NTSC games could come to PAL Virtual console

Wii News | The news many wanted to hear, straight from Nintendo UK.

A few days ago, Nintendo of America vice president George Harrison went on record that previously Japanese only classic Nintendo games could possibly be released on the US version of the Virtual Console service. He said "We are aware that there are some very successful Japanese franchises that have a small following in the US, and that they could never be reached by putting these products out at retail. We’re open to games released in Japan if we can get them translated properly.” And many rejoiced, hoping lost classics such as Treasure's Nintendo published N64 shooting classic Sin and Punishment would finally get the western release they always should have. But what of us PAL gamers? The US even got more games then us, and some real classics never made it to PAL shores - the SNES titles Super Mario RPG and Earthbound are usually held up as the poster children of this cause.

Well, UK site Eurogamer followed up on this idea, and spoke with a Nintendo UK representative, who continued Harrison's sentimenets, and seemed quite positive about the possibility. "There is always the potential for games that haven't seen the light of day in Europe to be on the Virtual Console" said the Nintendo rep, who continued even more positively with "The Virtual Console is the perfect platform for them."

But what of 3rd party classics, will they be able to cross PAL borders for the first time too? "I can't speak for third parties" said the rep "but if it's the right game then there's absolutely no reason why it should just be a first party game"

As noted by Eurogamer, this seems to be a change of policy for Nintendo, who previously seemed happy to simply release domestic content. So if you're listening to the fans Nintendo, how about getting onto the borders and speed problems of the Mega Drive emulation?

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15 Comments

efo

5 years ago

THAT IS REALLY GOOD NEWS!!!! i was looking forward to hearing this so CRONO TRIGGER is coming out too right?

Dare

5 years ago

Oh this is great news!

come to me Super Mario RPG

Googol

5 years ago

Hmmm... something I thought never could happen could be happening. Still, it was a UK PR that said that the Wii wouldn't be region coded, so I think I will take it just a bit lightly.

legend166

5 years ago

This better happen. I want Chrono Trigger, Earthbound and Super Mario RPG.

Infested Jibbs

5 years ago

Yeah forget mario rpg, it's all about the chrono trigger.Why it never had a gba port still confounds me to this day.....aholes.Square that is.

DancesInUnderwear

5 years ago

Forget Mario RPG AND Chrono Trigger - its all about Earthbound, damn it.

Much like the lack of turbografx games here I still don't see why this is a problem anyway - its already emulated, just put the damn things on our server. Or better yet have 1 global server. It wouldn't be that hard, would it?

Gizmocreative

5 years ago

i want super mario rpg and earthbound. chrono trigger i got for the ps1 only a month ago, so i am all sweet for that.

ret the roman

5 years ago

forget those games, we want the snes version of Math blaster, Nah i hope for what you guys are hoping for.

Gizmocreative

5 years ago

what about the snes version of wheres waldo, where in the world is carmen sandiago or my favourite, wheel of fortune.

Cerebral

5 years ago

What I wish is that Nintendo would start localising Japanese VC games to other regions. But that's wishful thinking on our behalf. (Hint: Please prove me wrong, Nintendo!)

Nexus

5 years ago

This sounds like the next logical step after what George Harission said recently but it still isn't official. I like most of you are looking for an announcement saying it will happen not could happen.

Both Super Mario RPG and Earthbound are games that I would be immensely looking forward to.

Peveus

5 years ago

I believe the dude that is quoted is talking crap. It won't happen. If it was going to, they wouldn't have so far taken such radical steps to give us complete crap with slowdown, squishing borders and games only released locally. Nintendo are money grubbing suck-festers recently and I think it's only going to get worse.

Sin Ogaris

5 years ago

I would rather Star Ocean and Far East of Eden Zero to the titles so far suggested, but that's just me. Oh, and am I the only person who actually played Chronotrigger and beat it when I was a kid? I didn't even know it wasn't released here until recently.

David

5 years ago

Sin Ogaris wrote

You must have known something, since it required a late-model cartridge converter to run on a PAL SNES...

Sin Ogaris

5 years ago

Well, I hired it from my local Video Ezy when I was really young, since then I had completely forgotten about the whole cart converter thing (although thinking back quite a few of the games I hired required it). The converter was pretty basic in design if I remember, just a round base with a square top.

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