Spot on, i got burned with Just Cause 3 and Batman Arkham Knight and vowed not to to pre-order games untill i see proper review scores first, saying that i pre-ordered the Uncharted 4 Libertalia edtion, somehow knew that would be OK lol.

Some games can be hard to get. Namely those niche JRPG's and smaller titles which don't get that much press. Sometimes, GS won't even get more than they have pre-orders for on some of those games...particularly in smaller regions or stores. Amazon isn't usually a problem for getting anything post launch, or even day one, and pre-ordering or buying early does allow one to gain a significant discount and any extras that might be included....although they're usually worthless nowadays....and it's easy enough to cancel a pre-order from Amazon should one change their mind before it ships.

Beyond that, pre-ordering bigger releases is mostly pointless, but it doesn't really hurt if you're going to buy the game day one anyways. Some people aren't deterred by negative reviews or care that a game doesn't work well on release.

The digital arguments made in this comment are mostly useless for those that prefer digital, but I see no reason to pre-order digital games outside of some bonuses that may be offered, which are more often than not not that compelling to me.

Some would argue that it makes it less risky for a publisher to release broken games because they know they already have sales, so all they need to do is hype it rather than make it work. If there werent pre orders and people heard a game was broken it would get way less sales. Personally I don't give a shit either way what people do.

What Cy said

Bull shit. DO you know the quality of the game before you buy it? No. No amount of pre-release info tells you about the quality of the game. It could be unplayable buggy (Assasins Creed Umity,) the prerelease info could have been super vague or deliberately misleading (No Mans Sky, Colonial Marines) or it could all sound great in theory but just not be enjoyable for whatever reason, You don't know, you can't know, if you pre-order games you get NOTHING of significant value but you're betting $60 on the fact that you'll like the game and it will be playable when you have no way to be sure of either.

People get burned by pre-orders constantly. Nobody should be pre-ordering games, period, because it's been made painfull clear that there is little/nothing in it for us but the publishers will happily exploit the hell out of it to screw us over as long as we allow it to continue. So not only are people burned by pre-orders on a regular basis, people who don't pre-order are also getting burned by the culture that people who do pre-order have created, so everybody loses. Except the publisher.

Hey Cy, thanks for the comment! You're right; research is key, and nobody forces you to pre-order. It isn't a bad practice in terms of what it does itself (pre-ordering collector's editions with physical media might be a good idea for example), but it is a bad practice in terms of what it enables.

Those little pre-order bonuses are, in my opinion, often something that should have been bundled with the main game without needing that pre-order bribery going on. Look at Civ, look at Total War, look at games that provide significant amounts of content to the pre-order people who are willing to lay down money on what could be a gamble of a game.

The people who then wait for a week to get reviews from other users then end up not really getting the full game. Pre-order bonuses aren't bonuses; they are giving you something you should be getting in the first place, and the price of that is potentially ending up with a buggy mess of a game.

Research is still super important though, you and I are agreed there!

You assume we're listening to what the article is saying now and basing your happiness over being right just because some article comes out about it? Plenty of articles in the past year have stipulated the same thing, doesn't mean that it's a terrible practice, or detrimental. It all comes down to how the customer uses the process, and whether it's good or bad for them is entirely up to them, and completely dependent on the game itself. So what you were saying is about as flawed as what the article is saying...except the article is actually saying something for proper discussion, whereas you are simply being self-congratulatory.

It's the cut content aspect that really irks me.

I'm surprised it's still the old site. I thought he said starting today?

Insert the Ferris Bueller end scene... "You're still here? It's over.."

Never say die