360 version for North America?

[nufan]

Hello,

I live in Canada but originally from NZ so a big cricket fan. Would love to enjoy BLIC07 on my 360. So my question has 2 parts:

1) Will the 360 version be released for NTSC? I assume that i won't be able to go down to my local EB Games and pick up the game here in Canada, they generally dont bring games like this in as there would be no interest over here.

2) If that is the case and there is no NTSC version, would a 360 version from somewhere else (UK, NZ, or wherever) work on my 360? Or will there be some kind of zone issue on the 360 version.

Really hope i get to play it on my 360 ! Worst case scenario i guess i'll have to import the PC version !

Thanks all and sorry if this has already been answered, could not find it anywhere though.

 

[rubbergenius]

I'd do a search on here if you could, I'm sure there's been a few threads on it.

1. No NTSC version sadly.
2. The game isn't region free unfortunately.

I typed up the reasons behind this, here:
http://community.codemasters.com/forum/showpost.php?p=2169243&postcount=18

Import the PC version - that's your best bet.

 

[jan52]

i should have bought 360 over ps3 just for that. any way i always buy pc version of the game

 

[cnbd_novice]

Rubbergenius,

What would be a good source to buy the PC-DVD version of Brian Lara 2007 over the internet that can be imported to Canada?? The Codemaster North America website does not contain any information about the game.

 

[nufan]

i understand no NTSC version, but what I can't understand is why it wont be region free. From what i understand the majority of 360 games are region free and can be played on either, and that its up to the developers. Why wouldnt you just make the PAL version region free?

 

[siddharth2002]

i understand no NTSC version, but what I can't understand is why it wont be region free. From what i understand the majority of 360 games are region free and can be played on either, and that its up to the developers. Why wouldnt you just make the PAL version region free?

Did you even bother to click the link he posted.
Here's a word by word quote if you feel too lazy to follow a link

As I say on there...

To confirm, due to the costs involved, there will NOT be a PlayStation 2 or Xbox 360 version of the game available for North American audiences. Codemasters does NOT recommend you buying the Xbox 360 or PlayStation 2 version of the game if you live in North America, as it probably won't work.

Unfortunately the barriers in the way to adapting the game for NTSC systems cost too much to overcome, so we've reluctantly had to say no to development for the North American continent at this time.

If you want to play Brian Lara International Cricket 2007 in the United States, Canada or the Caribbean then you'll have to play the PC-DVD game instead.

Apologies! If you've got any question or queries then post them up and I'll be happy to help.

This is simply because it costs too much to do. Think, it's not just putting them in a crate and marking it "America please Mr Postman!", there's the ESRB rating, Microsoft North American approval, new artwork, extra printing, distribution and duplication, along with point of sale material and promotion etc etc - all for quite a limited return. We'll make a loss if we decided to do that - so no more cricket games.

Everyone in Codemasters would like to do a US version of the game but we can't as it's not economically viable.

We "don't care about cricket fans"? So we release Cricket in three different forms in the three of the biggest cricketing nations in the world with imports available elsewhere - so it's got a potential audience of close to a third of the world's population (ie. bigger than the audience for American Football, basketball and baseball put together) - and you say we're limiting the audience?!

And finally - we're not excluding anyone in the world from playing the game. Simple solution if you want to play the game - buy the PC version. That works whether you're in Houston, Hull, Hobart or Hyderabad. Sorted.

 

[IloveGilly]

Ebay can't be that hard to use.

 

[nufan]

yes i clicked the link smartarse, did you even understand my question

i understand they will not release a version in north american, but they are stating not to import it (yes i know about ebay and use it often). This suggests the game will be region protected (much like dvds are with zones).

The majority of games are not region protected. And even though a game is made in the PAL territory it can still work for me here, as most tv's these days can play both format. There is 2 different things here, PAL/NSTC, and region protecting of games.

If this is the case it wont be able to be "ebayed"

 

[siddharth2002]

yes i clicked the link smartarse, did you even understand my question

i understand they will not release a version in north american, but they are stating not to import it (yes i know about ebay and use it often). This suggests the game will be region protected (much like dvds are with zones).

The majority of games are not region protected. And even though a game is made in the PAL territory it can still work for me here, as most tv's these days can play both format. There is 2 different things here, PAL/NSTC, and region protecting of games.

If this is the case it wont be able to be "ebayed"

There are issues with making games region-free and he has explained it in his post I believe. you can't even make that out. Its not just mere coding that makes a game region-free.

 

[hkhawaja]

I am not sure how much truth there is to claims that the games may not play on the US versions of XBOX 360. If you recall, similar things were said about the BLIC 05 - but I have been able to play the game on my modded XBOX without ANY issues at all. I am not sure if modding had anything to do with it, but certainly it was a PAL game being played on an NTSC console.

I agree with Nufan about the distinction between a game being "region-free" and one that is either PAL or NTSC. Region free just means that you can only play them in consoles designated for certain geographical regions, just like DVDs. NTSC/PAL are just different video display modes.

Siddharth, sorry to say mate, but I believe you are wrong.

So my hope is that the BLIC 07 version will play just fine on the 360, or may be we'll have to get it modded

 

[Kev]

You are correct. Region encoding and PAL/NTSC are totally separate. I don't know what the situation is in the US but many TVs in the UK are both PAL and NTSC compatible. I guess its similar in the US, afterall the TVs are all made in China

 

[hkhawaja]

The new HD TVs, plasmas and LCDs are basically just displays, and can take almost any kind of video signal to display.
So can we get confirmation if the game is region-encoded or is it region free?

 

[sphanlon]

This is why I'm waiting for the PS3 to get rolling in Europe and Australia. PS3 is completely region-free, although I think it will still display wrong on a NTSC SDTV. But I have an LCD HDTV, so I'll be fine. I can't wait for all the Football, Rugby, Management and whatever games that have been PAL only up til now.