| Soriku said: http://kotaku.com/5947861/its-time-for-japanese-developers-to-stop-hoarding-their-rpgs It’s Time For Japanese Developers To Stop Hoarding Their RPGsIf you're wondering why Japanese game publishers and developers have been so reluctant to localize their RPGs, the answer is easy. They think it's too much of a risk. They look at games that have failed to take off in the U.S.—RPGs like Brave Story and Half-Minute Hero and quite a few others—and decide it's not worth the time, money, and shame involved in localizing their games for an audience that doesn't seem to want them.
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Well that's about expectations and straight economics is it not? If localisation requires (say) 100K sales to be a profitable venture then that should be the basis for whether or not to do it. Looking for blockbuster sales for JRPGs in the West is crazy because only a few JRPG franchises are ever going to be million sellers in the West. But that's not a reason not to do it. The more JRPGs that are localised the bigger you can grow that niche market.
And it's Sega's own stupid fault with VC3. If the franchise had stayed on PS3 it would have sold waaaay better than on dumb old PSP, and VC2 and 3 would have been a lot cheaper to make given the game engine was already there and didn't need any improvement. Localisation would have been a no-brainer.
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