https://twitter.com/Bungie/status/889198914326347776

Speaking of extended, my Farm experience is still going at 2:15, double the advertised length. It's very calming.

Awesome! I've still got a chance to play it then.

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It sounds like you must have the beta downloaded within the next few hours to be able to still play through Tuesday.

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I wasn't INACTIVE! I was listening to the sound effects BUNGIE! Oh Well. Four and a half to five hours ain't bad, with an hour or two of which all by my self.

TO those of you who missed it - worry not. You'll be able to see it soon.

I have some collocating and organising to do first, through.

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It sounds like you must have the beta downloaded within the next few hours to be able to still play through Tuesday.

I'm downloading it right now. We'll see, I guess. I just got back from vacation, with a newly installed fiber connection waiting for me.

My warlock was still in The Farm after 6 hours. I've left the house for a few hours, I hope he's still kneeling on that roof when I get home.

My warlock was still in The Farm after 6 hours. I've left the house for a few hours, I hope he's still kneeling on that roof when I get home.

As I too was kneeling, minding my own business. I was not away long. 10 - 15 min.

I wasn't INACTIVE! I was listening to the sound effects BUNGIE! Oh Well. Four and a half to five hours ain't bad, with an hour or two of which all by my self.

TO those of you who missed it - worry not. You'll be able to see it soon.

I have some collocating and organizing to do first, through.

73 Images including the one here. 19 Videos totaling 3.86 GB. You missed it!? Well... I got'chu fam! ;P

Through I am scratching my head right now on how I'm going present all this. If we had HTML I would just embed an album from imgur. :/

No worries on the videos side through. :)

I don't get back to the US until the 27th. You guys need to really stress the network out so they keep it open longer.

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I don't get back to the US until the 27th. You guys need to really stress the network out so they keep it open longer.

Will do.

(Sad to hear you won't be back in time.)

I just got back from vacation, with a newly installed fiber connection waiting for me.

Great news!

I still got three extra days, and I enjoyed them. I know I'm buying the game. Unless the raid sucks (highly improbable), I know I'm going to get my money's worth (even buying special editions) compared to just about any other entertainment I could purchase for myself (except maybe used books).

I guess I understand the argument against preorders, but preorders represent a company's or game's stock in a sense. It encourages more investment in both, and I've yet to be convinced that pre-orders have contributed negatively to the quality of Bungie's games.

One for each of my preorders.

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I guess I feel manipulated by pre-orders. I know that I am if I succumb to the marketing. I go completely digital which of course does not require delivery time. Rarely have I received anything from a pre-order that I couldn't reasonably get by doing nothing.

and I've yet to be convinced that pre-orders have contributed negatively to the quality of Bungie's games.

I've yet to be convinced of that for any games. It's not like developers see the preorder numbers roll in and think, "oh that's alright, our work is done. Let's launch a shit game now."

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I go completely digital which of course does not require delivery time.

You have to download it… that counts as delivery time does it not? I can still run to my favorite game store, buy a disc, and be back way before a 50GB game is done downloading.

I go completely digital which of course does not require delivery time.

You have to download it… that counts as delivery time does it not? I can still run to my favorite game store, buy a disc, and be back way before a 50GB game is done downloading.

I can't. (Plus, I have to get in my car, drive 5 miles, park, go into a crowded mall, wait in line to pay, find my car, drive home 5 miles (in traffic, both ways), and then deal with swapping discs every time I want to change games. For digital downloads, I have to spend about 3 minutes navigating menus and pressing buttons, then I can swap my monitor back over to my computer and go back to work, and all that time I'd be sitting in traffic and depreciating the value of my car I can actually be MAKING money.

I'd be completely digital (when it's possible) even if pre-orders didn't exist, because they're 100000000% more convenient in my life, for the entire life of the game.

and I've yet to be convinced that pre-orders have contributed negatively to the quality of Bungie's games.

I've yet to be convinced of that for any games. It's not like developers see the preorder numbers roll in and think, "oh that's alright, our work is done. Let's launch a shit game now."

Bungie might not care, but Activision does. According to VG chartz, which may or may not be accurate, Des2ny has about 1/4 the preorders of Destiny the same amount of time from launch. It's at least comparing like to like. Of course gamestop has said their pre-orders for Des2ny were 'great', so who knows. It's in no way scientific, but I think one can safely say that Des2ny will have a harder time than Destiny in terms of sales. Maybe if everything is excellent, they pull a Halo 2 and outsell the original.

According to the contract, Activision had the right to terminate it if Destiny failed to sell 5 million units, or after 'Comet 2' in 2016. It's not impossible that Activision would walk away if Des2ny is disappointing, especially since they were not entirely pleased with Destiny over the first three years (but they weren't exactly displeased either).

In fact, and please do not take this as fact in any way as it is uncorroborated, but I spoke with someone at Bungie who basically said there's a chance that there might not be anything coming after Des2ny and its expansions.

I hope that is not the case. I'm not going to pre-order, but I'll sure buy the game on launch.

and I've yet to be convinced that pre-orders have contributed negatively to the quality of Bungie's games.

I've yet to be convinced of that for any games. It's not like developers see the preorder numbers roll in and think, "oh that's alright, our work is done. Let's launch a shit game now."

...or the game just doesn't get made coughDayZcough. Hashtag $30 gone.

I go completely digital which of course does not require delivery time.

You have to download it… that counts as delivery time does it not? I can still run to my favorite game store, buy a disc, and be back way before a 50GB game is done downloading.

I can't. (Plus, I have to get in my car, drive 5 miles, park, go into a crowded mall, wait in line to pay, find my car, drive home 5 miles (in traffic, both ways), and then deal with swapping discs every time I want to change games. For digital downloads, I have to spend about 3 minutes navigating menus and pressing buttons, then I can swap my monitor back over to my computer and go back to work, and all that time I'd be sitting in traffic and depreciating the value of my car I can actually be MAKING money.

I'd be completely digital (when it's possible) even if pre-orders didn't exist, because they're 100000000% more convenient in my life, for the entire life of the game.

So, for you the delivery time is less. There's a lot of people with bad internet, and possibly even with caps, for whom digital distribution is not yet more convenient.

On PC I don't mind, since there will be cracks and interpreters and stuff years from now to aid in the play of digital games. But on consoles, I only trust a disc.

I go completely digital which of course does not require delivery time.

You have to download it… that counts as delivery time does it not? I can still run to my favorite game store, buy a disc, and be back way before a 50GB game is done downloading.

Claude's responses are spot on.

Completed Xbox game downloads are immediately available for play. I understand PS4 disc loading are subject to a certain wait time, are they not?

I see your point but it simply isn't relevant to my point. Pre-orders I've experienced delivered nothing truly substantive for my future gaming activity. In this case, if I hadn't pre-ordered, I'd still have had plenty of time with the now extended Beta. I'm already burned out on it and don't want to further spoil the fun of full release.

Marketing always pushes the pre-order betas long before even mentioning the usually well hidden public access.

Was looking at numbers for wrong year...

Didn't we have this talk a while back about not counting digital sales? It seems hard to believe that D1 on the PS3 and 360 out preordered D2 in its entirety...

According to VG chartz, which may or may not be accurate, Des2ny has about 1/4 the preorders of Destiny the same amount of time from launch.

Destiny Released Sept 9, 2013
VG Chatz Numbers as of July 27, 2013: 52,890 total preorders.

Destiny 2 Release Date Sept 6, 2017
VG Chatz Numbers as of July 17, 2017: 129,447 total preorders.

#codymilleryall

Did you bother to add up everything on every platform? There was a reddit thread regarding this. Destiny had over a million total, and Des2ny had 250K plus up to 18K for PC.

Your numbers are not correct. Check again. For one, you didn't add up all the platforms. 50k is like PS3 level. Destiny had over a million, and Des2ny has about 250K, plus up to 18K on PC.

Regarding digital sales. They do in fact estimate digital preorders, but even if why didn't it's still the same website. Unless there is a huge shift to digital preorders on the order of 300% over the past 3 years, the numbers are still helpful even if not exact. We are comparing relatively, not looking for an exact amount.

…and why are they a reputable source of numbers? For all I know, I could pull some RAND() fields from Excel and have more accurate information.

Also, I inherently distrust any organization who gratuitously uses a "z" instead of an "s" in their name.

https://www.quora.com/unanswered/Are-there-any-examples-of-successful-companies-who-have-used-a-Z-instead-of-an-S-in-...

…and why are they a reputable source of numbers?

Again, I'm not saying these numbers are accurate in the absolute sense. I think it's likely they are accurate in the relative sense, since nothing has changed in their methodology over 3 years.

http://www.vgchartz.com/methodology.php

"In fact, and please do not take this as fact..."

I laughed at this one.

https://www.quora.com/unanswered/Are-there-any-examples-of-successful-companies-who-have-used-a-Z-instead-of-an-S-in-...

Starz, Inc.

And while it's a brand, not a company, Silly Bandz is/was hugely profitable...

Sweet meme. That's super helpful.

That game wasn't even really bad. It had the same sorts of dumb bugs that every Bethesda game has and is forgiven for, and it's honestly still ten times the game Fallout 4 is. As usual, the internet lost its mind over something dumb and it went viral, rather than anyone actually playing the game and judging from themselves

In any case, I've yet to see any proof that preorders had anything to do with pushing that game out the door. I'm not saying preordering is a smart decision, I'm just saying preorders are not responsible or even really all that relevant to bad games.

since nothing has changed in their methodology over 3 years.

Uh, you don't see that as a problem, given that digital pre-orders are increasingly common in the industry, but VG Chartzzzz doesn't account for them? By tracking physical pre-orders nowadays, all you could potentially surmise is the general market share that a title has for each platform. And even that is probably super rough, statistically.

Edit: This same thing is happening in music. It's like saying that the music industry has imploded because you're only paying attention to CD sales and ignoring subscription services. The problem with digital pre-orders is that there's no middle man to use as a data source. The digital video games market is effectively operating in a black box, and retailers aren't going to disclose their internal numbers.

Sweet meme. That's super helpful.

Jokes, man. Jokes.

That game wasn't even really bad. It had the same sorts of dumb bugs that every Bethesda game has and is forgiven for, and it's honestly still ten times the game Fallout 4 is. As usual, the internet lost its mind over something dumb and it went viral, rather than anyone actually playing the game and judging from themselves.

While the inside-out faces and NPCs moonwalking at lightning speed across a room don't do much for immersion, I typically just laugh and move on. This game, however, was actually broken.

The game had two game-breaking bugs when I played through it two weeks ago. A few days after that post, it actually crashed to the dashboard while trying to load one of the last cutscenes of the game. That's all on top of the at least two dozen times that I had manually reload the last auto save because the game couldn't tell I was dead.

This game, while pretty and a lot of fun (when it isn't actively trying to make you stop playing), shouldn't have been released in it's current state. And while it may or may not have anything to do with their pre-order numbers, the game was released, not because it was ready to ship, but because people were ready to get paid.

-Disciple

I go completely digital which of course does not require delivery time.

You have to download it… that counts as delivery time does it not? I can still run to my favorite game store, buy a disc, and be back way before a 50GB game is done downloading.

Not when I have the game preloaded and ready to launch the minute it goes live you can't.

I go completely digital which of course does not require delivery time.

You have to download it… that counts as delivery time does it not? I can still run to my favorite game store, buy a disc, and be back way before a 50GB game is done downloading.

Not when I have the game preloaded and ready to launch the minute it goes live you can't.

Also, even with physical copies, you have to wait for the game to install from disk (about 15 minutes), and then install the now standard day-one patch. With preloading being a thing now, digital preorders may be the only way to be able to play a game as soon as it's released.

-Disciple

since nothing has changed in their methodology over 3 years.

Uh, you don't see that as a problem, given that digital pre-orders are increasingly common in the industry, but VG Chartzzzz doesn't account for them?

Where does it say they don't? Their methodology would indicate they do somewhat through consumer polls.

Even if it were true that they don't account for anything digital, neither would their Destiny 1 numbers. Apples to Apples. If you want to make the argument that the percentage of preorders that are now digital is some huge amount higher than three years ago, that is a conversation to have, but it would require some kind of data. I will grant that the numbers of digital pre-order very well could be higher, but is it 300% higher?

since nothing has changed in their methodology over 3 years.

Uh, you don't see that as a problem, given that digital pre-orders are increasingly common in the industry, but VG Chartzzzz doesn't account for them?

Where does it say they don't? Their methodology would indicate they do somewhat through consumer polls.

Even if it were true that they don't account for anything digital, neither would their Destiny 1 numbers. Apples to Apples. If you want to make the argument that the percentage of preorders that are now digital is some huge amount higher than three years ago, that is a conversation to have, but it would require some kind of data. I will grant that the numbers of digital pre-order very well could be higher, but is it 300% higher?

Well... (Trend over the last six years)

It's hard to overstate what a seismic shift this has been for the industry. The US game market has completely flipped in just six years from one that was about two-thirds physical to one that's about three-quarters digital. On a percentage basis, physical game sales today are a smaller share of the market than digital game sales were at the beginning of the decade. On a dollar-for-dollar basis, physical sales have fallen by nearly 50 percent in six years, while digital sales have increased threefold.

Also... (2016 vs 2017)

Sales to PCs rose 34 percent, while revenue from games downloaded to consoles like Microsoft's Xbox and Sony's PlayStation jumped 32 percent year over year.

"The shift to digital for the console market shows no signs of a slowdown, particularly in the U.S. where the segment rose 43 percent," SuperData said in a report.

I still got three extra days, and I enjoyed them. I know I'm buying the game. Unless the raid sucks (highly improbable), I know I'm going to get my money's worth (even buying special editions) compared to just about any other entertainment I could purchase for myself (except maybe used books).

I guess I understand the argument against preorders, but preorders represent a company's or game's stock in a sense. It encourages more investment in both, and I've yet to be convinced that pre-orders have contributed negatively to the quality of Bungie's games.

Except stock ownership confers benefits that preorders don't.

That's also my main beef with the otherwise very useful crowdfunding sites-- they are vehicles for investment without return and without regulation.

Was looking at numbers for wrong year...

Didn't we have this talk a while back about not counting digital sales? It seems hard to believe that D1 on the PS3 and 360 out preordered D2 in its entirety...

Why? The installed base of the previous generation at end-of-life would be expected to be several times larger than that of the next generation at its beginning.

Like, dag yo. But how much of that is because Microtransactions and DLC are digital only?

I still got three extra days, and I enjoyed them. I know I'm buying the game. Unless the raid sucks (highly improbable), I know I'm going to get my money's worth (even buying special editions) compared to just about any other entertainment I could purchase for myself (except maybe used books).

I guess I understand the argument against preorders, but preorders represent a company's or game's stock in a sense. It encourages more investment in both, and I've yet to be convinced that pre-orders have contributed negatively to the quality of Bungie's games.

Except stock ownership confers benefits that preorders don't.

So pre-order bonuses aren't a thing?

I still got three extra days, and I enjoyed them. I know I'm buying the game. Unless the raid sucks (highly improbable), I know I'm going to get my money's worth (even buying special editions) compared to just about any other entertainment I could purchase for myself (except maybe used books).

I guess I understand the argument against preorders, but preorders represent a company's or game's stock in a sense. It encourages more investment in both, and I've yet to be convinced that pre-orders have contributed negatively to the quality of Bungie's games.

Except stock ownership confers benefits that preorders don't.

So pre-order bonuses aren't a thing?

I didn't say "stock ownership confers benefits AND preorders don't".

I said "stock ownership confers benefits THAT preorders don't".

Whether the preorder bonuses are worth the lost opportunity costs and the perverse incentives it creates is a separate argument.

When you invest in a thing, you get a negotiable asset that (hopefully) increases in value, and confers upon the owner certain other rights, such as voting rights, in certain conditions.

Preordering gives you bonuses plus the same thing everyone gets on launch day: the game.

Funding through Kickstarter or other platforms gives you bonuses (maybe) and the game (maybe) or quite possibly nothing at all.

You can, of course, invest your money and lose it, but that's because the thing you bought is no longer worth anything, not because you never received the thing you "bought".

(Sad to hear you won't be back in time.)

My adventures the last few days have helped ease the pain.

I still got three extra days, and I enjoyed them. I know I'm buying the game. Unless the raid sucks (highly improbable), I know I'm going to get my money's worth (even buying special editions) compared to just about any other entertainment I could purchase for myself (except maybe used books).

I guess I understand the argument against preorders, but preorders represent a company's or game's stock in a sense. It encourages more investment in both, and I've yet to be convinced that pre-orders have contributed negatively to the quality of Bungie's games.

Except stock ownership confers benefits that preorders don't.

So pre-order bonuses aren't a thing?

I didn't say "stock ownership confers benefits AND preorders don't".

I said "stock ownership confers benefits THAT preorders don't".

Whether the preorder bonuses are worth the lost opportunity costs and the perverse incentives it creates is a separate argument.

When you invest in a thing, you get a negotiable asset that (hopefully) increases in value, and confers upon the owner certain other rights, such as voting rights, in certain conditions.

Preordering gives you bonuses plus the same thing everyone gets on launch day: the game.

Funding through Kickstarter or other platforms gives you bonuses (maybe) and the game (maybe) or quite possibly nothing at all.

You can, of course, invest your money and lose it, but that's because the thing you bought is no longer worth anything, not because you never received the thing you "bought".

I'm not talking about the direct benefits to those who preorder, although there are some. I'm saying preorders are a measure of the company's or game's value, which in turn affect the actual stock value and (one hopes) the ability of the company to maintain and attract the talent necessary to make the game good, which is one of preorder sales' indirect benefits to gamers.

Was looking at numbers for wrong year...

Didn't we have this talk a while back about not counting digital sales? It seems hard to believe that D1 on the PS3 and 360 out preordered D2 in its entirety...

Why? The installed base of the previous generation at end-of-life would be expected to be several times larger than that of the next generation at its beginning.

True, but "install base" can be a misleading number. By the time D1 came along, I had purchased at least 4 Xbox 360s, all of which count towards that platform's install base. And yet I hadn't bought a 360 game in over a year, because I ALSO had an Xbox One and a PS4.

For this and other reasons, "install base" needs to be judged on a sliding scale. Video game consoles towards the end of their lifespan (ie already eclipsed by newer hardware) do not typically see a great ratio of sales per new release.

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True, but "install base" can be a misleading number. By the time D1 came along, I had purchased at least 4 Xbox 360s, all of which count towards that platform's install base. And yet I hadn't bought a 360 game in over a year, because I ALSO had an Xbox One and a PS4.

Launch of the Original Xbox. First guy to get one also buys two copies of Halo. Bungie jokes :"Halo has a 200% attach rate!"

Right. Also I have a vague recollection of the Next Gen consoles getting a majority or vast majority of Destiny's sales. Might try and track down some numbers later...