Activision’s community manager, Dan Amrich, has taken to YouTube in explaining the reasons behind why region locking is enforced.
For those unaware, this is the process of restricting software to only work within specific countries, or with consoles sold within those regions.
Amrich had been asked as to whether region locking enforced piracy, to which he immediately disagreed.
“Short version: no, it’s not enforcing piracy,” he stated. “I don’t think you’re going to ever find any major publisher trying to encourage people to rip them off.”
As for the reasons behind its implementation, Amrich believes that these are purely related to business. He gave an example of a Speed Racer game that had been released in Japan, yet a different company owned the rights within America.
“You can’t infringe on that Japanese company’s rights or that American company’s rights by releasing the game in the opposite territory if you don’t have the legal right to do it,” Amrich explained. “Region locking sort of helps police who has the rights to make what money in what territory.”
Game content can also be problematic, especially in regions with tighter control such as Germany.
“Is the content that you’re releasing in Country A acceptable in Country B?” Amrich said. “Germany is notoriously hard-nosed on things like violent content in video games.”
You can see Amrich’s video in full below:
Activision explain reasons behind region locking
