Have any of you ever got a game early?

[Deleted member 26746]

Got Halo3 one week early.


Also when Metal Gear Soid 4 launched in my country there was a transportist strike and a few friends got a car and went to the neighbour country to buy the game "before" all our friends could do it.

 

[rusty chrome]

I got Uncharted 2 a week and a half before it officially released.

 

[Glassboy]

I got Uncharted 4 8 days early and Horizon Zero Dawn 14 days early. Luckily neither game had significant day one patches so I had a good experience playing both early. I got UC4 from eBay and then they messaged me later asking if I wanted Horzion on the eve of its release.

 

[Diarrhea Day-Lewis]

Yea for reviews on my old website and back in the day HeB Plus here in TX used to sell games a day early out of negligence so I did that sometimes. That stopped shortly after Mario Kart 7 tho

 

[cainhxrst]

an ebgames near me sold fire emblem awakening like 2 weeks before launch, that was pretty dope

 

[reelbigeddy]

I got Uncharted 4 like 4 days before release, completed it before it was even officially out and sold it for what I paid. Great success.

 

[Foxnull]

I've worked at a local gaming store for a while and get most games a few days earlier nowadays because of contacts to suppliers. Also got the english version of Yakuza 6 a few months earlier, which was awesome.

 

[Patitoloco]

I managed to buy MGS3 like 5 or 6 days before its release in Europe. Removing imports, I might have been one of the first people to complete it in the continent lol

 

[Theswweet]

Plenty of review copies, of course, but I also have gotten games early I've bought. There's a local store near me that just sells games when they get them in I've been patronizing recently.

 

[Outlaw Torn]

Infamous 2 two weeks early due to a Subway promotional giveaway.

 

[wbloop]

I got Mario Galaxy 2 two days before release and Smash Bros. Wii U as well as my Switch a day earlier. Since then I saw no one breaking street dates anymore here. But before that... good times.

 

[Secretofmateria]

When the ps4 was coming out gamestop broke the street date on the launch games like two or three weeks early, so i had killzone shadowfall and knack like two weeks before i owned the console

 

[Datajoy]

When I was abroad the shops usually got major games anywhere from 3 days before to 3 days after release. Was always a major dice roll.

 

[lord_of_flood]

Not in the actual sense, though I did play NieR: Automata before its release in the West because I bought it via a different country's PS Store.

 

[Bad_Boy]

Living in south korea, get games and movies early all the time.

 

[Auberji]

I got Phantasy Star Universe a week early. Was a bit of a bummer since I realised the online wouldn't be up... for a week.

story was fine.

 

[Kor of Memory]

The closest would have been World of Warcraft Burning Crusade. I had a guild member with an older brother at Blizzard that got us into the friends and family Beta. Exploration was always my favorite part of WoW so I enjoyed every single minute of running around the Outlands for the first time. It became especially interesting when there were parts of the world that wanted you to have a flying mount, and I obviously didn't yet, but I still loved it.

 

[Kneefoil]

Back when I used to pre-order games, they would quite often arrive in mail maybe a day or two early. That hasn't happened in, like, 10 years now.

 

[AllMight1]

I got Rising Revengeance a week early in the mail with the steelbook.

 

[TradedHats]

Got Yakuza Kiwami early but hadn't beaten Zero at the time I got it so couldn't play it yet :(

 

[It’s Time To Go]

All the time i know a few places in London.

If a game launches on a Tuesday can usually get it the Friday before. If it launches on a Friday, Can you usually get it by the Wednesday.

Click to shrink...

I would like to know about these places? I live in London and ive never heard of them.

 

[Deleted member 9486]

I'm sure I must have at some point with as many as I order online, but none jump to memory. So if I did it wasn't something I was super stoked for.

The closet to that would be a console release. I was super stoked for the N64 release--first console I saved up for and bought with my own money. Some stores broke street date and I got a call from Babbages that I could come pick it up (I think Nintendo ended up giving the ok after enough places broke date IIRC).

 

[jack_package_200]

EB games sold Pokemon Stadium a day before release.

I was so psyched

 

[Iori Fuyusaka]

Used to work for GameStop and took stuff home early all the time.

 

[Poison Jam]

Got Horizon Zero Dawn a couple days before release. That felt cool.

 

[Profondo_Rosso]

If I'm remembering correctly I had Quantum Break four or five days before launch. Finished it and sold it on for a small profit a couple of days before the official launch

There was a branch of Game in Preston when I was at uni that constantly broke street dates back in the PS2 era which was great.

My brother managed to get his Xbox 360 delivered with PD Zero 3 days before launch. I was very jealous.

 

[80s Old School]

Yeah I got Halo 2 before launch. It's been awesome.

 

[Grettir_the_Swole]

There was a Play N Trade down the road from me who gave me my preordered copy of Halo Reach several days in advance. What was great about that was I could take a day out of school without alerting one of my teachers, who also used to take a day off from work whenever a major video game came out.

 

[MP!]

k mart almost sold us modern warfare 3 a week or two early... which would have been amazing cause we'd have sold it online for like $1000 I bet...

 

[iamsirjoshua]

Amazon delivered my launch Switch, with a copy of Breath of the Wild, a day early. It felt kind of neat, but it didn't mean too much because I knew I wasn't going to get into BOTW until I finished another game that had recently released, and there wasn't a whole lot else to play at launch that I was interested in. Plenty of other things I'd have rather had a day early, but that's not to say it wasn't neat!

 

[chipperrip]

Halo 3, three weeks early. My highschool class went apeshit. Local shop with no know-how had the tin box on the shelf one day during lunch break. We skipped pretty much the rest of the day.

 

[RochHoch]

Amazon delivered both Dragon Quest 7 (3DS) and Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate to me a day early.

 

[Jimnymebob]

Yeah, GAME used to always deliver a day early.
Uncharted 3 was probably my most memorable one thought, because I was convinced that was only going to arrive at launch, and it showed up in the afternoon the day beforehand.

 

[nsilvias]

i use to when play n trade was around. they gave no fucks

 

[lt519]

I got my Playstation 4 early. One trick is to have Amazon deliver 2-day release date delivery and then call UPS/FedEx/whoever and have them hold at a shipping center and go pick it up. There's a distribution center near me so it's pretty easy to do.

 

[J_ToSaveTheDay]

I imported Soulcalibur II for Gamecube about 6 months ahead of its North American launch.

Best Buy put the first Bayonetta out for sale about 2 weeks ahead of launch in my area, it was very shortly after the demo droppedon Xbox 360. I'd beaten the game twice before some friends of mine had been able to pick it up. No idea why it was put up for sale so early at some Best Buys back then.

Also,a Gamestop employee once came back from the managers conference with a ton of full copies of Guilty Gear Isuka months before it actually went on sale — the discs were labelless, no proper case, and said something like "trade build" on the disc. It felt really cool to get an advanced copy of a then-niche game but I didn't really enjoy playing it at all — thought it was a pretty weak beat em up take on GG.

 

[defaltoption]

Had Black Ops 1 a week or two early can't remember exactly. Got my PS4 a day before launch and Amazon sent me two on accident.

 

[Fonst]

-By a day-
Monster Hunter Stories
Far Cry 5
(BestBuy can do this for Tuesday games)

-By a couple days-
Battle Chasers (Switch)
Trine 4
(I got a local story that gets small games in super early and sill send them when they have them)

-By a week-
Uncharted 3
(Went to the Uncharted movie theater event and they mailed the copies out early)

 

[Starlightmuse]

Back in the day I got Uncharted 3 the day before official release, boy I was the happiest kid alive.

 

[Zaubrer]

Got The Witcher 3 on the 12th instead of the 15th. That was fun because the store was so affraid of repercussions that you could only pay by cash and got no receipt for it. But you could call and ask for a "certain game" and they would put one on the side for you. Some stores were actually busted because people photographed their receipts with the disc and posted them online.

Got Red Dead Redemption 2 one day early as well. But that was at a big ass store who sold early.

I think I got several other games one or two days early as well. It's usually not that hard to find a small retail store who sold early. Well, that is back then when retail video games were a thing lol

 

[crono686]

Yes, a local supermarket seemingly got their games delivered on tuesdays and they never cared for release dates, so they sold everything starting on wednesdays. Because of that i got all 3DS Pokemon games 2 days earlier. Hopefully they still do that, than i could get Pokemon Sword and Shield next Wednesday.

 

[Izzard]

I used to know shop people so yeah. Also got some early codes to do community reviews, including horizon zero dawn.

 

[Rat King]

Happens all the time, the store I buy my games sends them almost immediately after having them on stock. Bloodborne, Uncharted 4, The Witcher, FFXV, BoTW, Mario Odyssey and maybe more that I'm not remembering. All of those 3 to 4 days earlier.

 

[SirNinja]

Back in the PS2/GC/XB gen, my local Walmart didn't give a shit about street date. If they got a copy of something, they'd stock it. Most memorably, I remember getting Okami and Final Fantasy XII a couple days early, and showing them off to friends at campus.

 

[KtotheRoc]

Got Marvel vs. Capcom 3 about a week early. There was a store who broke street date, and I rushed over to get a copy.

 

[DeepChord]

Had to drive one hour by train to get Bloodborne three days early. Absolutely worth.it.

 

[CannonFodder52]

Got Yakuza 6 a couple months early due to the demo bug. That was wonderful, it ended up being my 2018 goty too.

 

[DodgeAnon]

I won a Microsoft competition to design a car livery and won the official Xbox 360 Steering Wheel and a copy of Forza Motorsport 2. I ended up receiving it around two weeks early.

 

[MayorTortimer]

Like 4-5 days before Animal Crossing City Folk came out on the Wii in North America, people found out that you could just waltz into a Walmart and ask for a copy from the back and they'd sell it to you. So that was pretty dope. To be fair, it was probably my least favorite of the series, but still was really exciting since I had been waiting to get a copy for months.

Most recently, my Switch was delivered a day before the launch date after Best Buy sent it early. That was awesome.

 

[srtrestre]

Pokemon Conquest like 3 days early.