Where to buy video games in English

I've been reading the recent thread from jimbo...which started well and became a 'I hate your console...mine's much better' slanging match.

But back to Jimbo's question. And a more definitive answer.

Considering germany is a PAL nation rather than NTSC it's a bit of a pisser that the stores stock mainly German-only titles. Do they not look around much...most of the country is plastered in English anyway. The war's over, we won...why do they continue to fight!?
Amazon.de, though speedy, isn't a help...they don't stock English titles. Ebay is an option...but again you have to wait. Most of the video stores around town also only stock German games but some have English titles that have been traded in.

They will order an English game for you and if you become a store member (no cost) then they'll advance order so that the English game is there waiting for you on the day of release. Try Gamezone at Ostbahnhof for this.

Jimbo, here's the trick. Many violent games/movies are immediately placed on 'the index' which means stores are not allowed to have them on the shelves. Therefore they often have a tray of goodies under the counter. I'm not suggesting you'll be wanting pixel porn but the tray exists nonetheless. Also, a great many German gamers actually want English titles too...but the stores aren't supposed to stock them with such prevalence because, after all, we're in Germany!

Now then. The best source for 'under the counter' games is GameCity at Isartor. The Turkish bloke in there is dead shifty looking but brightens considerably when you ask for a glance at 'the good stuff'. He's usually got a fair selection of English titles hidden away. Just wink and nod knowingly and you'll find games appearing as if by magic.

Superb tip - thanks for that. Gonna be unable to get down there until almost March now as I'm away the next few weekends, but I'll defo give the bloke a try.

Am I thinking of the same place? I went to what I think was Gamecity, and walked out after a couple of minutes because they seemed to stock (on the shelves) only games that were released prior to 1997. They still had Sega stuff in there even. It looked like it was a clearing out sale of a shop about to go out of business to be frank, but as I say, maybe it were'nt the same shop.
Is it the one that is directly at Isartor ubahn stop?

I will give it another go if you reckon he has some under-the-counter english titles, but why wouldn't they just display them on the shelf (games, not pixel porn) ? If there is any reason why the store has to keep 'em under wraps, why do Gamezone sit them on the shelf?

The Gamecity at Isartor is pretty much at the top of the S-bahn escalators and has a little mini mart thing beside it. It's recently be ripped out and refurbished, Don...perhaps you went there when it was a little tiddly poo place.

This shop should not be confused with the very bizarre Gamecity that's at Isartor and very close to the Isar. This one has blanked out windows and a 'no under 18's' allowed sign. For bloody good reason too. The interior reveals a token shelf of video games and the rest of the place it hardcore sausage hiding DVDs. Fairly scary!

Jimbo, if you find the Turkish fella unhelpful...then why don't we trade games between ourselves? Plus...I know a man who knows a man who can free up the Xbox DVD to code free as well as dump games directly onto the hard-drive. Dodgy as hell of course...but Bill can afford the damage to his profit margins.

Can I tag along to a Gunters evening perhaps...

Hi, anyone knows where to find, or if they exist at all, video game stores in Munich which sell the original versions? After some initial disappoints of getting home with Oblivion only to find the characters speaking german, or better yet, Call of Duty 3 (WWII game) and find the that everybody spoke german (americans included!!), i learned my lesson and started buying online (uk, play.com and game.co.uk) but there's shipping costs, and they always take too long, always more than a week!

So, anyone knows if there's a store in munich or around (or maybe even a online store in germany, austria(?) ) which sells original non-traslated versions?

Oh, and offtopic, if someone is interested in exchanging (in hand) xbox360 games drop me a line, i have a few collecting dust in the shelf (Call od Duty 3 (german), burnout revenge, Collin Mcrae DIRT, skate)

Cheers and thaks in advance.

Topics merged by admin

Play.com have free delivery???? use them myself

except that it takes over a week to get the games! That's why i switched to game.co.uk, which doesn't have free delivery, but takes a little less time.

not to be a downer, but which games are only german language? Every box that said "German Everything" ended up playing english fine when popped into my computer or PS3. Some games like NHL 09 let you choose language every time you launch the game.

Almost every PAL version game I have ever seen at least has an english option.

For some reason, a lot of 360 games are often German only. I've yet to have any issues with PS3 versions of games

http://www.spielegrotte.de often has English versions of games, but tbh you're still better off ordering from England anyway because more often than not you'll save between 10 and 15 euros per game. For some reason, a lot of games seem to be retailing at 70 euros these days.

There are several threads on English lingo games. I've been here for a few years, and bought games for a variety of consoles. The language options are severely hit n miss. Sometimes the game has a language option, sometimes not. Sometimes the box will say there is a sprachauswahl or something, but that sometimes just means that it is in German, nothing to do with "choice" whatsoever. Sometimes the box says the game is in German, but there is a language choice where you can choose to play in English. IF you xbox is set to English language, some games purchased here will play...in French. To get the German lingo, set your console language to German, and reload. Quite a few games are dual language French/German.
So far on PS3, every game I've had has been in English, but that is not true of PS2, Xbox, or Xbox 360. If you've never had any trouble with language options, then you have frankly just had good luck. The only 100% guaranteed way to get a game in English is mail order; either wait a week for delivery, or pay a pretty penny for Amazon express delivery, which will get it to you on the release date of the game.

To be fair, even with the Amazon express delivery, it's still cheaper than getting it new in Saturn, Gamestop or Karstadt.

So there´s nowhere in Munich that will supply the English (US) version of the WotLK WoW expansion when it´s released next month?

Very unlikely. As has been mentioned for the 12th time, it's better to order online.

It should still support the language though, but almost everything else will be covered in German.

PC Fun on Schillerstr, just off Schwanthalerstrasse. Might want to drop by though to check when they will be receiving it. They charge extra for English versions of games.

Computer games shops

I doubt you can get the US version here in Munich.

You can get the English (UK) Version at the Shop UA mentioned, I got my collector's edition there when I played... (does anybody want it? )
Unless you need the US version, picking it up there might be your best bet if you need the box. If you just want the license key, I'd order it from blizzard online.

Well.

Don't buy Fifa09 for PS3 here if you want English. It has none. I knew I was taking a risk buying it, but had read on some forums that there was definitely a language choice option; both on starting the game, and changing the in-game commentary.
Previously, many FIFA games here had either french or german as options, but I thought maybe it would be different for PS3 - and indeed it is, there are options for a variety of lingos; spanish, italian, portuguese, turkish, and some of those random eastern "european" countries like Poland and that Czech lot....but no English.

Ridiculous. The main selling point for FIFA over the years has not been gameplay (Pro Evo has always been better) but because they have the licensing for English clubs and players. Pro Evo had Spanish, French and ITalian licensing, but in football, the Premier League is number one across the planet, and EA sports know that, and it has made them money. Sky and Setanta sell their coverage to other countries across the globe, but EA sports decide to release a version for the game with no sky sports style english commentary!??! To really rub it in, when you start a game with Englsih teams, the stadium announcements are in fucking English, then some stupid foreign voice kicks in for commentary. Yeah, you can turn the commentary off, but why not also just turn the TV to black and white, and inf act, chuck out any of your consoles and just play "snake" on an old nokia phone.

If this is what EA want to do in Europe, then at least they should publish the language choice info somewhere on one of their 50000 websites. FFS.

Thanks


Thanks - I do need the US version, so the online option seems the best.

I thought I'd point out that you can just download them.
Steam is a content delivery system that lets you buy games over the internet without killing any trees in the process.

http://store.steampowered.com/

I'm sure there is more than one place where you can download games, but this is apparently the most reputable one.
Watch out for shifty sites that claim legal downloads, some actually offer pirated versions, which could contain viruses or trojans or something.
Rule of thumb: Never download anything from Russia

Also - if you enjoy WW2-themed games you should be aware that many of these are illegal in Germany, since they have swastikas and other nazi imagery that is strictly verboten
Sometimes special german editions are made which censor the offending content, or even omit the fact that the bad guys in the game are supposedly german, though I doubt these would come with english text in them.

Steam is generally my only source of new PC games these days. Can be a bit of a pain to use sometimes, but generally speaking I've managed to get most new games comparatively cheap through Steam using the US version of the store (afaik there's no to little region locking)

As far as other digital distribution methods like XBLA or PSN, I've had little problems with either - except that some games are IP banned - e.g. Duke Nukem in Germany.

Since were talking about video games,

go to the thegamerstavern.com and sign up.

Thats our website that we started VIA Toytown, and we meetup a lot and play games , drink and whatnot

We are based here in munich.

We are awesome

we can buy german games for my husbands playstation 3 and it automaticly goes to english...but we have used www.choicesuk.com for my boys ds
games, there is a delivery cost of £3, but only took 3 days, very quick delivery.

There is a new games shop open in the same building as toys r us, and staples, looks good. We bought a wii game in there, but it had the 5 language symbol on it anyway...and we didn't look at any other games...although they had used games, so they must buy games.

Does anyone know if a german wii games can be changed of language on the wii console...they are too exspensive to take the chance and try out!!