Pre-ordering is a benefit not for the buyer...

[Varjostin]

Endoperez said:

Varjostin, have you tried out DomII at all? You might want to adjust a little to the user interface, because the change from Dom:PPP to DomII was much bigger than it seems to be from DomII to Dom!!!.

Well, I have played the demo and the whole game at a friend, but I couldn't convince my parents again to lend me their credit card back then, because they (or my mother) became aware of the so-called dangers of e-buying. Yeah, it's the policy of my family. Since I now have a Visa Electron I was able to buy Dom III and I thought it's not worth of buying Dom II this late.

I have looked at the screenshots and feature lists and they look awesome. I can't wait to get my copy of the game. I presume it's published in June, right?

[Nerfix]

Varjostin said:Well, I have played the demo and the whole game at a friend, but I couldn't convince my parents again to lend me their credit card back then, because they (or my mother) became aware of the so-called dangers of e-buying. Yeah, it's the policy of my family. Since I now have a Visa Electron I was able to buy Dom III and I thought it's not worth of buying Dom II this late.

Goodnes, a fellow finn with same problem as I have.

Except my VE can't order stuff abroad.

[Gandalf Parker]

Ive worked for internet providors and I often recommend that people get some cheapo credit card that is NOT tied to your main bank account. Something like a $200 limit. And mark it as "for internet use".

Of course you are more likely to lose your credit info by carbon copy theft using it somewhere like cheap restaurants or gas stations, so its generally a good idea to get a minor card like that and mark it for daily spending also.

[atul]

Endoperez said:
A-ha! Another Finn joins our merry group of addicted gamers.

We are a legion.

:>

I'm too part of the group disagreeing about the claimed expensiveness of Dom3, recently bought Dragon Quest 8 (I think) for 62 €, and after 30 hours of playing it's starting to get old (good game, nevertheless). Compare that to the <50 € price of Dom3 and if the hours wasted to Dom2 are of any indication...

Anyway, people complaining about the inability to get Dom3 due to lack of credit card: there's still the payment options of Mail-in-check and Mail-in-money. It takes a bit of paperwork and extra money, but it can be done. Just ask from your local bank. I did it with Dom2 and it worked.

[Nerfix]

atul said:Anyway, people complaining about the inability to get Dom3 due to lack of credit card: there's still the payment options of Mail-in-check and Mail-in-money. It takes a bit of paperwork and extra money, but it can be done. Just ask from your local bank. I did it with Dom2 and it worked.

Can 17 year olds do this, how much paperwork, how much extra money?

[atul]

Nerfix said:
Can 17 year olds do this, how much paperwork, how much extra money?

Dunno about the age, you have to ask about that from your bank. But as it's your own money and not a loan, I'd hazard that the age won't be a problem. If I remember my ordeal correctly, I went to my bank with the payment info I'd get from the shrapnel's store, asked what I had to do in order to get money to US, filled a form or a two, paid about 10 € extra and got a pile of hardcopies about international money transfers and stuff. It took 20 - 30 minutes, IIRC.

[Endoperez]

Nerfix said:

Goodnes, a fellow finn with same problem as I have.

Except my VE can't order stuff abroad.

I got Dom:PPP when my dear godmother bought it from an otherwise non-games computer shop in Helsinki. I have since visited there once myself, just to see the place from where I received the Swedish blessing.
I hoped to get DomII for my birthday in December or Christmas, but for some reason my parents thought it to be better for me to wait until summer holidays.
Thankfully, I have no problems with Dom!!!. Being 18 does help, even if I don't care about alcohol or cars.

Do you other Finns remember the wonderful, wonderful review the Pelit magazine wrote for DomII? It was titled 'Tulkoon sinun valtakuntasi' (May thy kingdom come). I adore it. I have thought about scanning, printing & framing it. As far as price is concerned, if reading the review of a game I'm already familiar with makes me giggle, laugh and act unnervingly happy, it is worth its price. How did Gandalf sum it up, again? Digitalized crack? Pixelized crack? He was right!

[Nerfix]

I've read it. The best, but politicaly incorrect, subtitle there was "Nothing new on the West Bank"...

[Endoperez]

Nerfix said:
I've read it. The best, but politicaly incorrect, subtitle there was "Nothing new on the West Bank"...

Actually "Uutta länsirintamalta", literally "New on the Western Front" but better as "Something new on the Western Front". Sweden is Finland's western neighbour.
If those titles didn't fit the game that well, I'd have thought that the religious title and subtitles would be incorrect.

I just realized we conquered this thread. Sorry, Argitoth!

[NTJedi]

Argitoth said:
LOL!!! I just realized. I can't buy Dominions III because by the time it's released I'll be gone, away! Never to return! Actually, just for a year.

Zero entertainment for a year... either you are joining one of those reality TV shows, some unknown cult, or you're trying to bore yourself to death. Just kidding.

Argitoth said:
But why does GamersFront give us ZERO benefit for pre-ordering? Anyone knows that a good publisher will throw in SOMETHING! Was it Ultima Online or EverQuest that gave you cloth maps for pre-ordering? That's really stupid that GamersFront is completely ignoring the buyer.

Well before May_20th the preorder benefit was financial... saving the consumer $7.00 in cost. So financially it was better to pre_order before May_20th.

Actually if Shrapnel wanted they could release a "Collectors Edition" of Dominions_3. The collectors edition could include 3 unique items to lure the true fans. First a small paper manual providing hints & history otherwise not available. Second could be a figure of the angel in DOM_3 which is to rival the demonlords. having a holy symbol in the box should help. And third and most important is that anyone which purchased a collectors edition could attend a private online 1_hour chat with the Illwinter developers. This chat would be setup where the developers would choose to only answer the questions they wish. All questions would have to be PM to someone which sorts and passes the civilized questions to Illwinter.
--made a topic for this:
http://www.shrapnelcommunity.com/thr...&Number=426312

Argitoth said:
GamersFront is basically saying, "Let the buyers pre-order 2 to 3 months before the game is released, we don't care if we are out of stock, we don't care if the price is high, oh no. Lets ignore the buyer and give them NOTHING for helping us. No reduced price, no store credit, no special mouse pad, no cloth maps... Let's not give anything to our fans."

Anyone which pre-orders the game won't be on the 'out of stock' list because they manufacture the CDs, books and game box in bulk. Shrapnel will examine the total pre-order requests and match the demand for shipping before the game is released.
The TRUE benefit of pre-ordering was before May_20th which I mentioned earlier. The only benefit of pre-ordering now is not being placed on some waiting list if the game becomes a huge success. Ideally the game should still have a $2.oo discount to encourage more pre-orders.

I won't be able to take part in the Doms3 community.

We'll be here when you finish your year vacation which has zero entertainment. And one benefit you can look forward to upon returning is that your first game will have an official patch making it more stable and balanced.