By Luke Morris

By Luke Morris

An odd occurrence took place at 6:30 p.m. on Nov. 21, outside the Wal-Mart off McKinley in Corona. People began lining up outside the doors, bringing with them chairs, food, blankets, and games. The debut of the Xbox 360 the following morning had drawn these people here.

Few people were lucky enough, or had the foresight, to pre-order the new system in time to get one on the first shipment.

Estimates are that the people who weren’t on the first shipment stand a good chance of not receiving their systems until after the holidays.

So what was the solution for the gamer who weren’t fortunate enough to pre-order one? Many decided to camp outside Best Buys, Circuit Cities, Targets, Wal-Marts and the like to assure their spot in line to attain one of the pricey systems. Each location was only receiving 16 to 18 of the systems, so the lines filled up quickly. People arriving late would quickly move on to different hunting grounds or give up.

The first to arrive to the Corona Wal-Mart were two gentlemen, who arrived at 6:30 p.m. Four and a half hours later they lounged in their lawn chairs passing the night away with a classy game of Battleship. What was their drive and motivation to weather the chill of the night? Well one of the men was buying it for his son while the other was there to keep him company. Besides Battle Ship, the gentlemen’s plan of weathering the night included poker and sleeping in their chairs. The gameplan once the two got their Xbox?

“Well, he’s going to walk to the front of the store,” said the friend, “then I’m going to pull my car up to the front. Then we’ll load up and take off.”

A little farther down the line a group of young men were gathered together, having arrived minutes after the first in line.

When asked if they were giving up anything to get the Xbox 360, one of the young men replied, “School, about a week of it.”

They didn’t bring anything to help them pass the time, or any chairs to sit on. Instead they relied upon each other, and the chilly night to keep them up until morning.

“If I start falling asleep I’ll start stripping!” said one of the young men. The cold would be enough to jar an unclothed person awake; nearly everyone in line had brought blankets.

What were these gentlemen going to do once they got their Xbox’s?

Two of them replied that they were going home and playing it, the other couldn’t decide to keep it or sell it on E-bay, which would have a profitable venture seeing as they have sold for several thousand dollars on the online auction Web site.

Some may think the prospect of camping out for a $300-$400 gaming system to be crazy, but none of these people in line did.

They were there to achieve their goal, and if it took 14 hours in a line outside of a Wal-Mart then that is what they were willing to give.