Amazon.com's problem with Atlus games

[RivalShadeX]

I'm just curious why Amazon.com always has trouble with Atlus games, has anybody else noticed that?

They always say it won't come in until the end of the week after release, and then sometimes if you read their thing it says "Item won't ship for 2 - 3 weeks," or "Item won't ship for 4 - 6 weeks," anybody else think that is annoying?

[Iris]

Does it say this in general, or are you always picking Super Saver shipping?

Because Super Saver shipping is slow as molasses.

[RivalShadeX]

In general, and actually, on most of my Super Saver Shipping, they ship immediately and I get it in 2 days...

[Takara_Kitsune]

You do realize this is not limited to Atlus games, right?

I've had the same problem with any games I've ordered from Amazon. Tales of Vesperia was the only non-Atlus one, however. And I did manage to get Persona 4 within days of release.

When they have a date on their site, they're covering for the fact that your particular shipment won't ship until it gets to the nearest distribution facility. Amazon.com uses a 'star topology' for their supplies. A central facility that gets all of the items, and then from that facility, it ships out to all of their smaller distribution facilities. The distribution facilities send your item out.

With games, they don't get them until the publisher's ship date. So they get them, and then have to distribute them to the satellite facilities. This accounts for the 'end of the week ship date' you speak of. They often ship quicker than that, however. If you're in a big hurry for the games, I'd just recommend getting them locally. And to cover for why local shops get them quicker sometimes: They ship from the publisher via UPS or FedEx, straight to the shop.

[RivalShadeX]

That's not always true, I know Fry's Electronics and Gamestop get their supplies from distribution centers...

[Takara_Kitsune]

Okay, let me rephrase that...

Amazon.com goes through multiple distribution centers:

Standard Amazon Shipping method:

Central Facility --> Satellite Facility --> UPS/Fedex Facility --> Your House

Express Shipping Method:

Central Facility --> UPS/Fedex Facility --> Your House

Gamestop and Fry's are a bit different. There's only one main distribution facility:

Distribution Facility --> UPS/Fedex --> Fry's/Gamestop

They don't have to have a satellite facility since they don't have to filter through a list of customers, just a store list. The shipping date on Amazon is actually the date that an item with Super Saver/Standard shipping would be sent from the Satellite Facility. Additional things to keep in mind, are that sometimes the publisher doesn't actually send the game out until the ship date.

Now, on the other hand, a title that is highly anticipated, such as Pokemon, Mario, Halo, etc... those are actually sent out to the distribution facilities in advance. For instance, when I worked at Toys R Us ages ago, back when Halo 3 was released, we actually had a few cases of the game 3 weeks before the thing was released. Same with Super Mario Galaxy. A friend of mine at Gamestop said they had Pokemon Platinum for 2 weeks in the back room. (She's a super Pokemon fan, she said she really hated not being allowed to break the seal that minute. :P)

Either way, the date you see on Amazon is the date it ships from the satellite facility. And, another thing, I forgot that when you use Super Saver Shipping, they send it via United States Postal Service (if you're in the US. If you're in Canada, then it'd be the Canadian equivalent.) Only the "Express" options ship direct from the main facility. Otherwise, it's delayed a couple days. Like I said with Persona 4, I had that within a couple days of release... If anyone on Atlus staff could confirm this, I'd bet that one was out at the distribution facilities before release.

[PainKilleR-[CE]]

Fry's and Gamestop use the same method Amazon does. The difference is that Fry's and Gamestop usually have copies of the game to put on their shelves on the release date, so their central facility is going to have it in plenty of time to ship to their regional facilities, which will distribute to the stores (as well as online orders). For some publishers, Amazon may not be as high a priority because Amazon is not usually going to lose sales if they don't have stock on hand.

I've received games on or before release date from any number of online sources, including Amazon, it just depends on when they get some in stock and where you are on the list for shipments (after all, even Amazon could run out of the first shipment they receive before they ship yours out).

Super Saver Shipping from Amazon has never taken more than 4 days (not counting Sundays obviously) from the day they actually ship the item for me. Devil Summoner 2 arrived 2 days after release. Cross Edge arrived yesterday (a week after release, and even ordering from NISA left many people waiting that long or longer), but they didn't ship it until Friday.

[dungeon_man]

Amazon can't ship something they don't have in stock, and I believe Atlus often uses slower shipping methods to get games to retailers to save a bit of money. Thus they are often not available until a few days after the "official" release date.

Anyway, the slight delays cause Amazon's system to make up ridiculous delivery estimates which then get corrected when the shipment from Atlus arrives and starts being processed. It's really no big deal. Everybody will get their games.

[nbinney]

http://www.atlus.com/forum/showpost.php?p=118794&postcount=13


unless the game that's getting released is in super-high demand like Halo or Final Fantasy, games ship from the distributor on the release date(which is almost always a Tuesday) and arrive at stores on a few days later (usually Thursday).

otherwise, big title games show up at stores early which massive labels marked "DO NOT SELL BEFORE #/#/##"