UK gaming... life isn't all fun and games...

This is an example of how young children are adversely affected by
video games. She's clearly been playing too much GTA.
 NEXT TIME CHECK THE AGE RATING! 

Being a gamer in the UK is comparable to erm... a really bad analogy. Yeah, I guess that works... (*phew*) ^^;

The basic run-down of the sitch is this - the gaming market, has made many leaps and bounds in recent years, from graphical and technological advancements, to the main-streaming of 3D technology (3DS) and full-motion body image capturing (Microsoft Kinect).
The UK games market in particular has also shown steady growth and popularization, in particular it's successes with the so-called "casual-gamer" (it's success in this sector can largely be attributed to the Wii and Kinect systems) - a categorical term given to gamers who do not necessarily invest as much time into video games as the more archetypal "hardcore" gamer, and would much rather play fun "party-esque" mini-game collections with their friends than extensive story-heavy FPS games for example. 


Being a gamer in the UK has several disadvantages though. Developers and publishers of games would often forgo the UK completely when it comes to regional distribution. I don't have the facilities (or enthusiasm) to make a flow diagram of sorts, but It would look somewhat like this:

North American Developed games - Released in North America (guaranteed) - Released in Japan (dependant on genre) - Released in Europe (Likely) 
Japanese developed games - Released in Japan (guaranteed) - Released in North America (Likely) - Released in Europe? (never certain... D:)

Even when a video games' European release is a certainty, the price we have to pay in delays (down to something called "localization..." o.O) is beyond a joke.

Take this most recent example. A game called "Tales of Graces" has been out in Japan since Dec. 09. A game whose EU appearance has only recently been confirmed for a release here (yayyy). There came a point after the second email (first by me, the second by my friend - I don't just randomly go around emailing game publishers on a regular basis... -_-) that was sent to a representative of Namco's that a thought occurred to me: "Should this really be the case? Should I really have to be asking for something that the rest of the world seems to acquire by default."

UK gamers do seem to have drawn the short straw (at least in geographical terms...) I don't want to turn this into some sort of rant... but my point still stands. ToG being released here is the glistening ray of hope in an otherwise bleak forecast for the UK gaming market...

OK, it's not that bad - I guess I just have too much passion... :|