street dates are given by the distributors once ok is given by the developer to ship ( usually ready or not depending on the deadline ) these distributors send their products to the retailers ( walmart, gamestop, best buy, etc ) to be prepped and ready for sale on that date under contractual liscenses. same for DVD's and Blu's at a rental store. they use what is called a profit or revenue sharing program where they agree to send Blockbuster X 150 copies of a title with say 100 on revenue share meaning the retailer pays nothing for them but a extra ( majority ) percentage of the profit goes back to the distributor. same for rentals and retail sale.
if a street date is violated, they are fined usually between $500 and $2,500 per copy sold and any copies given as a share title are pulled or withheld in future shipments. if it persists, refusing to ship a title to that particular store or franchise. when a store or franchise can no longer receive say, all rockstar games for 3 years, thats a TON of revenue lost, order have to be split or shifted, or preorders refused.
In walmarts case, they broke street date on the Matrix back in the dayin an attempt to pay the fine but make up advance profit through their massive stock ahead of the competition. long story short ended up costing them neary 250 million plus and new line i believe pulled share titels from them and refused online sale on the title.
so say gamestop breaks date on Red Dead, 1/2 of their copies are pulled or redistributed to more stores for less copies. it takes an average of 9 weeks to start moving used titles down in price then a monthly statement is issued on what to lower when. So when you see ( example ) Halo 3 was a higher used retail for a long time compared to many even current titles because of street date breaking so they had to keep prices higher longer.
bottom line. street date violation = fines to the retailer = less copies at more cost = more to pay from us = longer to wait for price drops = fewer rentals in stores = BAD long term impact to game pricing and release dates to us.