If there is a midnight release, do you have you have to preorder Smash to go?

[Gidy]

Title says it all. Could I just buy it then and there.

 

[Golden Gallade]

Depends on the store. I would call the store and ask.

 

[Wanderer from Roseyard]

I'm thinking you probably do have to. When I went to Brawl's midnight release at Gamestop (feels like yesterday!), it was just people getting their preordered copies and there weren't any shelf copies out.

It's easy to preorder, though, so you should definitely do it. It may depend on your retailer, but at Gamestop, there is a $5 minimum pre-pay, and it's yours.

 

[The_Thumbs]

As an employee, I can say that typically you do not need to preorder a game to attend a midnight at a GameStop. Of course though, a GameStop manager might try to make a midnight event preorder only, but technically by policy anyone can come in to buy the game. Not that there is anything confirmed, but they are allowed to make something like giveaways and tournaments preorder exclusive.

Particular reason you wouldn't want to prerorder though? Not trying to be a salesman for GameStop, chances of you being local to my store are very slim, so I get nothing for trying to push this matter. You could preordre from Best Buy for all I care. However, preordering does good not just for the store, but Nintendo actually. It gets them an idea of where there's Smash interest, and will send that store more copies. That means Nintendo sells more copies of the game to that particular company/store. Preorders are one of the few more tangible ways for a company to know how many they can sell.

I don't know how other stores do it really, but a preorder at GameStop doesn't cost anything extra in the end. Just a 5 dollar minimum down on the game that comes off the price. If you're looking at the bundle that comes with a GameCube controller and an adapter as well, I highly suggest preordering that, who knows how hard those will be to find with just a walk in (personally, like how some peripherals end up, I'm worried we're not going to have extra adapters and controllers outside of what we have preordered).

 

[Rich Homie Quan]

Hmmm, that's a good question. Like others, I say just call up whoever you're buying from.

 

[Swedish_Otaku]

Well, unless you live in a small town you better preorder anyway. No use in risking it. You don' lose anything on preordering. I would normally preorder an important game as Smash but I live in Sweden and a not so big city, so I know the copies wont run out quickly. I'll just be there before they open so I can get it as soon as I can and play as much as I can all day and night.

 

[DraginHikari]

As the place I ordered it from is inside of a mall that is kind of stingy about allowing for after hour events I would be very doubtful that mine would be doing one.

 

[Hitzel]

As an employee, I can say that typically you do not need to preorder a game to attend a midnight at a GameStop. Of course though, a GameStop manager might try to make a midnight event preorder only, but technically by policy anyone can come in to buy the game. Not that there is anything confirmed, but they are allowed to make something like giveaways and tournaments preorder exclusive.

Particular reason you wouldn't want to prerorder though? Not trying to be a salesman for GameStop, chances of you being local to my store are very slim, so I get nothing for trying to push this matter. You could preordre from Best Buy for all I care. However, preordering does good not just for the store, but Nintendo actually. It gets them an idea of where there's Smash interest, and will send that store more copies. That means Nintendo sells more copies of the game to that particular company/store. Preorders are one of the few more tangible ways for a company to know how many they can sell.

I don't know how other stores do it really, but a preorder at GameStop doesn't cost anything extra in the end. Just a 5 dollar minimum down on the game that comes off the price. If you're looking at the bundle that comes with a GameCube controller and an adapter as well, I highly suggest preordering that, who knows how hard those will be to find with just a walk in (personally, like how some peripherals end up, I'm worried we're not going to have extra adapters and controllers outside of what we have preordered).

I work at Gamestop and this is pretty much all spot-on, especially the part about preordering helping Nintendo.

In my experience Nintendo AAA games tend to sell out more easily than others, so preordering is probably a good idea. You're not risking your October turning into Jingle All the Way if you don't, but it's still smart.

 

[The_Thumbs]

I work at Gamestop and this is pretty much all spot-on, especially the part about preordering helping Nintendo.

In my experience Nintendo AAA games tend to sell out more easily than others, so preordering is probably a good idea. You're not risking your October turning into Jingle All the Way if you don't, but it's still smart.

Yeah, I don't know what it's been lately, but Nintendo has had some very tight allocations. I don't know if it's a push for digital, or if they just don't produce enough or what. Luigi's Mansion, Animal Crossing, Fire Emblem, Kirby Triple Deluxe, and more all just didn't seem to get a whole lot of extra copies in the store. Though, X and Y didn't have too many problems, so I think the very big Nintendo games should have some walk-in copies... though we're a bit more of a Nintendo store than some, so maybe that's just us who got enough for that one.

 

[Raijinken]

If they have extras in stock that are not preordered, then in most cases, yes.

However, stores like Gamestop typically only do midnight releases if there are enough preorders to begin with, so as mentioned above, the safest guess is to call and find out.

 

[Niala]

As long as they have leftover copies, it'll be fine. Usually, however, with high profile games like Smash, there aren't any left over. So I guess that's your call to make.

I think a better question is what reason is there not to preorder one? Even if you end up being tired and not wanting to go that evening, you can go pick it up the next morning.

 

[The_Thumbs]

If they have extras in stock that are not preordered, then in most cases, yes.

However, stores like GameStop typically only do midnight releases if there are enough preorders to begin with, so as mentioned above, the safest guess is to call and find out.

Sadly there are other factors too. Normally, if there's enough preorder, there's no question about it. However, things like Pokemon X and Y didn't have a midnight release. This was due to the fact that the perceived recipients were "children" and the fact that most competitive stores weren't going to do a midnight either. If Best Buy wasn't going to do a midnight, we don't need to do one either. yet if Best Buy does have a midnight, we want to be able to compete and have one too.

So I'm not saying GS won't do one. With the right preorders, it can happen. I know I'm personally going to push for my store to do one (rather two). I want my copy as soon as possible of course. However, if we don't get the payroll or permission, we might not be able to.