Wii U region locked

[mike_intellivision]

okr said:

mike_intellivision said:
To the vast majority of people who buy systems, this is a non-issue.
And for the vast majority of games, this is a non-issue.

As someone in the US, I can count on one hand the number of releases that I might have bought if they were made available in the NA market (both games from JP and EU).

Region-free would have been nice. But because of music rights and ratings boards and such, it is much more complicated than others make it out to be.

Mike from Morgantown

Bolded parts: As an European gamer, I strongly have to disagree.

The DS was not region locked (except for DSi downloads and a few other DSi specific cartridges). I imported lots of Japanese DS games which were localized for US but not for EU, mainly RPGs: Dragon Quest Heroes: Rocket Slime, Etrian Odyssey II, Glory of Heracles, Knights in the Nightmare, Nostalgia, Radiant Historia, Sands of Destruction, Summon Night: Twin Age, The Wizard of Oz: Beyond the Yellow Brick Road, plus the unique adventure game 999 - 9 Hours, 9 Persons, 9 Doors. Some great games.

Additionally, there were plenty of other good to great Japanese games which were localized for US but not for EU (and which I didn't buy), e.g. Etrian Odyssey III, The Dark Spire, Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Survivor 1+2, Shin Megami Tensei: Strange Journey, Super Robot Taisen OG Saga: Endless Frontier, Theresia: Dear Emile, Tokyo Beat Down, Trauma Center: Under the Knife 2.

Finally, there even were a few very interesting US games which were never released in Europe either, such as Contra 4 and Robocalypse.

If the DS would've been region locked, I would have been forced to either buy two DS systems, EU+US, or to buy an US system and import all DS games from US, even the ones which got a separate EU release.

So, depending on the system region-locking actually can be an issue - it would have been a huge issue for me and other EU gamers on DS, it would have been an issue on PSP (Jeanne D'Arc, to name one great PSP game which was never released in EU) and it probably will be an issue on 3DS - and keeping a system region-free is actually not complicated, not for Sony and obviously not even for Nintendo.

I agree though that region-locking wasn't a big issue for Wii and I hope it will be the same for Wii U.

Three things.

 

First of all, I was explaining, not condoing. I have import games for various systems -- unlocked and otherwise in some cases (the Saturn has a unique method for playing imports for example).

Second, I did not see you address the bolded point on ratings and recording rights. 

Third, and sometimes we forget this, we are NOT the vast majority of gamers. Most consume what they are given gladly without question. Those who spend this much time reading and researching are but a small percentage of all console owners.

 

Mike from Morgantown