Live outside the US? Better be prepared to wait for your game.
s a Canadian gamer I can expect two common truths for when it comes time to get a new game: 1) I'll be paying more for it compared to American gamers, and 2) I'll be getting it later than Americans. Normally I would tolerate this; after all, I'll end up getting the game eventually and there are some legitimate reasons for why there is a delay and why it costs more. On Monday, however, I saw something that unraveled my tolerance on the issue, and that is that Too Human will be available in Canada two days after the American release.
Too Human, a game that was developed by a Canadian game studio. Too Human, a game that went gold two months ago. A game that will be released in its own country later than in the US, when there was ample time for Microsoft to manufacture and ship the discs so that they would be available on release. It was the same thing for Mass Effect, a game that was developed in my own town. It was made available, later, and for more than what American gamers paid for it.
Sure, this may sound like whining, and compared to what gamers in other regions of the world, it is. Take Australians, for example: they constantly get screwed over on game releases. It took three months for them to get Super Smash Bros. Melee. after its US release date, or, if you prefer a future example, Australia will be getting Rock Band a full month after Rock Band 2 becomes available in the US. Europe has things just as bad. The fact that there isn't more outrage and anger from gamers in these regions is shocking.
Now I'm sure that there are valid reasons for why there is a delay for games to be releases outside the US. I mean, it does take time and money for products to be shipped and those cost unfortunately get passed onto the consumer. But when it comes to things like a few days' delay or unreasonably extreme delays, what these game distributors are essentially saying is that the money from an international gamer doesn't matter as much as the US gamer's does. And that is not a fair situation.
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