I had one person show up to my Saturday prerelease, no one on Friday.
I have sold less than I sold of Aetherdrift on prerelease weekend (2 booster boxes, 1 bundle, 2 booster packs, 1 prerelease kit). Almost all of my preorders bailed on their orders, sadly I did not collect 50% at time of order like I usually do.
Someone sent a Reddit post to me with this meme.
It's too bad we can't see overall pre-release attendance by set but there was a reddit thread on the main subreddit about attendance. All if it anecdotal but it seems like it's pretty down overall. I'm not surprised either, regardless of UB they totally half-assed this entire set. It was originally planned to be an aftermath style booster, like those 7 cards, and this is what we get when executive leadership decries 6 standard sets a year. Upper management is the only force possible to ruin this game.
Design has been uninspired of a while now, everything has felt like "draw a card to place +1/+1 counters on a 3/3 token and animate a land" for years with any card outside if that being overcosted or instantly removed.
Making it a non optional part of corporate IP bingo doesn't help.