Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Nintendo And Europe - Not Best Of Friends

Posted by simoniker on from the continent-and-big-n-the-new-odd-couple dept.

Thanks to C+VG for their report revealing that Nintendo's e-Reader device for GBA will not be released in Europe. This official confirmation from Nintendo comes after "e-Reader was [originally] confirmed for Europe back in May", and adds to the pain of European gamers still waiting for the multi-language PAL version of Animal Crossing for the GameCube, despite the fact the PAL Australian release is now announced for October, and Aussies still get the e-Reader. Why does Nintendo continue to give consumers a raw deal in Europe?

6 of 56 comments (clear)

  1. why? a few guesses... by MORTAR_COMBAT! · · Score: 3, Interesting

    1. more liberal laws concerning reverse engineering. this could have affected the e-reader decision specifically.
    2. less perceived market. this could affect the animal crossing decision specifically.

    both of these come down to "risk" for releasing a product. there are costs for releasing a product -- returns, bugs, shelf-ware, etc. it's the reason "Futurama" isn't coming to the Cube (and they can bite my shiny metal ass over that one) -- the perceived risk for releasing the product was too high for the perceived rewards.

    --
    MORTAR COMBAT!
  2. AC Based on Culture by Zandia · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Okay, does anybody realize that Europe is one of the most multicultural areas of the world and the AC is highly based upon the culture of the users playing it? I mean do you think that everyone in the world celebrates Thanksgiving and the 4th of July? It takes time to taylor the culture in AC. This tayloring not only includes the holidays but the items too. Not only that, they would have to make it multilingual (not everyone in Europe speaks English). However, in Australia they do speak English and they only have to change/add a few holidays here and there. So, I don't think it's a personal beef with Europe. I just think Europe is a little bit more complicated place than other areas, which would take more time to produce a game for them.

    1. Re:AC Based on Culture by SmallFurryCreature · · Score: 3, Insightful
      You seem to have a very odd perception of how products are released here. You mention holidays. In holland we have "Sinterklaas" on the 5th of december, a saint who rides a white horse over the rooftops and delivers presents. Do you think a single movie, book or game has ever been redesigned to use sinterklaas instead of santa claus? Of course not. Same with many other slight variances found all over the world.

      The world today is far more global then you give people credit for. Don't forget that they also had to this work for the american version, there are a hell of a lot more differences between america and japan then between american and europe. If nintendo had a clue they would have could have done it at the same time.

      As for multilingual, this is a valid point to a certain extent. Very few games are fully translated over here. Don't forget that most of us learn english as a second language early in school and that most of popular culture comes from the US.

      Oh well great way to get people to buy your stuff. I guess they are okay with coming in third.

      --

      MMO Quests are like orgasms:

      You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.

  3. Nintendo Hates Europe by Lewisham · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Nintendo has no reason to hate Europe:

    Multi-language?
    Five main languages isn't that hard, really. You'd need five translators on the payroll. The appliances company I worked for simply used their marketing departments overseas to do the translation of their web sites and sent the translations back to the UK for input. I don't see how hard/expensive Nintendo thinks translation must be.

    Different display format?
    Aussies are quite happy with PAL as well.

    Different regional legislation?
    Slap on a blood patch for Germany. Hang on, Nintendo haven't had any blood in their games in the UK since they begun. They haven't been censoring us have they?!

    Different cultures
    This argument I simply couldn't buy. Tastes are different everywhere. UK tastes are different to US, US is different to Japan. I can't name one country that has radically different games they enjoy than the rest of Europe.

    There are only two answers. Nintendo is incompentant in Europe and arrogant towards Europe. It has always given Europe the shaft; it's not a new idea for them. Seeing as all the excuses they could come up with are as thin as Japanese paper walls, I have to say that the split must be 50:50 between the two issues. They don't need Europe, they're only the third biggest games market. They're a company trying to save cash, when in fact they're pushing themselves further over the edge by cutting out a major territory. Their business plan consists of: "If it ain't no work to convert, then ship it 6 months later and clamp down on importers in the mean time!" No joke, they sent cease and desist letters to all importers last month trying to get them all to stop selling the games that Euro Nintendo users want but can't get.

    Total. Bloody. Genius.

    1. Re:Nintendo Hates Europe by Firehawke · · Score: 3, Interesting

      There's only one problem with that overview. It's not just Nintendo.. Konami, Capcom, Microsoft, and Sony are little better about getting stuff over to Europe in a reasonable time. I seem to recall a number of PS1 games having really shoddy European ports with bad bordering and framerate issues.

      It's an attitude from the entire industry that Europe doesn't really matter. Japan is the most important market and everyone else can suffer for all they care. Hell, the US gets shafted more often than not with the truly innovative or good games. It's all mindset-- the Japanese don't know or care what the rest of the world wants. They'll just release what they THINK will sell, because finding out what really WOULD sell is too much effort.

  4. Yes by pommaq · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Well, this is just the most recent installment in Nintendo's campaign to shaft us Euros! They've happily been doing it for 10+ years, so it shouldn't really come as a surprise to anyone. Why they do it, I'm not sure. It's probably just the good ol' German censorship laws, localization (and most of us could do without localization, thank you very much), stuff like that.

    Knowing this, as soon as the cube was released in the US (more than half a year before it hit our shores, how's that for a warning sign?) I imported myself a JAP/US cube. Yeah, it's sort of a hassle having to import all my games, but there's a thriving industry that's realized you can make a buck off this region bullshit. So now I'm a proud owner of Soul Calibur 2, F-Zero GX, Winning Eleven 6 and Mario Golf, neither of which are even CLOSE to releasing in Europe yet. Hell, WE6 probably won't even go outside Japan, seeing as footie games aren't very big in the US.
    ...but anyway, my point was - Nintendo have always been doing this, they will continue to do it, and the best you can do is try to work around it. It sucks, really; they make the best consoles, the best games, but their business decisions sometimes seem to be made by monkeys.