Japanese Import Game Cases

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Japanese Import Game Cases

Postby S4Blade » Tue May 13, '14, 12:28 am

Okay this makes me really, really mad. I have a short story to tell and then I'm going to rant.

I recently imported 3 Region free Japanese shooters for Xbox 360. They were all made by Cave (who I love) and I ordered them from Amazon. When I got the games, I noticed something strange about them:

The DVD style cases that they came in were the most sturdy, solid, and well made DVD style cases I have ever seen since games transitioned from regular CD cases to DVD cases. There is a noticeable difference between these and the DVD style cases I have been getting with games for the past few generations of games.

Now I'm going to exclude PS3 game cases from my rant because they come in Blu Ray cases and they are pretty good. However, I'm going to focus on Xbox 360, Wii, Wii-U, and PC game cases here.

Anyone who has purchased any games for these systems probably already knows what I'm talking about. In recent years, the quality of DVD style game cases has plummeted to a sorry state. You used to be able to stack your games on top of each other without any problem and they would hold their shape, but not anymore. Now the plastic in the cases is so thin that when you stack more than a few games on top of one another, they bend over, and don't even stand up straight. Don't even get me started on the cases that are missing large chunks from both sides behind where the disc sits and behind the instruction manual. Those are so flimsy that you can barely even mount the disc on the prongs, and the whole case sags inward. Terrible design.

So why am I ranting about this? Well it's because I just got the Japanese games, and their cases were fine, just like they should have been. Hard plastic, nice and sturdy, much like you never see in the US anymore.

So why can Japan still have these cases and we cannot? I think it's a bunch of crap. I'm sure it has to do with some "Save the Earth" garbage, but I'd rather have cases that are adequate for holding my games, and storing them in a stacked formation if I feel the need to do so.

Sorry, rant over. Does this stuff bother anyone else besides me?
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Re: Japanese Import Game Cases

Postby R-90-2 » Tue May 13, '14, 2:41 am

VistaBlade wrote:So why can Japan still have these cases and we cannot? I think it's a bunch of crap. I'm sure it has to do with some "Save the Earth" garbage, but I'd rather have cases that are adequate for holding my games, and storing them in a stacked formation if I feel the need to do so.

Sorry, rant over. Does this stuff bother anyone else besides me?


Let's not get so complicated there- I'm sure that it was billed in-house as a cost-saving measure.

Japan just tends to do things differently- sometimes it's great, like the swank presentation of meatspace game sales, other times, not so much.
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Re: Japanese Import Game Cases

Postby Wolf Bird » Tue May 13, '14, 6:00 am

R-90-2 wrote:
VistaBlade wrote:So why can Japan still have these cases and we cannot? I think it's a bunch of crap. I'm sure it has to do with some "Save the Earth" garbage, but I'd rather have cases that are adequate for holding my games, and storing them in a stacked formation if I feel the need to do so.

Sorry, rant over. Does this stuff bother anyone else besides me?


Let's not get so complicated there- I'm sure that it was billed in-house as a cost-saving measure.


I'd be a lot more likely to chalk it up to cost-savings to use a more cheaply manufactured and flimsier plastic, not save the earth. If it was save the earth, they wouldn't be stored in plastic at all and we'd probably be getting more and more digital so we don't have to extract and use as many raw materials for our games. ;) The thing is, I've noticed the same for movie DVD cases. Some of the plastic cases for my Godzilla DVDs are clearly very cheaply made, and they've been bent and distorted and such from just being on my shelf. I imagine it has a lot more to do with finding the cheapest plastic (which is actually quite likely to be less environmentally friendly) to make the cases.

I say that as a member of the "Save the Earth" camp and I've taken classes and done work on corporate sustainability issues, and will be doing more, but I also know the Earth and life will be fine. It's humanity I wonder about. :P
Last edited by Wolf Bird on Tue May 13, '14, 6:00 am, edited 3 times in total.
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Re: Japanese Import Game Cases

Postby S4Blade » Tue May 13, '14, 10:02 pm

Well whatever. It may be cost saving, but it makes their end products look like cheap garbage.
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Re: Japanese Import Game Cases

Postby Wolf Bird » Wed May 14, '14, 2:33 am

It does make it seem like cheap garbage, I certainly don't dispute that. But if they can get away with it, it's what they're going to do.
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Re: Japanese Import Game Cases

Postby Tweeg » Wed May 14, '14, 5:03 am

Effectively what has happened in the last twenty or so years is that American compaines have transitioned to a "profit over consumer satisfaction model from a quality product with high satisfaction model. If company "X" believes they can squeeze an extra penny of profit out of you by providing a flimsy reject out of a Chinese sweat shop DVD case to you, then that's exactly what they're going to do, and to hell with what the consumer thinks. The attitude of such companies towards consumer complaints regarding product quality is generally that of "just be glad we even made the product and shut up".

Believe me, I've worked the last six years as the head of the RMA (Return Materials Authorzation) Department at the company I work at, and there are some companies out there that I would just assume burn to the facilities thereof to the ground and stab there CEO's to death with a platic spork as to ever contend with they and their garbage merchandise ever again. Hewlett Packard, Foxconn/Sabrent/PC Chips/ECS/etceterra, Chimei, and Lenovo, and every cell phone accessory maker are all such companies... or maybe they are all secretly apart of the Foxconn mega conglomerate as that would explain why they all sell sub-par overpriced garbage to consumers.
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Re: Japanese Import Game Cases

Postby S4Blade » Wed May 14, '14, 2:30 pm

Tweeg wrote:Effectively what has happened in the last twenty or so years is that American compaines have transitioned to a "profit over consumer satisfaction model from a quality product with high satisfaction model. If company "X" believes they can squeeze an extra penny of profit out of you by providing a flimsy reject out of a Chinese sweat shop DVD case to you, then that's exactly what they're going to do, and to hell with what the consumer thinks. The attitude of such companies towards consumer complaints regarding product quality is generally that of "just be glad we even made the product and shut up".


I kind of know what you mean. Everything is about money these days. In the past few years, the company I work for has reduced the size of my department by half, and the amount of work we have to do goes up all the time. The timeliness of the service we are able to provide to our end users is terrible compared to what it used to be. The thing is that the top brass at the company simply does not care. As long as they are saving money on having less full time positions.

Which is why I encourage our end users to complain to our CIO if their issues go unresolved for too long and they are not satisfied with the service that they receive. It's the best way I know of to show how these poor corporate decisions are affecting our end users, without sticking my own neck out there.
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Re: Japanese Import Game Cases

Postby Wolf Bird » Wed May 14, '14, 3:44 pm

It's about maximizing shareholder value. They can keep getting money while still providing poor service and products to actual consumers, as long as shareholders are happy. As long as they have theirs, they generally don't care about much else.
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