• Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.

Square-Enix gouging JP PC players of Tomb Raider : 30$ for JP language pack

DD

Member
This can't be serious...

I'm honestly interested in the game, but now I may pass if this is true. I'm not japanese, but one cannot ignore such abuse...
 
Crazy... shouldn't it be the other way around (jp VA, english VA for extra)? You pay a premium for a 'niche' thing, but having your native language as dlc... fucking weird.

But wait... does this mean western pc versions can buy this JP voice pack too? I'm not sure how regions and steam work.
 

Casimir

Unconfirmed Member
All of this shit is just a result of the ridiculous game prices in Japan. Of course, this is a particularly egregious instance.

Please don't call it "grey" importing, that could imply that there is anything at all wrong with it. Which there isn't. It's also not a problem for certain countries, it's a problem for certain companies.

That's not entirely true. Most of the time, I agree that region restrictions are antiquated, but there are some legitimate reasons for region blocking. Primary one would be to cooperate with any local laws or regulations that a certain country may have (Australia, Germany, etc). Second is that in many underdeveloped markets, like Eastern Europe and South Asia, the average level of income maybe disparate to more developed countries. So companies may offer drastically reduced pricing so that they can recoup a modicum of sales profit instead of losing all sales to piracy.

when went full r when 3.7 million insit enough sales for TR

Maybe. Tomb Raider had a really thorough public marketing campaign, and those are never inexpensive. So SE might have overspent on the marketing, as they falsely assumed higher sales. So the net profit of TR is at least lower than just assuming costs associated with development and physical production.
 
Let's fire this off to multiple sources and see what happens

SE:"Oh it was a mistake on our part! We have now made it free"
The power of GAF! Really though this is fucking absurd. I so wish times were different. Focus groups, big budgets with no risk, shitty DLC and anti-consumer measures are starting to turn things sour for me...
 

i-Lo

Member
Remember how the recent financial statement depicted that SE would fall short on their expected profits (which is counted as expected losses)? Well they have to make part of that estimated profit back somehow.

SE is a corporation that exists to make money and are well within their rights to charge whatever they feel is justifiable. If you don't like it, don't buy it. Go out to some cabin for a month w/o wi-fi instead of raising stink over it here. Do you want NeoGAF to be responsible for another Orth like debacle where an irascible Cliffy B points out the gall of the internet and GAF to challenge norm of a corporation trying to be the vanguard in introducing language pack for that kind of price?
 

Jackl

Member
  • Can't develop MMO/RPGs.
  • Charge 30 dollar language pack for action platformer.
  • Blame western studios for not meeting "expectations"


GG Square.
 

Z3M0G

Member
Wait wait wait... am I understanding this right?

- Game releases in Japan with Japanese support
- Game patched to remove Japanese support
- Japanese support now sold separately for $30

Please tell me I completely misunderstood... please tell me this isn't real...
 

Stuart444

Member
If you don't like it, don't buy it.

People need to stop saying this. So no one is allowed to complain, it's just a "Don't like it, don't buy it, don't complain about it"?

Doing that means word of mouth would be nothing but praise or indifference and the company would always point to how no one has complained to them, all they hear is good things.

People who don't like it, won't buy it but they will also complain and they are well within their rights to complain if they find a practice or product to be worthy of complaining such as this practice (Taking something out with a patch and selling it back at a premium)
 

Takuan

Member
I'd wager that the Japanese folks that might be affected by this have long since moved past Tomb Raider and aren't overly concerned.

Still a dick move by Squenix, however.

Random, but I wonder how Japanese Lara moans?
 

duckroll

Member
Okay, let me explain how this fuck up probably happened. Please bear with me, because it's going to sound really stupid, and I'm not defending Square Enix here, only explaining the nature of the fuck up.

- Tomb Raider comes out in Japan on April 25 2013, at the price of 8000yen (80 USD).

- The Japanese release includes voices in English or Japanese, and Japanese text. This differs it from the version sold in US and Europe where the voice options are only in English.

- Somehow it appears the PC Tomb Raider release on Steam was available for purchase in Japan at the US/Europe release price of 50 USD when it was released last month.

- Additionally it appears that someone fucked up massively and included all the language content meant for the Japanese release along with the package.

- So for a period of time Japanese fans were able to buy Tomb Raider on Steam for 50 bucks, and enjoy Japanese language support, a whole month before the release in Japan.

- Someone found out, panicked, and removed the language content support so Japanese consumers would no longer be able to buy a fully functional Japanese version of Tomb Raider at almost half the price and a month before it is released in Japan.

- Now that the Japanese launch is finally arriving, they are offering the option for anyone who used the previous "exploit" to top up the 30 dollars of difference to regain access to the Japanese language options.

From Square Enix's perspective, what they were doing was closing a reverse import regional loophole, and now they are offering an olive branch to fans who used that exploit so they don't have to sit on a useless 50 buck English-only Tomb Raider. From the perspective of everyone else, Square Enix is scamming everyone.

ROFLMAO. :p
 
Wait wait wait... am I understanding this right?

- Game releases in Japan with Japanese support
- Game patched to remove Japanese support
- Japanese support now sold separately for $30

Please tell me I completely misunderstood... please tell me this isn't real...

I would like confirmation if this is indeed the unfortunate series of events that we are now witnessing.

Holy crap, Squeenix, seriously...

edit: heh, got cleared in the post above!
 

FlyinJ

Douchebag. Yes, me.
People need to stop saying this. So no one is allowed to complain, it's just a "Don't like it, don't buy it, don't complain about it"?

Doing that means word of mouth would be nothing but praise or indifference and the company would always point to how no one has complained to them, all they hear is good things.

People who don't like it, won't buy it but they will also complain and they are well within their rights to complain if they find a practice or product to be worthy of complaining such as this practice (Taking something out with a patch and selling it back at a premium)

I'm pretty sure he was being sarcastic.
 
People defend anything on Gaf


Remember how the recent financial statement depicted that SE would fall short on their expected profits (which is counted as expected losses)? Well they have to make part of that estimated profit back somehow.

SE is a corporation that exists to make money and are well within their rights to charge whatever they feel is justifiable. If you don't like it, don't buy it. Go out to some cabin for a month w/o wi-fi instead of raising stink over it here. Do you want NeoGAF to be responsible for another Orth like debacle where an irascible Cliffy B points out the gall of the internet and GAF to challenge norm of a corporation trying to be the vanguard in introducing language pack for that kind of price?
 

Kunan

Member
I see Neogaf's lynch mob is at it again, I wonder how will get fired because of you sons of bitches.
Give me a break. Attacking a company's faceless decision is hardly the same as personally attacking someone over their public comments on twitter.
 
This is Wada's parting shot at everyone.
Wada left a note.
wkyf9uC.gif
 
Okay, let me explain how this fuck up probably happened. Please bear with me, because it's going to sound really stupid, and I'm not defending Square Enix here, only explaining the nature of the fuck up.

- Tomb Raider comes out in Japan on April 25 2013, at the price of 8000yen (80 USD).

- The Japanese release includes voices in English or Japanese, and Japanese text. This differs it from the version sold in US and Europe where the voice options are only in English.

- Somehow it appears the PC Tomb Raider release on Steam was available for purchase in Japan at the US/Europe release price of 50 USD when it was released last month.

- Additionally it appears that someone fucked up massively and included all the language content meant for the Japanese release along with the package.

- So for a period of time Japanese fans were able to buy Tomb Raider on Steam for 50 bucks, and enjoy Japanese language support, a whole month before the release in Japan.

- Someone found out, panicked, and removed the language content support so Japanese consumers would no longer be able to buy a fully functional Japanese version of Tomb Raider at almost half the price and a month before it is released in Japan.

- Now that the Japanese launch is finally arriving, they are offering the option for anyone who used the previous "exploit" to top up the 30 dollars of difference to regain access to the Japanese language options.

From Square Enix's perspective, what they were doing was closing a reverse import regional loophole, and now they are offering an olive branch to fans who used that exploit so they don't have to sit on a useless 50 buck English-only Tomb Raider. From the perspective of everyone else, Square Enix is scamming everyone.

ROFLMAO. :p

well... uh...yeah. SE with all these exciting stories, can't wait for E3!

It does leave a potentially interesting model though. ala carte language packs. But then they would probably lose money because consumers rarely would need more than 1 language pack.


Silly Square.
 

Coxy

Member
pretty sure that's illegal, I can see the mistake they made, but it's their mistake, they dont get to decide they want more money for it after the sale has been made
 

MechaX

Member
From Square Enix's perspective, what they were doing was closing a reverse import regional loophole, and now they are offering an olive branch to fans who used that exploit so they don't have to sit on a useless 50 buck English-only Tomb Raider. From the perspective of everyone else, Square Enix is scamming everyone.

ROFLMAO. :p

So it seems like this is a mix of scuminess and incompetence!

SE is the gift that keeps on giving.
 

Doczu

Member
Most companies just acept the fact that they fucked up and live with it, but this... this is just plain stealing from buyers.
 

llehuty

Member
I mean, seriously, 30$ worth of voice acting?. Didn't know Angelina Jolie, Brad Pitt, Leonardo Dicaprio and Matt Damon where in charge of the japanese dubbing...
 

duckroll

Member
Most companies just acept the fact that they fucked up and live with it, but this... this is just plain stealing from buyers.

Well, I think that depends on how you view it. They fucked up, but they closed the loophole by removing the Japanese language option which wasn't supposed to be there to begin with. They could have just stopped there. This would mean anyone in Japan who bought it early thinking it would have Japanese support would remained screwed, unless they requested for a refund from Steam successfully after that.

I think that's what most companies would do, and that wouldn't be seen as -that- bad of a thing, since that "extra" feature was either promised nor advertised anywhere.

How Square Enix fucked up is that they then thought to themselves "Well what about those few guys who didn't get a refund, and are sitting on a 50 buck game they don't understand now? Poor bastards!" and instead of making them buy the JP release all over again at 80 bucks, they "generously" released this 30 buck solution for those who want it.

It's really hilarious, but I really think that's what's going on here. Whoever made that decision should probably... not be making any decisions in futures about such things. :p

still though, 30 bucks for just a few subtitle text seem like a giant rip off
I mean, seriously, 30$ worth of voice acting?. Didn't know Angelina Jolie, Brad Pitt, Leonardo Dicaprio and Matt Damon where in charge of the japanese dubbing...

This is not being priced as an actual DLC product with a value cost though. It's simply meant to top the price up to the equal value of what they're selling the product for in Japan. It's really weird that something is distributed this way, but I think it's also a reminder of the gap between game prices in various regions sometimes.
 
30$ For a dub?

I like the idea of lenguage packs and I'm willing to pay (if they are just not holded back from the main game) but 30? Lol no

Edit: The Japanese version... That makes it pretty fucked up...
 

antitrop

Member
From Square Enix's perspective, what they were doing was closing a reverse import regional loophole, and now they are offering an olive branch to fans who used that exploit so they don't have to sit on a useless 50 buck English-only Tomb Raider. From the perspective of everyone else, Square Enix is scamming everyone.

ROFLMAO. :p

That all sounds fairly logical, but they deserve a backlash.

I bet the actual true story won't even be nearly as interesting.
 

web01

Member
Absolutely disgusting they screwed up and should cop the loss on the chin not patch out the Japanese language and charge for it. Complete disgrace. Those people who are affected by this should just "pirate" the language tracks removed from the game they purchased and tell sqeenix to get fucked.
 
30$ For a dub?

I like the idea of lenguage packs and I'm willing to pay (if they are just not holded back from the main game) but 30? Lol no

Edit: The Japanese version... That makes it pretty fucked up...

Why would you like the idea of paying for language packs when games usually support more than one for free?
 

Jubern

Member
On the price thing: It was readily available to buy from Japan at the US price since Steam doesn't seem to support yen currency. At least, from what I can see.

IIRC, it's pretty much like the early days of Steam, when Europeans would also pay in dollars, and thus, at a lower price point, until Steam finally adapted to the market, sometime in 2007 or 2008 if my memory serves right.
 

snap0212

Member
I think that's what most companies would do, and that wouldn't be seen as -that- bad of a thing, since that "extra" feature was either promised nor advertised anywhere.
I'm pretty sure games are advertised and sold "as is" and that would include everything mentioned or not.
 

dose

Member
I'm not so sure about this. If you go to the Square Enix website a post from February 20th ( http://www.sqex-ee.jp/2013/02/post-162.html) states - via google translate...
http://translate.googleusercontent....2.html&usg=ALkJrhi7gtDQlCqt_hWxRV4eamvGkingFA
I will inform you about the difference between "Tomb Raider (TOMB RAIDER)" will be released (Thu), the specification of the overseas edition April 25, 2013.

[For voice]
Japanese / English Audio:
Subtitles: Japanese

※ can switch the audio of the English / Japanese option settings in the game is possible.
 

Z3M0G

Member
I mean, seriously, 30$ worth of voice acting?. Didn't know Angelina Jolie, Brad Pitt, Leonardo Dicaprio and Matt Damon where in charge of the Japanese dubbing...

Japanese voice actors are rock stars in Japan... so it's basically equivalent I guess. They might realize that people would be willing to pay for it.

But don't take it away from those who "accidentally" got it for free... Jesus, SE... pay for your own damn mistakes!
 
Top Bottom