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Late Night Consoling

by Alec Matias, Oct 11, 2004 8:00pm PDT
Related Topics – Sega, Namco, Bungie, Sony, Games: Console

I'm curious; do pre-order bonus offers do anything for you? It seems these days that every new game has some sort of promotional offering that comes with a pre-order. For me, I've always been adverse to pre-ordering games. I don't like how if I put my $5 down, it's basically now store credit; can't get a refund. You never know when a store will miss a shipment or not receive their full allotment; and because I've never had a problem finding a game day one, I see no incentive. However, lately I've been tempted to lay down the cash. The bonus content for the pre-order only Halo 2 Limited Collector's Edition seems to be worth the risk. But nothing yet has had me truly "excited" where I made it a part of my to-do list to hit up the local game store.

Xbox Halo 2 Gone Gold Halo 2 is officially finished. Community liaison Frankie posted on Bungie's site, "We finished every line of code, every pixel of art, every frame of animation, every phoneme of dialog and every note of music. And we're kinda proud of it. We think it's 'fun.'" The game is currently being manufactured for shipment to 27 countries. All is a go for a November 9 North America launch.
PS2 Xbox GCN Midway Acquires Inevitable Entertainment Midway has acquired the studio that is currently developing Area 51, Inevitable Entertainment. It was an all-stock transaction, offering a little more than 200,000 shares of Midway stock for the company. Midway has been looking to open a studio in the Austin, Texas area and found it much more suitable to acquire one that is already up-and-running. Inevitable Entertainment has now been renamed to Midway Studios - Austin.
GCN Nintendo Holding Back 'Revolution' Until PS3 The new poster boy for Nintendo, Reggie Fils-Aime, has told IGN that the company is taking a conservative approach with its next-gen hardware, currently codenamed Revolution. Nintendo wants to release at a time that is competitive with Sony's PS3, saying "We are driving our timetables based on what we believe Sony will do." At the same time, Reggie scolded Microsoft for rushing to bring out the successor to the Xbox. "Not that I want to ignore the Xbox," he said, "but certainly we believe that a rush to a new system is a mistake."
Xbox The REAL Bungie Weekly Update Due to some confusion on Friday, Frankie had to hold off on the Bungie Weekly Update which was to be presented in video form. The weekend has offered much clarity and now we are treated with what we were waiting for; a tour of the Bungie offices! Get it fresh off of FileShack!
GCN Chainsaw Controller You've seen the dual pistols for Final Fantasy X-2 and the samurai sword for Onimusha 3... now behold the chainsaw controller meant for use with Resident Evil 4. NubyTech expects to ship the product in January. In the mock-up graphic provided, it appears to be a large, yet functional, controller fashioned after the chainsaws used by one of the game's enemies.
GCN Baten Kaitos Pre-order Bonus If you're looking forward to the upcoming Namco RPG, Baten Kaitos, better get that pre-order in; many retailers will be offering special promotions. One such deal is through Toys R Us. Pre-order either in-store or through its online site at Amazon.com and you'll score a mini-CD that features select tracks from the game's soundtrack. More deals through EBgames and Gamestop are to be revealed next week.
PS2 Xbox GCN Misc. Q&As/Features EuroGamer talks with Kevin Hendrickson about TRON 2.0: Killer App.
  Misc. Media/Previews
PS2 Game Informer has new screens and details regarding Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas (GameSpy previews the game here). They also have a trailer for Sega SuperStars. GameMethod runs down some hot titles for us: Killzone, Jak 3, and Ratchet and Clank: Up Your Arsenal. Gameplay footage of Under The Skin can be found at GameSpot. IGN has all the details on Shining Tears and screens of Tenchu: Fatal Shadows.
Xbox IGN goes twelve hours with Dead or Alive Ultimate. GameSpy updates their preview of Jade Empire. TeamXbox takes us hands-on with GunGriffon: Allied Strike. Game Over summarizes Blinx 2: Masters of Time & Space for us. GameSpot has shots of Spikeout Battle Street.
GCN IGN delivers a whopping fifty new movies of Metroid Prime 2: Echoes. They also have all the media you can handle for Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door.
NDS GamerFeed takes a hands-on approach with WarioWare Inc. DS. GameSpot posts more shots of Feel the Magic: XY/XX.
PS2 Xbox GCN More multiplayer impressions of GoldenEye: Rogue Agent (PS2, Xbox, GCN) can be found at IGN. They also have some shots of Mercenaries (PS2, Xbox). GameZone gives us a quick rundown on Crash 'n' Burn (PS2, Xbox). GameSpot shares new screens of Super Monkey Ball Deluxe (PS2, Xbox) and Sonic Mega Collection Plus (PS2, Xbox).
Console Game of the Evening: HALO for the Xbox. "Bungie delivers the greatest FPS game for a console to date. It was fast, fun, and on the edge of your seat excitement! As long as I live I will never forget the years of fun this game provided for me and my friends. Thank you Bungie!" (submitted by jedi_27).


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Comments

25 Threads | 128 Comments
  • #112
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    By: Vincent Grayson This person is cool! x
    Reply
    Exactly what stores won't give you your $5 back? Every store I've ever pre-ordered at has made it very clear that there is "no risk" in pre-ordering, you can always get a refund. I know it was done that way when I worked at Gamestop.

    In all the time I've been buying games, and the year and a half I worked at Gamestop, I only ever saw *ONE* game miss its' full allocation, and that was only because the shipping guys fucked up, and damaged the box the game was shipping in. Even then, a good 25-50% of pre-orders *NEVER* get picked up, so even if they don't get all the copies they should, odds are, you won't get screwed, ESPECIALLY on a big title like Halo 2, where they will make absolutely sure every store has enough.

    Me, I pre-order *EVERYTHING*...I didn't pre-order Katamari Damacy, it was probably the first time in 4 or 5 years that I didn't pre-order a game I wanted to play on day one...and you know what? I couldn't fucking find it anywhere.

    As for ordering online, I dunno, I've ever done it, and I don't see much point, since I have 4 or 5 game stores within 10 minutes of my house.
    Oct 12, 2004 6:31am PDT
  • #106
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    By: pyide x
    Reply
    i only pre-order online.

    1. no paying 5-10 dollars in advance to reserve

    2. they don't charge until the item ships - plenty of time to change your mind

    3. if i feel a title will be available without pre-ordering, i won't do it.
    there are plenty of retail stores out there that carry games.
    ex: i picked up katamari damacy the weekend it was released.
    funny reading about people hassling with game stores trying to find that one out of three copies they recieved. shit, bb still had +10 copies.. 4+ days after it hit the stores.

    4. some games like i mentioned in #3 have incentives you can't find when buying in a store. stuff like free overnight shipping(plus no tax in some cases) makes it cheaper than buying it elsewhere. plus extras like bonus discs or other freebies you can't get anywhere else can tempt me.

    basically, if you want to pre-order, i suggest you do it online.
    when the halo2 LE was announced, ebgames had free 2-day shipping. i pre-ordered it without thinking, and without even owning an xbox. knowing the rabid masses would rush the retail stores and nab every copy before i could have a chance in hell of finding one, i played it safe and will have it a day or two later with no headaches :P
    Oct 12, 2004 3:30am PDT
  • #87
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    By: Backspace x
    Reply
    I tend to pride myself in my tshirt collection (hold on I'm going somewhere with this). Now while I really like my ghost in the shell and armored core tshirts, the 2 tshirts I unquestionably get the most complements/comments on are a) neon genisis evengelion and b) the ff7 tshirt that I got as a preorder bonus (btw the armored core one wasn't a preorder but was a special internet offer. Armored core 3, a tshirt, an action figure, and a book cover(?) for $30. The anime store in my town was selling the action figures alone for $20 (they're nice)). Anyway since then I've been looking for a good tshirt preorder bonus as I personaly hate ff7 and neon gensis evangelion (well not hate but feel they are very over rated) and get tired of people coming up to me and saying "that's the best rpg of all time" and me having to tell them they are dumb and wrong. I actualy made a guy at gamestop trying to sell me on a street fighter anivsery edition preorder bring out the tshirt and then told him I didn't want to preorder (yes I am an asshole). Anyway, you know when I said I was going somewhere with this? Well I lied (yes I am an asshole).
    Oct 11, 2004 10:18pm PDT