a position to contemplate or not to pre-order, chances are the latter is completely out of the question.

If I want to play the game enough, then I am willing (or rather, must) put up with the marketting bullcrap.

Fortunately, my favourite game series, Fallout, has not fallen to that problem. Bethesda has been pretty good on not forcing pre-order bonuses on initial game purchases, the only time it occured, it was in GoTY, so I am not too miffed.
 
I thought I had convinced myself to no longer preorder games years ago and then Bethesda came out with that Pipboy edition for FO4 and I couldn't help myself. Biggest waste of money ever. $150 for that and the season pass. The main story ended up being a joke and the DLC has been largely useless. I'm so mad at myself over that. I think I'm going to go back to waiting for "Ultimate Editions" on Steam that go on sale for $20 and include all the useless DLC crap that should've been in the game from the start.
 
chenw said:
Normally, I would agree with this sentiment, if the publisher offers absolutely no incentive for anyone to pre-order, then I will not pre-order, as, like you said, it makes ABSOLUTELY no sense. At worst, make it a day one purchase, at least have people's initial opinions count.

The problem I personally have with pre-orders are the pre-order bonuses that are not available, even with GoTY versions that includes all of the DLCs (yes, some do this, I can't remember off the top of my head which game it was, it might have been DX:HR actually, though I can't remember exactly), which basically makes the game 'incomplete', and I abhor incomplete games, especially games that are touted 'complete' (since it is a bloody lie).

So I pre-order games that comes with sizeable pre-order bonus, TW3 is one such example, and DX:MD is getting really tempting for me at this stage.

Call me stupid, moronic (I'd totally accept "you'd pay $60 for a couple of in game skins" comment), unfortunately it's an obsession I have.

I tend to cut my pre-orders down to strictly only those who have a proven track record of releasing good games (CDPR for example).

No Man's Sky never caught my eye, simply because I don't have the time to invest in another open world game when I have 3 others I still want to play through (Skyrim, TW3, FO4, FO:NV etc).

I only discovered later that NMS was actually made by a small studio, which makes even $60 asking price less palatable (granted, the price available to me is closer to $40) and above all, too ambitious for a studio with unproven track record with many lessons yet to be learned.
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What do you do when they give Amazon pre-orders one bonus DLC and Gamespot another?
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Also, when it comes to giving less to a small studio instead of a so called triple-A, fuck that. EA or Bethesda or whoever are going to sell a million copies no matter what shit they dump on our doorsteps. If an independent comes along that competes, I'll pay. Again though, since I wait to buy almost every game, the difference is like $30 compared to $20.

In the case of NMS... I've heard more bad than good. A lot of ifs and maybes. So maybe in six months or so I'll bite if the game becomes more than just a bunch of grind.
 
I will give some kudos to SquareEnix and IO Interactive when it comes to Hitman. They were upfront about what it was going to be when they started taking orders. They laid it out flatly that it was an episodic game with special missions and things added in as time went on with no additional costs to those who purchased the full game. I don't agree with the always online requirement but that was also something they didn't try to hide (as far as I know.) If you preordered you got access to the "beta," which was essentially just the training missions, and if you didn't preorder then they unlocked with the rest of the game on release. The episodic content has been good too. I didn't preorder the game, after my experience with FO4, and waited for some video of Paris to release on YouTube. I spent countless hours exploring the Paris mission to find all the creative ways to kill my targets. When Sapienza was released I was floored. That level is stunning with the sheer amount of effort and detail included in the backstory of Caruso and the design of the level.

I would say the new Hitman is a perfect example of how a game should be done. It's been excellent so far and they aren't trying to milk their customers for every dime they own. I wish more companies would consider that free updates that include content may buy them some good will from gamers in the future.
 
Decibel said:
What do you do when they give Amazon pre-orders one bonus DLC and Gamespot another?

Also, when it comes to giving less to a small studio instead of a so called triple-A, fuck that. EA or Bethesda or whoever are going to sell a million copies no matter what shit they dump on our doorsteps. If an independent comes along that competes, I'll pay. Again though, since I wait to buy almost every game, the difference is like $30 compared to $20.

In the case of NMS... I've heard more bad than good. A lot of ifs and maybes. So maybe in six months or so I'll bite if the game becomes more than just a bunch of grind.
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A good question, actually in that case I would probably buy neither, and wait for the game to go GoTY. I am crazy on pre-order bonuses, but not enough to buy 2 copies of the same game from different vendors JUST for that DLC.

If the GoTY doesn't have both, it will probably end up being bargain bin purchase for me, but thankfully, I am not terribly into Batman games (yet...).

Considering both of these are physical copies of the same game from different retailers that I cannot avail of though, I personally never had to deal with that problem. All of my purchases recently are electronic games, the shipping cost of the physical copies would most likely double the cost of the digital, as I must have it shipped from abroad to ensure an English version of the game (those that are sold locally have no such guarentee).

The last time I was conflicted about pre-order DLC was Steam vs GoG version of TW3, GoG offered more of it, but some was only offered exclusively on Steam. I was heavily leaning towards Steam (achievement system and much less pain to maintain the game), until I decided to give CDPR all of the $60 instead. Turns out I got lucky, because it's one of the few games that's priced the same on Steam and GoG. A lot of games that overlap between GoG and Steam, Steam is cheaper in my currency (sometimes by quite a lot, NMS is a good example, it costs US$40 for me on Steam, but $60 on GoG).

I personally have no problems with studios asking for $60 for their game if it is worth it (CDPR), I just have reservations about a small 10+ studios coming out with a $60 game straight away and facing the full brunt of the media backlash regarding the game with no possibility of a comeback (a botched $60 could mean the company name is already over). A cheaper introductory game would have given them more leeway and learn from their mistakes and make a product that would establish themselves.
 
Every time I see a thread popup anywhere on the internet telling me not to preorder, I preorder another game on my wishlist. Instead of putting an end to preorders you people need to put an end to no preorder PSAs, first. I've cleaned out my entire wishlist of forthcoming games just in the past month because of the internet's self-righteous characters. In fact, it was a no preorder PSA that made me preorder No Man's Sky. Thanks for that, as it's one of the most engrossing games I've played in awhile.
 
On the other side of the coin, if nobody pre-orders then the game might get shoved aside as a colossal failure. A promising franchise could could die a slow death as an unpatched mess on Steam sale for $5. Obviously nobody wanted it, right? There's a fine line between being wary and simply accepting where the industry is. Pre-orders often drive what publishers to support a game.
 
Domingo said:
On the other side of the coin, if nobody pre-orders then the game might get shoved aside as a colossal failure. A promising franchise could could die a slow death as an unpatched mess on Steam sale for $5. Obviously nobody wanted it, right? There's a fine line between being wary and simply accepting where the industry is. Pre-orders often drive what publishers to support a game.
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So this is a good point: Because the publishers are basing SO MUCH of their KPI on pre-orders, a product that does not move millions of day-one purchases may be considered a total failure. To that, I offer the anecdote of Skyrim. Not in the pre-order sense, but in a different way this game: The Elder Scrolls V, changed the industry.

Skyrim was going to be a success, no matter how you sliced it. Each successive TES game becomes an order of magnitude more popular than the last; nobody was loosing sleep over at Zenimax over sales projections. What WAS surprising was the longevity and platform choice of those sales. Sales were steady, and new sales still flowed in more than a year after its release. DLCs were selling like hotcakes and the game was still topping Steam's popularity charts despite the game being years old. That is another thing, as I mentioned, Steam. Skyrim (in my wacky mind) launched the modern PC platform as we know it today. I worked as a PC technician when Skyrim hit stores in late 2011. Over time, more and more people were coming in and getting nice ($800 and up) custom-built PCs for the specific purpose of gaming. I always ask my customers what games they planned to play (as it helps design their build), and the #1 answer was Skyrim. This was not a flash-in-the-pan sort of thing, either. This was still the case YEARS after the game had come out. Ever notice how PC gaming has become WAY more mainstream and positively portrayed? Remember the dark ages between say, 2002 and 2011 when everyone and their dog was declaring 'the death of the PC platform!' and 'the end of PC gaming'. I remember Unreal 2 was declared the game that will 'save the PC!'. Every Tripple-A developer was claiming that PC gaming was nothing but a bunch of pirates and neckbeards and was not worth the time and effort to develop anything other than half-assed ports. Skyrim flicked a freaking switch on the industry. While Console Kiddies bought out the game and traded it in and moved on to the next COD clone, Skyrim on PC was enjoying millions of dollars worth of consistent income years after its release. Skyrim was the messiah of the current PC culture. Now PC is the superior platform in many people's eyes, now PC is getting tasty exclusives, and its the console kiddies getting shitty ports. Skyrim also had a smaller, but still significant effect on the priority of single-player titles. Prior to Skyrim, nearly ALL publishers KNEW that single-player games were dead, they KNEW that multiplayer was the ONLY way to make money. Welp, Skyrim changed the hell out of that. Now its not hard to find a decent Tripple-A single-player experience, and its not hard to find it on PC.

Sometimes, just sometimes, voting with your wallet CAN change the games industry. Sometimes it only takes one title to change how the industry plans its income. In the case of Skyrim, it was a positive feedback loop, which is a different kettle-o-fish to trying to change the industry with a negative one. This whole pre-order culture CAN be overturned, but it requires the thoughtful and diligent enforcement of one's own wallet. If you refuse to Pre-Order, and a game is declared a 'failure' because of low pre-orders: remember it was the publisher pulling the trigger, not you. Also remember when Square Enix declared the Tomb Raider reboot a 'failure' from a sales perspective? Yep, that didn't stop them from making a big-budget sequel, now did it? Remember Sim City? Remember how everyone and their dog pre-ordered that game, and it sold like crazy? Remember when EA promptly dissolved Maxis anyway? Trust me, refusing to Pre-Order is only going to net a positive for the industry.
 
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Armenius said:
Every time I see a thread popup anywhere on the internet telling me not to preorder, I preorder another game on my wishlist. Instead of putting an end to preorders you people need to put an end to no preorder PSAs, first. I've cleaned out my entire wishlist of forthcoming games just in the past month because of the internet's self-righteous characters. In fact, it was a no preorder PSA that made me preorder No Man's Sky. Thanks for that, as it's one of the most engrossing games I've played in awhile.
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KazeoHin said:
. Every time you pre-order a game, any game, from any studio, large or small, you are telling the publisher, not metaphorically suggesting, not 'might as well be telling them', but objectively and literally communicating to them that you care more about a game's marketing than the actual quality of the game.

Just don't pre-order games. It does not make sense.
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That's utter bullshit.

I'm telling them that I'm confident in their ability to deliver an awesome game, and that I want to play it as soon as I can. That's all I'm telling them.

You're reverse logic is marvelous. Nobody is paying for marketing. They pay and they expect a real product for it. It's not like they take the pre-order money and don't make a game after that. I'll continue to pre-order games that I have confidence in. And if a developer disappoints me then I won't pre-order their next title. That's all there is to it.

Many people act as if pre-ordering was the root of all evil, but it's not. It's showing support for the game/developer. Not much different than a crowdfunder.
 
I think that preordering is completely different from crowdfunding.

Crowdfunding is when you take your hard earned money and literally give it to a group of individuals with the faint hope that they will in good faith create the vision that they marketed to you. You do this because the product that you desire would not be created elsewhere on earth without some form of funding. Thus taking a chance is what you do to have a sliver of hope to bring this person's ideas to reality.

Preordering occurs when a publisher or studio has marketed a product successfully to you. The product is finished regardless of working or not. It is being shoved out the door on launch date X and there are plenty of marketing materials from various trade shows to showcase what you may potentially get. The publisher tosses in some inane bonus like $1,000 cash in game or worse when they add an exclusive level to suck you into the hype train. It is exactly the same thing when you see the pedobear van with "Candy" emblazoned on the side. Step right up! Don't know what you'll get for preordering this product, but we have dancing showgirls at this trade event! If they can dance, we can holler, and show videos of game play that will never happen without a supercomputer, then you will love us and preorder!


With this said I have preordered plenty of games over the years. I've been pretty good at picking good games, but I have been burnt plenty of times by B and C level games successfully marketed as AAA+. I've gone cold turkey on preordering games. I just can't do it. Now when it comes to crowdfunding I will step up a few times and back a title. During the Steam Summer Sale I backed Wolcen: Lords of Mayhem for @ $10 I think. If I don't get my pony in a couple of years, I'm out $10. Also I had 2 hours to return it in the event that I wasn't satisfied with their vision.

Now is it a bad idea to crowdfund? Of course not if you don't mind GIVING people free money to maybe create a product. If you have issues with giving the homeless a $100 bill, then you should have issues with giving a stranger that you have never seen $100 on a Kickstarter. After you accept the reality that you may get nothing in return, crowdfunding is fine.

What about preordering? I stopped preordering. I've concluded that marketing firms shouldn't tell me what is good or bad. I'd rather wait for someone on Twitch, PC Gamer, Rock Paper Shotgun, etc to show me some release title game play. I've gotten wary of Youtube with their hidden marketing tactics. I just want the facts; not marketing. Don't hide your product behind a NDA as that makes me think that something is rotten and to stay wary.


Here is a perfect example of marketing vs reality. I'm going to get No Man's Sky next year when the price point reflects the value of the game play that I've witnessed from various sources. What a person assigns to this value is up to them. Thus I don't judge people for what they pay. But here is the truth about marketing. It can make you all hyped for something and then get let down. I'd buy the game at my price point in a heartbeat just the way it is today with the obvious technical issues fixed. What I'm NOT interested in is the supercomputer rendered screens of what could be on a movie set if the consumer had an unlimited budget PC.

Once again this is just my opinion; not knocking people for assigning different priorities or value to video games. ;)

Blame Blade-Runner for the lols.
 
I always pre order games that I am invested in. I already preordered the new Deus Ex. I also pre ordered ROTTR this year. I am going to be pre ordering God of War, Gears of War 4 and Forza Horizon 3.

With steam refunds there is no downside to pre ordering now.

I really don't get what the fuss is about. Pre ordering let's me spread my games expense better even though money is not an issue. I always hate to put like 5 games in my cart towards winter and spring months. Might as well pre order if you know you are going to be playing them.
 
I started pre-ordering on Amazon because of the 20% discount. I used to be against it, but 20% is enough of an incentive if I know I'm buying it anyway.
 
I'd argue that with refunds that this all becomes moot.

I don't pre-order because I don't believe in false scarcity. I remember back in the days the SNES and PSX what preordering meant, and it never translated to me in the era of PS3/360. That's around the time I stopped. Occasionally, I will pre-order based on the fact I get a deal that is at or below my threshold. Like, I preordered Doom because I got the game for $35.

If its a series that I love, and will buy Day 1 regardless, then I might preorder...though, I usually don't. Like, why? It's not going anywhere. But, with Amazon giving good deals with physical pre-orders, I sometimes pre-order games from them too. Nintendo is notorious for scarce title releases when it comes to their CEs.
 
You mean I had low expectations? Indeed - I did. I didn't follow the game at all and thought nothing of it. I was satisfied with that I got.
 
Pre-ordering is a risk. Not a huge one, but it is still one. If you are going to to do it you have to accept that risk. If a person is willing to do that, then whatever. It's their money. No one has any right to tell a person what to do with their money unless that person is a parent or a significant other (or the government I suppose, but that's a totally different argument). I'm not going to stop pre-ordering because other people got burned on a game. I didn't get burned and the tiny amount of times I've been burned are far outweighed by the times I didn't. The thing is though I don't pre-order on a whim (usually). I study the game and the people behind it, I gauge whether or not I think it will be good and how it will launch and go from there. If I have doubts I don't pre-order and I wait. I also don't pre-order months in advance. If I'm going to pre-order something it will be within a week or two of release, usually within a few days of it. A lot of times I'll wait and see if the review embargo is up prior to release and then look into what common good and bad points exist between reviews and pay careful attention to anyone reviewing it on the system I'm planning to buy the game on. Getting decent discounts on games I'm going to buy anyway is also a nice bonus.
 
I don't pre-order much, I think the last game was Overwatch after spending some time in the Beta, Evolve after the alpha and first beta, I had some discounts applied so I didnt loose much on that one. Cities Skylines who have earned every penny of the pre order and cost of all DLC. Star Citizen, Arkham City, then I believe that it was Guild Wars 2, Guild wars 1 and I cant remember before that.

I do pre order some but I typically get things that I expect by researching and testing them out. Evolve was the only one that flopped out after a few months and the Wraith update. I've played stage 2 but not for more than a few minutes due to Overwatch and other games but at least they are trying.

I signed up for the Battlefield 1 beta, first one I've been excited for since 1942 + Desert Combat mod. Not paying 60 dollars for it, and if its being replaced in a year like the last 3 or 4 no matter how fun it is I wont be buying.
 
IMO with how BF3, BF4, and Battlefront 3 shaped up; I'm not wasting any time on this new battlefield. Any/all of the complexity that the series had back in the days of the first few games is gone to cater to casuals.
 
This is your brain after you preordered to prove how e-tough you are and got a crap game that you encouraged developers to put out by happily paying in advance.

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Derangel said:
Pre-ordering is a risk. Not a huge one, but it is still one. If you are going to to do it you have to accept that risk. If a person is willing to do that, then whatever. It's their money. No one has any right to tell a person what to do with their money unless that person is a parent or a significant other (or the government I suppose, but that's a totally different argument). I'm not going to stop pre-ordering because other people got burned on a game. I didn't get burned and the tiny amount of times I've been burned are far outweighed by the times I didn't. The thing is though I don't pre-order on a whim (usually). I study the game and the people behind it, I gauge whether or not I think it will be good and how it will launch and go from there. If I have doubts I don't pre-order and I wait. I also don't pre-order months in advance. If I'm going to pre-order something it will be within a week or two of release, usually within a few days of it. A lot of times I'll wait and see if the review embargo is up prior to release and then look into what common good and bad points exist between reviews and pay careful attention to anyone reviewing it on the system I'm planning to buy the game on. Getting decent discounts on games I'm going to buy anyway is also a nice bonus.
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I think you've raised my awareness to the tone ive mistakenly taken with this thread: I don't want to come off as someone who believes he has any right to dictate how people spend their hard earned money. Instead I want people to understand exactly what it means to pre-order. If you understand the issues and still choose to pre-order based on trailers or bonuses: you do you. I would hope you don't for the reasons I stated earlier, but a bad educated decision is better than a well meaning uneducated one.
 
cageymaru said:
I think that preordering is completely different from crowdfunding.

Crowdfunding is when you take your hard earned money and literally give it to a group of individuals with the faint hope that they will in good faith create the vision that they marketed to you. You do this because the product that you desire would not be created elsewhere on earth without some form of funding. Thus taking a chance is what you do to have a sliver of hope to bring this person's ideas to reality.

Preordering occurs when a publisher or studio has marketed a product successfully to you. The product is finished regardless of working or not. It is being shoved out the door on launch date X and there are plenty of marketing materials from various trade shows to showcase what you may potentially get. The publisher tosses in some inane bonus like $1,000 cash in game or worse when they add an exclusive level to suck you into the hype train. It is exactly the same thing when you see the pedobear van with "Candy" emblazoned on the side. Step right up! Don't know what you'll get for preordering this product, but we have dancing showgirls at this trade event! If they can dance, we can holler, and show videos of game play that will never happen without a supercomputer, then you will love us and preorder!
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I don't know your reasons for pre-ordering games when you did. Maybe you did pre-order them based on the dancing showgirls. But I certainly don't care about the hype surrounding a title. If anything hype turns me away. I look at what I know about a game, and pre-order based on that. How big of a fuss the publisher puts up at E3 is meaningless. I pre-order games that I'm confident in if they're cheaper than the list price. I don't care about pre-order bonuses. Those are meaningless shit most of the time that if missing wouldn't be a big deal to me. I only pre-order to save money, nothing else.

To me crowdfunding and pre-ordering is no different at all. I do both because I have confidence in the developer and the game that they're making.
But it's very easy to loose that confidence. For example ubisoft lost my confidence because of Watchdogs. I'm sure as hell not pre-ordering any of their games now. I don't think people are that stupid that they'd keep pre ordering when burned repeatedly. And publishers know this. Games are not "bad" and "buggy" because of pre-orders. It has nothing to do with it. If a publisher repeatedly releases unfinished buggy games they'll regret it.

Now is it a bad idea to crowdfund? Of course not if you don't mind GIVING people free money to maybe create a product. If you have issues with giving the homeless a $100 bill, then you should have issues with giving a stranger that you have never seen $100 on a Kickstarter. After you accept the reality that you may get nothing in return, crowdfunding is fine.
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Except in case of the homeless person you know you're not getting anything in return. In the case of a kickstarter campaign, you fully expect to get something. Sure it might not happen if you back the wrong horse, but if you have that little confidence that you compare it to throwing money away, then why do you even back that campaign?

What about preordering? I stopped preordering. I've concluded that marketing firms shouldn't tell me what is good or bad. I'd rather wait for someone on Twitch, PC Gamer, Rock Paper Shotgun, etc to show me some release title game play. I've gotten wary of Youtube with their hidden marketing tactics. I just want the facts; not marketing. Don't hide your product behind a NDA as that makes me think that something is rotten and to stay wary.
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Remember the time when we used to have demos months before a game's release? Now just because a game has no demo / under NDA it doesn't mean it will be a bad game. My favourite car game of all times, test drive unlimited was under NDA too until a few days before the official release.

If someone doesn't want to pre-order that's fine. But vilifying those that do is not cool. I'm not addressing this at you but in general. I don't think pre-ordering is the root of the problems with the gaming industry. I don't think there is a huge problem either. Maybe I'm good at seeing trough the bullshit, but I'm usually very satisfied with the games that I buy prematurely. And not because I'm satisfied with crap.

Does anyone honestly think that games are not delayed because of pre-orders? How naive are you really? If they want they can delay a game regardless of that. They don't delay because videogames became a huge business with nasty wall street types who don't take no for an answer when they ask "were the quarterly projections met"?

The gamers who pre-order games are blameless in buggy releases.
 
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