Q4: Currently, Nintendo hardware and games are region-locked in territories throughout the world, so that a game purchased in one region cannot be played in another. Are there plans to do away with that restriction and unlock them?



A4: Iwata: There have been various conditions at play in the game business, such as a history of localization taking an extremely long time, a variety of marketing constraints and circumstances in each country, and the fact that the license needed to sell games have not always been granted globally. In a sense, the region-lock has existed more for reasons having to do with the seller than the consumers. That has been the situation throughout the history of video game systems, and as for what should be done going forward, there may be advantages for the consumers and also for us if they were unlocked. Conversely, unlocking them would mean having to resolve different issues that would subsequently arise. While we have not decided whether we will unlock them or not, we do recognize that it is an issue that needs to be considered in the future.