Why Can’t Australians Pre-Order Star Wars: The Old Republic? [UPDATE: Delay Confirmed]

Star Wars: The Old Republic was released for pre-orders today but, for some reason, Australians are not able to pre-purchase the game, with the message “Star Wars: The Old Republic is not available in your region” appearing on the game’s official website.

This adds credence to earlier rumours stating that the game would be delayed in Australasia.

Stephanie Bendixsen of Good Game tweeted that she was told by EA reps that the upcoming MMO Star Wars: The Old Republic had “been delayed for Australasia” around E3 time, but when we spoke to EA directly we were informed that nothing concrete had been decided, since the game’s release date hadn’t been decided yet.

There is still no official release date, but the fact that the official site claims that “[t] o maintain a high quality of service, only certain regions worldwide will be able to pre-order Star Wars: The Old Republic” suggests that there will be some sort of staggered release of the game in different areas. It seems as though Australia will not be among the first regions set up for Star Wars: The Old Republic.

It could also be the case, however, that its simply the ‘early access’ that the pre-order provides that Australia is excluded from. Hopefully this is the case and there isn’t too long of a delay for Australians.

We’ve contacted EA for more details, and will update the story as soon as we receive more information.

UPDATE: A Kotaku reader has had a response email from Bioware Customer Service stating the following: