Not always. Wal-Marts down here are never in a hurry to put games out on release day. They might have 300 copies, but will only put out so many at a time. When they run out in the display case, they might not refill it until the middle of the night. I hate Wal-Mart for this very reason. The service is terrible and you aren't saving any money. I try to support smaller retail outlets with my game purchases.
Shrug. I live in Birmingham.
I used to preorder things, but it was never particularly reliable.
Sometimes online preorders would SHIP on release day, and then you'd wait while other people who just picked it up in a store were already playing.
Stores like EBGames or GameStop would have a limited number and if you weren't early enough, you wouldn't get on the release day list.
I picked up World of Warcraft from Wal-Mart at midnight on release day, along with about two other gamers, and a bunch of people who were there for the new season of Seinfeld which came out at the same time.
My girlfriend preordered one of the Harry Potter books from Books-A-Million, but they closed the door in her face when we got there a bit late to pick it up (We had some other plans than night and intended to pick it up afterward) We ended up just going to the Wal-Mart across the street who had like 2000 copies in stock, and that was the end of our preordering.
Wal-Mart's the best in the world at getting products to consumers.
