ModifiedLogic

Grand Theft Auto 4 crept up on me. I knew it was there, but I wasn’t going to get it day one. I was really in no hurry. I figured it was going to be just another GTA game. (That still might be the case)

Over this past weekend, I began reading the reviews, namely ones from IGN and 1UP. Then, I watched the GameTrailers video review. Then I started reading other reviews via metacritic. By this point, I decided that I now needed the game. I went from willing to get it in a week or two to I need to pre-order it and get it, maybe even at midnight madness.

When I got into work Monday morning, Gamestop had a big banner on their site for GTA4. It said. "Order GTA4 by 2pm today with overnight shipping, and we guarantee you will have the game tomorrow." I thought, wow, I waited until the very last day to decide to pre-order this game and it was still available through a guarantee. How "Lucky" I swiftly ordered the game.

A little back story on this is needed. I’ve pre-ordered some of the last major game releases from Gamestop. Mass Effect being the most recent and most major. Something always seems to happen whether it be showing up a day late or some other error. Regardless, I seem to keep going back to the fire.

I waited until about 9pm last night before I called Gamestop to ask why my order was still "In Process". The customer service rep on the other end said "the address you have listed isn’t the address your bank or institutional has on file". My answer was "cancel the order". I have had my cc on file with Gamestop since it was issued. Nothing has changed. But whatever happened, I knew the game wasn’t going to ship. I really believe they pulled some kind of bait and switch on the people like me who ordered based on the banner on their front page Monday morning. Either that, or they realized that they didn’t have the resources to fulfill all of the day one orders in time.

So today, I will make my way to a few local retailers to see if I can score a copy of GTA4. With the internet as my witness, I shall never ever ever pre-order a game from Gamestop again.