There are benefits a lot of the time, don’t lie. What’s typical are exclusive cosmetics, closed beta access, and/or early release access. So weighing those against the worst case scenario of returning the game for a full refund makes it a decent deal.

Then just pre-order the game. The worst that can happen is you end up returning it for a full refund.

I am going to keep pre-ordering games on solid platforms like Steam. The pros of pre-ordering tend to outweigh the cons. But people here, and on Reddit, love to exaggerate the cons of pre-ordering. As long as I can painlessly return a game if it turns out to be a stinker, it’s not a big deal.