Recently, Sony announced that they will start selling import
Japanese PS3 games via PSN. So basically, gamers outside of
Japan will be able to purchase Japanese PS3 games!

But there's also another trick that works pretty well.
If you are signup up for a PSN (Playstation Network) account,
enter "Japan" when it asks you for your country.

From then, the interface will change into Japanese and you can
enter your info. At one point, you'll have to enter in a Japanese
address. Since Sony doesn't verify the address, just enter in
any valid Japanese address (for example, find a hotel in Japan
and copy the address :-).

I had no problem understanding all the signup forms (thank you Heisig!).

When you're done, you'll have complete access to the Japanese PSN
store. It's the closest thing to being in Japan and having a PS3. Really
awesome.

Youtube tutorials on making a Japanese PSN account:

Now you can download new demos and downloadable games whenever
they come out in Japan..... :-)

I'm betting the import games on the US PSN are only the ones that never got translated, so nothing like FF7 or anything... Just Cho Aniki and other games that weren't popular enough to translate, but were still hits.

I've been buying games on the JP PSN since not long after launch.

i have been doing this for demos for the last 2 years... how do you purchase games with a credit card is my question... Try playing "Home" in Japanese, it is much better than the English version

From what I've read, you need a "Japanese" credit card.

Apparently, Japan's banking system is isolated from the rest of
the world. So "gaijin" credit cards won't work.... :-)

Can anyone confirm that this is true?

FYI,

The demo for "Tales of Graces F" for PS3 is
being released on Japanese PSN October 8th (tomorrow).

I'm assuming that's Japan Standard Time....

You need a Japanese credit card OR a pre-paid PSN card. I use the latter.
If you don't have friends in Japan that can buy some PSN-cards for you, then get them at ebay or something. =)

Tales of Graces F Demo is now up.

Just search for “テイル” and it's in the first few results.
Size is 165MB.

Apparently, 体験版 means "demo" in japanese.

You don't need any PSN cards to download it (probably
because it's a free download).

Just played through the Tales of Graces demo. Pretty short (but then what did I expect from 165 MB download). However it shows off a good amount of weapons and combat gameplay. Worth a download IMO.

You can purchase Japanese PSN cards from http://www.japan-codes.com and get cards codes delivered to your email.

Has anybody tried signing into the Japanese PSN lately? I recently purchased a PS3, and I was able to register, but when I sign in it says my region is not allowed to use the network.

^That's probably one of the new security measures that Sony implemented after the PlayStation network hack.

Yea, that's what I was thinking. Does anyone know of a workaround, or are we sunk?

cjswanson1355 Wrote:Yea, that's what I was thinking. Does anyone know of a workaround, or are we sunk?

You can buy Japanese games on play-asia.com. Discs only though.

ignore the message. the japanese PSN store is down. you can still sign in from other regions as long as the store is up. give it a few days

keikei Wrote:ignore the message. the japanese PSN store is down. you can still sign in from other regions as long as the store is up. give it a few days

Yep this. I've heard tons of reports that even if you are in Japan you will get that message. Also other times the PSN has gone down people have gotten that message when trying to go to the store. It just seems like a terribly worded message to me, but none of the other stores are region locked so I'm pretty sure the JPN one won't be.

PSN is back up in Japan. I can't get any of the welcome back stuff due to creating my account while PSN was down, but I can at least get my Disgaea 4 DLC now.

Yep, it's back up. Downloading my copies of FFVII & FFVIII in Japanese riiight now.

sethg Wrote:Yep, it's back up. Downloading my copies of FFVII & FFVIII in Japanese riiight now.

finally, I just found out yesterday it was up. Can't wait to get FF8+Parasite eve games(both ps1 games)

Daichi Wrote:PSN is back up in Japan. I can't get any of the welcome back stuff due to creating my account while PSN was down, but I can at least get my Disgaea 4 DLC now.

don't know why but jp ps1 games are expensive(expensive media i guess)

I know, I thought they'd be 1,000円 since they're $10 in the states, so I bought a ￥3,000 card, thinking I'd buy FF7, 8 & 9, but since they're ￥1,500 each, I just settled for 7 and 8.

Its just FF apparently. Even the awful PS1 versions of FFV & VI cost 1200 Yen haha. Not sure what they were thinking considering how bad the ports are compared to the excellent SNES/Wii versions.

Chrono Cross (800 Yen) & Breath of Fire IV (600 yen) were released on PSN today btw. if anyone is interested.

I know this is not a PSN game but does anyone know if the NTSC version of Sacred 2 will change to Japanese text if I change my system language to Japanese on the PS3???? (Lost Odyssey and Dead Rising 2 both do this!)