PS3 Pre-Orders Came and Went

Warlock7 writes "Well, it's official. The pre-orders have begun ... and mostly ended. I just got mine ordered and four hours later there are already units on eBay. Some acutions have already gone north of $1000 USD. The guys at EBGames told me that the most units going to any one store was 36 and that there were an average of 8 units being distributed to each store. The one I went to reported that they were going to be getting a total of 16 units. They waited this long to take pre-orders because they wanted to be sure that they weren't going to get burned like they did for the XBox 360 launch." The reports from across the internets are varied, with long lines netting nothing for some, and others reaping the sweet rewards.

Oooooh big fucking deal

I have a better idea. I'll wait to get one (if I bother at all) and then when I do all the bugs will have worked out, there will be more games available, it will cost less I won't have to wait in any ureasonably long lines and I won't have helped fuel Sony's ridiculous hype machine.

Heh...

After hearing chatter about PS3 pre-orders at GameStop in #ps2 on efnet, I checked your site in order to see if it was true. I figured since it was my night off, I might as well waste it camping out for a few hours...Once I got to my nearest Gamestop, I saw there was only one guy camping...He had gotten there at 5 a.m.

Now there's a gamer -- standing in line at GameStop from 6:30 to 9 qualifies as "camping out".

Re:Heh...

Camping in the same spot for nearly 3 hours... he's probably just afk.

Re:Heh...

Actually, "camp out" means to "camp" "outdoors".

The proper term to use for standing in line three hours is "standing in line."

Its silly to get a console on release

How many consoles have we gone through that had problems on release? Everything from the DS Lite cracking, to the xbox controllers being the size of a small gorilla, to the xbox360 over heating, to faulting dvd roms of the ps2. Its almost at the point where its guaranteed to have a flaw in it. And i feel worse for people who buy it on ebay at an extra $500/pop.

And with all these horrid rumors of design flaws with the ps3, its more of a reason to just wait it out. Same with the Wii. I refuse to believe that 6 months down the line, they are going to come up with a much more accurate wiimote than the have now.

Re:Its silly to get a console on release

Personally, I have only ever had a single problem with a Nintendo made product and that was I got a disc-read error on my launch Gamecube about 8 months after I bought it. My dealings with Nintendo's customer service about my broken Gamecube were so good that I have no worries about buying a Wii at launch; essentially, Nintendo just told me where to drop off the Gamecube and they shipped a refurbished Gamecube overnight to their Depot so I only had 1 day without my gamecube.

The PS3, on the other hand, I would be worried about mainly because I have had bad experiences with Sony's customer service in the past and the PS3 has a first generation optical disc drive in it; my memories of first generation CD-RW and DVD/DVD-RW drives tells me that the most you can really expect from a drive like this is (about) 12 months of usage. I never want to have another system (like my PS2) where I own it for 13 months and have to go buy a brand new system (at full price) because of a disc-read error.

Re:Its silly to get a console on release

Anyone who buys a console on day 1 needs their head examined. Aside from bragging rights, or sell the thing on ebay, what is the point? If a console is THAT GOOD, it will be just as good a few months down the road. Then you can make an informed purchase decision in the absence of hype and with a good chance of getting a replacement if the thing turns out to be broken.

This applies equally to the Wii, or any other shiny overhyped piece of kit (e.g. anything made by Apple). Never buy version 1.0 of anything

Really over $1,000?

At the time of my looking at it, sure amounts were at 1,000 bucks or higher, but that was the starting bid and no one has yet bid on it. Not saying it won't happen, but at the time of story posting it is misleading.

Re:Really over $1,000?

People were paying almost that much for consoles in the previous generation, and inflation has marched on since then. A fool and his money are soon parted, regardless of how much money he might have - it's the amount of foolishness that determines how long it takes, not the amount of money.

Pre-orders are a scam

GameStop now takes your $100, puts it in the bank, gets mad interest off of your cash and another 400,000 reservations, and you're left with nothing. Instead of just having customers pay when the product is physically here.... Sorry, but I want a product when I put cash down.

Re:Pre-orders are a scam

The product launch is about a month away, you put down $100. Lets say you could get 4.40% (currently what I get on savings). ($100*.044)/12 = .36 So you are paying a .36 "fee" to be certain to get a system. Ripoff? hardly.

Uh... what?

Some acutions have already gone north of $1000 USD.

No they haven't.

The linked auction search only shows LISTED auctions for the PS3. The starting bids for a couple are $1000 or more. NONE of them (as of this post) have any bids.

Heh

They waited this long to take pre-orders because they wanted to be sure that they weren't going to get burned like they did for the XBox 360 launch.

Allow me to express some mild scepticism, but I predict shortages and many unfulfilled pre-orders.

Why send an email about pre-orders...

This morning I received an email regarding pre-orders sometime after 10am GMT-6. I immediately called the six closest retail locations & they were ALL already out of pre-orders.

Why not send the email out DAYS ahead of time?

Oh well, I was just going to use the EBAY profits to fund my Wii.

A sufficient bunch of suckers apparently was born

A sufficient bunch of suckers apparently was born for this.

So, $1000 eBay auctions for PS3 pre-orders. How do I describe this.

- it's a preorderm might not even happen
- they are willing to be the guinea pigs to try out the first (possibly faulty) batch of PS3
- how do you call something that's overpriced, and then overpriced again? But yea, that too.

So keep it going. If I ever buy a PS3, it'll be in an year or so when I'll get it for less than its current retail price, with rich game selection, stable performance (all major software and hardware bugs fixed), and if it flops I might even just save myself the $500 or so, and just play with my xbox.

Thank You, Beta Testers

We are pleased that so many of you have volunteered your hard-earned time and money to be the first to work out all the kinks in this first generation of PlaysDISK READ ERROR

1000$

So it's actually CHEAPER on EBay ?

Rewards?

reaping the sweet rewards.

Wait, so, standing in line in order to get something that you're just going to resell to get more money while the person behind you wants to buy the same item for her kids for Christmas, and then realizes her checkbook was empty and has to leave, is a reward?

I guess on the bright side, it saved her lots of cash to buy other (hopefully less expensive) things for her kids.

Re:Rewards?

Oh, stop it already. That story of the mom in line to pick up a brand-spanking new console for her kid is a hasty generalization at best.

Why don't you think of the hard working widower Dad that needs to work 12 hours a day to pay for his Son's cancer treatment and wants to make his son's life more cheerful by buying him a PS3 from eBay because that's the only place he can get his hands on one?

Won't someone think of the fallacy?

Fraud?

From both accounts I've read, it seems like stores might not be playing by the rules. Rumors that only 2 per store were for friends or family, with one store selling six to friends and family and another selling all of theirs... I think it would be fitting if Sony did an investigation and refused to give ANY to a store that had a problem like that. Many of the 'friends and family' are probably just making money on EBay...

Wow... $1600!!!

This one [ebay.com] went for $1600...

No wonder

From the kotaku post [kotaku.com]:
Each store had at least eight PS3's for preorder, with some getting as many as 16.

Wow. No wonder it's already sold out.

If people will pay it...

Then people will pay it. We all saw what happened with the 360 launch (units going for upward of $2K on ebay). Why wouldn't it happen with the PS3? A unit that's even harder to get during the first couple of months, especially close to the holiday season, will easily start to sell for 2K clsoer and clsoer to christmas. Wait... why didn't I go pre-order one? FUCK!

I'll be your token troll for this thread

Okay. I've bought LOTS of Sony stuff. Thousands of dollars worth.

Trinitron Tube'd TV's
Disk- and Walk-men
Standalone home theatre speakers
nifty AV receivers
a Laptop
A Camcorder.
several pairs of headphones
countless Sony branded movies and albums, I'm sure.

And I'll never buy another Sony product again. Why?

Rootkits
Proprietary Media - MD, DAT, Memory Sticks, little odd writeable DVD's for their camcorders, PSP's oddball media, Beta, and now BluRay. I'm sick sick sick of the intentional fracturing of the market at the expense of the customer.
A Laptop installed with XP that _couldn't_ take SP2 due to a crappy memory controller.
Decisions for music players that just flat seemed STUPID (ATRAC?)
The fact they're betting the company on this one, expensive, item that has a cobbled together controller at a price I don't care to spend, forcing a media format I do not want.

Coupled with my moving away from physical media for entertainment purposes (I'll probable not get either competing format. I shifted from record and 8track to cassette, then CD's, from VHS to laserdisk to DVD.) I'm tired of re-buying the White Album, catch my drift?

Are you guys really falling all over yourselves for this company? Haven't they screwed you enough? (And by you, I mean the Customer)

Sony is an example of a machine that's gotten so large, it cannot move without standing on itself. I see no reason my money should reward it for its actions.

Re:I'll be your token troll for this thread

Are you guys really falling all over yourselves for this company? Haven't they screwed you enough? (And by you, I mean the Customer)

On the contrary. SCE has delivered two solid platforms already, each with thousands of games, hundreds of those being of excellent quality. Too many to play, too many to choose from. This isn't what I call "screwing over".

Does Sony/BMG do stupid stuff? Yes. Does Sony Pictures do stupid stuff? They're MPAA---yes. Does Sony Computer Entertainment do stupid stuff? Probably, but less so. What they have done is deliver a solid platform with a solid library. Have they secretly funded organizations to undermine the Linux community? No. So, yes, I'm "voting" with my dollar; I may "vote no" to Sony/BMG, I may "vote no" to Sony Pictures, but I will "vote yes" to SCE. May they set an example for the rest of the company.

Free overnight shipping!

Here [ebay.com]'s a good one...

How about some REAL discussion?

I don't care if you're not going to buy the ps3. I also don't care if you're going to use the hypothetical money you set aside for a ps3, to now buy a Wii. I don't care that you feel so persecuted by one company that you take every chance you get to tell everyone about your Sony boycott.

...The mere mention of the word "rootkit" should not mean you automatically get modded "funny".

Slashdots games section is next only to Gamefaqs when it comes to trollish/childish behaviour. And now since I'm adding nothing to this discussion, I'll leave to start my own boycott.

So get one here

Mine [ebay.com] is available to you all.

I'm a little worried here

I know the Wii will be in stock even more than the PS3 when pre-orders start, but even so, I fear I may not be able to get to my pre-ordering in time.

Give me a break...

Just don't buy one. Does it really make you feel better to tell us all that Sony is too big for their own good? That Sony is shooting themselves in the foot? That (insert favourite comment here)? Enough already.

Here's why eBay listings vanish...

eBay has a fairly clear policy [ebay.com] regarding pre-sale auctions...I'd imagine any PS3 listing that get pulled probably don't satisfy their requirements.

From the eBay rules site:
Pre-sale listings are those that describe items for sale that are not in the control or possession of the seller at the time of the listing. These listings generally consist of items that are sold in advance of a delivery date to the public.

eBay permits Pre-sale listings only on a limited basis. The seller must guarantee that the item will be available for shipping within 30 days from the date of purchase (i.e., the day the listing ends or the date the item is purchased from a store front listing). The seller must also clearly indicate within the listing the fact that the item is a pre-sale item with a delivery date that indicates the item will be shipped by the 30th day from the end date of the listing. Additionally, this text must be no less than the default font size of the eBay Sell-Your-Item form. Currently, the default font size is HTML font size 3.

Violations of this policy may result in a range of actions, including:

* Listing cancellation
* Limits on account privileges
* Account suspension
* Forfeit of eBay fees on cancelled listings
* Loss of PowerSeller status

I just looked on Ebay

On of the ones going on ebay shows a copy of the reservation slip. The guy paid the full $500 up front when he reserved the console and the shop still charged him a $5 reservation fee for the privalage of taking his money off of him 2 months in advance. WTF?

Holy fuck, how do you people live with yourself?

It's a god damn video game console! Why do you care whether other people buy it or not?

Are there any good games?

So, are there any games that look like they'll be worth $600+ to play?

Re:OMFG What Will Wii Do?

If only mario galaxy was a launch title...

Re:OMFG What Will Wii Do?

Artificial shortages are nothing new in the console market. Microsoft did the same thing with the 360 release. See this post on here. [slashdot.org]

Re:OMFG What Will Wii Do?

Yeah, my son want to get the Zelda title too. Not sure what we'll get at first.

How long until Animal Crossing: Revenge of the Hampster comes out?

Re:Forget the PS3...

Ha! Me too! I saw the PS3 email and went over to GameStop and said, hey, you guys taking Wii pre's yet? No? Bastards! Oh, here's $5 I'd like to reserve another Wii game. =P

Re:Forget the PS3...

I've heard that they will be available on Friday...

Re:North of $1000?

eBay started cancelling the auctions, no idea why.

At least one of the units was over $1300. There are now more [ebay.com] that are at $1000 and going up...

Re:*yawn*

"Danger: Info Inflow Overload, Knowledge Blackhole Imminent!"

Re:Forget the PS3...

EB said end of next week when I stopped in Saturday.

Re:On my way to Game Stop

If you actually find a GameStop with pre-orders left, THEN it's useful. However, sadly - I don't think you'll have much luck.

(from someone who was the last person at a GameStop at 8:20 am to get one).

-ebob9

Re:The party's over.

The only real sport to be found through a computer nowadays is trolling message boards.

Which you seem to be pretty good at indeed. You injected the perfect amount of truth, in this case quite a bit, just with (mostly) wrong (well, IMO) conclusions. Ie. gaming isn't dead, it's just kinda sucky at the moment.

This "gen" won't be a writeoff either, even if what you say is somewhat true. The Wii will prove useful, even if it sucks for traditional games(not enough evidence at this point to say with 100% certainty), it will be fun for some things. There's some great titles in development for the 360 -- Gears of War(doesn't look like my cup of tea, but looks good nonetheless), uh... that one Action RPG, Bioshock, and etc. The PS3 is expensive indeed, but the price will come down, probably sooner rather than later, or as soon as it's not selling out -- they've already reduced the Japanese launch price, and there's some excellent games in development for it too.

Some growing pains perhaps, but not a total bomb for gaming.

Re:Big sellout

Big sell outs expected in stores across the country!

Dude, Sony already sold out, big-time. I remember when they were an unsigned console manufacturer, setting up at dive bars for 20 people to play a few games for a quarter each. Yeah, PlayStation (back then, that's all it was; there was no PSP or PS2 or PS3) was primitive and unpolished by their standards of today, but you could tell there was passion behind it. It used to be about the gaming, man, it used to be about the gaming. Now, it's all corporate and sterile and 'how-can-we-leverage-this-product-to-increase-plat form-dominance' bundled Blu-Ray and stuff. They've changed, man. They've changed.

Re:*yawn*

mod -1 lame

Re:Lol medium-small town

That's terrific.. Where are you from, the Tri-Cities?

Salem, OR apparently had 15 people lined up at opening of EB for 8 machines. Good times.

I slept in :)