Importing: Good or Harmful?

[Psaakyrn [deprecated]]

I guess this would be the current seasonal topic after the double whammy of Sony's lawsuit and Lik Sang closure. Do you think importing benifits or harms companies as a whole? (note: this is about companies, not consumers. There're a few "benifits" to consumers which negatively harms the companies, and that isn't good for long-term)

Import advantages:
a) "Minority" markets outside target country audience is provided a source to obtain games. (in some extreme cases like Osu! Tatakae! Ouendan, it may not be as minor as previously thought)
b) No actual sales are lost, since each import is still a product sold.
c) Imports also have a tendency to increase hype. See example: Osu! Tatakae! Ouendan (which is still one of the best cases where imports distinctively helped a product)

Import disadvantages:
a) Global sales strategy may be negatively affected. (See example: Sony's case regarding importing PSP to Europe before Europe launch)
b) Product shortages may be worsened. (Example: if people imported PS3 away from USA/Japan, the already low numbers of PS3 in said locations will be even lower)
c) If customers are not informed enough, product differences may be seen as defects.

 

[Goofonian]

I think importing is a good thing, for all the reasons you mentioned.
It is seriously about time that companies like sony and microsoft realised that there is a big bad world outside of Japan and the US and that a lot of us get really annoyed when we get screwed around.

Honestly, the price of games in PAL regions is bordering on stupid. Its gotten to the point where I can pay full freight to ship my DS games to AUS from the US and still be saving a lot of money over buying it from the shop down the road, let alone the fact that 90% of games release in the US anywhere from weeks to months before they make it out here. Then I go into EB and see xbox 360 games for AUS$110. WTF! I don't care what exchange rate your using, thats daylight robbery. And the situation is even worse in the UK.

Then we start to hear rumours about things like nintendo's virtual console being region encoded, so all the cool SNES games that never made it out in PAL regions will still not be available in said regions. Anyone care to give me an explaination that doesn't require popping mushrooms to understand?

The more companies operating out of hong-kong that are supplying us with the deals we should be getting anyway the better.

 

[Shannon Drake]

I don't get the business logic that says people buying your products is a bad idea. Lik Sang wasn't exactly dealing in stolen goods. They (presumably) were buying things entirely aboveboard and just shipping them to people in different places, though the "regions" issue is one I'll admit up front that I don't fully understand.

 

[Psaakyrn [deprecated]]

Ref point a) Global sales strategy may be negatively affected. (See example: Sony's case regarding importing PSP to Europe before Europe launch)

Sometimes companies anticipate a larger demand in certain regions and mark up their prices respectively. Importing thus reduces potential profit even if products are still sold.

Ref point c) If customers are not informed enough, product differences may be seen as defects.

This includes things like Nazi symbols in certain games, if imported to Germany, could be seen as a problem, even if it's completely acceptable in other contries. Or a simpler case of different voltages.

 

[Russ Pitts]

Don't forget about tariffs, trade agreements, exchange rates and other quirks of international trade.

 

[Lex Darko]

I think importing is great as long as it's done with respect to the supplier.

If I manufactured a product and some company came along and started selling it to a region before I planned to do so I would be upset, but if I never planned to sell to that region because of logistical issues I can't say that I wouldn't be glad to have importers there supplying that region.

Lik-Sang selling PSPs to Europe before the Europe launch after Sony told them not to do so, was just stupid. Even if they believed they had the law on thier side it isn't smart to piss off your supplier just to make extra profit especially when you are a small company and the supplier is huge global company like Sony, Microsoft or Nintendo.

 

[Echolocating]

Though Lik-Sang was being somewhat "disrespectful" to Sony by providing PSPs to Europe before the launch, I wonder how Sony feels about a European citizen going to North America and bringing a PSP back with them?

It has less to do with PSPs being in Europe before the launch and more to do with convincing investors that Sony is doing everything conceivable to save face from their apparent profit losses by "impressing" investors with arguably pointless legal action.

Yup, your investors are less angry now, Sony... *cough* according to your overpaid consultants. *cough* You did good... you did good. ;-)

 

[vcsjones]

Russ makes a good point. Importing is something that a lot of companies have a hard time dealing with since digital content is so easy to exchange.

Ultimately, importing is illegal unless otherwise noted. Importing is a good source of tax for involved counties. While most people have the mentality "One more copy won't hurt", when 1000's of people have that mentality it does cause harm. DVDs, Blu-Rays, etc are regional for a reason, mainly to satisfy market forces. A game in America does not have the same value as in, say, Belarus. Distributors need to accommodate price by demand and value in regions.

Honestly if there is a game not in your region, then look for release dates. If there isn't one then file a petition with the publisher.

This is a particular reason why some publishers have taken some extreme measures with DRM content, such as Bio Shock for the PC. Also, typically imported copies are pirated as well to work around issues with region-locked content.

EDIT: 3 am, wasn't paying attention to the age of this thread.

 

[scnj]

I imported Silent Hill Homecoming to the UK last November when they announced that Europe would be getting the game at the end of February. It's still a unit sold for the company, but it could have been easily avoided if they'd treated the European market equally to the US and Japan.

 

[Jandau]

Importing is a sign that your company already screwed up somewhere. Either by providing an insufficient supply of a product in a region, forcing its customers to import, or by failing to anticipate a demand for a certain product and providing no supply at all, which is common with imported games.

Japanese are especially guilty of this since they don't seem to realize there's a whole market for many of their games in the West, but they keep them Japanese-only, so people have no choice but to import.

Furthermore, the entire argument over importing is a bit pointless since last I checked importing games and hardware isn't illegal as long as the product isn't in violation of any age ratings the country might have (Australia, I'm looking at you... )

 

[Aardvark Soup]

Well, if a gamer is and will never be released in a certain region it is perfectly justified in my opinion that people from that region can import the game.

 

[Vortigar]

Honestly if there is a game not in your region, then look for release dates. If there isn't one then file a petition with the publisher.

Let's flash back to 2001, Street Fighter 3: Third Strike.

There's no, I repeat, NO, PS2 release of this game in the PAL regions. The first time this game finally hit EU shores officially was on the XBox anniversary collection 6 years later. The same anniversary collection that was released across the world on PS2 as well, except for (you guessed it) the PAL region...

Same goes for XenoSaga 1 and Katamari Damacy btw. Why would anyone need to petition for titles like these to be released? I can take a delay, sure, the EU is an absolute hassle with translations and lisencing and shipping and such but no release at all for massive games like these? Why? I'm not talking about some obscure JRPG or strategy game or shmup, I'm talking about a flagship fighter, which is still being played to this date.

Loads of companies just don't care one darn bit even if you petitioned (yes, there's been many). All those US and J copies of all manner of games in the EU and all those chipped and cracked consoles we got here are directly on the shoulders of release decisions like this. (Worse yet, it is in fact cheaper to get a US PS2/XBOX/DS and import games than to try and support your home market, and you get a better library of games as well.)

Thankfully it seems they've finally grown wise to this stuff. With the PS3 not being region locked and many games getting global releases. Well, grown wise, KoF'98UM will probably never see a PAL release.

Also:
No these are not pirated copies, I've seen hundreds of J and US games, the gamestores themselves import them as well over here. They're marked with the appropriate seals and shrinkwrapped and everything.

 

[hebdomad]

This whole "regional" thing of games is to help get around government regulations.
I'm sure the Australian government (or at least a certain South Australian attorney general) would be mighty pissed off If I got my packets of gaming freedom from New Zealand.

(from what I've heard) The amount of red tape, you need to cut though to get a simultaneous launch is something shocking, but this is not out of reach of the mega corps. They have done it before.

This whole region exclusive thing is not new. Toyota don't sell their rear wheel drive cars in Australia, Movies have different release dates in different places around the world, and some products are barred from sale out right from their nation of origin.

To be quite honest, I hate allot of this region exclusive stuff, and that to get it, you need to get a hold of the grey market. But that's trade and economics for you, people will play the market and will try to make as much money as possible out of it.

But the fact that PAL regions get the shaft so much, is inexcusable, even on the portable front where PAL or NTCS does not even matter. To be quite honest the fact that PAL and NTCS continued into Digital Television (HDTV) is just adds to the fact that people are still trying to divide and corner the market.

 

[Samurai Goomba]

I think importing is good. If game companies want their products sold in a certain manner, they need to be more fair in their treatment of other companies, like not charging Australians 3x the money that Americans pay for the exact same thing. Importing can also give publishers MORE money, as niche titles are sometimes Import-only.

If an importing war is started by the big gaming companies, the only people who will suffer will be niche gamers, the companies themselves (when people boycott their products) and gamers trying to get around the absolutely insane problems of their government. How else are Australians going to get a hold of banned games, for example? What, do they just not get to play them?

The PS2, for example, has oodles of JPN-only games, especially SHMUPs, 2D fighters and Mech games. Since these games will NEVER be released on this platform in the US, I fail to see the harm in letting us buy the Japanese version. How else is somebody gonna play Hokuto no Ken or Ibara?