Idolm@ster 2 on PS3

[Rihsa]

Well I don't know if it was already like that on the Xbox version, but the circles moves if you press "o" on the ps3 controller. Also, I think Ami's loading screen disappeared :c
I never got to see it, neither in produce mode or S4U! mode.

Press Square and Triangle, too.

So the Miku stuff isn't on the JP 360 store, meaning it's only available for the PS3 version.

So it's built into the disc of the PS3 version, effectively making you buy content that you've already paid for? The "DLC" or should I say,  unlock codes, are 70kb.

Right?

If that's the case, can people dig out the other suspected DLC characters then? I remember people were unlocking Yoda and Darth Vader in Soul Calibur IV without buying the DLC, which was just an unlock for what was on the disc.

[Ghift]

If that's the case, can people dig out the other suspected DLC characters then? I remember people were unlocking Yoda and Darth Vader in Soul Calibur IV without buying the DLC, which was just an unlock for what was on the disc.

I was wondering about this, I assume Honey Heartbeat was pulled out of pre-existing files too, right, since it surfaced so early?

[Setsuna]

Guys, you're walking into DMCAable territory.

I can't stop any of you people from doing it, but breaking ANY sort of digitial 'security protection system' can land you all with big fines, or even jail time. You need to petiion for specific exceptions, and they're hard to get.

Now the odds of you being caught aren't that high (And I sure in hell wouldn't report anyone that actively promoted it) but US law is what it is. If you venture further into the topic, be sure as all hell you want to (and be prepared to be shot at) or make sure you're standing somewhere you can't be shot at (like a country where US laws do not apply.)

[Rihsa]

Brah, none of us are saying LET'S DO IT. I'm just wondering if it's possible to pull up the DLC characters like others did for Soul Calibur IV. Keyword wondering.

[Setsuna]

Brah, none of us are saying LET'S DO IT. I'm just wondering if it's possible to pull up the DLC characters like others did for Soul Calibur IV. Keyword wondering.

You are aware that wondering is in fact enough to get you in trouble, right? It has a 'promotional' aspect written right into it. Frankly, it frightens me.

Yeah, the DCMA IS that badly written. It sort of surprises me people in the US haven't gotten up in arms about it. Then again....

[JohnNiles]

Ugh, all this talk of DLC makes me head hurt (Or maybe it's the fact that I didn't get a full night's sleep).  I was thinking, "Maybe I'll just get that one song..."  But that's not realistic, is it?

I'm kind of unnerved by how much of IM@S's content is paid DLC.  I never bothered with DLC for the SP games because the graphics are too weak to justify it but I did notice they charged for each individual accessory, and separately per idol per song.  I never even tried converting those points to dollars... the numbers are scary enough as is.  Thank god they're not doing per idol per song for Idolmaster 2, right?

But I must admit I am envious of Namco-Bandai's payment strategy.  I've worked on software that's freely distributed (I get paid a salary though) and it sucks.  People still complain, and with no cost attached to requests, nothing stops people from asking for the moon.  How often have I wished, "If only I could charge for DLC!"

[TweenDoriru]

Ugh, all this talk of DLC makes me head hurt (Or maybe it's the fact that I didn't get a full night's sleep).  I was thinking, "Maybe I'll just get that one song..."  But that's not realistic, is it?

I'm kind of unnerved by how much of IM@S's content is paid DLC.  I never bothered with DLC for the SP games because the graphics are too weak to justify it but I did notice they charged for each individual accessory, and separately per idol per song.  I never even tried converting those points to dollars... the numbers are scary enough as is.  Thank god they're not doing per idol per song for Idolmaster 2, right?

But I must admit I am envious of Namco-Bandai's payment strategy.  I've worked on software that's freely distributed (I get paid a salary though) and it sucks.  People still complain, and with no cost attached to requests, nothing stops people from asking for the moon.  How often have I wished, "If only I could charge for DLC!"

I know they definitely make serious bank off of all that DLC...speaking of that, the Japanese PSN prices are here: http://www.bandainamcogames.co.jp/cs/list/idolmaster/im2/ps3/dlc/catalog1.php

As a friend of mine calculated, it actually costs a fair amount more for foreigners, not being in MSP. :<

3500MSP costs $58.99 while 5000 PSN points/yen costs $73.99 on Japan-Codes (cheapest place I know of). Neither is normally enough to buy a full catalog iirc, but that's still a pretty sharp difference (like the MSP wasn't expensive enough as it is).

edit: derp. Did the math. Catalog 09 will cost you 5500MSP if you buy everything (not counting money); Catalog 01 (PS3) will cost you ￥7760 (provided you buy things in the packs, not counting money/mail).

[Setsuna]

Ugh, all this talk of DLC makes me head hurt (Or maybe it's the fact that I didn't get a full night's sleep).  I was thinking, "Maybe I'll just get that one song..."  But that's not realistic, is it?

I'm kind of unnerved by how much of IM@S's content is paid DLC.  I never bothered with DLC for the SP games because the graphics are too weak to justify it but I did notice they charged for each individual accessory, and separately per idol per song.  I never even tried converting those points to dollars... the numbers are scary enough as is.  Thank god they're not doing per idol per song for Idolmaster 2, right?

But I must admit I am envious of Namco-Bandai's payment strategy.  I've worked on software that's freely distributed (I get paid a salary though) and it sucks.  People still complain, and with no cost attached to requests, nothing stops people from asking for the moon.  How often have I wished, "If only I could charge for DLC!"

The trick was with im@s that they made it clear on the outset and said 'If you want more, you'll have to pay for it.'. It's a similar trick to antivirus protection - you're told that 'support only lasts X long' after you pay, and you pay a licence to do so.

So the best way to make it clear up front. It does take real guts, (simply because the whole thing CAN fall flat on its face) and you also risk dwindling your support base, but making each one pay more.

The trick is to of course, balance the two so you get a net gain.

Most people don't like it, because no one likes actually PAYING for anything anymore. It's almost expected you get everything free because well, damnit, I paid enough to get unlimited lifetime support, and stuff. That and no one seems to have any money.

... Well, only if they said you did, for one, and paying people to progam costs money. There's no such thing as a free lunch - Although I might add that you may not pay for it, but there's a cost in everything. Even the free stuff I do costs me time (and money) even if no one actually gets charged for request filling, for instance.

[Setsuna]

I know they definitely make serious bank off of all that DLC...speaking of that, the Japanese PSN prices are here: http://www.bandainamcogames.co.jp/cs/list/idolmaster/im2/ps3/dlc/catalog1.php

As a friend of mine calculated, it actually costs a fair amount more for foreigners, not being in MSP. :<

3500MSP costs $58.99 while 5000 PSN points/yen costs $73.99 on Japan-Codes (cheapest place I know of). Neither is normally enough to buy a full catalog iirc, but that's still a pretty sharp difference (like the MSP wasn't expensive enough as it is).

edit: derp. Did the math. Catalog 09 will cost you 5500MSP if you buy everything (not counting money); Catalog 01 (PS3) will cost you ￥7760 (provided you buy things in the packs, not counting money/mail).

For the exact figures try:

Catalog 4 to purchase out all the costume related items, you needed 6700 points, for reference. Last I checked 2 3500 cards was somewhere in the vicinity of about 140 US.

As well, for some reason, Yes-Asia are selling PSN 10000 yen cards for less than Japan-codes.

http://www.yesasia.com/global/playstation-network-10000-point-card-japan-version/1021395212-0-0-0-en/info.html

That'll add about 1% in PSN's favour, if you were to go in for the long haul. Catch is of course, it's a physical card, so there's a lead time for it.

There's probably cheaper, but I thought I'd just note that for absolute price comparisons. (And I'd like to find a cheaper distributor of cards, myself. Any suggestions? I only (for fairly obvious reasons namely, bulk buying) only do 10000 yen demoninations.)

[TweenDoriru]

For the exact figures try:

Catalog 4 to purchase out all the costume related items, you needed 6700 points, for reference. Last I checked 2 3500 cards was somewhere in the vicinity of about 140 US.

As well, for some reason, Yes-Asia are selling PSN 10000 yen cards for less than Japan-codes.

http://www.yesasia.com/global/playstation-network-10000-point-card-japan-version/1021395212-0-0-0-en/info.html

That'll add about 1% in PSN's favour, if you were to go in for the long haul. Catch is of course, it's a physical card, so there's a lead time for it.

There's probably cheaper, but I thought I'd just note that for absolute price comparisons. (And I'd like to find a cheaper distributor of cards, myself. Any suggestions? I only (for fairly obvious reasons namely, bulk buying) only do 10000 yen demoninations.)

Alright, let me just straighten this out...bah, I had that catalog all figured out because I didn't have to fabricate the PSN amounts XD
If Catalog 04 were on the PSN as-is, it would cost a total of ￥7240, under the assumption that both sets of accessories are in packs and that the Gothic set isn't more expensive than the Vampire set like it is on the Marketplace because I wouldn't know how to convert it. So a little more than that, maybe.

If you're buying from Japan-Codes with the price I proposed in the last post, it would cost you $117.98 to buy the 360's catalog, vs. the $139.99 for the PSN?

I'm not really doing the math for the future, though. Where's the lead at, in the leftover?

Also, I honestly have no idea about where to find cheaper cards. Japan-codes will match any lower price you find somewhere else (so you could send them Yes-Asia's price and get your code instantly from them, provided they have it in stock), but I've never seen cheaper than that. Sometimes Play-Asia has better, though not normally.

That being said, I promote Japan-codes despite them having things sold out all the time. The one MSP card I bought, I e-mailed them about the stock and they e-mailed me back when it was in stock so I could buy it, even when I got them to lower the price. Heck, they may have only picked up one card because they were sold out almost immediately after, again

[Setsuna]

Alright, let me just straighten this out...bah, I had that catalog all figured out because I didn't have to fabricate the PSN amounts XD
If Catalog 04 were on the PSN as-is, it would cost a total of ￥7240, under the assumption that both sets of accessories are in packs and that the Gothic set isn't more expensive than the Vampire set like it is on the Marketplace because I wouldn't know how to convert it. So a little more than that, maybe.

If you're buying from Japan-Codes with the price I proposed in the last post, it would cost you $117.98 to buy the 360's catalog, vs. the $139.99 for the PSN?

I'm not really doing the math for the future, though. Where's the lead at, in the leftover?

Also, I honestly have no idea about where to find cheaper cards. Japan-codes will match any lower price you find somewhere else (so you could send them Yes-Asia's price and get your code instantly from them, provided they have it in stock), but I've never seen cheaper than that. Sometimes Play-Asia has better, though not normally.

Oh, that 1% doesn't actually make PSN any cheaper than X360. I was just noting I could shave about 1-2% off the costs you fired.

EDIT: I forgot to calculate the leftover - the remaining card points (if we used a pure XE middle exchange rate - dock about 5-7% to calculate something 'real) if we assume that 7800 yen is spent (I just added 100 yen for the 4 items which would get jacked up) and there's a remainder of 2200. It's 27.7773 USD on XE, so we'll just say 23-24 US left cause of the fact no one does anything for free?

It's a lot closer. Maybe 2-5% at most, although you're at the mercy of the currency market (and a lot of approximation)

The PSN costs usually have a 10-15% premium attached to them. This is due to the fact the X360's release had a specific deal attached to them which in turn meant MS got less royalty for distribution. Sony didn't cut them a deal in that regard (most of it was in the film/anime space.)

There was a very specific reason I was WARNING people to be careful what they wished for in regards with PS3's im@s2 - I had a draft price list for PS3's catalog 1 and 2 sitting on my desk since Catalog 4 Xbox 360, and even then it scared the hell out of me.

Of course the fact it's priced directly in currency means that if the yen suddenly tanks, you'd get closer to parity, then some (As MS points are fixed floating) but I wouldn't be counting on world economics to balance my im@s budget...

[TweenDoriru]

Oh, that 1% doesn't actually make PSN any cheaper than X360. I was just noting I could shave about 1-2% off the costs you fired.

The PSN costs usually have a 10-15% premium attached to them. This is due to the fact the X360's release had a specific deal attached to them which in turn meant MS got less royalty for distribution. Sony didn't cut them a deal in that regard (most of it was in the film/anime space.)

There was a very specific reason I was WARNING people to be careful what they wished for in regards with PS3's im@s2 - I had a draft price list for PS3's catalog 1 and 2 sitting on my desk since Catalog 4 Xbox 360, and even then it scared the hell out of me.

Of course the fact it's priced directly in currency means that if the yen suddenly tanks, you'd get closer to parity, then some (As MS points are fixed floating) but I wouldn't be counting on world economics to balance my im@s budget...

Ohh, okay. I get it.

So the real tradeoff is in waiting for the dollar to stop sucking against the yen XDD So after a while (long while, probably? XD) the DLC for the PSN can be cheaper than the 360's. Sounds so good...

Well, when that happens, I'll probably still be into iM@S. I'll be picking up my copy then. orz

Though, remember when they ceased availability of the Macross Frontier DLC for SP, due to copyright-whatever? I wonder if they'll do the same for World is Mine / Miku clothes...

[Setsuna]

Ohh, okay. I get it.

So the real tradeoff is in waiting for the dollar to stop sucking against the yen XDD So after a while (long while, probably? XD) the DLC for the PSN can be cheaper than the 360's. Sounds so good...

Well, when that happens, I'll probably still be into iM@S. I'll be picking up my copy then. orz

Though, remember when they ceased availability of the Macross Frontier DLC for SP, due to copyright-whatever? I wonder if they'll do the same for World is Mine / Miku clothes...

Pretty much. Basically, due to the direct pegging (as opposed to the MS 1.2 points to the yen) it does some funky stuff to the PSN prices when you see pricing fluctuations. I THINK (it's still too early for me to be doing math, you people kill me when I'm answering legal, economic, and mathametical questions in 3 hours of awake time without notice, coffee or even breakfast) what happens is that due to the 1.2 per point multiplier (And the subsequent point conversion), if the yen goes under a certain price point, you end up paying less under the PSN.

However, the reverse also applies.

I'm not really one to give financial advice though (I'm not legally allowed to do it since I'm a freelance journalist, and the government in Australia would be after me if I did (ACMA is fun particularly when you consider I have to report to them))  although I can probably say that I'm personally not confident in seeing the yen tank, at least compared to the US dollar.

But this is from a perspective of someone who remembers that the Australian Dollar (which is my reference point) was at 53c to the USD back in 2001 (and damn it hurt when I was paying my expenses to get to E3 2001 on assignment).

Right now? Uh, 107c AUD to the USD. It spiked to about 110c AUD to the USD at one point too. (If you bought Australian dollars back in 2001, you'd have made 10% a year, even if the only thing you did was stuff it under your matress! A term deposit would have just made it even better.)

In comparison? It's been about 70 yen to the AUD back then, and it's about 80 yen to the AUD now.

Given that, personally, not optimistic about the USD's ability to recover. But I also do international politics and economics, so I have other reasons.

[JohnNiles]

Reminder me never to bring up DLC and pricing again.  Hate currency exchange, hate the state of the USD.  Gonna squeeze in some Atelier Totori and hit the sack.  IMAS 2 won't arrive for a couple more weeks so I've got time to kill.

[Setsuna]

Does anyone know what the notice at the beginning of the game says? It's curious to say the least.