Did anyone else notice that the "unlock" time for the STEAM pre-orders of FONV are listed as 2pm EST on the 19th? Anyone have any clue as to why they would make us wait till so late in the day to unlock our game when the official release date is 10/19/10 00:00:00? Almost makes me want to try and cancel my STEAM preorder and just go pick it up at Walmart since the guy in the electronics department said that they werent even bothering with preordering, just selling the Caravan pack straight up.

How can they sell the pre-order codes "straight up" when they're packaged inside the game? Unless you mean just selling the pre-order copies to anyone.

Hence why I said "The Caravan Pack", and not "The Caravan Code". Of course this is just what the employee told me, but he said for every previous midnight release he has worked on that had a "preorder bonus" they simply sold it retail cause they generally get 100+ units in stock.

This is how it's been since Steam started for all non-Valve games. No official statement why, but I imagine it's the publishers making concession to brick and mortar stores.

Yeah I think at this point I will just take my chances, cancel my preorder and go to pick it up Monday Midnight at walmart. -_-

Eh, those few hours really don't matter. It's just that they have the best potential to solve all problems that might arise once the game gets unlocked. Would they do this in the middle of the night, they'd be left with growing numbers of frustrated people until someone checks in at 8 a.m. or so in the morning. ^_^

Agree its not smart to open-up a massive download in the off-hours, as the providers are all still in on-call status at that time. Given that its impossible to predict where the network could get jammed, its wise never to do these things off-hours or on Fridays / Weekends. Those who release big things on a Friday afternoon are risking alot if something goes south on the network and the guys/gals needed to fix it are away from home or in traffic.

Could be alot of reasons why, the concession to brick and moarter stores also makes sense, why get it from a store if you can get it from Steam at the exact same time? I doubt this as a Real reason why the download is at 2pm - the timing seems more akin to having maximum staff ready to go.

Well if the downloading is an issue they could simply do what Blizzard does with patches and the like. Allow you to predownload 99% of the file before hand and only send out the final 1% on launch day.

If shops weren't doing midnight openings, you'd have to wait till a civilized hour anyway.

And as pointed out, the Staff at Steam aren't at work 24/7, they have to sleep too.

There is an active thread about this already, still on the first page even. In it GStaff, the Community Manager, said the other day he was going to look into whether the unlock will change or not and get back to us, though he said it might not be until Monday.