Lame. People should be protesting this like they protested P4: Arena's region lock. Really though, region locks are pretty outdated and pointless.
Well, the Wii was region locked. It's really silly though. it just means people can't import games they really want. Like, I remember that Elite Beat Agents was made only because a lot of people imported Osu! Tatakae! Ouendan and the demand was high enough, so they created an Americanized version of it. By region locking the Wii U, people won't import games, and the really great Japanese titles might not even get a chance at being localized because they just assume Americans won't want to play it.
God dammit, do we really still need bloody region locking? I really can't see it serving much purpose, other than to deprive people of potentially good games.
As far as I can gather from some good ol' google research, it's a lot of things. Something like what PaW said above^, pricing differences and rating differences among countries, staggered launches in countries, and also as a tool in the relationship between the companies involved in the game from creation to publishing across countries. I rarely play video games anymore, so I'm usually happy with what I can get and I'm not so savvy with the gamer world that I'm aware of games outside of where I look for them anyway, but I can see why region locking, from a customer perspective, really sucks. I can also see why a company would rather their games and systems be region locked. Honestly, I think an easier way can definitely be found that will suit whatever the companies' needs are if they would just spend some time looking for it.
