PLAY ASIA has been working hard on releasing physical versions of indie releases on PS4, PS Vita and now on Nintendo Switch, so I got in touch with them to talk about this initiative.
PS4Blog: Hi! Welcome to PS4Blog.net. Could you please get us started by telling our readers a bit about yourself and your work?
My name is Hardy Pace, and I am the PLAY Exclusives Manager at Play-Asia.com. I have been working in the video game industry for the past seven years, much of which has been focused on Japanese-centric gaming. Myself and my colleagues at Play-Asia.com are huge advocates for video games being released physically and in their most complete form.
PS4B: Play-Asia has been working on a collection of limited edition physical games for PlayStation 4 and PS Vita for a while now, and now the Nintendo Switch has also entered the mix. What made this decision possible? Why push for physical releases of indie games in limited quantities?
Play-Asia.com has been selling video games internationally for over 15 years, and a huge passion of ours and our customers has always been physical & limited edition releases. There is something much more satisfying about properly owning a game you can hold in your hands, not to mention all the extras you get with our releases! Many of our favorite games come from indie studios who might not have the opportunity to produce & distribute physical releases, despite the fact that they are very much deserving, and we’re incredibly honored when we are able to assist in that process.
PS4B: After the experience from releasing games such as Alchemic Jousts, Semispheres, Caveman Warriors, Rive and Vesta, as well as by taking into consideration the feedback from customers, the initiative has now become the PLAY Exclusives Collection. What can you tell our readers about it?
PLAY Exclusives is our collection of limited print releases of amazing games we have had the opportunity to help immortalize in physical form. The releases in our collection, with help from eastasiasoft, are designed to be sleek & affordable: regularly including original soundtracks, artbooks, reversible & alternative covers, and other extras! The collection grew out of the amazing support our fellow gamers & collectors have shown.
PS4B: For the Nintendo Switch side of the equation, the collection has so far included Dimension Drive and Shikhondo: Soul Eater. What other Nintendo Switch games can we expect to be made available later this year?
We have quite a few games lined up, however, I can’t reveal any releases just yet. I can say that we are putting more thought into how we sequence our Nintendo Switch releases, with our first three having a fairly obvious similarity. We are also exploring various ways to reward those who collect these different sequences within the full set.
PS4B: How is the total print run for each game decided? What makes one game get, say, 1,500 copies in total while others get 3,000 copies?
Demand is always the biggest factor. If we feel confident that 3,000 copies will be sold, we will do our best to make it happen. Risk is always involved in creating a product, so we do our best to communicate with gamers to find out what types of titles they’d like to see released.
PS4B: And that’s all the time we have for today. Is there something else you’d like to add before we end this interview?
Thanks for the questions, and thanks to all the fans of our PLAY Exclusives collection! We have been working with some amazing developers and publishers throughout 2018 and will be bringing some truly impressive titles physically to PS4, Nintendo Switch, and the PSVita well into 2019 and beyond.
