Have some questions...

1. Have you ever being caught by the customs ?

2. Have you had any problems with delayed deliveries ?

3. Is the cheapest shipping method safe ? As in, have you lost any packages ?

Off topic : If you plan on buying from play-asia anytime soon, post here..

1. No, why?
2. No.
3. I hope. No.

I heard that tax for imported games in my country are as much as 50%..

1)when they deliver the game to ur home then they will ask for custom duty.I had to pay $20 to get the delivery one time when it was shiped by UPS.Another time the delivering company when i selected the cheapest delivery option didn't ask for any custom duty.

2 & 3)i have had delayed delivery when i chose the cheapest delivery option.There was only 2 days  gap between the premium UPS delivery and the regular delivery.It got delayed or lost so i called them up and they dispatched another copy of the game this time by UPS on the their own expense.

I got the UPS delivery.some days later i got the regular delivery too.I had 2 copies of game then.

I have been wondering about the same things. I have been thinking about importing Mushihimesama Futari Ver 1.5 (finally, a region-free import shmup on 360! All the other Japanese-exclusive 360 shmups have been region-locked thus far.) but I'm worried about the possibility of getting dinged by customs (I live in Canada). The game itself costs $80 Canadian (only a little bit more than what a $70 game plus tax goes for over here so no biggie) but if custom fees are applied, it can easily balloon to $100 np probably. :S I've heard that if you avoid UPS shipping and use USPS instead (I take it that USPS is the cheapest option?), you are good. But who knows.

getting caught by customs just seems random... sometimes u can get away othertimes.. pay up when the postman arrives at your door!

and I got my copy of Futari and didn't pay any tax! but I got mine from eBay from a seller selling them brand new direct from asia

I've never imported anything from Play-Asia but if I get a 360 for Christmas like I'm thinking Mushihimesama will be the first thing I import. I was considering importing FFXIII before the release date was revealed but since it's only 3 and a half months I can just wait. :edit: I fail at math, 2 and a half months.

Sweet. You can get dinged by customs importing from ebay too as well though. Though a lot of ebayers (not all though. Some have disclosed the true value of games I've imported from the states) will lie about the true value of the goods they are shipping out so that they can save you the trouble of having to pay customs. I'll keep an eye out on ebay as well.

Btw is Futari's stock going to be around for awhile? Or is this something that is going to go out of print fast? I have a few games on my plate at the moment so I'd like to put off purchasing this for awhile if possible. Though if it's something that'll become rare and even more expensive soon, I won't have a problem with importing now. This is the first region-free Japanese-exclusive 360 game and from what I understand, it's fully playable if you don't know Japanese since the menus and options are in English. I want to buy this to support Cave's decision to go region-free. If people import the games, hopefully Cave will make all their games region-free from now on. I understand that localization isn't cheap (even if the translation is very easy, there are so many costs involved with localizing a game) so I can understand them not doing NTSC-U or PAL releases but at least make all the Japanese stuff region-free from now on. I don't know why Cave and other Japanese developers haven't tried this sooner considering that they have the option of going region-free. They aren't forced to make their games region-locked.

well the limited edition with music CD is already out of print.. dunno about the standard edition..  Yes you can get caught even with ebay but those sellers that have a decent amount of transactions via their feedback will know how to get round customs and tax because last thing they want is bad feedback from potential regular customers who could buy from them again and again.

Never used it. I might use it to get GT5 though since it'll be months earlier in Japan.