[dorkatlarge]

A few days ago, someone on the IGN message boards was concerned that there were no clear statements on whether the Wii eastern RPGs Xenoblade, The Last Story, or the upcoming Pandora's Tower would be officially translated. Xenoblade is slated for release in the UK, though there's been few indications about a Last Story localization.

Since then, there's been an attempt to get people to pre-order a lingering Amazon.com listing of Monado: Beginning of the World (which was an early name for Xenoblade), and some talk on Facebook. It's still not clear what might happen.

Would you buy any of these three games if they were published in English? Would you go out of your way to import them from the UK, and find a system capable of playing them?

As for myself, I dunno. I've been an eastern RPG fanboy since 1990, but I haven't played many that kept my attention since 2006 or so. Since it seems a lot of people are buying western RPGs instead, I don't think there's much monetary incentive to translate games -- maybe two or three eastern RPGs will be published in English in the next few years. And since I was pretty apathetic about most Wii software except for a few light party games, I don't know if I'd buy these lengthy games.

[GITS SAC Motoko]

To save money, I would just want them published in the country, so then I don't have to go and track down a UK console. But I mean if they bring the games here then more people could buy it and not have to buy a separate console. Personally, because Wii has pretty much NO eastern lengthy games, I'd like to see them come out for that purpose. I like eastern RPGs as well, and there haven't been many that I know of out on the Wii (I haven't followed Nintendo for years) but I'd like to see some. Maybe it will give the Wii better reputation. Because I remember GameCube had or was coming out with a line of Eastern RPGs, and I really haven't seen much on the Wii but Tales of Symphonia: Dawn of the New World. But if I'm wrong, don't quote me--again I havent followed Nintendo in ages.

But I'd buy them. I've never played any of those games before (God I reallly need to get back into video games O_O) and if they came here, yeah I's try them. I miss lengthy Eastern RPGs.

[TekoMuto]

*nudifies Xenoblade, greases him up and slides him down a shopping isle lane*

[Rukariou]

We just got rid of our Wii. So as much as my husband loves to talk about how much of a genius Tetsuya Takahashi is, there will probably be a very small chance that we'll ever get Xenoblade.

[STVO]

I'm not a big RPG person but these are some of the type of games that SHOULD be on the Wii. Nintendo of America needs to stop holding back on releases such ad these titles, Disaster: Day of Crisis, and Fatal Frame. They may have won this generationconsole war overall but most Wii owners I talk to except the hardcore Nintendo fans (which I am one) are either disappointed or have sold their system.

I've kept my system and have no intentions of selling because of the upcoming Zelda title, need to finish Mario Galaxy 2, and I have lots of great Virtual Console games. Biggest problems with Wii I have are for every 1 great/good game released, we get 50 shovelware titles, they don't have any noteworthy third party titles exclusives besides Goldeneye and Boom Blox, and besides the "Wii Sports" series, they haven't created any new fun IPs for Wii like they did with Pikmin on Gamecube.

[GITS SAC Motoko]

Yeah Nintendo of America needs to stop holding back on things. I mean look back to before Wii was even called "Wii" (it was the Nintendo Revolution) remember the Metal Gear game "Project H.A.M.M.E.R? What ever happened to that? That was one of the games I REALLY wanted to get on the Wii, and it's like poof! gone. I'm not getting rid of my Wii because I 1. stood out in the cold for it the night before it came out 2. am lifelong Nintendo fan and 3. Still hanging on thinking that games like Xenoblade or lengthy RPG games will come out again, like they did a ton on GameCube. And I agree with your 1 good game 50 shovelware title games. But I'd say you're being conservative....more like 100. XD loool If you look at the Best Buy/electronic store ads for the Wii section, it's ALL the shovelware games/games that well, aren't Nintendo. Like Dora the Explorer game or something. O.o

[Aiddon Valentin]

I don't really care that much for Xenoblade, mostly due to Monolith Soft not doing much of interest (either Takahashi was a one-hit wonder with Xenogears or the real genius behind the writing was Kato), but I would buy The Last Story in a heart beat since I do like Sakaguchi's work. I will say that NoA is a bit stingy with releases (such as Hotel Dusk 2), but considering the current economic climate and the fact that they've spent tons of money on R&D toward their new systems as well as getting a new dev building constructed I can't say it's surprising to be picky about what comes over.

[dorkatlarge]

Still not convinced that the letter writing campaign will work... and even if it does, I suspect only a few fans will buy the games, and most people will just pirate them. I admit that I don't have all that much money for video games, and I usually don't feel compelled to import legit copies of untranslated games. If the campaign fails, and if I have some cash to spare, then I might import the UK versions and modify my Wii system.

But on a less cynical note, I might actually write a letter today, and get it in the mail tomorrow. I'll be using some of the persuasive letter advice from _How to Make Friends and Influence People_, and try not to come across as a crazy fan.

[STVO]

GITS SAC Motoko, on 27 June 2011 - 11:25 AM, said:

Yeah Nintendo of America needs to stop holding back on things. I mean look back to before Wii was even called "Wii" (it was the Nintendo Revolution) remember the Metal Gear game "Project H.A.M.M.E.R? What ever happened to that? That was one of the games I REALLY wanted to get on the Wii, and it's like poof! gone. I'm not getting rid of my Wii because I 1. stood out in the cold for it the night before it came out 2. am lifelong Nintendo fan and 3. Still hanging on thinking that games like Xenoblade or lengthy RPG games will come out again, like they did a ton on GameCube. And I agree with your 1 good game 50 shovelware title games. But I'd say you're being conservative....more like 100. XD loool If you look at the Best Buy/electronic store ads for the Wii section, it's ALL the shovelware games/games that well, aren't Nintendo. Like Dora the Explorer game or something. O.o

Yeah, I wanted Project H.A.M.M.E.R. so bad! It ended up getting cancelled for whatever reasons. I'm guessing they didn't feel like it was a "Nintendo quality game?" If that's the case, that's fine, but I think they should have released the Fatal Frame game and some of these other titles that people wanted. Then there's the whole motion controls aren't as great as they could have been discussion I can get into, but that would be treading off-topic, lol.

Aiddon Valentin, on 27 June 2011 - 12:41 PM, said:

I don't really care that much for Xenoblade, mostly due to Monolith Soft not doing much of interest (either Takahashi was a one-hit wonder with Xenogears or the real genius behind the writing was Kato), but I would buy The Last Story in a heart beat since I do like Sakaguchi's work. I will say that NoA is a bit stingy with releases (such as Hotel Dusk 2), but considering the current economic climate and the fact that they've spent tons of money on R&D toward their new systems as well as getting a new dev building constructed I can't say it's surprising to be picky about what comes over.

I never played Xenogears but everyone who loves RPGs seemed to enjoy it. Xenosaga I did play a little of (well the first one) and honestly I thought it was extremely boring to be honest. I liked Kos-Mos and was excited to get more into the game, but I was already ten hours in and nothing of note happened to my memory. Also, I think I only had 2 or 3 fights. What is this, Witch Hunter Robin the video game? (LOL, sorry had to take a cheap shot there, no offense fans of either.) I won't speak of Monolith's other work as I never played any of it, but I didn't think Xenogears was too hot. I really didn't want Disaster: Day of Crisis to come here. From what I remember, the Europe release attained decent critical reviews (a couple 6's and 7's) but it didn't do too well sale wise. I still think they should have given it a try in America, I mean it's not like Wii is overflowing with mature titles.

dorkatlarge, on 10 July 2011 - 10:49 AM, said:

Still not convinced that the letter writing campaign will work... and even if it does, I suspect only a few fans will buy the games, and most people will just pirate them. I admit that I don't have all that much money for video games, and I usually don't feel compelled to import legit copies of untranslated games. If the campaign fails, and if I have some cash to spare, then I might import the UK versions and modify my Wii system.

But on a less cynical note, I might actually write a letter today, and get it in the mail tomorrow. I'll be using some of the persuasive letter advice from _How to Make Friends and Influence People_, and try not to come across as a crazy fan.

Not to be a naysayer, but with Wii U's pending release rumored to be around March-May 2012 (it could be bumped to Fall 2012, but they did release 3DS around then) I just don't see Nintendo making too much of an effort to release many more titles on Wii aside from the announced titles for this year (Kirby, Zelda: Skyward Sword, and Mario & Sonic Olympics 2012.) You know what though, give it a shot, you may be surprised! Fortunately it seems like there are enough fan interest to get Xenoblade and Last Story to America, so maybe Nintendo (or perhaps a third party) will see enough interest generated that they will pick up the titles and release it to America. I remember on the Gamecube, Nintendo of Japan released a game called "Animal Leader" but Nintendo of America had no interest in releasing it here. So surprisingly, third party publisher Atlus picked it up and released it here as "Cubivore: Survival of the Fittest." I guess you can say there's always some kind of hope.

[Aiddon Valentin]

STVO, on 10 July 2011 - 01:56 PM, said:

I never played Xenogears but everyone who loves RPGs seemed to enjoy it. Xenosaga I did play a little of (well the first one) and honestly I thought it was extremely boring to be honest. I liked Kos-Mos and was excited to get more into the game, but I was already ten hours in and nothing of note happened to my memory. Also, I think I only had 2 or 3 fights. What is this, Witch Hunter Robin the video game? (LOL, sorry had to take a cheap shot there, no offense fans of either.) I won't speak of Monolith's other work as I never played any of it, but I didn't think Xenosaga was too hot.

Xenogears was actually a really good game, though admittedly it was very story-centric (especially that second disc where you see a LOT of just nothing but plot due to the team swiftly running out of funding). Saga on the other hand was a mediocre mess. The story just wasn't as good due to the narrative being bogged down by a plot that was less interesting than the writers thought it was and the focus on an absolutely IRRITATING, unlikeable, emotionally unstable protagonist like Shion (who, shockingly enough, they can't justify for being in the game) when they should have focused on far more interesting characters like Ziggy, chaos, KOS-MOS, and Jin. It was one of the biggest disappointments in RPG history.