Nintendo’s and Sony’s take on pre-orders

Why do they call it a pre-order anyway? This is the magic of the prefix “pre”. How does it work? You place an order before you actually order? It’s all confusing to me. It’s like preheated. They say: “Put something in a preheated oven.” Well, there are only two states an oven can be in: heated and unheated. But enough of ripping off George Carlin and lets move on to the juicy bit.

Erin Bilba from PC World admits to not being a hardcore gamer, but says the console war is so hot that a small look into Sony and Nintendo’s stance on pre-orders is in order.

What’s amusing about this is that according to Erin, neither Nintendo nor Sony was that open about going on record regarding pre-orders. It was only when PC World told Sony that Nintendo was commenting that Sony answered phone calls. They speculate that this could be because Sony is only planning to ship 400,000 (according to PC World) units to the US.

Anyway here’s the not-so-helpful bottom line that they got from all the phone calls they made: buyer beware. If you were in line at around 3 a.m. and you didn’t get what you’ve been waiting for, the console makers don’t want to be responsible. The most they’d extend to eager console hungry gamers is a word of caution.

At least, it’s good that known retailers are trying their best to manage demand that obviously exceeds supply. But the system that they’ve got isn’t perfect. For example the Wii pre-order at EBGames/GameStop requires a 50 dollar deposit, but then the pre-order procedure would warn you that they “control production” and that “a reservation deposit does not guarantee receipt of a system available to purchase at launch.”

Oh joy. A pre-register for a pre-order, so that you can pay money to stand in line at 3 a.m. and not be guaranteed anything. Sigh. Still, that particular system is infinitely better than the multitudes of iffy pre-order sites that turn up when you type in pre-order PS3 or pre-order Wii on Google. I guess being warned that your deposit might not get you anything is still better than paying for something you expect to arrive but you get shafted anyway.

Why do they call it a pre-order anyway? This is the magic of the prefix “pre”. How does it work? You place an order before you actually order? It’s all confusing to me. It’s like preheated. They say: “Put something in a preheated oven.” Well, there are only two states an oven can be in: heated and unheated. But enough of ripping off George Carlin and lets move on to the juicy bit.

Erin Bilba from PC World admits to not being a hardcore gamer, but says the console war is so hot that a small look into Sony and Nintendo’s stance on pre-orders is in order.

What’s amusing about this is that according to Erin, neither Nintendo nor Sony was that open about going on record regarding pre-orders. It was only when PC World told Sony that Nintendo was commenting that Sony answered phone calls. They speculate that this could be because Sony is only planning to ship 400,000 (according to PC World) units to the US.

Anyway here’s the not-so-helpful bottom line that they got from all the phone calls they made: buyer beware. If you were in line at around 3 a.m. and you didn’t get what you’ve been waiting for, the console makers don’t want to be responsible. The most they’d extend to eager console hungry gamers is a word of caution.

At least, it’s good that known retailers are trying their best to manage demand that obviously exceeds supply. But the system that they’ve got isn’t perfect. For example the Wii pre-order at EBGames/GameStop requires a 50 dollar deposit, but then the pre-order procedure would warn you that they “control production” and that “a reservation deposit does not guarantee receipt of a system available to purchase at launch.”

Oh joy. A pre-register for a pre-order, so that you can pay money to stand in line at 3 a.m. and not be guaranteed anything. Sigh. Still, that particular system is infinitely better than the multitudes of iffy pre-order sites that turn up when you type in pre-order PS3 or pre-order Wii on Google. I guess being warned that your deposit might not get you anything is still better than paying for something you expect to arrive but you get shafted anyway.