Okay here's the deal. I own a PS3 from Japan and I thought the console was freaking region free, so no matter if I would buy the US version of a game, I still get the US version of the game.... NOT. I freaked out this morning, when I dropped the American R&C Future Tools of Destruction disc in the layer and saw... Ratchet with black eyebrows and a freaking ugly, green color suit. OH NO! Not the Japanese Ratchet! I'm used to the original Ratchet ever since Ratchet & Clank came out on the PS2 and then I get to see this, only because I own a Japanese PS3, WTF is up with that?! My PS3 system is in English and I have my US PSN ID on when playing US games.

I read on the Internet that the story background in the Japanese versions is different. I've contacted Insomniac about this, as they said that "in the US version the Japanese ratchet can't be unlocked", well look again my friends. I can get used to this different Ratchet but if the story turns out to be different as well, I'm not even planning to continue the game. If the PS3 system automacilly censures blood, like its done in Uncharted and Oblivion, despite the fact they're US versions, I don't care about, but complete change of characters and story lines is outrageous and therefore they're screwing the entire US version on my PS3 this way. Only because of these stupid updates.

Are there more people out there owning a JP PS3 and playing US R&C as well?

Well it's wrong in the first place, Blu-ray discs do have region codes. However unlike DVD and such that have come before it, Japan and America are in the same region (woo!) though it's still possible to lock out games through software without the hardware region locks. AS far as that, you have your console set in English it's still a Japanese console. I have mine set to Japanese to force me to use it daily(well okay I don't play my PS3 daily but it was the idea) so I don't get too rusty. That doesn't make it a Japanese console.

Hey Onna,

That's really weird, and it does suck!!

I remember that Final Fantasy X for US and Japan didn't have a lot of the side quest boss's that the PAL version did, I'm guessing that if you were to play say a future FF on the PS3 and if it was the same scene, (Japanese version has less content) then you'd want to import the PAL version to play on your Japanese PS3 right, I bet they'll lock out the extras!

Yeah, something like that. I hate this, I hate this! Why claiming the PS3 to be region free and then getting a Japanese character, when you drop in a US game. That has nothing to do with being region free??!! So region free is in the future a term meant only as "the game can play on every region console". Why releasing in Japan a different R&C game anyway since the US version will automatically adapt on a JP PS3...

This is so f*****d up!

Yeah, I read about this. Apparently the game checks what region you're in, and determines what Ratchet looks like accordingly. I guess it's the fabulous space offered by the Blu-ray that makes this possible. You should thank Sony. =P

With the Wii or 360 you simply could not play an out-region game, so I wouldn't you got entirely screwed in this regard. Hopefully they release a patch that lets you determine which character model you want or something.

So that's why you hate Japan. What a perfectly sensible conclusion.

Sorry to hear that Onna...

I thought that since you're a huge Mario fan you'd be so happy with SMG that you couldn't care less what Ratchet looks like on R&C...