The Video Game Revue

Wii Pre-order

7:50 am - I pull myself out of bed and grab a light lunch before heading out to the nearest EB Games. I live near downtown, so that's where I go.

8:25 am - $4 for two hours of parking

8:30 am - I arrive at "the line-up" and my heart immediately sinks. There are already roughly 25 people in line, and when I called on Friday, the EB Games manager said that they were only taking 15 Wii pre-orders. But I start asking people about the line-up and quickly discover that a lot of them are there for the PS3.

There are 8 people at the front of the line who have been there since about 6 am and want the PS3. Of the remainder, about half say they want a Wii--I ask for a show of hands, and about ten of them go up. So supposing that, say, twelve people order the Wii, I can still get one. The real question is how many PS3 spots there are, since if those sell out right away, a lot of the remaining line-up people will likely order a Wii as a consolation prize. I know that I'm on the cusp, but I decide to line-up anyway.

9:00 am - I have a nice conversation with a few of the people around me in line about various console games and who will win the next gen console war. The general consensus is that the XBox 360 is basically screwed, and while the Nintendo Wii is definitely going to come out to an early lead this holiday season, the PS3 will likely take-over the market in the long run--ie. the two or three years from now picture. The general reasoning behind this is that while the Wii is nice and cheap with a lot of buzz about it and no supply problems, the superior hardware capabilities of the PS3 will become a major factor, and more importantly than that, Sony still has the backing of a lot of the most important third-party developers. I agree that unless Nintendo can manage to steal serious development attention from the hardcore game publishers out there (Square-Enix, Capcom, Konami, Atlus, etc.), they can't maintain a dominant position over the market. There's also a guy who shares my opinion that Shin Megami Tensei 3: Nocturne kicks ass.

At this point I was about 3/4ths back in line. Much to my surprise, not many people are playing on either PSPs or DSes.

9:20 am - EB Games employees show up and start to open the store.

9:25 am - The manager of the EB Games store distributes playing cards with "PS3" or "Wii" written on them so people know whether or not they have a spot. This is the moment of truth.

Within seconds the PS3 spots are gone. Only 8 were given out (or maybe it was 7?) and the people who showed up at 6 am got all of those. The announcement goes out,

"All of the PS3 spots are gone! I'm sorry, but there are no more PS3 spots!"

...and right there about a third of what remains in line leaves. Then the Wii spots start going. The EB Games guy gets closer, and closer, and closer, all the time saying "Wii. Wii. Wii. Wii. Wii" as he hands out cards. I am mortified.

He finally gets to me and I get a joker card with "Wii" written on it. Then the guy behind me gets the last one. Holy crap!

"Sorry people, but all of the pre-order spots are gone!"

Everyone behind us leaves save for one hold-out engineering student who says that he is going to hang on and hope against all odds that somebody didn't bring enough money for the pre-order or some such thing.

9:30 am - The EB Games staff starts letting people in a few at a time to fill out their pre-orders. Every ten minutes or so, somebody would show up and join the line, and us guys at the back would explain that all of the spots have already been given out while flashing our "Wii" cards around. That was enough to convince people not to waste their time, but the engineering guy stayed. I don't know whether or not he got anything for his efforts in the end.

There's some talk about Okami while we're waiting. One guy I'm with says he finished it and it took him about 35 hours. I tell him that I'll probably only make it to the 20 hour mark at best. I don't do well with console games that are any longer than Resident Evil 4.

10:10 am - I'm finally let into the store to make my pre-order. The phone is off the hook and a phone in the background is ringing constantly. The store manager says,

"I'm not taking any calls until I'm done dealing with all of the people who waited in line."

I can tell that he's going to have a fun day telling people "no" every five minutes when they ask about pre-ordering a PS3 or a Wii. :(

The Wii deposit comes to a whopping $200, and I pre-order Zelda: Twilight Princess to go with it. On top of that, I pre-order Castlevania: Portrait of Ruin, Final Fantasy III DS, and Children of Mana. Combined with The Burning Crusade, that should be enough to keep me busy until Christmas.

posted by Parappa @ 10:35 AM