Diablo 3 Collector’s Edition Really is a Collectible?
Posted 12 December 2011 by FluxA forum user made his first post ever to share some ominous news; the 
Diablo 3 Collector’s Edition can no longer be pre-ordered from Amazon.com. If you try to do so, you are redirected to the regular edition of D3, and Amazon tech support says they have no more of that item to sell. Other users chimed in to report similar issues with other retailers.
Blizzard has not released any info about how many copies of the D3CE are being manufactured, so it’s possible that the rush of pre-orders has already exhausted the global supply. Or perhaps some retailers still have it, while others, like Amazon.com, are sold out? Or possibly a whole additional wave of them is coming and there’s nothing to worry about. In any event, if you want one and you haven’t pre-ordered yet, you should probably get on that.
Will Blizz allow us to buy a standard, and then upgrade to CE so we can play if it’s hard to get a CE on launch night? I believe they did this with WoW.
I don’t want to risk it.. already pre-ordered at GameStop and probably somewhere else too, just to be safe..
I think they just stopped taking pre orders before actually knowing how much they’ll get for sale.
Here in austria/germany we can’t even pre-order the CE yet.
Blizzard won’t miss out on that money.
Collector Editions are not suppose to be Unlimited
Same thing happened with the SC2 CE, but I can waltz into my local best buy and buy one today if I wanted to.
Curious. The Best Buy I went to a few days after Blizz officially announced the CE said they wouldn’t take CE pre-orders in store. They would take regular box pre-orders in store. bestbuy.ca already ran out of stock for the online CE orders at that time (with the $5 off promo). After I badgered them some more, the manager further explained they only get 15 copies of the CE per store, same as all other Blizz CEs. They fly away within the first few minutes of midnight launches.
Though I despise FutureShop’s sales rep attitudes, I decided to go check them out right after. Basically the same answer regarding in store CE pre-orders.
The Best Buy games sales guy did mention GameStop is the only box store he knows of that’ll reserve in-store CE pre-orders. True enough, no fuss no muss, receipt in my wallet waiting from GameStop.
Maybe you live in a small city. I don’t.
My city is also a gaming city. There’s three LAN cafes here, one not too far from me. And I can walk into any store at midnight (whomever has a midnight opening) and get a CE without any bother, even without pre-ordering, every single time.
My best buy (all of them; we have like four or five) had stand-ups for the cata CE. There must have been at least 100 boxes in each standup. In each store. But Best Buy employees are generally morons and cannot be trusted with even the most facile of information.
Metro population 1M+. 4 Best Buys. 8 GameStop/EBs. North America’s largest mall.
“…Best Buy employees are generally morons and cannot be trusted…” I’m going to lean towards that. At least they’re not lifeless and rude like the FS reps =/
Preordere 7 minutes after it became available on my favourite retailer. They are sold out too. I am so happy I managed to order it, it was gone super fast 8)
GameStop still has it for preorder, with local pickup option. I was trying to wait for a solid release date to get announced… but after reading this, I’m going to buy it anyhow, better safe than sorry.
If I recall correctly (WarCraft III: Reign of Chaos), Blizzard distributes one CE per 100 ordered standard units to retailers, at least that’s what different retailers told me over the years. Better don’t get your hopes up if you’re still seeing the CE being offered online somewhere, I’ve had the case where the retailer cancelled my CE order on release day (WoW: Burning Crusade) because they simply didn’t expect supply to be limited (or that limited).
I could very well imagine finding CE’s standing in the store shelves on and beyond release though, maybe even the 100:1 ratio has changed over the years, if there’s simply enough profit to make …
They probably just reached the limits of their first local allottment of CEs and the manufacturer needs more time to produce more… There will be more in the near future, if not for pre-order then for the surge of intial sales on release day and the next couple weeks after…
Yes, that’s a common occurrence.
Or a certain retailer has gone through their allotment already. Each retailer/chain is only offered a certain amount.
I’m still on the fence about the CE, but maybe this put the nail in the coffin. I would have gotten the CE from Amazon, anyway.
Sad to say it, but I (and probably others) have grown more apprehensive about D3 the more info that’s been released (and after playing beta), which makes me somewhat wary about spending what is essentially the cost of two games for a single game plus goodies. Never thought I’d say it, but I have doubts about the game and its appeal and longevity.
it just got available for preorder at my games store here. in switzerland (wog.ch). pretty feisty price tag..