Can the American PS3 Play Japanese PS3 Games?

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Fortunately for PS3 owners the answer to this question is YES, the American PS3 CAN play Japanese PS3 games and there's nothing special you need to do in order to play them. Simply get your hands on a Japanese PS3 game, place it in your American PS3 and you're ready to go. You can think of the PS3 as being region free. This means that there is no encoding on the discs that makes it so you can only play the game on a system from one area or another. To put it simply, a US PS3 will play games from Japan, and vice versa.

Let's say there is a cool new game out in Japan that is not scheduled for release here or it's not going to be coming out for many months. However, you want to play it now! The beauty is that you can, and Sony has made it possible without you having to make any alterations to your system. Imagine getting that game in the mail, tearing open the plastic packaging, and putting that game directly into your American PS3 and playing it right away with NO problems. It's that easy!

This makes the PS3 the perfect importers console. You can buy Japanese PS3 games and play them on your American PS3 without spending any extra money or performing any changes to your console that will void your warranty or break any laws. It's ok to play Japanese games on your PS3! I can personally assure you that Japanese games do work on the PS3. I play Japanese games on my PS3 all the time and it's a lot of fun. However, keep in mind that while Japanese PS3 games work on an American PS3, Japanese PS1 and PS2 games do not.

I think that the decision to allow a US PS3 to play Japanese games was probably made to cut down on piracy, but you can also think of it as a way that Sony listened to it's fans. By doing this they acknowledge that American gamers want to play Japanese PS3 games legitimately and that there is nothing wrong with that. I'm very thankful that this console generation allows Japanese PS3 games to work in my PS3. While I'd love to be able to play my PlayStation 2 and 1 games I understand that they were from a different generation and are still protected by the territory encodings of the past. I hope that this trend of regions free playing continues into the next console generation.

You may want to know what are the BEST Japanese PS3 games for your American PS3 or what types of Japanese PS3 games are available for you to play on your American PS3? You may also be wondering whether you can move save games from a Japanese game to another PS3? You'll also want to know where to buy Japanese PS3 games for your American PS3. Go ahead and click the links to find out more!