lik-sang.com/info.php?catego … ts_id=7481
grrrrr sony… the root of all evil
Lik-Sang was a great store. I’ve bought several things from there in the past, and it’s a shame to see it go.
Sony have just stabbed themselves in the foot, by screwing over import gamers. Do they want people to pirate games that aren’t released outside of Japan, instead of buying them or something?
They just want total control of the market… wonder why the hell they made the PS3 region-free if they’ll be attacking all the importers…
Sad that they used such underhanded tactics as well… Lik-Sang was doing nothing illegal and the case only went to court because of Sony’s lies that made the judges think they were operating in the UK when they were only based in Hong Kong…
Lik-Sang was flooded with lawsuits they would have to go bankrupt to counter them all and so instead of doing that they decided to refund their current orders and close down on their own… Congrats Sony…
lik-sang offered to advertise on panzerdragoon.net before right?
and yeah… i bought stuff from there before, it was a good store, you could find weird and wonderfl stuff there… =)
There’s still play-asia but Sony did state they WILL go after more importers so at the very least they won’t offer Sony products (or they will offer them with restrictions or whatever)… I doubt they’ll close everyone after the bad press they got with being blamed for Lik-Sang’s closure so I think they won’t go as far as flooding them with lawsuits again… of course pursuing this at all is going too far anyway but yeah, the less people lose their jobs the better.
Yeah, they did.
Graham “Tails” Parker who worked for them, also used to write the excellent “Dreamcast Weekly” email magazine every week. I always looked forward to that. 
Not really logical. Lik Sang doesn’t represent a large portion of retail sales, and Sony doesn’t control retail sales to begin with. If anything, Walmart has “total control” of the market.
And the PS3 only region-free as a technicality. It’s the exact same as the X360 (as far as I have seen). With the X360, publishers have the option of releasing a game as a worldwide SKU or region by region. If it’s worldwide, the same disk can be used in any X360 worldwide. If the region is locked, then it’s the same as on previous gens. Same thing with PS3.
Whether or not Lik Sang was doing something illegally, I don’t know. Depends on how they were operating their business. However, regardless of that, it was a dumb PR move, given that a lot of the hardcore, even if they’ve never shopped there, had a good opinion of Lik Sang or of other similar stores.
[quote=“Abadd”]
Not really logical. Lik Sang doesn’t represent a large portion of retail sales, and Sony doesn’t control retail sales to begin with.[/quote]
They didn’t have a large portion of retail sales, but shortly after they went down Sony told GameSpot that they would go after other importers as well so in totalit may matter (some other big store cancelled their PS3 pre-orders shortly after that I think).
Also, I meant total control as in, their products are where they want them for the price they want them. Like the price reduction in Japan which won’t apply for the rest regions, so they don’t want them to have access to that at all.
But really it doesn’t make any sense to go after this at all so that’s all I can think of…
About the region-free-ness, well, that’s interesting I guess. Thought it’s 100% region free.
I wonder how the Sony loyalists will feel about this when they can’t import a PS3 to Europe.
Like the good sheep they are , they’ll put up with it and defend it. Buy somehow making out they’re had no money and this gives more chance to save ect, or its the law of the land
I know SEGA Europe , NCL and even Konami Europe have had a run in or 2 with Importers , but this action by SONY takes the piss. So much reminds me of the sheer arrogance that SEGA and NCL showed @ the top of their game. Fair enough if it was about Mod chips or copies . But to try and shut down a shop to hide over production problems its something else. Much like the utter contempt SONY treats Pal users with.
All that Sony is out to do is impose it’s barrier on game releases. Play-Asia is a import site for anyone interested. I only know of it but haven’t had the chance to try it yet.
I’ve bought literally thousands of pounds worth of goods from Play-Asia over the years - everything from sweets to consoles and I’ve never had a single issue with them. I always found there stock selection to be much more comprehensive than Lik-Sang too.
I wonder if anti-importing on Sony’s part will go as far as eBay?
There are obviously alternatives to Lik-Sang for importing PS3 units, as a shop I know has a PS3 on display (for playtesting purposes) and I’m, well, obviously in Europe. 
I doubt it will happen. E-Bay allows people to auction off items they obviously don’t want.
But, knowing Sony, I’m sure they are going to try.