Seems Sony has yet to set plans to release the PS3 in Korea. Despite Korea, a bastion of PC gaming, being generally hostile to console games, the XBox 360 seems to be doing OK.
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Korea is hostile to console game makers who sell the hardware at a loss, because as a rule Koreans do not purchase software, including game software, if they can steal it because the software’s media can be cost-effectively duplicated (i.e., by burning pirate CDs and DVDs). You can’t make up the loss on consoles by selling games here. Piracy also kills any PC software vendor who doesn’t have a service-subscription model.
And God help you if you adjust your hardware-sale model to stanch the losses — then you are attacked for “price-gouging” in the Korean market. No similar condemnation for software piracy, though. That’s not gouging.
I have to agree with Brendon on the software.
We have three PS owners in our team, and they NEVER purchase software.
Instead they go to a certain Korean site which contains uploaded files
of the game titles, download them, copy them to a DVD or in case of the
PSP,directly into their machines and play on.
Someone commented in a previous post how Koreans are cheapskates, well this
definitely helps prove it.
Come on, they are thrifty. Think of all the polution they are preventing.
Look, every country has a problem with software piracy. The United States is no different. Americans pirate software too. But there is an important difference between the casual piracy found in the US (people making a copy for a friend, or doing a one-off download from the net, while still purchasing software at one of the many, thriving retail sales channels (CompUSA, Computer City, etc.), and the industrialized piracy that is the mode here in Korea. There is virtually no sales channel for packaged software here, because the competition is W3000 a won a disc.
I know its theft. It is maddening that the rules are made for everyone else but me. Me first, let me get mine, while everyone else pays hard earned dollars for goods and services. The same mentality says its OK to barrel down the sidewalk on your Daelim at speed while people walk their children. I choose to use humor over anger.
Korea is not hopeless, if will to change can be found (good luck there). Singapore used to be a famous software piracy haven. Sim Lim Square was the spot. While there were all manner of hardware vendors, it was hard to find legit software for sale and ripoff CD vendors ruled the roost. Is it still so?
Even China is trying to clean up. Better luck!
This is clearly another sign of how Sony, just like Toyota and all other Japanese companies will stop at no cost to hurt the feelings of the Koreans and put them down. I hear they don’t even have Dokdo on the box for the PS3!!!
there is industrialized piracy in America, too, clearly. For a long time, New York City did nothing, absolutely nothing to deter people from selling bootleg dvds on subway streets and sidewalks. Only recently, I think they started enforcing some rules.
Until the RIAA came along with sueing and charging random citizens and shareware software makers, people downloaded music and videos like crazy.
What else explains Tower Records, once the west coast spot for buying music, turning into a bankrupt retailer?
You’re venting, Carr.
actually, what I found amusing about the Japanese video game consoles being sold in Korea, at least for the origianl 80’s Nintendo system was that, the Korean market was offered the US model, but it couldn’t play US games.
That’s understandable.
But, Korea, being right next to Japan, wasn’t allowed a console to play Japanese games.
That’s not understandable.
They were given the crappier US Nintendo console version with the inability to play any of the better variety and better technology Japanese games.
So, in essence, since the early 80’s, nobody was interested in buying the Korean version of a licensed Nintendo. All my smarter and richer friends bought the Japanese version or bought Korean hack versions. I was the dummy who bought the Hyundai Comboy, which was the Korean licensed version of the Nintendo.
Let’s discuss regions. Why is Japan in region 2? Region 2 is Europe. Japan is nowhere geographically near Europe.
I personally think Japan drove Koreans who like Japanese goods, towards seeking bootlegs or straight up Japanese licensed versions rather than legit Korean licensed versions. I bet you, there’s a lot of Koreans who already bought Japanese versions of PS3.
Theft or not, anyone over the age of 12 ought’a feel sheepish that they’re still playing video games… Dorks, read a book or buy a punching bag (don’t let it hit you on the bounceback though). Not to step on my own kind’s neck here, but way too many American guys (not all but too many) are losing precious time diddling in front of the game console.
the real reason why PS3 is not officially launching in Korea may be that, after past market analysis, they know that Koreans will buy the Japanese legit ones anyway, over the Korean licensed versions. Maybe they’re having a hardtime finding a Korean distributor, who’s willing to take up the risky business. It’s an unattractive business, when it’s so easy to just buy the Japanese one.
Tower Records was doomed by factors other than casual piracy — namely its horrible management decisions to be a “high priced” warehouse store in expensive locations ($20 for a CD?), with diffident staff who were more interested in talking to each other than to customers. Why pay retail for crappy service? Tower, having massive economies of scale, should have been the cheapest place with the widest selection, and best-trained staff. But they weren’t, and so they died. There are plenty of brick-and-mortar shops surviving in the States.
PS, a game at W30,000 (yes, that’s the best price game publishers can charge in Korea, compared to W50,000 in the States) competes very poorly against a W3000 ripoff CD edition — much more poorly than a music CD does against free downloads on the net. The difference is that the game studio has no other income, while music publishers get royalties from other media plus the artists can perform at live concerts.
But yes, I’m venting.
As opposed to diddling around, writing comments on blogs?
Saywhatnow? Korea is a bastion of PC gaming? Are we talking about the country where the average retailer only carries maybe five computer games (two of which are probably Starcraft)? Maybe my experience is unusual, but all I ever saw anyone play in PC rooms in Korea was Blizzard titles (Starcruft, Warcruft, Diablo), ages-old first-person shooters, and ‘homegrown’ (ie Korean-made) online-based games that look like they could have been programmed on the 286 in ma’s basement. Online games that typically had someone fighting cute monsters, or else had cute monsters fighting each other… Oh… and Princess Maker… but let’s not talk about that *shudder*.
There is a big difference from being thrifty and being outright cheapskates.
If you are thrifty, you don’t buy things you don’t need, and if you do buy something, you go for the better deal and value.
If you are a cheapskate, you want to buy everything you want, but you
want it for free and/or want the seller to discount the price to unreasonable
levels. (ie cutting the price of a 10,000 Won item to 1,000 Won)