US Stores Off-Sync?

Ok, I've seen a pattern developing, I went to Best Buy's to get NTW but the clerk said that NTW was to be released the 25th, and Amazon.com says the 24th. It's a release date, how can you be unsure about it?
So now I've turned to Steam as a last resort though it's going to take forever, the current estimation is 22 hours.
Also another question, can I do anything else while it's DLing?

I went to all the normal places looking for it, and nobody had it available. Gamestop and Target both say it will be on shelf tomorrow, Wal-Mart...well, they are hopeless... "total what?"

release dates are usually the SHIP dates.. meaning it'll be in stores the day after... i have no idea when this started, bout 2 years ago really.. before that release dates actually meant it'd be on the shelves.

From what I'm seeing for mass market retailers the 23rd was the day the game was actually shipped to them. That means that most brick and mortar retailers should have it on the shelf 24-25th and those with Amazon pre-orders should have their orders shipped out by tomorrow. I got NTW with an Amazon gift card given by my father-in-law and used the surplus on the card to get overnight, and it currently shows my estimated delivery date as the 25th, so I'm expecting it to see a note on my door about failure to deliver when I get home from work Thursday.

Originally Posted by SirAndrewD

From what I'm seeing for mass market retailers the 23rd was the day the game was actually shipped to them. That means that most brick and mortar retailers should have it on the shelf 24-25th and those with Amazon pre-orders should have their orders shipped out by tomorrow. I got NTW with an Amazon gift card given by my father-in-law and used the surplus on the card to get overnight, and it currently shows my estimated delivery date as the 25th, so I'm expecting it to see a note on my door about failure to deliver when I get home from work Thursday.

Im in the same exact situation as you! I pre-ordered from Amazon using a gift card... I can see that its supposed to ship on the 25th. I bet you will see some action going on with your order starting tonight, but it all depends on what service you picked. I went with the $3.99 same day delivery deal. I expect to get my game Thursday morning via FEDEX. The waiting is killing me! I was about to cancell my Amazon order and go for a digital download version.... I will use some self control and wait for my $39.95 Limited Edition from Amazon!

I pre-ordered on Gamestop using a giftcard on 12/29/09 and right now at 1:29 AM (USA Southern California) it says my order is "Backordered" on gamestop.
What a joke, thats means it probally wont ship until the 25th if they even get the game in stock by then.

It makes me want to cancel my pre-order and go directly to their store and buy it there.

You can still play Steam games or other games while downloading. Your internet speed will be slower obviously... Just make sure you don't have the launcher open(the screen appears when you double click the shortcut in your Steam Games tab).

Amazon said 23rd, as in today for me, hell i even got the game today lol, and i just ordered it yesterday...thankgod for living close to the amazons resource stores

Originally Posted by Space Wolves

Amazon said 23rd, as in today for me, hell i even got the game today lol, and i just ordered it yesterday...thankgod for living close to the amazons resource stores

I shake my fist at the heavens for the injustice.

Yeah I went looking looking for it at all the usual retailers today and found out that 'released on 23' means, as the pleasantly accommodating lady at walmart put it, "they just done shipped it!"

Not desperate enough for a steam purchase though. I want a hard copy, and I want to pay in cash (yes TW is my drug).

Originally Posted by ♔DeusVult!♔

Yeah I went looking looking for it at all the usual retailers today and found out that 'released on 23' means, as the pleasantly accommodating lady at walmart put it, "they just done shipped it!"

Not desperate enough for a steam purchase though. I want a hard copy, and I want to pay in cash (yes TW is my drug).

tell me about it, next TW should be Walmart: TW Best buy would be the other superpower with gamestop and other smaller stores the "fodder" countries. just annoys me that gamestop dosent even carry pc games anymore, you have to pre order a copy of pc games to get them there, they dont have a bunch on the shelf. f'in sellouts. Oh and they wont have my copy till tomorrow either. NJ here so east coast theory didnt work out for me.

Yeah, I won't be getting NTW until the 26th according to Amazon.

I wouldn't mind just getting the game on Steam, but it's such a rip-off to pay 39.99 and not get the two unit packs, whereas I can pay the same price at Amazon and get both the unit packs.

23rd is the ship date here in the US. If you live on the west or east coast theres a chance you could get it today. If you live further inland{midwest for example} the store wont actually recieve it until tomorrow. And if im not mistaken Best Buy usually gets their new games on a Thurs.

Originally Posted by Achilleslastand

23rd is the ship date here in the US. If you live on the west or east coast theres a chance you could get it today. If you live further inland{midwest for example} the store wont actually recieve it until tomorrow. And if im not mistaken Best Buy usually gets their new games on a Thurs.

I live in New England, though.

I just got back from best buy and no luck. The flyer said the game comes out on the 23rd. Thats bs.

Originally Posted by Achilleslastand

23rd is the ship date here in the US. If you live on the west or east coast theres a chance you could get it today. If you live further inland{midwest for example} the store wont actually recieve it until tomorrow. And if im not mistaken Best Buy usually gets their new games on a Thurs.

nah lately we have been getting them early,as is the case with Heavy Rain,MAG and others to insure a day and date release,but for some reason we did not get the same for Napoleon.At any rate we typically get our games on Wednesday morning if we did not have it early

Originally Posted by hitokiri2486

Yeah, I won't be getting NTW until the 26th according to Amazon.

I wouldn't mind just getting the game on Steam, but it's such a rip-off to pay 39.99 and not get the two unit packs, whereas I can pay the same price at Amazon and get both the unit packs.

That was my thinking, well, that and the Amazon gift card. Free is a pretty decent price for NTW, especially when I'm still a bit sore from the whole ETW thing. The only sad thing for me is that with my work schedule I won't be around to get any deliveries on Thursday or Friday, which means I may be out of luck till after the weekend. Ah well.

I went to Best Buy to buy Empire the day it came out, and all they said was "oh it's probably sitting in the truck in the back, we may offload it in a couple days". Lol so these stores may have it but are just lazy and don't put things out on Tuesdays, I have seen this trend with many DVD's that are supposed to come out on Tuesdays.

EDIT: Actually Best Buy has the release date as the 25 on their website, so it may be up to the store when they actually release it.

its because the game isnt as hyped up as empire or other pc games are was. not as big of a release, since the stores arent expecting to sell much of them.

Indeed.I am the computers/media supervisor at my local Best Buy and the case appears to be the same as many other retailers,being this is not considered a high profile release,which i dont agree with but it is what it is.Hopefully we will see it thursday rather than Friday