Japanese PSN cards on sale ... at a price

by Andrew Yoon { Sep 7th 2007 at 12:00AM }

Most will find purchasing anything off the Japanese PlayStation Store an impossibility. Without a Japanese address and credit card, users are locked out of purchasing anything from the country's virtual store. With many games releasing earlier in Japan, this comes as a disappointing disadvantage to gaijin hardcore.

NCSX is planning on changing that, though. They're offering pre-paid PSN cards for the masses. With these cards, players will be able to buy content off the Japanese store without any qualms. The problem? They're a bit pricey. A 3000 yen card goes for $36.50, a premium of almost $10. The retailer explains: "Our vendors in Japan don't have access to the tickets at wholesale and had to pay retail (from Family Mart, no less) and tacked on their mandatory handling charges to obtain them for us. Think of it as a videogame vigorish that's built into the price."

The orders will be delivered digitally, so customers won't have to wait to get their downloads on.

[Thanks, J! Via GameBrink]

Tags: card, import, ncsx, psn, store, ticket

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

Mike Augello @ Sep 7th 2007 1:35AM

Here's the main question. Can my PS3 play japanese PS1 games like Biohazard? If so, I'm down.

tozza @ Sep 7th 2007 1:46AM

I think play-asia is already offering this service.

adam @ Sep 7th 2007 2:14AM

Why doesn't Sony just make it so we have pre-paid PSN cards here in the states? This is bullsh*t.

JohnnyLaRue @ Sep 7th 2007 3:55AM

They should find a new vendor. I am sure there are other places than Famima like 7-11 or Lawson or Seico.

Plus side for me is I no longer have to use my Japanese chickees credit card! She'll be happy to hear that! :)

generalklagg @ Sep 7th 2007 4:27AM

Yes. I brought an American PS3 to Japan, and Japanese PS1 games work fine on it.

generalklagg @ Sep 7th 2007 4:27AM

I mean, games purchased over the PSN. Disc games don't work, of course.

anonymess @ Sep 7th 2007 6:30AM

PSone 'disc' games work fine on my PS3.

Popfrogs @ Sep 7th 2007 8:22AM

What a racket these guys are doing. All it takes is some bored kid in Japan to go and buy a ton of these and resell them..where's the ginormous handling fee coming from?

Ridiculous but I guess some people will buy them.

generalklagg @ Sep 7th 2007 8:26AM

Well, I'm talking about Japanese PS1 games. The ones purchased over the Japanese PlayStation Network will play on an American PS3 (I've been doing it for months). I don't think you can play a Japanese PS1 disc on an American PS3, though. The old stuff was stricter in its region-encoding.

erx3 @ Sep 7th 2007 9:17AM

@3

My guess is that they should be coming soon. Two nights ago I purchased a game over the PSN and it asked if I wanted to use money from my PSN wallet or use a PSN card.

Charles @ Sep 7th 2007 9:50AM

I wasn’t aware that Sony were operating a PSN card system in Japan but this is great news as it may indicate that a similar card system is in the works for the US. If that happened people in Europe could start buying games from the US store without having to put up with the long delays caused by the lazy, incompetent morons at SCEE.

At the moment my PS3 only serves to piss me off thanks to the state of the EU PSN store. However, if I could buy games like Super Puzzle Fighter and Tekken Online I’d be very happy with my PS3. Number 9’s comment sounds extremely promising and I’m very excited about this. Hopefully I can start to enjoy my PS3 instead of looking at it with disgust as it sits unused.

OrganicShadow @ Sep 7th 2007 10:59AM

Nice card designs. Now get who ever did them to redesign the PS Store. It's awful looking. The icons for the items are just horrendous. The bold, standard-font "GAME" or "IMAGE" labels are vomit-inducing.

never$$hort @ Sep 7th 2007 12:40PM

Meh.. I'll stick with my credit card... why pay more than you have to?

generalklagg @ Sep 7th 2007 9:25PM

Nevershort: The point is that you can't use an American credit card on the Japanese store, so you have to use the prepaid network cards. "I'll just use my credit card" only makes sense if you have a Japanese issued credit card. Get it? The reason they're charging more for the cards is because you CAN'T use your credit card.