by RMGreen
There's a fundamental difference between a video game release and a board game release. With video games, the publisher plans to release a game to everyone on a specific date which they have spent marketing money promoting. Games will be produced early, get shipped early, and get to distributors early to make sure they can be sent to retailers several days ahead of the release date. Retailers are then under strict restrictions to not sell the game until the publicized date hits, and then everyone will have access to it at the same time.For board game publishers things are different. First, the production is much more complicated and more prone to unforeseen errors that can cause delays. Also, they are trying to get the game out to customers as soon as they possibly can. They don't spend money on big marketing campaigns where they target a specific date for everyone to have access to the game. As soon as they have the game available they ship it out, rather than having distributors and retailers withhold the game until the street date hits. There's no 'padding' in the schedule to compensate for an unexpected delay like extra scrutiny at customs.
To have a rock-solid release date, publishers like PHG would have to pick a date probably months past when they would anticipate actually getting the game. Sure if everything goes well they could just send the game out early, but then what's the point of that arbitrary release date? It would be meaningless since problems could push a release even past that date, and the publisher wouldn't want to sit on salable product for months just to keep to the date they picked so far in advance.
Instead they give their best guess at any given point to when they expect the game to be available, and if there's a delay that date gets moved. Yes, it makes planning around a board game release more difficult than planning around a video game release, but that's because the process is so different between the two industries.
This was PHG's first attempt at an in-house pre-order system. It seems like it worked out fine to me, but obviously there are some people who are less than satisfied. Maybe they'll change it for the next time (although I hope they don't change it much!)
It's worth noting that many board game companies don't give nearly as much information about the progress of a game as PHG did. People waiting for those games get to stew in ignorance regarding the status of the game rather than being kept in the loop with disappointment when estimates change. Pick your poison. I'd rather be informed along the way regardless of problems that may come up, but that's just me.
As a side note, Stronghold Games also does pre-orders, but they say they don't open the pre-orders until the game is already on the ship, so the possibility for significant delays at that stage is minimal. Of course, that means the window for pre-orders is smaller. Just another way of doing it.