Import Gaming: Difference between revisions

The vast majority of [[Video Games]] are made in America and Japan. These two countries use NTSC TVs, and so games are naturally optimised to work with this technology. Europe, however, uses PAL TVs, which the games are not optimized for. Therefore, many games are poorly converted from NTSC's 480-line, 60Hz60 Hz video system to PAL's 576-line, 50Hz50 Hz video system, with the result that they were slowed down by a sixth and squashed into a bar in the middle of the screen. The result of this is that many games [[No Export for You|never get released in Europe]], and if they do, there is a considerable delay. This is particularly aggravating in the case of story-heavy games, as Americans and Japanese gamers casually spoil major plot points in forum posts before European gamers even get to touch the game.

A further delay results from the need to translate games into, at the very least, French, German, Spanish, and Italian for the European release. This delay varies depending on the amount of text and story in the game, with the result that story-heavy games take longer to be released, thus adding even more time between the NTSC debut and the PAL release -- morerelease—more time for European gamers to end up spoiled. The problem is even worse in Australia, which is very low on the list of game designers' priorities and ends up getting games several months after even the European release (and when they do, the translation is in American English).

Importing is at a bit of a crossroads, these days -- itdays—it is becoming both more accessible and less relevant. The Internet makes importing games much easier (in earlier days, importing was pretty much out of the question unless you lived in a major metro area, mostly on the West Coast, or you had access to a mail order club, most of questionable legality), but at the same time, localizations are increasing in both speed and quality, and more and more games are making the jump across the oceans, so it's not as necessary as it used to be. "[[PS 360]]" games are also making the jump to the universal 720/1080 line 60hz HD standard, making TV compatibility problems a thing of the past.