From my understanding, Amazon may have ordered too many copies of TLR. TLR was $39.99 well before the game even came out - which is rather odd, but they may have over-estimated, and then backed down due to IU underperforming.

The Black Friday sale is part of it.

As for the other part, uh... bomb?

Fun game, though. The battle system is really neat, and I think the framerate issues are way overblown (at least with a full HDD install).

To me it's not worth half that price. The framrate is terrible and pop ins happen way to much. The framerate gets so bad the game almost stops during cutscenes. Gameplay gets confusing and the camera moves around so much you don't know whats going on, plus the voice acting is bad and the story is weak compared to other JRPGs. I think the Unreal engine hurt this game then helped it. I thought it would be good but I was wrong.

I expect a low score for this game in your review Mr. Stickball.

Amazon.ca doesn't even have it listed......

does the HDD install really help the framerate? (I haven't done it yet)

I would think that retailers are supposed to stick to the MSRP due to publisher fees. How could they sell TLR for $39.99 at launch? Isn't that probably what they bought the title for? No profits?

It's strange to see a new 360 game costing as much as a new ps2 game. These prices make me want to get a 360 arcade because it's really the JRPGs on 360 I want to play. I could even do without paying for xbox live.

I can't say, as I haven't tried running it from the disc. The framerate doesn't seem that awful to me, though. The pop-in is a different story.

I heard it has framerate issues but I didn't think it it was a worse game than Haze?

No idea how Amazon could manage $40 at launch, and drop it to $30 within a mere week. There were a few games I saw very insane prices on, such as Sonic Unleashed...The Force Unleashed has also seen major price reductions, which is odd given the fact that it sold well.

I'd certainly reccomend getting a X360 for the back-catalog of JRPGs. Even though reviewers have derided the majority of them, I'm certain you'd enjoy the majority of them at least for a little bit. Even if they aren't groundbreaking, the fact is....Every JRPG can be purchased for $20-$40 except for Tales of Vesperia....Brand new.

Citing Amazon for pricing (which is insanely cheap BTW...I may start buying my missing JRPGs from Amazon next year - like Spectral Force 3):

I don't think I'm getting the game when it releases on the PS3. The fact that the game is literally being killed by critics, the 360 version is dropping in price pretty fast... already, and PS3 owners most likely pay full amount of 60USD / Euro for it... well.. lets just say, enough reasons to let it pass. Unless SE can bring miracles, but so far I haven't seen many of them yet.

Edit: oh sorry, didn't think about the Black Friday thing. Still, 40USD is already a bargain, "especially" for a Square Enix game, considering the fact most of their games in the US are the most expensive (I refer to DS games mostly).