Launch Titles to Be Region Free

One thing that annoys me in today's technologically advanced world is the possibility that manufacturers and publishers can be seen to be acting to restrict free trade by locking DVDs and games to specific regions.

Nintendo, however, has done the wise thing of not making launch Wii Console Games to be region-free. So you should be able to get your launch Wii games from Amazon US as well as UK.

The Nintendo VP of marketing Perrin Kaplan mentioned to Wired News that "like the Nintendo DS, the Wii will be able to play games from other regions, such as Japan, without any restriction. Kaplan implied there might be a region lock that publishers would be able to flip on, but it doesn't sound like the first-party titles from Nintendo will be restricted."

However, we can only hope that other game publishers choose not to regionalise the games as this would just lead to mass confusion.

So, I wonder how many of us will be encouraged to buy from the US, Hong Kong and elsewhere? With VAT and import duty to consider, it may end up being cheaper buying from the UK, that's if all games are available everywhere.