As my list of options addresses hardware (and the regionlocking of hardware) but does not address accounts (aside form cancelling them), option 2 does include the possibility of starting over with a JP-region SE and POL/FFXI account.
You're confused, sir. The PlayOnline service was designed to allow for that.
What was impossible was MANAGE accounts with mismatched region. Meaning you would be blocked from accessing the section of Service & Support on POL Viewer which required the user to login.
Since that is obsolete now, not even that limitation exists anymore. And management is done through a website. While I have the front page in English at the SE account management site, as soon as I fill in my login everything switches "automagically" to Japanese.
It is pretty amazing any mmo would drop its first customer player base of the start of thier game. Its a sign of long term death. Even if its not even cost effective to make a ps2 NA version, fact is they droped a core player base. A bad sign for any game and its future.
Well it may not be a MMO but look at Monday Night Combat, it did something very similar and just as stupid, it started out on XBL Arcade and ended up going to Steam, then they stopped updating the Xbox almost completely and focused on the PC, and even made a new game for the PC that was not put on Xbox. In my opinion most of the time it shows life, I mean you can evolve your game, if WoW was built on the PS2 and was still as popular then they would have at some point cut it out and continued to upgrade past its limitations I'm sure. In SE's case its not even that they are doing that though, they are simply cutting their losses, which is good since they are losing a lot of money as of late it seems.
They are not loosing money on this game, in fact - it is one of the few games they made that are making money. Enough to cover the cost of another series moniker that is being reborn again soon. I suspect all these "adjustments" are designed to provoke nerd rage and encourage people to do rash decision, and you know, perhaps try something new. Something something with the name of FF:AAR?
I heard it is shaping to be a quite good reborn again game. And the producer is really cool and totally in touch with what the player base wants and there is a great deal of transparency when it comes to communication and long term strategy. Tons of video showcasing what it could be. And the best news, it will be available on PS3!!! Possibly carried over to PS4 as well. Then there is SE world renown reputation when it comes to costumer service that you have to deal with.... :cool:
no more gutless than what sony themselves did regarding the HDD addon for the US, which was practically abandoned by them from the start
your reason for singling out my post? my post said basically what you did but in different words