[UPDATE] One of the cinema chains who suffered issues with their online ticket sales, Alamo Drafthouse, has now issued an apology to moviegoers. In a statement, Alamo CEO Tim League said: "The Alamo Drafthouse has been preparing for this hugely important day for the past nine months, and we thought we were ready. The massive onslaught of simultaneous users, however, exposed an unforeseen flaw in the ticketing infrastructure itself that we were unable to fix on the fly. We apologize for making what was supposed to be a joyous day a big hassle for Star Wars fans. We commit to doing better in the future."

　　Read the full statement here.

　　The original story is below.

　　The worldwide rush to buy tickets for Star Wars Episode 7 – The Force Awakens hasn't gone smoothly for everyone. A number of agencies selling advance tickets to the sci-fi blockbuster met unprecedented demand, causing delays and outages to their online services.

　　As Deadline reports, platforms such as Fandango, the Alamo Drafthouse, and AMC Theatres all struggled to keep up with the number of fans trying to buy tickets for the film's December 18 opening. Fandango was said to have suffered the most severe issues, with many unable to access their site at all. Similar stories were reported when tickets to UK cinemas went on sale.

　　Predictions for The Force Awakens' box office are extremely high. In August, Paul Dergarabedian, senior media analyst at entertainment research company Rentrak, told CNBC that the decision to release the film in December rather than the summer provided it with almost no competition from other movies.

　　"It's going to break records like we've never seen," he said. "I think most certainly it's going to break the all-time December opening weekend record. We've never had a movie in North America open with over $100 million in December and this will happen with the next Star Wars.

　　"That movie can play very strongly into the new year, where it's a bit less competitive than the summer time frame."

　　The latest trailer for The Force Awakens has now been released and can be viewed here. The film is directed by JJ Abrams and stars John Boyega, Daisy Ridley, Adam Driver, Oscar Isaac, Max von Sydow, Harrison Ford, Carrie Fisher, and Mark Hamill.