Amazon UK Games

[syntheticgerbil]

Why is it that Amazon UK will not ship video games to the United States? That is incredibly not fair.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/help/customer/display.html/026-4707775-2841239?ie=UTF8&nodeId=14044781&qid=1177838834&sr=1-1

I demand an explanation!

[Ginger]

An American complaining about not being able to get a game he wants ¬¬

Welcome to the pain of pal gaming.

Edit: Also why would u want to import? The exchange rate is wank for u at the mo and most things cost the same in $ in the US as they do in sterling over here

[syntheticgerbil]

I want Tonic Trouble for Gameboy Color, only released overseas.

There's not really any other place I've seen it for sale.

[Thrik]

I think they'd also get slammed with typically heavy export charges if they shipped out, just like they do when they import (apart from some places like Jersey, which is where most Amazon UK stuff ships from). Plus, imagine having to deal with returns and stuff with those import/export charges on top -- it'd be financial suicide. Well, it would be if it wasn't Amazon.

But yeah, the most predominant issue is most stuff here being incompatible. If it isn't a different plug/voltage/etc then it'll be different standards (NTSC/PAL).

You might be better off trying to get some wanker from the UK to send it over to you, duly compensated of course.

[elmuerte]

export charges? that sounds like a very stupid movie for a government to enforce. Impost charges are for the receivers. Returns might be an issue, no idea how that would work.

It's just weird amazon stuff, never bought anything from/through them. Often webstores don't ship at all to certain regions, but if it's only certain articles then it's stupid.

[Thrik]

I haven't really got any idea what it's like for exporting to the US, but I know that a lot of US e-shops avoid shipping to here because of the costs involved. I assumed there'd be similar costs both ways, though I could be 100% wrong on that point.

I don't know what Amazon UK would have to pay to get stuff imported into the US, but it's probably enough for them to just stick to the intended market and leave all US business to Amazon US.

[syntheticgerbil]

The thing is though, I buy Region 2 DVDs and CDs from Amazon UK quite often, and those are clearly allowed. But for some odd reason, Amazon doesn't see fit to ship video games over here.

I found a marketplace seller willing to sell the game for like 8 pounds and they said that they ship to the US. Once I told them that Amazon wouldn't let me order from them, they said they can't ship to the US because of PAL format. But it's Gameboy, which doesn't come in PAL or NTSC, just Gameboy format.

And if it were a problem with PAL, why can I buy PAL format VHS tapes and DVDs? Garfunkel!!

[DanJW]

Region coding: the most popular name for "market fixing".

[eljay]

There is no sane reason for them to not ship GBA games as nintendo handhelds have never even had region locks.... for them to willingly ship things that consumers might not be able to use (DVDs and such) but not this is absurd.

Tell them as much.

[vimes]

I know that in France importing a DVD in the 6 months following the release of the film is theater was illegal and might still be. Maybe it's the same for games in the US...

[elmuerte]

it probably has to do with the owners of the content not allowing parallel import, within the european union this is prohibited by law (e.g. preventing parallel import). That's why iTunes is currently being pursued for now allowing UK customers to buy something from a French iTunes store.

anyway... it's just another way to screw over the customers (just like region coding).