will all this leaking screw us over

[TFerro]

The Japanese just don't really understand the internet. I've been to Japanese websites - they're barren like wastelands. Then again, considering that keyboards aren't usually made with Nipponic languages in mind, maybe that's the reason.

Japan is the only country in the world with an increase in fax use.

 

[Zeta]

This is kind of why (or at least one of many reasons) Japanese developers are lagging behind. They just don't know or understand the appeal of online games. It's pretty silly.

 

[Joshawott]

The problem is, it wasn't just that one store in Canada that was leaking (and that guy was an absolute moron) but people with review copies too. It's not just retailers breaking the street date, but reviewers outright breaking the NDAs they signed. That puts a lot of doubt in more than one sector of the industry and with a company as traditional as Nintendo, this could have a significant impact. It is worth noting that every single leak we have had so far has come from English language games.

I personally hope that this doesn't discourage Nintendo and GameFreak from any more global launches, but at the very least, I can see Nintendo really clamping down on this sort of thing. Heck, UK retailer ShopTo, who are infamous for getting games delivered the day before launch, were ordered by NintendoUK to not ship Wind Waker HD until today - a 10+ year old remake.

 

[tubbi07]

I don't think the tread of a "worldwide release" would be broken too soon just because of leaks. While Nintendo's marketing will have dozens of problems, it's now their call to distribute the games in a much later date as opposed to how it is sent to distributors and retailers almost two weeks earlier than the release date.

 

[The Hoopster]

Nah, Pokemon G7 is probably just a stack of ideas on the table at this point. The breaking stores shouldn't be allowed to get next Mario or Smash Bros. games. Y'know, highly anticipated Nintendo titles releasing in the span of months, not years.

There will be other games in Gen VI after X and Y, like Pokemon Conquest in Gen V and Pokepark in Gen IV.

 

[Supreme Leader Palpitoad]

Wonder how angry Nintendo and GF is now. On a scale from one to ten?
And why is it just XY that leaks? Did GTA V or Last of Us leak?

 

[Necrozma]

Wonder how angry Nintendo and GF is now. On a scale from one to ten?
And why is it just XY that leaks? Did GTA V or Last of Us leak?

Because Pokémon > all those other games.

 

[Supreme Leader Palpitoad]

Wonder how angry Nintendo and GF is now. On a scale from one to ten?
And why is it just XY that leaks? Did GTA V or Last of Us leak?

Because Pokémon > all those other games.

I think so too(why would anyone like GTA???)but most people do not. So if they did not leak why Pokemon?

 

[Muur]

Don't see it myself.

You don't see Rockstar pulling their releases just because GTA gets leaked early in the thousands...

They block profiles that played the game early though.

 

[Crackseed]

Don't see it myself.

You don't see Rockstar pulling their releases just because GTA gets leaked early in the thousands...

They block profiles that played the game early though.

Yeah, there is certainly SOME blowback if you're breaking street date even as a player but for the most part, it hardly has an effect on future distribution was the bigger point I was making

 

[The Outrage]

The problem is, it wasn't just that one store in Canada that was leaking (and that guy was an absolute moron) but people with review copies too. It's not just retailers breaking the street date, but reviewers outright breaking the NDAs they signed. That puts a lot of doubt in more than one sector of the industry and with a company as traditional as Nintendo, this could have a significant impact. It is worth noting that every single leak we have had so far has come from English language games.

I can see Nintendo and Game Freak not bothering with reviewers anymore.....its not as if Pokemon really needed reviews. Let's face it, we only cared about reviewer copies because they may post reviews of the game before the release date so we get more information.

Honestly, if reviewers did start leaking, I'm willing to bet its because stores broke the street date and people started playing the game and posting information and didn't want to lose the scoop or something....you know, typical lack of journalistic integrity on their part considering they agreed not to reveal information.

Really, the worst thing I could see happening is some passive aggressive "not letting everyone get these online events" type of thing. That and maybe they won't let smaller stores have the games two weeks in advance....which I was honestly wondering why they were given it so early if they're so concerned about leaks.

 

[randomspot555]

Even stuff like Let's Plays and crappy photo-camera pictures, they all fall under fair use since you own the rights to that specific piece of media you purchased.

That's ... not technically what 'fair use' means. Fair use technically means you DON'T own the rights to what you're using, but you have a damn good reason to do it anyway. A Lets Play unambiguously contains a stream of copyrighted content (the graphics, the music, etc.) that you very likely do not have any permission from the content's owner to 'distribute' (i.e. upload to YouTube), but the part that makes an LP fair use is that said content stream is a fundamental component that the LP simply cannot exist without.

(Yeah, I'm no lawyer. But the official criteria for 'fair use' are deliberately nebulous; fair use is about intent, not technicalities.)

Fair use fits what I'm talking about because you don't own the rights to distribute but it is for entertainment purposes and not making so much of the game available (IE viewers or readers of the LP are being treated to a sub-standard version of the video game that they can't actually play themselves, can't download it, etc...). Some of the more humorous LPs could also fall under fair use and parody precedent, which has been ruled as protected speech in US courts even when done for profit.

Regardless of legalities, what my general point was true: Nintendo can do absolutely nothing legally to someone who legally purchased the game from a legit retailer. There certainly are contractual agreements Nintendo has with retail outlets, distributors (if Nintendo doesn't distribute it themselves), etc... and that will almost entirely be handled internally. But there's nothing they can do to someone who legally purchased the game from posting about their experiences.

That of course won't stop them from contacting social media admins directly, who would probably be much more willing to take down an account.

This is an entirely separate issue from reviewers from media leaking it (if they have, I'm not certain if that's the case) who most likely have contracts between their employers and media companies preventing stuff and I'm sure sanctions can occur due to that.

 

[Heredity]

Wonder how angry Nintendo and GF is now. On a scale from one to ten?
And why is it just XY that leaks? Did GTA V or Last of Us leak?

GTA V: Yes, it did. The entire game was ripped and up for download days prior to release.

The Last of Us: Yes, the ending of the game was up online as a video on several websites prior to release.

 

[Stratelier]

Regardless of legalities, what my general point was true: Nintendo can do absolutely nothing legally to someone who legally purchased the game from a legit retailer.

Agreed; that would fall under biting-the-hand-that-feeds-you territory.

Oh, and reportedly Nintendo/TPC sent a representative to recover at least one leaked copy of XY. (Important clarification: This was a player who was posting images and videos to the Internet about it. If they merely kept it to themselves, almost no one would be the wiser.)

 

[=Dragonite=]

A lot of leaks in Instagram now. Must stop looking at them..........

 

[bluestarfish]

Those of you talking about fair use have to remember that IP law is very...complicated, there's lots of twists and turns and oddities, probably mostly because most people don't go to extra lengths to protect their properties. But any given IP case if it is taken to court is just as likely to go one way or another because of how foggy ip law tends to be.

Although I'm not sure how IP law is really related at all to a store breaking street date. Apparently Nintendo fined the store in Italy for each copy that wasn't returned, so obviously there is more to this in terms of legality than is overtly obvious to us as outsiders looking in. Nintendo isn't forcing people to give the games back (likely with a refund) but they are punishing the store for breaking the street date. And I say bravo to them for enforcing their release dates, even if it may not have been the greatest ideas to ship them in that early.

I don't know if this will "screw" anyone though as far as future releases...what are they going to do? Go back to the old way of doing things? For some reason that just doesn't bother me all that much, but that's just a personal thing.

 

[Stratelier]

The one reported by Geek.com turns out that the store wasn't selling the game early in general, one employee sold a copy to a friend early, and Nintendo probably found out about it primarily because said friend was uploading images and videos of it to the Internet (thus potentially spoiling a lot of things to a lot of players). Nintendo's not exactly fond of Lets Plays and the like to begin with, but this is still a good week before anyone else is supposed to be playing it at all. The friend returned their copy as a measure of good faith, but the employee could still be fired for making a "buddy deal".

I haven't tracked any other news, really. Not that I track news in general, and besides, the risk of accidentally running across unmarked spoilers is just too great right now.

I don't know if this will "screw" anyone though as far as future releases...what are they going to do? Go back to the old way of doing things? For some reason that just doesn't bother me all that much, but that's just a personal thing.

That was just a scare post, really. Recall that in January's Pokemon Direct Iwata specifically mentioned how long it took to localize each generation for overseas releases, and in the more recent Pokemon Direct, Masuda described that part of the reason was their whole localization process: In older generations, they localized from Japanese to the US version first, THEN localized from the US version to other languages. (It's not like they had all the languages ready at Japanese release date and deliberately kept other regions waiting until later.) For G6, they're doing all localizations directly from the Japanese version, and in a much faster and more organized manner. Improvements that they can't exactly go back on.

 

[bluestarfish]

The one reported by Geek.com turns out that the store wasn't selling the game early in general, one employee sold a copy to a friend early, and Nintendo probably found out about it primarily because said friend was uploading images and videos of it to the Internet (thus potentially spoiling a lot of things to a lot of players). Nintendo's not exactly fond of Lets Plays and the like to begin with, but this is still a good week before anyone else is supposed to be playing it at all. The friend returned their copy as a measure of good faith, but the employee could still be fired for making a "buddy deal".

I haven't tracked any other news, really. Not that I track news in general, and besides, the risk of accidentally running across unmarked spoilers is just too great right now.

I'd heard that the store in question had sold more than just that one copy, and there is a good handful or more that still haven't been returned and the fines are adding up. Granted the person who posted that elsewhere didn't give a source, so who knows. I sure don't.

 

[Crackseed]

The one reported by Geek.com turns out that the store wasn't selling the game early in general, one employee sold a copy to a friend early, and Nintendo probably found out about it primarily because said friend was uploading images and videos of it to the Internet (thus potentially spoiling a lot of things to a lot of players). Nintendo's not exactly fond of Lets Plays and the like to begin with, but this is still a good week before anyone else is supposed to be playing it at all. The friend returned their copy as a measure of good faith, but the employee could still be fired for making a "buddy deal".

I haven't tracked any other news, really. Not that I track news in general, and besides, the risk of accidentally running across unmarked spoilers is just too great right now.

I'd heard that the store in question had sold more than just that one copy, and there is a good handful or more that still haven't been returned and the fines are adding up. Granted the person who posted that elsewhere didn't give a source, so who knows. I sure don't.

The breakdown on that is apparently about 40ish games were sold - they are still missing 16 as Nintendo has said for each un-returned game, it will be $2000 per. So that store is definitely going to feel the pinch if the remaining customers do not return the game per Nintendo's demand.

More interesting is that Nintendo said they probably wouldn't have reacted as harshly if Kosthedin hadn't basically flaunted his early copy on Instagram like he did.

 

[Stratelier]

Okay, I see. I was only drawing interpretations from what I read in the one article, nothing else....

More interesting is that Nintendo said they probably wouldn't have reacted as harshly if Kosthedin hadn't basically flaunted his early copy on Instagram like he did.

...but I did pick up that vibe almost immediately.