I was considering a Japanese 360 when I was shopping for an Xbox two years ago. Reluctantly, I chose a domestic 360 over an import one, for several reasons: First, the 360 had (or has, depending on who you ask) a ridiculously high failure rate for a home electronics device, no matter what percentage you find, it's higher than the industry average. A warranty may be in your best interest. My 360 hasn't red-ringed on me yet, but it freezes more often than I care to admit.ImportBoy wrote:I was looking at the play-asia's 360 region chart - seems most of the games I'm interested in have some interesting options. Some of the asian edition ones even include Japanese voice acting with English subs. If prices come down I'll probably just pick up a Japanese 360 in the future then.
Second, I eventually found out that most of the import games that I wanted came to the United States anyways, with notable exceptions like Oneechanbara Vortex and Shikigami no Shiro III.
Last, the price is notably higher on an imported 360 than on a domestic 360. Even if an arcade-equivalent 360 is only $330 at play-asia.com, there's still a $70 to $120 shipping bill to take into account. Personally, I found that to be a high premium for a less-than-reliable machine that plays very little exclusive titles that I couldn't find in the United States. It did seem like a neat idea, but the pros didn't overcome the cons in the end for me.
Buy $400 of imported PS2/PS3/PSP games instead.
