What makes a great game launch? Some would say simply getting a highly coveted game like Grand Theft Auto IV into the hands of hungry gamers is enough, but to some of us a launch night means more than that. To some, big-name game launches are like mini gaming conventions, where we can swap stories, bitch about the way the store is handling things, and speculate on how much sleep we'll be losing over the next couple of days. Or, it can just be a line of people waiting. I attended two different midnight launches at GameStop tonight and got a healthy dose of both sorts of events, just 10 miles apart.

GameStop One - Roswell, GA

When I moved last year I had to say farewell to my favorite GameStop in favor of something a bit closer. At first I was preordering games from the local mall, but said mall wouldn't allow for a midnight launch, so I took things up the street to the Mansell store in Roswell, Georgia. It was here I preordered Grand Theft Auto IV, expecting the gala launch event that GameStop had announced last week. When I arrived at 9PM yesterday evening, I was the only guy waiting. One of the employees informed me that a line would start forming at 10, and that no events were planned. Bummer. I decided to take a trip north to my old GameStop, where I had cut my teeth as a Game Advisor years before. The difference was amazing.

GameStop Two - Alpharetta, Georgia At my old stomping grounds there was a tent set up outside already, with the store's Xbox 360 kiosk setup for some Rock Band action and two televisions on a table in case anyone wanted to get their Call of Duty 4 system link on. The mood was bright, the employees excited despite having to stay at the store until 1AM or later. I suggested they order pizza to go along with the free drinks they had available, and dammit, there was pizza.

Due to the mall store nearby not being able to have a midnight launch, the manager from said store was at this one, having set up her own table filled with freebies for the trivia contest that would be taking place later on. They even drew a chalk outline on the floor that was meant to look like it had a head wound but ended up looking like someone had offed Ronald McDonald, but it was the thought that counted.

I may have also scored a pretty damn awesome Iron Man standee - see the gallery for details.

I hung out with the Alpharetta crowd for as long as I dared, desperately trying to stay alive in Call of Duty as my opponent shouted "JIHAD" at the top of his lungs and charged at me time and time again with explosives, taking us both out in the process, and even managed to look slightly less than totally incompetent at Rock Band, thanks to some wandering incompetents passing through.
Come 11:30PM I hopped into the battered Nissan and hightailed it back to the Mansell location.

Return to GameStop One - Sigh I will say it isn't the employees' fault that the Mansell store's launch was about as fun as waiting in line for toilet paper in Soviet Russia. When I showed them the pictures of the joy going on up the street, they were just as flustered as I was. What they lacked in style they certainly made up in efficiency. From the back of a rather long line to checkout, I was out the door at 12:06AM, ready to head home and give Liberty City a go.
I guess the moral of the story here is that 10 miles isn't that far when it comes to having a good time, especially when it comes to a big name game launch like Grand Theft Auto IV. They don't come along all that often, so why not make sure they're memorable? And yes, I bought the strategy guide. I was running out of comics to read in the bathroom.