Three GameStops in Jersey City, N.J. put Assassin's Creed II and Left 4 Dead 2 on sale today, calling in customers to pick up their preorders. Clerks said corporate authorized the move, blamed on a rogue independent breaking street first.
The stores involved were nos. 4627, 4260 and 6005 at the Hudson Mall and Newport Centre. In calls placed to the stores, sales associates said another store in the area had started selling Assassin's Creed II and Left 4 Dead 2 early; they sought permission to break street from "higher ups" in GameStop, and it was granted. The broken street date was only for Jersey City, they said. Calls to stores in Hoboken and Clifton said Assassin's Creed II was not for sale until its Tuesday release date.
Last week, GameStop authorized stores in a much wider vicinity of the U.S. northeast to break the street date and begin seling Modern Warfare 2. Independent stores selling advance copies were also blamed in that instance.
Kotaku has emailed spokesmen for both GameStop and Ubisoft. Should they have any comment, it will be updated here.