Hundreds of customers who pre-ordered the limited edition of Ni no Kuni have found out that their orders have been cancelled due to “overselling” of limited stock. This may seem normal, but there are supposedly other factors at hand.

There have been at least two windows of opportunity available for fans to pre-order the game’s “Wizard Edition” through Namco Bandai’s official online store, which is managed by Digital River. In the past, Digital River has had issues with other pre-orders and limited editions, including THQ’s Darksiders II.

Ever since the last opportunity to pre-order the game on January 17 at 10 AM PST, many fans expectantly waited for their copy sometime during that week; instead, they waited for a shipping confirmation that never came. Hundreds of customers who experienced shipping discrepancies rallied to the Bandai Namco forums and NeoGaf, wondering what on earth was going on with the pre-orders.

On January 23rd there was an official notice by Digital River on the Bandai Namco Forums:

"We apologize for the discrepancies you may have encountered with your order of NAMCO BANDAI’s Ni no Kuni: Wrath of the White Witch™ – Wizard’s Edition. As one of our valued customers, we want to assure you that a Digital River representative will be reaching out to you individually via email to address your specific issue. Should you wish to contact us, please call us at 952-392-2057. We sincerely appreciate your patience as we work through this situation."

True to their word, hundreds of fans, myself included, received this mass email in their spam box mere hours after the announcement by Digital River.

"Dear Customer:

Digital River is very sorry for the problems you had ordering NAMCO BANDAI's Ni no Kuni: Wrath of the White Witch™ - Wizard's Edition. Regretfully, we must inform you that because of an error in our ordering system, the available inventory of Wizard's Edition was oversold by mistake. As a result, we were unable to fulfill your order because it was placed after the stock was depleted. You will receive an official order cancellation notice within 24-48 hours.

We want you to know that Digital River does not take this situation lightly. We are implementing process improvements to prevent this issue from happening again and are committed to regaining your trust. While we can't replace your order for the Wizard's Edition, we hope that you will accept this one-time-use coupon code for $20 off (valid through March 31, 2013) on any item from clubNAMCO. Please feel free to shop today for one of your favorite NAMCO BANDAI games or pre-order Naruto Shippuden Ultimate Ninja Storm 3. We are confident your next experience with us will be a good one."

Enclosed at the end of the email was a coupon code for 20 USD off one item in their store.

Overall, it seemed like a simple error on Digital River’s part, but only at first. Things got worse as the night wore on as there were reports on the forums that individuals who had ordered their copy of the Wizard's Edition last summer were getting their shipments cancelled, while some lucky individuals on the January 17th restock had received shipping confirmations. As more people posted on both of the forums, it became painfully clear that they were not shipping based upon the 'First in, first out' concept where individuals who ordered first would receive their products first.

Later on the NeoGaf forums, there had been a leak of a private URL leading to a page for the purchase of the “out of stock” Wizard Editions of Ni no Kuni. The URL was to be used by customer service personnel for customers who had pre-ordered in the summer but had their credit cards or addresses changed. This URL was special in the fact that it bumped up your order to the top of the list. Needless to say, many abused this link, causing more people to lose their pre-orders. There are reports of some individuals who allegedly ordered the game through this link, despite having not pre-ordered the game at all during the first three deadlines. All of the orders processed through the special URL have supposedly been shipped immediately. This lead to another wave of cancellation emails that did not even offer the $20 coupon.

On January 24, there was speculation of a possible price gouging conspiracy. This speculation posted on the Namco Bandai forums details how an eBay seller, PlayCanada, had sold over 220 copies of the Ni no Kuni Wizard Edition at up to four times the markup price. The listing price for Ni no Kuni Wizard Edition is currently at $399 as opposed to Namco’s $100 price tag. This may explain why even more pre-orders were cancelled. However, there is a strong counter argument that PlayCanada ordered their copies during the Ni no Starter campaign in August, which allows for unlimited copies to be ordered.

For customers who had already paid for their Wizard Editions via Paypal or credit/debit card, Digital River is currently taking up to 5-7 business days to get a refund back to them. Individuals with canceled orders who wished to order the regular edition from stores such as Gamestop or Amazon cannot do so, as most of the stock and pre-order bonuses are gone. The 20 USD off coupon given by Digital River can’t even be used to purchase the regular edition of Ni no Kuni as it is currently sold out there as well.

Later on January 24th, Digital River has responded once more on the Namco Bandai forums:

"We want to update you about the fulfillment of NAMCO BANDAI’s Ni no Kuni: Wrath of the White Witch™ – Wizard’s Edition game. To start, we want you to know that this event should neither reflect negatively on NAMCO BANDAI and the value they place on customer relationships, nor take away from the high quality of their game, Ni no Kuni: Wrath of the White Witch – Wizard’s Edition. Digital River is taking responsibility for this situation and we are truly sorry for the experience you may have had with our company. We are working hard to make sure an event like this doesn’t happen again.

In the meantime, we are moving as quickly as possible to help each of you with your order. We are listening to your comments on the forums and can understand why you are confused and upset. To help clarify:

For those of you who placed orders prior to January 17 and provided valid payment and shipping information, your order and a shipping confirmation should have been sent to you.

As many of you know, there was an additional allotment of a limited amount of Ni no Kuni: Wrath of the White Witch – Wizard’s Edition inventory available for pre-order on January 17.

If you placed your order on January 17 before the inventory was exhausted, you should have received an email notification stating that your order is being fulfilled.

If you placed your order on January 17 after the inventory was exhausted, you should have received an email notification yesterday from Digital River stating that your order was cancelled and that you will not be receiving Ni no Kuni: Wrath of the White Witch – Wizard’s Edition."

This statement did little to quell the disaster as many are questioning Namco Bandai’’s official stance as it did not offer any sort of acceptable compensation for the customers. What is more troubling is the fact that this did not address the leak of the backdoor URL or other problems that the launch has had.

So far, there have been no other official statements from Bandai Namco or Digital River regarding this PR disaster. Many individuals have already expressed so much distaste with the launch that they have lost all interest in buying and playing the game at all. Judging by the amount of angry comments left on the official Facebook, forums, and Twitter, if they don’t resolve this issue soon, Bandai Namco’s image may be significantly hurt.

How do you think this issue should be fixed? What do you think about how Bandai Namco handled this debacle? Leave a comment below.

Update 1: We have reached out to Namco Bandai for a statement.

Update 2: Namco Bandai released a formal statement on January 25, 2013.

NAMCO BANDAI Games America would like to officially offer clarification to certain stories and sentiments surrounding the Ni no Kuni: Wrath of the White Witch – Wizard’s Edition.

NAMCO BANDAI Games America would first like to acknowledge our fans that will not be receiving their copy of Ni no Kuni: Wrath of the White Witch – Wizard’s Edition. This situation is truly unfortunate, having come about due to a glitch within our E-commerce provider’s ordering system. NAMCO BANDAI Games America continues to monitor the situation and is actively working with our E-commerce provider to offer remedies to each and every order. We are also working to ensure that a situation like this never happens again. We respectfully ask for our fans’ patience during this time.

NAMCO BANDAI Games America is not, nor has it ever, worked with or in conjunction with the EBay seller known as “PlayCanada” to sell units of Ni no Kuni: Wrath of the White Witch – Wizard’s Edition at a price premium on EBay.

According to our records, this individual or group of individuals purchased Ni no Kuni: Wrath of the White Witch – Wizard’s Edition during the NinoStarter promotion period (August 2012); at which time, no limits were placed on how many units an individual could order.

PlayCanada’s claims that they officially worked with NAMCO BANDAI Games America to obtain their stock is entirely false.

We understand the $20 clubNamco voucher that has been offered to our affected fans may give little solace in place of an actual Wizard’s Edition package. It is unfortunate that we are unable to produce additional Wizard’s Edition units to fulfill all the extra orders; with that in mind, NAMCO BANDAI Games America will be giving the affected fans a 400 page hard bound copy of the Ni no Kuni: Wrath of the White Witch strategy guide which includes an exclusive code to unlock a Gold Hurly Familiar in the game in addition to the original $20 clubNamco voucher. Our E-commerce provider will be contacting the affected customers in the coming days with instructions on how to obtain their copy of the Ni no Kuni: Wrath of the White Witch strategy guide. We hope that this can give the affected consumers some comfort; NAMCO BANDAI truly does value and care about its fans.