I was debating buying it in Japan while i was there, assuming that Last Story would come eventually (correct) but assuming this never would (happily incorrect). I was dissuaded because it seemed, while an action-y game at heart, still a little complex for the language barrier.

Zangeki no Reginleiv nicely slid under the need to understand much more than "slash giants to win."

Too late the ship has sailed.

Include me in the "surprised" camp. Seems too late, no?

Project Rainfall had no affect. Nintendo was always going to publish them when and how they did. Nintendo didn't think they needed to both, until they saw giant holes in their release calender. That's what got the games published, not a few hundred letters from niche fans.

Then I'm sorry you're choosing to miss out. Those of us who want it shall acquire it though.

But Nintendo only published 1/3rd of the games, with XSEED covering the other two. If Nintendo always intended to publish them in the Americas, why did it hand the reigns over? A guy from XSEED said himself they brought over TLS because of the reaction from fans and Op. Rainfall. I can dig for the interview if you need me to.

It's a reaction to The Last Story's good sales, something that they wouldn't have had time to act upon before Wii U rolled around, so it makes sense.

That does nothing to explain: 1) Xenoblade's highly restricted release (one retailer + online only), 2) why a (very small, very niche) third-party publisher had to step in for the remaining two titles, 3) why, of all the titles not localized, only these three were selected, or 4) why they're trying to "plug a hole" after the release of their next-generation console...with an extremely niche title being published by a puny third-party publisher who has extremely limited distribution channels (see step 2).

Additionally, and feel free to correct my memory here, but this is the only time I recall Nintendo ever actually bothering to release a public statement in response to any of the umpteen bajillion petitions they've received over the decades.

So, we can either take this mountain of evidence and conclude that it all adds up to OR having actually done something to persuade someone, somewhere, to publish these titles...or we can conclude that Nintendo is both grossly incompetent and batshit insane.

Wait, what? This game yet has to be released in NA? It's been out for ages in Europe...

I can believe that. I just think the returns on this title are likely to be much, much lower, for a variety of reasons, and that this bet won't pay off as well.

But hey, not my money!