Was there ever really a good reason for region locking content? I would imagine that, to some extent, it was to protect the rights of various international distributors but with the freedom of imports and the wide availability of multi-region DVD players it does seem a little pointless now. With games this feels even more ridiculous, as the distribution channels for a publisher are typically their own rather than those of a local distributor who purchased the rights.
However, in an age of content that you can download, region locking makes absolutely no sense at all. Yes, you should make localised copies available for the various languages of your consumers but why not let people have access to whatever copy they want online? The additional costs of making it available everywhere range between none and exceptionally small (depending on if you want it hosted on a server close to the consumer or not).
With physical copies of games there are perfectly reasonable reasons not to distribute everywhere. I know that Peter was complaining recently about the fact that Sony aren’t release MLB 11: The Show in the UK, even though it’s widely regarded as one of the best sports games out there. The problem is that there simply isn’t a significant enough audience in the UK, or Europe in general, to justify the costs associated with a full-blown release of a title on physical media. Sure, there are people outside of the US who love baseball, but compared to the audience in the US it’s likely to be pretty insignificant.
The thing is, there’s no good reason not to make it available on PSN. SCEE do have their rules for localising all content, but is it really necessary for every game? I know that makes it sound like the UK is more important than the rest of the countries falling under SCEE’s remit but it’s more a case of logistics.
If the game’s out in the US there’s not really any localisation that needs to take place for a release in any English speaking country. You could worry about converting every American English spelling to British English, but I don’t think we’re going to riot if a game has some words that aren’t spelled the British way. If you’re downloading a title from a digital store then you’re probably used to reading a wide variety of spellings on the internet anyway.
With that taken into account there’s no reason not to release it in the UK, or everywhere. That’s not to say games shouldn’t be localised from English, they certainly should. All I’m saying is just make it available to everyone as long as there are no legal concerns.
This approach could certainly be taken with Japanese games as well, particularly because there are plenty of gamers that prefer to play a game in the original Japanese rather than the localised version. Again it should be localised for those gamers who don’t speak Japanese, but there’s really no reason not to make a title easily available to those who want to play it.
It may well be that there are certification issues I’m not considering, although I’m not sure about the loopholes that are created when a title is being distributed globally. Content that comes via the internet is still in somewhat of a legal quagmire, but given that it’s perfectly possible to import games surely this kind of scheme could treat the titles in the same way.
Really all I want is to easily be able to pay for the content I want to consume. I’ll happily pay for it if someone lets me, but it’s incredibly frustrating when no-one’s making it available to you. More than anything it doesn’t make any sense from a business perspective. If people are more than willing to give you money, with almost no additional outlay from you, then why not let them?
coruscant
Yeah, I was just about to say, the PS3 doesn’t use region-locking, so fans of MLB are perfectly free to buy a US version and have it shipped here, if they’re that desperate to play it.
doomsday619
http://www.365games.co.uk/ps3-games/mlb-11-the-show-game-move-compatible you can get it here for £44.99
Vaile23
and its based in sheffield! they have to import them somehow…
if it drops in price i’ll buy it, otherwise i’ll pick it up from the US later in the year
JesseDeya
The great thing about being in Australia is that importing games ALWAYS works out cheaper :). Oh wait, that kinda didn’t make sense :/. Well, at least for now while our dollar is strong :D.
The PSN is actually pretty good about letting you decide how or where you’re going to buy your content. Nothing is stopping anyone from making an account in from any region, and in the big regions it’s trivial to buy PSN cards and top up your account, so purchasing from the US (if you’re outside the US) is very feasible.
Furthermore, the fact that you can download something from your US account, and play it from any other account on the machine is commendable. Admittedly, DLC from one region generally won’t work with game discs from another region – but that’s something you just need to think of ahead of time.
With respect to the idea of just making the game available via download (ie: MLB 11) – there are more factors that just ‘making it available’. It needs to be fully supported in that region too, particularly if you’re asking people to download 10s of gigabytes at full retail prices. Mostly people want their multiplayer to work lag free (which it would struggle with if most other players are in the US), help centers probably also need to be trained on that particular title. I think for something like MLB it would get critical mass to warrant release outside of NA, and Sony know that hardcore fans will import it.
Lastly, classification. Not an issue for sports games, but it might be interesting if something like Mortal Kombat were to be made digitally distributed on the US store given the game is actually now banned in Australia. Speaking of which, I’ve listed at least two titles I’ll be bringing back from the US with me in a couple of weeks ;).
Dange
Can someone clear this up for me, can I simply just import MLB 11 and play it on my UK PS3 and if so can I play it online too. Really want this game, looks great.
colossalblue
I’m almost sure that if you buy it via an importer, or import it yourself, you can play on a UK PS3 but any future DLC will have to be purchased via the US PSN Store. Not sure how multiplayer will work as it will depend on how the servers are handled.
Hopefully I’ll see you online ;)
KeRaSh
You should have no problems playing the US version on your UK PS3.
Dange
Nice one thanks, payday next week (got a nice bonus due this month) so very tempted to get this. Move compatibility sounds fun too :)
hazelam
with globalisation being the big thing for major businesses for the last couple of decades it’s staggering how even with the internet some companies are still stuck with a regional mentality, gone are the days when it would take weeks to send your product round the world, so long as it’s digital you can send it in seconds now.
so why is it that so often there are games i can’t buy because i don’t live in a certain region, and why do i keep seeing “this content is not available in your region” on web pages?
nofi
The 3DS is region locked, isn’t it? For a portable, this is crazy.
Gaztee
I thought that the region-locking was so that all the different territories wouldn’t be competing for the same revenue? Why buy the same game here in the UK if you could import it cheaper from US/JPN etc? Isn’t that the reason Sony gave for destroying the wonderful Lik-Sang??
I’m pretty sure that a lot of US games also have Spanish as a second language these days? Certainly if you’re French just import the Canadian version as it comes in English & French.
In the end it seems redundant because you can get almost everything (at a cost) through eBay. I tend to get a lot of my stuff through amazon.com, although certain things they won’t send, most games they do!
Foxhound_Solid
Region free is the way forward and always will be. Simples.
SlapnutzUK
I’m confused? PS3 doesn’t have region locks and games can be imported with out fuss via sites like Amazon.com. Add to that the ability to download content from another regions PSN store and the minor inconvience of something not coming out over here is easily worked around?
igotmy9milli
Well working for a publisher region locking can help when games are released in different regions, at different times…. It does kind of make sense….
But from a gamers point of view I prefer region free!