http://www.computerandvideogames.com/article.php?id=148658 "virtual console: secrets exposed" anyone read this? sorry if this is old information. the wii is going to be region locked, that doesnt bother me so much... what bugs me is that the virtual console will be region locked as well. because, you can only download the games, you cant buy them in a store. the games only work on the console they are downloaded from. then theres this: "Nintendo: No. The European Virtual Console will be available only to European machines. If you import an American machine they would have to connect to the American service and use American Wii Points cards to buy content. Their warranty would also be void so this is not recommended." i dont live in europe, im in the u.s. but, i can see games being released for the VC in japan that will not be released here. and i will want those games to play on my wii. why are they doing this? makes me angry.
THat is a F*ing stupid thing to do ! Not to worry though, I'm sure someone will find away to get around it. Yakumo
They better do, because one of the reasons I was looking forward to VC is to play legendary games I havent played, not that much the ones that I ve torn through for many hours, and I can play them anytime if i just unbox them.
Thats why im getting a japanese wii because i knew stuff like ths would happen. Not really a big deal anyway, thats what importing is for.
It is a big deal.owning two seperate decks for essentialy the same thing, it's absurd. It's not even technical limitations, its purely artificial too between US and JP systems.
Its no different to all those people who have 2 xboxes or 2 gamecubes or 2 of anything due to the region locking. Sure some people mod them or use disks to allow all region on just 1 console but i know quite a few who just have duplicate consoles so they can play both Us stuff & Jpn stuff. The virtual console for me isnt the reason im getting a wii its just a nice extra so to me it isnt that much of a big deal plus i have pretty much all of the games that are going onto virtual console. The ones im interested in are msx & pc engine so i got a jpn machine. Obviously everyone is going to be different hence the fact that ts quite a big problem to yourself but not to me. Im sure there will be some clever hacker person who will sove this problem eventually (fingers crossed)
Obviously nintendo don't hate their customers. They just want to avoid litigation as much as possible, within the obligations of consumer protection. This is however funny, considering that the GameBoy and other portables have been region free since their creation. They need a "revolution" in the way they deal with region-locks for games it would seem to me.
I totally agree, its bizarre that every handheld they have made has been region free. But on home consoles its locking as usual. Im sure theres a few genuine reasons like liscensing in certain countries & translation issues but they should at least give you the choice. The perfect way would be that they let you acess the japanese stuff but make you click on a disclaimer warning you that the game you are about to play is in japanese & you you agree to the risks that it may not be playable if you cant understand the language. That way if you really want it you can download it & play but it covers them for the whingers that would say they downloaded a japanese game but couldnt play it due to them not understanding it.
I m with you on this sir. The "genuine" licensing issues are questionable however. Mutliple publishers may be used for different regions even in publish a DS game, but this doesn't seem to be enough of a reason to lock the device. So why would they lock their home console? Aren't both portable and stationary , video games in the end? Don't they have to offer the same level of protection to the consumer? In the past, the subject of PAL vs NTSC was the main reason for making the great divide, but consoles like the MegaDrive could play other regions freely. I also understand that any company would like some degree of control over specific region/markets - but allowing a region-free console doesn't mean joe public is going to import things. Take a look at the DS for example. People actually WAIT in europe to receive a version of the game, they don't import from japan (most of them anyway).
I m afraid that this is not the case Liquitt. Even the Wii Test units only accept retail GC games , not their NR counterpads, although they accept Recordable Wii discs. This means that nintendo has made sure to change quite a few things in order to keep people out of the box.
I think he is refering to the fact you only had to compair the boards to find a sodder point that was different. It probably might be the case as well. The only reason I could see otherwise is if the test units are also region locked or not (maybe nintendo finaly grew up and learn how to do a real region lock?) Still I find it stupid what they are doing for the VC, Even microsoft realises gamers want stuff from other regions. They've mention quite a few time they were thinking to have an "import corner" on live arcade where you can get live arcade games from different regions just not fully translated yet. Sadly tho there has been no use since all live arcade games tend to come out for all regions at once.
The only thing they're doing with this is giving the pirates out there a reason to hack the Wii and look good while doing it.
That is an interesting thought since the GC just had 2 points you could connect a switch to and switch between US and Japan. I'd think they'd be a bit smarter this time. I think the best hope in homebrew on the Wii would be booting Action Replay on the Wii to do one of the exploits to get the GC homebrew running, and then maybe there would be a way to get it back into Wii mode. Also the GC modchip was only like 4 wires and has been cloned alot. I kind of think on the Wii they'll make it harder. Or maybe it'll be easier if someone can make their own bootable Wii disc that modifys the firmware. Either way I hope the GC homebrew works on Wii.
Thing is the gamecube took ages to crack. It was only hacked near the end of its life, it took them ages to eventually get a modchip out.
The GC was never as popular as other consoles were, and even at the very beggining it had a very lackluster launch, unlike the Wii that seems to be a musthave for everybody and their dog. Since the hardware is basically a GC, and the popularity is sure to keep up for at least a year, I think a modchip or hack is just around the corner.
Popularity had nothing to do with it. The reason it took so long to hack was nintendo did a bloody good job of protecting their disks. It took some pretty amazing backwards engineering to figure out how to crack the discs & get copies to run.
if it werent for PSO, many of the mysteries behind the GC would still be in place. PS: reverse engineering my arse. They found the command to unlock the matsushita drive from the manufacturing manual. no one can be that lucky. That's how the Viper/Anaconda thing got started, which led to the modchips eventually. I can tell you this because I took the time to read the asm code that was written in order to make the drive boot recordable media, and its fairly evident that the guys behind it had a lead from an official source or manual.
i'm pissed of it not being region free, and i'm even more because the vritual console is too. go on nintendo, keep doing the OPPOSITE people asks, and you'll live long! (sarcasm)
