The Monday Inbox is curious to see if the Xbox Series X/S pre-order will be run better than Sony’s, as one reader successfully secures a PS5 pre-order.
To join in with the discussions yourself email gamecentral@ukmetro.co.uk
Money saver
I decided several months ago I was going to pre-order the PlayStation 5. I missed out on the PlayStation 4 and thought it was time to jump back into gaming.
I had signed up to received email alerts, as I knew stock was limited.
I watched the videos online, which unveiled the new PlayStation and also the follow up with the price on Wednesday night. I went to sleep at around 2330 that night and checked my email for one last time. No emails regarding pre-orders.
I wake up the next morning and check my email. There’s one from Currys at 2347 with pre-order info. I go to the site and it’s all sold out. Same with other sites during the day.
Thursday night/Friday morning I stay awake until 0130, thinking that Argos may open pre-orders at 0000 onwards. I wasn’t the only one with the idea as the site often crashes after 0000, due to the number of people logging on.
I go to sleep and wake up with the news that Argos has sold out.
Today I realised that I’m not going to get a PlayStation 5 this year and I certainly won’t buy one from eBay.
In a way it’s a positive. I’ve saved a lot of money and I can go back to my PlayStation 3 and finish off some games that I’ve neglected.
Keep up the good work.
Rave
Witching hour
So I waited until midnight to pre-order the PlayStation 5 on the Argos website, waited patiently and patiently up until between 5 and 6, once they were available to purchase. Guess what? It was not available to deliver to my postcode.
What a waste of time waiting for this. Forget PlayStation 5, Argos was not ready. I’m done, thanks for wasting my time
Your sincerely one p***ed off customer…
Anon
Farcical system
I think all this pre-order system from Sony has been an absolute farce. It has honestly just been a joke since Thursday! One minute Sony are presenting their official showcase, revealing their official price and release date, then approximately two hours later most of the big retailers have put out there pre-order service online with basically no warning whatsoever or anything set in stone from Sony at all?
It’s the genuine people who read these pages and make this community here on GC that I feel sorry for and others that have been at work or genuinely didn’t know anything about Smyths, GAME, and Very, etc. that already had their pre-order online service available just out of the blue? Hopefully, the people that do genuinely want a PlayStation 5 will still be able to get one as more stock comes in this side of Christmas.
Then all them greedy scalpers already charging extortionate ridiculous prices on eBay can ram it. I just hope there is going to be enough stock for everyone and they can get their hands on the PlayStation 5, then the guilty ones who have pre-ordered to make a killing are stuck with all their new shiny machines that nobody wants!
JAH
E-mail your comments to: gamecentral@ukmetro.co.uk
Sony, Nvidia, and… Microsoft?
You know, I had one in my Amazon shopping basket. The disc drive version. I sat there and couldn’t bring myself to spend £70 on Demon’s Souls, so I removed the console from my basket. Sure, there was a small part of me that wondered if I should go ahead anyway with the pre-order and sell it on at launch for undoubtedly an inflated price, but you know what, I couldn’t do it.
I’ve just read your story that PlayStation 5 consoles are appearing on eBay for £7,000, and I’m sure nobody will pay that much, but I fully expect £700/800 to be the norm if there isn’t a restock before Xmas. Perhaps nearer £1,000.
It’s a similar story with Nvidia’s new RTX 3080 graphics card, which seems to have had a ridiculously small amount of stock available. I suppose it’s just the way the world works now; concert and sporting event tickets are snapped up by scalpers and then resold for profit all the time, but I do think the companies involved should attempt to negate such practices.
Glastonbury Festival sells out within an hour, but the method involved in acquiring a ticket gives most an equal chance – providing you’re awake at 9am on a Sunday in late October.
Sony, on this occasion, have really let fans down by not giving them more advance notice of the pre-order times. Let’s see how Microsoft approaches this.
Matt
Corporations are not your friend
Sony’s first party arsenal is like a tactical nuke compared to Microsoft’s spud gun. These were the weapons they would destroy Microsoft again with in a new generation. Microsoft’s laughably bad Halo Infinite demo proved their policy of no next gen first party exclusives was holding back Xbox Series X and Sony stirred that narrative up with talk of believing in generations and providing experiences only possible on new hardware, cue clips of Spider-Man: Miles Morales and Horizon Forbidden West. Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart is regarded as only possible on PlayStation 5 because of the fast loading SSD.
It’s amazing how quickly the narrative changes and that whole party line is being called into question and seen by some as outright lies. Sony quietly releasing some unpalatable, slightly contradictory news after last week’s PlayStation 5 games/price/launch date reveal, like Miles Morales and Horizon Forbidden West will be on PlayStation 4, has eroded a chunk of public trust and made Microsoft seem just honest regarding their next gen exclusive policy – even though Microsoft’s next gen exclusive messaging is just as confused as Sony’s.
For me these games being on PlayStation 4 doesn’t really make Sony’s generational beliefs lies, they also didn’t announce positive news in the reveal, like 99% of PlayStation 4 games will be playable on PlayStation 5, but it does warrant a sideways sneer in their direction. Charging £70 quid for first party exclusives is a bit of a cheek too and put noses out of joint a bit, me included. The pre-order fiasco I think was just incompetency and retailers jumping the gun but the perception by many is that it was Sony dabbling in a bit of artificial scarcity. Sony are the bad guys again. For some the old arrogant Sony are back.
Personally, I think Microsoft, Nintendo, and Sony are as bad as each other. Nothing Sony has done will stop me getting a PlayStation 5 next year. But we’ve all got to put our own line in the sand and I don’t blame anyone if they wash their hands of Sony after the recent nonsense. It’s been an interminable wait for news and info for the next gen but now we are nearly there it’s getting quite fun. It almost feels like a two-horse race this time, almost.
Simundo
Modern eyes
I’ll start by saying there are certain games I will never be able to view objectively through modern eyes, Super Mario 64 is one of them.
I still think it holds up fantastically well, but I would be interested to know what people who have never played it before think.
Consoles moving into 3D using polygons instead of sprites was so exciting and the fact that Mario transitioned so seamlessly was absolutely mind-blowing. It could have been a disaster but captured the essence of Super Mario games and blasted them into 3D, amazing.
John
The journey continues
It began when I was but a youth. A child if I must say. My eyes were laden on it. The PlayStation 2. My first ever foray into Sony’s flagship brand. I booted it up. My childlike curiosity lit up like a Christmas tree. The starting screen flickered and I was immediately in love. I witnessed, as a primary school pupil, the joy of experiencing The Simpsons Hit & Run. The terror I felt seeing those robotic wasps, gunning for my life and that buzzing… it petrified me. But I find myself asking for that remake.
I waved goodbye to my childhood love, as I grew to become a teenager and my taste had changed. The PlayStation Portable. I lay down in my bedroom and as I scored one winning goal after another, in FIFA 11, and enjoyed the charm of Crash Bandicoot it had captured my heart. The void had been filled. Once more however, I had grown to be a secondary school pupil and I waved goodbye to another friend. My heart was broken.
I waved goodbye for a few years. But it came back to me. 2015. 18-years-old. I purchased the PlayStation 4 for £349 on a cold December evening at Argos. Grand Theft Auto 5, the majestic delight. Far Cry 4, love those honey badgers. And The Last Of Us Remastered, a heart-breaking masterpiece that captured hearts everywhere. My heart fluttered with love as I cowered away from the terror of Bloodborne, as I swung through the city of Manhattan as Spider-Man.
And as I write now, as a 23-year-old college graduate, I once again have been able to continue my journey. 16 September 2020. I have pre-ordered the PlayStation 5 from GAME. I know it will sell out like hot cakes, I am fixated upon the confirmation email and my love affair continues. Wednesday’s showcase was a masterpiece, a cocktail of heavenly delight. I purchased the console for £474, with a charging dock, and I am anticipating, among millions, the arrival of 19 November 2020. My childhood is my future. I am in bliss.
Zeeshan Shafiq
Rock solid future
As part of the lockdown we have been doing this thing in our town called Rockdown, where people of the community all paint rocks and leave them in the park for everyone to see. In celebration of the Super Mario 3D All-Stars collection coming out today I have painted one of my favourite scenes from Super Mario Galaxy.
With the full-fat announcement of the next gen consoles (finally!) and Nintendo remembering to release some games, the future, while still uncertain, is starting to look that little bit brighter.
Major_Kahonas
Catch up on every previous Games Inbox here
Holding back the praise
I don’t really get all this fuss about how apparently the PlayStation 4 will hold back the PlayStation 5 when it comes to games. I mean Spider-Man: Miles Morales doesn’t look held back at all to me. And I’m sure Horizon Forbidden West won’t be either. These are two of the best developers out there right now and I’m sure they will use both sets of hardware to their fullest potential.
Both Spider-Man and Horizon on PlayStation 4 are two of the best-looking games I’ve seen, so to drop the PlayStation 4 this early on when the PlayStation 5 comes out would be financial suicide.
There are only a limited amount of PlayStation 5 consoles to go around, and we are in the middle of a global crisis right now… there are probably a lot of people who wanted to buy next gen consoles but now cannot due to loss of employment/furlough, etc… but a new game maybe within budget.
I can easily see both games selling at least 10-15 million units on PlayStation 4 each maybe more with the giant PlayStation 4 userbase that’s out there that won’t be upgrading.
Most people thought that cross-generational was a good idea at first and consumer friendly until Halo Infinite showed it’s ugly, glitchy, pop-up induced head to the world… now it’s the worst thing ever. Blame 343i for being incompetent.
Good developers will make games work to their specific hardware, I’m sure Insomniac and Guerrilla Games wouldn’t be doing PlayStation 4 versions if they thought they wouldn’t be up to scratch.
Both versions will look amazing. Mark my words.
Stewart
GC: Did you always approve of the concept of cross-generational games or did you change your mind, along with Sony, last week?
Inbox also-rans
Has there been any news yet with regards to the PlayStation VR 2, please?
Paul Lodge
GC: Not yet, we suspect there won’t be until next year at the earliest. Sony has said the current headset will work on PlayStation 5 though and have implied their championing of VR will continue.
It’s odd some retailers stop advertising Super Mario 3D All-Stars. I pre-ordered form Amazon on Thursday and got mine delivered on Friday.
Ste C
Don’t see me bothering to get a day one PlayStation 5. The games doesn’t even look that amazing so far. So this year I’ll be getting the Oculus Quest 2 VR headset. Are you doing a review of it?
SJH1973 (PSN ID)
GC: We are, yes. But it hasn’t arrived yet.
I’m looking at getting the Xbox Series S. What reputable site to people recommend for digital purchases? Is CDKeys trustworthy, for example?
Jez
GC: That’s not something we have any experience of, but we’re sure a reader can advise.
This week’s Hot Topic
The topic for this weekend’s Inbox follows the pre-orders for the PlayStation 5 last week and the Xbox Series X/S pre-orders due to start on Tuesday, and asks simply: have you pre-ordered a next gen console yet?
If you have, how much do you intend to spend on next gen hardware and software overall this year? What are you hopes and expectation from the consoles in the short and medium term and which games are you most looking forward to?
How do you think the pre-orders and marketing were handled and did they cause you to change your original plans at all? If you haven’t pre-ordered when do you intend to get a next gen console, if at all?
E-mail your comments to: gamecentral@ukmetro.co.uk
The small print
New Inbox updates appear every weekday morning, with special Hot Topic Inboxes at the weekend. Readers’ letters are used on merit and may be edited for length.
You can also submit your own 500 to 600-word Reader’s Feature at any time, which if used will be shown in the next available weekend slot.
You can also leave your comments below and don’t forget to follow us on Twitter.
MORE: Weekend Hot Topic, part 1: Will you buy a PS5 or Xbox Series X/S?
MORE: Weekend Hot Topic, part 2: Will you buy a PS5 or Xbox Series X/S?
MORE: Games Inbox: PS5 pre-order disaster, Demon’s Souls price, and Super Mario Galaxy perfection
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