Why I Hadn't Pre-ordered GTAV & The AfterMath
Well, hello there again, everybody!
You might have noticed my constant ramblings on Twitter/Tumblr(even /Facebook) about my thought process behind deciding 'should I pre-order GTAV, or should I save my money?'. Unfortunately, and by 'unfortunately' I mean as of what I've recently realized it to be, I finalized my decision to not pre-order GTAV, and as of current, I actually regret it. So, let's back up into 2013, shall we?
Back in the earliest time, Grand Theft Auto V was announced ... oddly for only PS3 and the Xbox 360 ... but where's PC? I think at this time, I did have a look to see what had happened in Grand Theft Auto IV's case, and it had apparently taken about 8 months till its PC port was released. So, hey, just give it a few months longer to arrive on PC.
Then arose a petition on Change.org, asking Rockstar to consider bringing GTAV to PC, and it grew very big. I think I'd even signed it too. Eventually, whether the petition actually was victorious or not, it was finally announced.
Last year, Rockstar'd finally put out that they were releasing a newer and more advanced version of GTAV for the next-gen consoles, the PS4 and Xbox One (which now, actually is easier to say than if it were '720' instead of 'One', but oh well) ... but not only those ... they also had finally included PC in that very announcement! Hooray! Rockstar really is doing the right thing!
... Well, then that excitement had to be pushed back when apparently Rockstar needed more time with GTAV. So, the console crazies got their hype factories, while the rest of us, the PC (Gaming) Master Race, if you will, would have to remain waiting for our chance at the new thing ... at least till December.
Nope, ours got delayed again. Good reason, who'd have known? I believe the specific date of the first delay was January 28, 2015. Then, it got delayed again to March 24 (coincidentally the same day as my oldest brother's birthday). Lastly, it was delayed a third time to this previous Tuesday (April 14).
I'd had mine eyes on GTAV since the PC release announcement and began actually contemplating pre-ordering it back in January, and I continue to contemplating pre-ordering it till the day it'd finally released. By now, I really wish I had. Why didn't I though?
Remember back to GTAIV, which was jack-loaded with DRM? Social Club, SecuRom, Games For Windows - LIVE, and (if you were smart and bought it there) Steam. For this, I'm rolling in the case of having the Steam account, because yes, you are darn fool if you play computer games like these and don't have Steam. Anyway, on top of Steam account, which is absolutely no issue, you'd need to create a Social Club account, which is Rockstar's special DRM service, but also a bit of a social network for their games, or something like that. Then there's Games For Windows - LIVE, which really, no honest and more-than-casual gamer likes it. I mean, I like the feature that allows me to chat with my friends on their silly Xboxes, but other than that, I, among others, have no need for it ... plus, it initially having issues with recognizing CD keys (which the Steam copies come with) kind of brought it my unhappy side ... and overall, that DRM is seen as evil and possibly a terrorist to the gaming community. Last, but kind of least, in terms of putting one in a good mood, SecuRom, and what annoys me about it is that if I am running my Process Explorer (because it's more organized than the default Task Manager) it will give me an error. It boggles my mind that any software, no matter what the heck it is, would have any issue with me running my handy Process Explorer. Aside from the jacking of DRM, the game itself is a crappy port ... because one can tell it's likely just a literal copy-and-paste of the console code to a computer, and no optimization at all. Okay, maybe there might be slightly some optimization, but like heck is there much nor enough.
This very issue with Grand Theft Auto IV is what originally had sparked my avoidance of pre-ordering Grand Theft Auto V, as I'd thought to wait till release to see if anyone who'd pre-ordered got burnt, and maybe have a good laugh at them. Then another factor came by:
When you could finally pre-order Grand Theft Auto V, its price point turned out to be $70. Well, it's apparently $60 in the US, but I like my Canadian pricing. Now, I'm one of those who does not believe a game is ever worth anything past 60 bucks. The only games I've ever bought for a wee bit more than 60 bucks are Batman: Arkham Origins and Wolfenstein: The New Order, but Arkham had taxes included (got it from EB Games on its release day) and Wolfenstein must have had something extra to its pricing, and this was back when Steam used American pricing on us Canadians. Upon the $70, it would come with in-game money of over 1 million dollars and San Andreas as the extra game (on Steam, at least). I personally don't really care for in-game money as I'm not so much a fan of pay-to-win, as this is what it seems like to me ... do let me know if I'm wrong though, thank you. As for San Andreas, I'd already had the game in my library, although it did cross my mind of either trading/selling it, or using it for a giveaway within a Steam Group I'm an admin in. Here was the bigger issue though. My money-spending was between GTAV's pre-order OR ordering a new CPU for my computer (a 2011 AMD A8-3850 Quad-core). So, one being $70 and heaven knows I'd be able to run it too well, or about $180 to $200 for something that would allow me to run my games more smoothly—even finally be able to record Batman: Arkham Origins or Skryim!
This very week, I'd finally discovered the ugly and disheartening and inducing-a-left-out-feeling flip-side to my whole desire for avoidance of GTAV:
You might have noticed my constant ramblings on Twitter/Tumblr(even /Facebook) about my thought process behind deciding 'should I pre-order GTAV, or should I save my money?'. Unfortunately, and by 'unfortunately' I mean as of what I've recently realized it to be, I finalized my decision to not pre-order GTAV, and as of current, I actually regret it. So, let's back up into 2013, shall we?
Back in the earliest time, Grand Theft Auto V was announced ... oddly for only PS3 and the Xbox 360 ... but where's PC? I think at this time, I did have a look to see what had happened in Grand Theft Auto IV's case, and it had apparently taken about 8 months till its PC port was released. So, hey, just give it a few months longer to arrive on PC.
Then arose a petition on Change.org, asking Rockstar to consider bringing GTAV to PC, and it grew very big. I think I'd even signed it too. Eventually, whether the petition actually was victorious or not, it was finally announced.
Last year, Rockstar'd finally put out that they were releasing a newer and more advanced version of GTAV for the next-gen consoles, the PS4 and Xbox One (which now, actually is easier to say than if it were '720' instead of 'One', but oh well) ... but not only those ... they also had finally included PC in that very announcement! Hooray! Rockstar really is doing the right thing!
... Well, then that excitement had to be pushed back when apparently Rockstar needed more time with GTAV. So, the console crazies got their hype factories, while the rest of us, the PC (Gaming) Master Race, if you will, would have to remain waiting for our chance at the new thing ... at least till December.
Nope, ours got delayed again. Good reason, who'd have known? I believe the specific date of the first delay was January 28, 2015. Then, it got delayed again to March 24 (coincidentally the same day as my oldest brother's birthday). Lastly, it was delayed a third time to this previous Tuesday (April 14).
I'd had mine eyes on GTAV since the PC release announcement and began actually contemplating pre-ordering it back in January, and I continue to contemplating pre-ordering it till the day it'd finally released. By now, I really wish I had. Why didn't I though?
Remember back to GTAIV, which was jack-loaded with DRM? Social Club, SecuRom, Games For Windows - LIVE, and (if you were smart and bought it there) Steam. For this, I'm rolling in the case of having the Steam account, because yes, you are darn fool if you play computer games like these and don't have Steam. Anyway, on top of Steam account, which is absolutely no issue, you'd need to create a Social Club account, which is Rockstar's special DRM service, but also a bit of a social network for their games, or something like that. Then there's Games For Windows - LIVE, which really, no honest and more-than-casual gamer likes it. I mean, I like the feature that allows me to chat with my friends on their silly Xboxes, but other than that, I, among others, have no need for it ... plus, it initially having issues with recognizing CD keys (which the Steam copies come with) kind of brought it my unhappy side ... and overall, that DRM is seen as evil and possibly a terrorist to the gaming community. Last, but kind of least, in terms of putting one in a good mood, SecuRom, and what annoys me about it is that if I am running my Process Explorer (because it's more organized than the default Task Manager) it will give me an error. It boggles my mind that any software, no matter what the heck it is, would have any issue with me running my handy Process Explorer. Aside from the jacking of DRM, the game itself is a crappy port ... because one can tell it's likely just a literal copy-and-paste of the console code to a computer, and no optimization at all. Okay, maybe there might be slightly some optimization, but like heck is there much nor enough.
This very issue with Grand Theft Auto IV is what originally had sparked my avoidance of pre-ordering Grand Theft Auto V, as I'd thought to wait till release to see if anyone who'd pre-ordered got burnt, and maybe have a good laugh at them. Then another factor came by:
When you could finally pre-order Grand Theft Auto V, its price point turned out to be $70. Well, it's apparently $60 in the US, but I like my Canadian pricing. Now, I'm one of those who does not believe a game is ever worth anything past 60 bucks. The only games I've ever bought for a wee bit more than 60 bucks are Batman: Arkham Origins and Wolfenstein: The New Order, but Arkham had taxes included (got it from EB Games on its release day) and Wolfenstein must have had something extra to its pricing, and this was back when Steam used American pricing on us Canadians. Upon the $70, it would come with in-game money of over 1 million dollars and San Andreas as the extra game (on Steam, at least). I personally don't really care for in-game money as I'm not so much a fan of pay-to-win, as this is what it seems like to me ... do let me know if I'm wrong though, thank you. As for San Andreas, I'd already had the game in my library, although it did cross my mind of either trading/selling it, or using it for a giveaway within a Steam Group I'm an admin in. Here was the bigger issue though. My money-spending was between GTAV's pre-order OR ordering a new CPU for my computer (a 2011 AMD A8-3850 Quad-core). So, one being $70 and heaven knows I'd be able to run it too well, or about $180 to $200 for something that would allow me to run my games more smoothly—even finally be able to record Batman: Arkham Origins or Skryim!
This very week, I'd finally discovered the ugly and disheartening and inducing-a-left-out-feeling flip-side to my whole desire for avoidance of GTAV:
- By January, it was now over a year since Rockstar'd released the original versions of GTAV, and they'd released the next-gen ones too. This was already a longer period than between GTAIV's crappy PC port and its console versions, so obviously, Rockstar's had much more time to spend on making GTAV for PC;
- Back in January, again, it came with San Andreas and the in-game money. So, let's checking the pricing, shall we? San Andreas: $70 - $17 = $53. Then the in-game money: $53 - $25 = $28. Yeah ... looking at this now ... man, I was such a total idiot. Plus, again, I could have just traded or given San Andreas away or such;
- The sheer concept that Rockstar's probably planning on doing the PC port right this time, after the criticism and crappiness of GTAIV's port;
- The third and fourth delays must have meant Rockstar was up to something with this port;
- As (over) 1 million copies of GTAV had apparently sold on release day, I think my friend @JCGRE3N has a point in that GTAV won't be getting any discounts till the hype is nil (;w; (this emote is an exception and is justifiable for this very case)).
... And the AfterMath of it all? (Since I got the reference to work (hopefully), hopefully I can resume development on At Day's End soon ... Thought I should mention that if I'm going to cross-reference another project of mine.) Feeling of self-deprecation, or in other words, like an idiot or fool or over-skeptical ... thing—er, bugger. Feeling left-out, as all my Steam friends are having a jolly-good time with it, while, again, I was an over-skeptical bugger. Oh, and it turns out, I won't ever get my CPU. No fault of the store (our local CBS), but their dealer kept pushing the ETA (date). So, that 'which to get' thing I'd worried about ... I really shouldn't have, and just go for the game. Even worse now is my school's got two events coming up which I plan to go to: this upcoming Friday's Wake-a-Thon (the first in four years), which is $30, and we do all sorts of fun things at school from 7 PM on Friday to 7 AM on Saturday (I might just binge watch me some Daredevil, etc.! Heh, heh!); then the 1st of May is my school's Semi-Formal dance, which is $10 per person, although if I'm lucky, it might be $20! Even more are the upcoming releases of Hatred and Batman: Arkham Knight, which'd be about a total of $110 (about $50 for Hatred and $60 for Bats).
Lastly, I have also contemplated even just waiting till a day like 4.20 (April 20th), because you know that whole dumb line drawn from the 'blaze' part of my name, and since I myself get express permission to draw such a line, I will: the '420 blaze it' thing. Actually, that's also a possible (although not guaranteed) date for BLAZONNATION to finally resume with BN #20 ... but who knows. I just haven't had the time nor motivation/inspiration lately for it. I've really just contemplated simply just buying the game when I do ... but I feel like the 70 bucks is only justifiable for if I was pre-ordering it or if it came with the extra perks ... I don't like feeling left out from the fun I could have playing Grand Theft Auto V, but my retardation towards getting to pre-ordering it has turned to want to cost me.
I do apologize for my recent lot of tweets and such consisting of the sort of 'should I do this?' or 'why didn't I do this?' topics, but, I mean, the stuff has been honestly bugging the crap out of me. I know it might not be that big a deal to others, but of course, you're not me, and I do tend to bug about a lot of stuff that I myself feel very passionate about ... including not feeling left-out on fun such as Grand Theft Auto V ... but fortunately, writing about it here has allowed me to describe my thought process as detailed as I can.
Anyway, I gotta go for now. I have dishes to wash, a lab report to complete, and if I have enough time, play a game or watch one of my shows!
Thanks always very much for reading me out!
~ JBJblaze
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