One arcade game that always draws a lot of questions is Bandai Namco’s Wangan Midnight Maximum Tune (WMMT) series. As a technical skill-based racer, it has quite a few fans all around the world. In the USA, WMMT3DX+ can be found here and there, which was an upgrade to the Western released WMMT3 but with 4 and now 5, the question has remained as to whether those will be available in the West.
Bandai Namco Japan has officially launched the “International Version” of the game, which uses English in the software. With this new International site also showing up, I have received questions about when the game will be out in the US.
I did some checking around and so far this looks to be the same situation as WMMT4 when that got an international release – Bandai Namco has put units into distribution areas like Hong Kong, Singapore and Australia but is not officially commenting on units elsewhere. The US and Europe did receive some test units of WMMT4 but as of this time, there is no indication that Bandai Namco Amusements America/Europe will be carrying the game for distribution; there are no announcements from BNAA about WMMT5 and no distributor I have checked with has indicated that they have heard anything either.
So at the end of the day what does this mean? It falls upon importing – either a distributor that thinks that they can move some units imports some in or an operator/owner tries the same thing for their location. With Round1USA growing and importing games like Initial D8 then I imagine that means they are a likely source to find it and then maybe a few others. After importing costs are settled, you are looking at a very hefty price tag to get a set so that limits the potential market in these instances. I’m not 100% sure what the costs are to do this for the US but I know that for places like the UK which have very high import taxes/duties, a $10k game like WMMT is probably going to cost a little more than 2 times that amount once you’ve paid those mandated fees and freight.
If the situation changes then we will be certain to report it.
There are no import duties on arcade video games in the European Union at least as long as they are from the US or Japan. And it’s a “country of origin” thing. Buying a Sega game “Made in Japan” in Hong Kong also qualifies for Japan.
http://ec.europa.eu/taxation_customs/dds2/taric/measures.jsp?Taric=95043010&Lang=en&GoodsText=&Domain=TARIC&MeasText=&Offset=0&Area=JP&ExpandAll=&callbackuri=CBU-1&LangDescr=de&SimDate=20141024
(I haven’t checked other countries due to the fact that I can’t think of an interesting arcade manufacturer from there right now.)
All you have to pay is the local sales tax if the sale is the final transaction.
In every European country I know the final transaction rule works pretty much like this:
When you buy an arcade game for your private basement arcade you have to pay the sales tax of around 20% because this is the final transaction.
But when you buy a game for use in your public arcade you don’t have to pay the sales tax for the machine since the final transaction is the money that your guests put in the coin chute.
I LIKE WMMT 5
The import tax issue is a bit of a red herring. The industry has dealt with ‘grey imports’ and failed. Companies like RoundOne and CEC working round the letter of the law to get the games they want.
For the Route/Street operator that attempts to “influence” western distributors selling habits, the writing is on the wall. That is why some feel that direct buy is the only path – finding it impossible to justify the 20% distributor fee for SFA!
Just looked on highway games and it appears that wmmt 5 could possibly still come out in the west.
I also looked on the official wangan site and it sounds like the game might still come out as future labs (presume this is the developer) have said they have been developing two versions of the game simultaneously so even though wmmt 4 seems far fetched now it’s possible that the 5th game could still get released
http://www.highwaygames.com/arcade-news/bandai-namco-launching-wangan-midnight-maximum-tune-5-international-english-version-3207/
http://wanganmaxi-official.com/wanganmaxi5/en/
http://wanganmaxi-official.com/wanganmaxi5/en/miraiken/003.html
Much like WMMT4, this version is for Southeast Asia which covers Australia, Malaysia, Hong Kong, Philippines, etc. Namco Japan has sales jurisdiction there which is why this exists in the first place – so far no one I have spoken with on the Western side seems to have indicated that they will be bringing WMMT5 over but with IAAPA in a few weeks I will probably be able to get an official answer then.
Please let me know if the wmmt4 or 5 will be released in las vegas or LA thanx