My wife props against me with a tired laugh. “The things I do for you.” This wasn’t planned. But neither was her car dying in sheets of Sydney rain and darkness — within walking distance to the EB Games where we now stand. Hundreds for a new alternator and battery is tomorrow’s problem. Tonight I balance the win column by clutching GTA V.
On Monday morning I had mentioned to Serrels and Luke from Giz that I might head to the Sydney World Square festivities. If only to check out the music and burritos. JB Hi-Fi, Gamesmen and Gametraders organised their own separate midnight soirées also.
But my potential plans were before the break down. An awesome friend came to the rescue with jumper cables. (Eva: you rock). Negative to negative. Positive to positive. Success? Negative.
Tonight I joined the NRMA.
By this stage of the evening, World Square was doubling as a wet wind tunnel.
Free ponchos and a shift to shelter looked to be keeping spirits high.
Free ponchos for everyone at World Square!
#EBGTAVLaunch: 80% covered, 100% awesome. See you there! pic.twitter.com/P0zBohJCfO— EB Games Australia (@EBGamesAus) September 16, 2013
Here in Marrickville, the mood is more subdued. But dry. With free Skittles.
Looks like EB (and no doubt other retailers) are planning a bunch of midnight launches before Christmas. Battlefield 4 and Assassins Creed IV: Black Flag are first up. Then COD: Ghosts followed by the new consoles. And here I was thinking that GTA V was my PS3’s last great stand before joining the ranks on Gumtree.
I’m typing this story on my phone to pass the time. My wife is shopping in K-Mart. It’s an odd night.
Mercifully, the dot matrix register screeches it’s conga and the line shuffles. What’s this? John Daly’s ProStroke for $4! What the hell are you thinking man. You’re over tired. Focus. Pay the nice lady.
There’s going to be a bunch of people taking sick days tomorrow. I may not make it in either.
Like I said, I have to see a guy about a car. His name is Simeon Yetarian.
Comments
17 responses to “Grand Theft Auto V: Getting A Jump Start With Midnight Launches”
When I was waiting for mine at midnight launch we had two lines (XB360 and PS3 line), surprisingly 80% who showed was collecting their PS3 versions.
I think this late in the current console generation most hard core gamers like the kind that would line up at midnight to buy a game have both the 350/ps3 and a combination of dead consoles and like myself expired XBL gold subscriptions that have expired.
I know am not buying more gold XBL for one game and there’s nothing on 360 horizon that interests me and I’m not getting an Xbone at launch.
I think it has more to do with the ps3 ( as far as im aware) being vastly more popular in australia for some reason.
I don’t think my online preorder from JB is gonna show up today 🙁
Edit: Nevermind…. I got it.
http://www.kotaku.com.au/2013/09/a-shipping-embargo-may-delay-some-grand-theft-auto-v-pre-orders/
Mine did
I got mine from JB today via courier and I’m in regional SA. Perhaps your location had too many deliveries to make it today.
Also received mine, 8am this morning from Toll
I have had more than one extremely pissed off dude on Facebook who didn’t realise the game required a 10GB install, and own a 360 arcade or 4GB unit. Considering the broad mainstream appeal, I’m surprised they didn’t try to get the message out to Joe-CallOfDuty more than they did.
Getting that message out could potentially harm sales. Can’t have that.
Nothing a $6 thumbstick couldn’t solve. Tell them to get over it
Just when you think video games can be taken seriously, some dick pulls it down for all of us and gives the brain-dead idiots who oppose video games ammunition…http://imgur.com/P1kYDZm
@coolguy41506 I know that feel, even though I got my “dispatched and on its way” email last night from EB, I just know it won’t arrive. So I am pretending the release hasn’t happened yet….Its not working.
Jelly levels rising to excruciating heights.
I know it’s not entirely related to this story, but I wish that for just today, I could have a video camera pointing inside a EB Games store, just to see how many parents with kids in tow come in to buy the game for said kids. I noticed literally less than 5 minutes after it opened this morning, my local EB was already selling GTA V to a parent obviously buying it for her kid, who would of been lucky to be 12…
Worst part is there is literally nothing you can do, trying to explain it to them has amount as much effect as talking to a brick wall, yet we all know if something bad happens, it won’t be her fault…
As I mentioned in the article surrounding the 11yo on youtube, I wonder how much impact the R18 rating has when all it mentions is “Drug Use”. The ESRB rating has a paragraph of consumer advice mentioning everything that would make a parent think twice. The PEGI rating has the same. Do parents know enough about the rating system to know that they’re not required to mention consumer advice pertaining to anything that could qualify for a lower rating? Would parents be less likely to be doing this if the consumer advice was complete: “Strong impact themes, strong impact violence, strong impact coarse language, high impact drug use, strong impact nudity and strong impact sex”? A little more informative than “R18 (Drug use)”…
There’s a lot of anecdotal evidence that says that parents care when they find out, but they don’t seem to care when they buy the damn things… so it can only be a knowledge problem, as far as I can tell.
I didnt go outside for the midnight launch and I didnt take a day off work today but enjoyed reading this article. If possible I would like to hear more about Fat John Daly’s ProStroke.
I went to the midnight launch at the Knox City VIC store. They separated people into 6 lines (360 Standard Edition, Special Edition and Collectors Edition / PS3 Standard Edition, Special Edition and Collectors Edition). Arrived at 8pm and was 30th in the pay line. There was a makeshift shooting gallery (using NERF guns) and the event organizer was throwing old Game Informer mags, GTA 5 Lithographs, and GTA 5 scene viewer keychains into the crowd. Managed to get a Game Informer and a keychain thing myself. There was also drinks for sale at $2 each with proceeds going to the Starlight Foundation.
During the down time I walked to the JB Hifi and bought Iron Man 3 on Blu-Ray, the staff member was disappointed that i didn’t preorder GTA 5 there but we did discuss Iron Man 3 a bit. Hit up Timezone for a bit, then went back to near EB Games where I spent 20 minutes in one of those massage chairs while watching stuff on my iPad.
Nice story bro 😀