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Today, as I don't yet have the privilege to vote-to-close, I raised a moderator flag against this question.

However, the flag was denied, but I feel that this question falls in to the category of both "Shopping advice" and "Speculation of upcoming releases" which is defined in the FAQ as being prohibited.

More so, I personally believe that a question like this has no historic benefit once a game is released.

So, are these kind of question acceptable to ask?

  • For clarification, it's not asking a question about the game itself, but about the pre-order items that are included if enough people pre-order. This seems to be a new thing that might benefit from some discussion. – Frank♦ Sep 17 '12 at 15:45
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    Hey @musefan way to go on the Meta topics! I agree with badp's answer, but good job posing these questions in the right place. – EBongo Sep 18 '12 at 0:13
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"Shopping advice" means "I need something that does X, what should I use?"; this is not that kind of question. This is instead "I want to buy product Y, where can I find it?"

"Speculation of upcoming releases" is about speculating on what the not-yet-released game will or won't feature ("will Y have multiplayer?"); it's not "speculation about upcoming releases" and, more poignantly, this question is not speculation anyway: the moment for pre-order bonuses is now, not in the future, and the preorder terms are already published.

Finally, the historical benefit argument will only hold water once the game has actually released. Being localized to a specific time frame is not enough to be closed as too localized, especially if the specific time frame is "now."

An argument can be made about closing as questions about the past as too localized in order to mark them as obsolete and to prevent them from receiving new answers — and that's what we do, actually, but that doesn't apply to something that's relevant here and now.

The above is why this question is not "shopping advice", not "speculation of upcoming releases" and not "too localized." It doesn't mean, though, that the question is on-topic. I believe it's more on-topic than off-topic, but the community will speak its mind via voting.

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    If being localized to a specific time frame isn't enough to be considered "Too Localized", why does the Too Localized close reason plainly state "a specific moment in time"? – Niro Sep 18 '12 at 3:02
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    @Fluttershy because "a specific moment in time" is part of what makes a localized question too localized, but by itself is not enough. (Besides, weeks are not a specific point in time.) – badp Sep 18 '12 at 4:06
  • Well I don't agree with shopping advice part, are you really trying to tell me "I need something" and "I want something" are different? Is so, perhaps the FAQ should not contain as broader term as shopping advice then. The speculation bit is fair enough. – musefan Sep 18 '12 at 8:15
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    Also, @Pixel has answered his own question a couple of hours later, arguable this is a sign on "shows no research" for their own question. Mainly this person appears to have added a good few questions they have answered themselves almost straight away. I think it is fine to want to pad the site with useful question, but this one will be useless in a few weeks once released. Even when closed the question will still be visible, and still useless to any future visitor. Personally I just completely disagree questions like this serve any use, but this is a community and if people want it then fine. – musefan Sep 18 '12 at 8:20
  • @musefan Yes, they're different kind of questions with different kind of problems. "I need something that does X" gets you a popularity contest between X products; "I want somewhere to buy X from" less so. Self-answering is never a bad sign; it shows the asker cares to get an answer enough to eventually reach it on their own. The question will be visible to all future visitors searching for it, so it'll be useful to those people by definition. – badp Sep 18 '12 at 11:48
  • sure. but it will only be useful for the next two weeks! Anyway, no worries I shall accept this question is here to stay ;) – musefan Sep 18 '12 at 12:02

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