I’d usually start an article like this by saying “unless you’ve been living under a rock, you’d have heard that you can now pre-order a PS5”, well as it happens if you were asleep or away from a screen on the night of Wednesday 16th September/early hours of September 17th then there’s a very good chance you wouldn’t have know about the PS5 pre-orders. The whole situation as loads of different retailers (here in the UK) such as Amazon, GAME, Currys PC World, Argos and more all scrambled to make pre-orders available was an embarrassment to everybody involved. This entire fiasco felt even more insulting after Sony already promised they’d prewarn us on pre-order dates and pretty much said that it wouldn’t be a massive free-for-all, so much for that!
Before we get going, if you don’t fancy reading today then you can catch the video version of this article in the link below!
Before we jump into whether the console will still be available to pre-order for those who missed out I want to address those of us with pre-orders who aren’t even guaranteed a PS5 on November 19th, which may give you a rough idea of where you stand if you’re yet to secure a pre-order. Most people reading this will have already seen the talk between fearful gamers who went through Amazon, fearful because the retail giants have been busy sending out emails warning buyers that they can’t promise you’ll have a PS5 in your home come launch day. Personally I think there’s no need to panic about this one as it’s probably just Amazon covering their arse just in case. We have an uncertain future with the current pandemic and for all Amazon knows we might all be smack bang in the middle of a second spike or even back in lockdown during the week PS5 is released meaning getting the console out to everyone may be a tall order.
It’s not just Amazon customers who are in the dark. I just about secured my pre-order from Currys PC World who’s website crashed hard this past Thursday as thousands attempted to get their pre-order sorted. In fairness to Currys, they quickly established a queue system which meant 100,000 lucky customers were able to pre-order. However since then it’s come to light that the majority of those 100,000 haven’t had confirmation emails (myself included at the time of writing) as the staff at Currys scramble to try sort themselves out and manually send out confirmations after their email system supposedly went down under the pressure of so many orders. The company’s service partner ‘Team Knowhow’ have been dealing with the brunt of complaints from worried gamers on Twitter and some of the answers they’ve given are a slight cause for concern. It even got to the point when they stopped trying to be polite and just threw Sony and their disastrous handling of the situation under the bus. Big props to this guy in the image above for his honesty!
It’s not just Amazon and Currys, pretty much every retailer faced some sort of criticism as they tried to handle the last minute rush created by Sony. GAME decided to not waste any time and made pre-orders available only a couple of hours removed from the big PS5 showcase shortly before midnight. Meanwhile Argos took a more sensible approach of holding back their pre-orders until the following Friday, however when asked what time on Friday, the official Twitter account for Argos responded vaguely saying it could be midnight or it could be sometime the following morning.. Of course those pre-orders went live at around 4am when everyone was asleep causing a mass panic in the morning. Great.
It sounds like I’m having a pop at all these big British retailers but I’m really not. The blame lies 100% with Sony. These retailers are professional and would have undoubtedly been able to run a more organised service if Sony had committed to a date and time that all PS5 pre-orders go live, much like Microsoft have for the Xbox Series X/S. Instead the responsibility was shifted to these stores who were feeling the pressure from both customers and competitors to make the pre-orders available ASAP despite not being fully prepared.
If you’re one of the many people who weren’t able to grab a pre-order then you may well be looking for where to turn next. Well I have a few suggestions and my main one is not to worry. Yes I’m a hypocrite as I’ve personally gone after a PS5 myself but I truly don’t believe it’s anywhere near an essential purchase. The launch lineup, although good, isn’t setting the world on fire. Spider-Man Miles Morales and Demon Souls seem to be the two getting people most excited but given one isn’t a full length game and the other is a remake, you’re not missing out on too much. Add to that the fact that pretty much every PS5 game for the next 12 months or so will also be available on PS4 anyway, it really doesn’t hurt to wait. Don’t let the pressure from the media and your friends do force you into a purchase that can wait. If you can get one then cool, if not then you’re really not missing out on a lot.
My other suggestions for those who are still determined to nab a pre-order are slightly more tedious. There’s a chance that pretty much every retailer I’ve mentioned above may get more stock in before the November 19th launch so that means refreshing web pages on a regular basis and hoping you get lucky with your timing. However given the recent history of pre-orders going live throughout random times of the night by these retailers, this may need more than luck. Outside of that may I recommend following IGN UK Deals (@IGNUKDeals) who have been fantastic at keeping UK gamers up to date on who has stock and when it’s available. Good luck and for the love of Kratos do not buy a pre-order from a tout!
Before I shoot off I just want to say one thing and it’s going to sound like I’m ripping off Stuart’s Bear’s Den catchphrase but be nice yeah? I’ve seen staff have to deal with a lot of angry people who want certain guarantees about their PS5 pre-orders and quite frankly it’s not right. The retail companies themselves are hardly to blame for this mess let alone the unfortunate souls who happen to work for them. So please, don’t take out your frustrations over your brand new expensive shiny toy on these good people, it’s not their fault!
I want to hear your PS5 preorder stories. Was you able to get one easily or have you had to jump through hoops? Let us know in the comments below or drop us a tweet over on our Twitter @RespawningUK.