Why is Nintendo so concerned about interchangeability between JPN and USA games?

[NeoPTLD]

Nintendo released Super NES in USA a year or two after the release of Japanese counterpart. With the release, it made an effort to design the housing differently so that Japanese and American games are not interchangeable. As some of you know, American and Japanese version of SNES are the same internally and if you remove the shell on the cartridge, they're 100% interchangeable.

As a user, it's surely nice to be able to play import games like you buy foreign music CDs. If the games are properly licensed, Nintendo is profting regardless of where it's sold. So why are they so obsessed about preventing the casual users from using one control deck to run both Japanese and US version of cartridges?

 

[Dragnov]

Isn't it the same for all game companies?

But anyways, just pick up a freeloader for like what $40? And then you can play all the imports you want.

 

[lupohki]

Nintendo is probably the most lenient of all the game companies when it comes to territorial lockout, as their protection schemes through the generation of consoles are the easiest to break or simply nonexistant.

 

[axelfox]

I guess they weren't concerned enough...all you had to do is cut some prongs out of the SNES, or, if you a Game Genie, cut the prongs off that to play Japanese imports.

 

[NeoPTLD]

I am fully aware of how to circumvent it and the protection is lame. Why did they even bother with re-designing the whole console and cartridge just so they can keep out users from using games from different regions using same broadcast format?

 

[atom]

Because different parts of the world have different economies. What we deem a fair amount to pay for a product here isn't the same across the globe. They might be profiting either way, but by locking them by region (and I don't really blame them) they are able to maximize those profits.

 

[Gonad the Barbarian]

Originally posted by: NeoPTLD
I am fully aware of how to circumvent it and the protection is lame. Why did they even bother with re-designing the whole console and cartridge just so they can keep out users from using games from different regions using same broadcast format?

They don't want all the Chinese bootlegs finding an American market. It's also why DVD's are region encoded. There may be other reasons as well, though I am too tired to think of any.

Actually, what atom said is probably the main reason.

 

[Schadenfreude]

Originally posted by: atom
Because different parts of the world have different economies. What we deem a fair amount to pay for a product here isn't the same across the globe. They might be profiting either way, but by locking them by region (and I don't really blame them) they are able to maximize those profits.

Agreed