DoDonPachi Saidaioujou coming to Xbox 360 (REGION-FREE!)

[pestro87]

Good: Ordered the game the very instant I saw the region-free announcement.
Bad: I'm still worried that the tweet has been misinterpreted. Google Translate says something about "players overseas", so I assume it says "overseas people will get to play it." But the thing is, this statement is not the same as "the game has no region-locking." It might allude to some future localization. And with that tweet being the only god damn fucking confirmation of region-freeness at all, I have no idea whether or not I'm wasting $70.

海外の本体 = "overseas consoles"

It says, more or less, "it will be possible to play Xbox 360 SDOJ on overseas consoles." I guess it could MAYBE refer to a localized release if you really want it to, but I'd bet anything that it specifically means region free. The wording would be too strange to be anything but, IMO.

Why haven't then done an english message for the people abroad?

Come on now, people outside of Japan don't play shmups

[Kollision]

hmmmm... so it might be that Saidaioujou isn't actually region-free?

[Drachenherz]

Could anybody well versed in japanese please follow this up?

[dan76]

Why haven't then done an english message for the people abroad?

Because it's Cave and they have no sense. You must have realised that by now.

[CloudyMusic]

Before this thread just descends down a spiral of self-fueling panic, let's remember that this thread of discussion was started by someone's Google Translate interpretation. To me (though I'm not infallible) the original tweet is pretty unambiguous, at least to the extent that it's silly to be screaming "OH MY GOD NOT RF AFTER ALL!!!" for no reason.

If someone who's fluent in Japanese is reading this, by all means step in and give us your take, but from my reading, it's hard to take that original message as much of anything but an announcement that the disc that's coming out in two weeks can be played on non-Japanese consoles. Not a vague hint at an unannounced, future localization to some unnamed territory in some unnamed language at some unnamed future date, at the very least.

[Giest118]

My intent wasn't to spread panic; I was just saying that I myself didn't feel like I knew for a fact about the region-freeness. I think I may keep the order either way to perhaps make up for one or two of the Cave games I've played but never really had a way to pay for. :V

[NTSC-J]

Xbox 360 怒首領蜂最大往生は海外の本体でも遊んで頂くことができます

Literally, "SDOJ for Xbox 360 can even be played on overseas consoles".

[Giest118]

NTSC-J, you are a gentleman and a scholar. Thank you sir.

[CloudyMusic]

My intent wasn't to spread panic; I was just saying that I myself didn't feel like I knew for a fact about the region-freeness.

I know, that's just the direction the thread was rapidly heading.

Xbox 360 怒首領蜂最大往生は海外の本体でも遊んで頂くことができます

Literally, "SDOJ for Xbox 360 can even be played on overseas consoles".

Thank you!

[Muchi Muchi Spork]

The announcer for Neo Turf Masters told me this was weegion fwee so don't worry about it. And apparently I've gotten myself onto something called the gween.

[geekmiki]

Not that I doubt the translation, but didn't Cave and Microsoft agree that there wouldn't be other region free releases after MMP/PS?

I remember reading this somewhere a while ago...

[hail good sir]

and

[trap15]

Pretty sure they were lying to get people (read: us) off their backs about it.

[AntiFritz]

Which had the consequences of no mushihimesama HD for us pal/ntsc-u folk

[Drake]

How did so many people manage to preorder the game and only just now decide to go "wait what if sdoj isn't really region-free and it was just a google translate error"

because apparently everyone decided to share this everywhere without double-checking a cursory google translation?

[O. Van Bruce]

How did so many people manage to preorder the game and only just now decide to go "wait what if sdoj isn't really region-free and it was just a google translate error"

because apparently everyone decided to share this everywhere without double-checking a cursory google translation?

It's the collective inferiority complex westerners have toward japanese developers. We can't believe they are being nice to us, there must be some trick.

[Giest118]

Skepticism that a company would ever do anything good ever. If you've, say, existed at any point in the last eight decades or so, you might be able to sympathize with the feeling.

For myself, I hadn't actually seen a literal translation of the tweet outside of the barely helpful Google Translate, so the voice in my head telling me that real life is always shit started to kick in.

But NTSC-J cleared that shit up, so yay.

[BulletMagnet]

[Giest118]

Well, then we're all fucked.

[MOSQUITO FIGHTER]

I Don't Believe You

NTSC-J is a triple agent. True story.

[clairobskur]

from @cave_matsuri twitter:

[Deca]

Makin me feel bad that I missed out on the LE I'm still hoping to get an email back from ncsx that they were allotted more right before release or something.

To be totally honest though I think I prefer the normal edition box art.

[Jeneki]

*looks at pic* SLE and LE don't include the game?

[trap15]

That would amazing in every possible way

[Friendly]

Apt punishment for falling for that LE nonsense.
(I pre-ordered the SLE)

[Udderdude]

Does it matter? It's going to remain sealed for all eternity anyway ..

[DJ Incompetent]

Not that I doubt the translation, but didn't Cave and Microsoft agree that there wouldn't be other region free releases after MMP/PS?

I remember reading this somewhere a while ago...

Correct.
At the time of the SDOJ 360 port announcement, Cave declared that it would be a worldwide release. Nobody had truly disputed the details because it was reasonable to assume Rising Star Games, who was legit-publishing Akai Katana in Europe and North America at the time, would also handle this new (and "more anticipated") port.

Until there's a second official confirmation from Cave's marketing, I'm holding back on the preordering. I don't question the tweet's language, but the source of the tweet, considering:
- @cave_matsuri, while the longstanding account that provides official Cave news, is still an offshoot account. 'Never been truly sure how many and what level people have access to post on it.
- When has Asada's blog not confirmed a region free release? I'm pretty sure their last official position on region free releases years ago (to never do them again) was stated on that blog.
- Cave and G.Rev made ongoing cases that Microsoft Japan have been the reason region free releases were forbidden. It's really, really easy to say both companies were lying in the name of securing localization at this point, as Qute and Triangle Service clearly have not had any issues over the past 1-2 years doing the same thing. Moss has always successfully localized thus far, so they're not a consideration yet.
- There has been a significant miscommunication before. spong.com had that Cave Week interview thing with the lower-down-the-chain Cave staff and inaccurate reporting came of it, claiming Akai Katana (IIRC) was coming to PSV. It was easy to just say the Spong interviewers just sucked at journalism, but it's curious that several months had to go by of this news-rumor circulating before somebody just flat-out asked Asada, which then he denied it.
- I'm pretty sure the last game Cave themselves region free'd was Espgaluda 2 (edit: nope, lol). They made the SE region free and the LE region locked. I remember that news was dropped just before release at the time. The region free SDOJ tweet doesn't go into any detail, and there's 2 LEs. (edit: Naw, Cave did MMP/PS last. 'Cuz Pretas is right)
- We know Cave's financial statements have been sucking.
- Their recent matsuri event was scaled down and disorganized
- I don't like speculating when a company is going to fail, but Cave Proper and Cave World together seem to have no projects on the horizon, not even genre changes, and both those groups seemed to be able to put out content almost independently of each other.
- When smaller Japanese businesses fail, they usually just disappear without a word. Irem and Milestone did this, so I'm guessing that's still a thing.
- Cave has debatable loyalty to their overseas fanbase when they don't stand to make money. Sure, sending a Cease&Desist to end CV1000 emulation is reasonable, maybe their occasional youtube copyright takedowns had merit, and sending a C&D to trap15 for images of Ketsui Arrange is-...-strange, but they also sent C&D to EOJ back then, for images on his own fansite. At the end of the day, Japan still doesn't care much for gaijin on street level.

Adding that up together, it's reasonable to speculate a possibility that Cave could actually give zero fucks about accidentally or intentionally misleading us into thinking SDOJ is region free when parts or all of it really isn't. Foreigners hardly have recourse besides bombing their twitter accounts if Cave just totally lied about this release and closed their doors after, now that that it's within view, and the company isn't a shiny beacon of honesty; more importantly, a hot mess of mixed-messages.

And that's my essay on why I'm gonna wait-'n-see into June to purchase, unless new confirmations happen.


I suppose the counter-dickmove Cave could string us along long enough for is to finally unveil that SDOJ Black Label they said they weren't going to do. But whatever. 'Speculation.

[Pretas]

When smaller Japanese businesses fail, they usually just disappear without a word. Irem and Milestone did this, so I'm guessing that's still a thing.

Irem is still alive, if only as a pachinko company.

Cave isn't closing their doors any time soon. They may very well shutter their arcade and console divisions by the end of the year if the SDOJ port fails, but their mobile division is doing at least well enough to stay afloat. Their social Farmville clone Shirotsuku had a playerbase of well over a million at one point.

I'm pretty sure the last game Cave themselves region free'd was Espgaluda 2.

The Muchi Muchi Pork/Pink Sweets double pack was region free.

[O. Van Bruce]

DJ just brought us back all the thrill we wanted

We'll have to wait for the end of May then... That's ok for me because the only reason I wanted to preorder was to support then for the RF decision. If this ends as Region locked I'd better use that money to RGH my console. Yeah, fuck CAVE

can some gaijin in japan with an NTSC-U/PAL console confirm this on day one release?

[pestro87]

DJ Incompetent brought up some good points! Also, I'm not going to completely rule out the theory that Cave might say that it's region-free in order to maximize the profits because they know that they're going out of business soon... I hope, for the sake of all of those who don't have a jap 360 (however, you should have one ), that it is in fact, region-free.