Wii VC Gifts Locked By Country!

[Telefrog]

It turns out that the Wii VC Gift service isn't just region-locked, it's locked by country (http://www.computerandvideogames.com/article.php?id=177361)! This means that you can't send gifts to friends or relatives in other countries even if they're in the same region.

Wii owners in North America, where the gift feature has just been released, report that sending Virtual Console gifts to friends in other countries - even North American neighbour Canada - results in a disappointing error message and the purchased VC game going into the bin.

I can't imagine how this will "work" in Europe with all the countries in one region.

[Dr.Finger]

Continental Europe should get by okay since they all use the same currency, but yeah it's a little annoying.

[Feltoar]

Different countries have different VC games available. It wouldnt be possible to send a game to a country that doesnt have that game for purchase. Its pretty lazy of them to not put in a system that stops you from gifting to people who cant get the gift though and allowing international gifting.

[Disgustipated]

Wow, Nintendo is just fucking retarded.

[Telefrog]

Of course, the counter-argument is to ask "how often will this come up?" I think it still speaks volumes about Nintendo's commitment to it's virtual community. Which is not to have one.

[Phanto]

Wow, Nintendo is just fucking retarded.

Tell us something we don't know...;)

[KingGorilla]

Tell us something we don't know...;)

Reggie eats babies and craps out their souls.

[mkelehan]

I'm sure it has to do with different companies having the rights to the same game in different countries, and they decided to take the easy route and just deny it all. It'll probably come up so infrequently, they just decided to hell with it.

[agentgray]

I can confirm this. Sorry, Spigot, you would have loved Double Dribble.

[Chainblast]

Yet they still make me buy points in US dollars. As far as I'm concerned Sony is the only company that got it right. Yeah, that's right.

[jacktion]

Though it is popular to criticize Nintendo's online plans, what other way could they have done this?
Different games are released in different countries at different times. That is done according to each country's managing plan. If they allowed cross country gifting then every release would become a global release. And that would throw all planning and marketing out the window. No company likes involuntary global releases. So this is the only way that Nintendo could have handled this. And it is because they are offering a feature that the others aren't. But acknowledging that wouldn't fit into the criticism would it?

[Feltoar]

Different games are released in different countries at different times. That is done according to each country's managing plan. If they allowed cross country gifting then every release would become a global release. And that would throw all planning and marketing out the window.
Well sorta, if they werent so lazy they could program the Shopping Channel so you cannot gift a game to countries where the game isnt available. With more effort and commitment they could have made it work.

[Opty]

Here's another reason besides who owns what rights in what country: money. How much is a Wii point in Canada? How much in England? How much in America? How much in Japan? I'm pretty sure the price of the points hasn't changed since the Wii's launch but since then the American dollar's dropped below the Canadian in value and back again. This is to stop people from having a friend in another country buy and gift games to them at lower costs.

Also something I just realized, giving gifts across borders might incur taxes and/or tariffs based on the countries involved. I know nothing of this area so I'm asking anyone who might know to verify if this may or may not be a concern of Nintendo's.

[mkelehan]

Here's another reason besides who owns what rights in what country: money. How much is a Wii point in Canada? How much in England? How much in America? How much in Japan? I'm pretty sure the price of the points hasn't changed since the Wii's launch but since then the American dollar's dropped below the Canadian in value and back again. This is to stop people from having a friend in another country buy and gift games to them at lower costs.That's a lot of effort to save 49 cents on SMB3.

[divinechaos]

That's a lot of effort to save 49 cents on SMB3.

But Nintendo's losing so much with the Wii that they HAVE to be careful. :rolleyes:

[Headcase]

Kinda crappy. The workaround is to provide Wii Points or money and let them buy it, but that's not the way a gift ought to be given.

I think it still speaks volumes about Nintendo's commitment to it's virtual community. Which is not to have one.

Does XBox Live let you gift between countries? How about in the same country (honestly I don't know so this one might blow up in my face :o)?

Considering XBL is the standard of VG virtual communities (one of Microsoft's pillars, not one of Nintendo's), I find it hard to fault a company for providing better service at something in that area than MS, but not good enough in a certain way.

How about when they were selling videos in US but not Canada? Was that speaking volumes about MS's commitment to the virtual community too? I figured it was legal reasons, red tape, etc, but no, I guess it was MS not caring about its virtual community ;)

But yeah, I do agree that Nintendo isn't interested in a having fancy online community. MS also has the resources (more than just money) to do it better. It's a feature the 360 has over the Wii, and I think most people were expecting that from day one. However, IMO country-locking gift games is not the sign that made this fact clear!

Check Mii Out and Everybody Votes represent the flaky but fun online system Nintendo's going for. Not so much meat to it, but I always have to make my votes :). This is where I could see myself being disappointed; they've already been pretty slow with releasing channels and frankly I'm expecting more interesting ones following EV and CMO.

If you want to fault Nintendo on this little news story, fault them for not warning about the limitation. I assume you get your points back, wonder if it takes any time \ contact with Nintendo? Because if there's any time invovled in getting your points back, on top of the time wasted sending the gift in the first place, that's Bad.

[KingGorilla]

Headcase, I would like you introduce you to Steam, apparently the two of you have never met.

[Bydo_Empire]

I'm sure it has to do with different companies having the rights to the same game in different countries, and they decided to take the easy route and just deny it all. It'll probably come up so infrequently, they just decided to hell with it.Exactly. I bet there are simply legal reasons why it's not feasible to do. While it would certainly be nice, how many people were really going to gift VC games to friends in other countries?

[Royal Fool]

Exactly. I bet there are simply legal reasons why it's not feasible to do. While it would certainly be nice, how many people were really going to gift VC games to friends in other countries?
Um, probably more than you think.

[Lon Lon Rabbit]

Um, probably more than you think.

It's a problem for all the importers, too, like me.

I can't give or receive any gifts to friends in my country because of this (except for one friend who also imported) but I guess I can send them to you guys I don't think so!

[GabeCube]

Spoiler: if you ARE in the same territory, but in a different country, you can temporarily change the settings and send a gift. I tested this by sending a gift from my Brazilian account to an US Wii, and it worked flawlessly. It even received the reply from the US Wii AFTER it was set back to Brazil.

Go to the settings menu and change the country (must be in the same region: Americas/Europe-PAL/Japan). You will be prompted to reset the online settings by accepting the user agreement again, and you are all set. After you are done gifting, set the Wii back to your own country.

With this, at least people in Europe should be able to gift each other fairly easy.

This is INFINITELY better than the kind of retarded restrictions that Xbox Live imposes to us in South America. I won't even go into the fact that Microsoft Brazil will not even SERVICE my broken US Xbox, even if I pay for it.