ok, from what I recall, the early days of video gaming, the importers were parallel importers and there was no actual official presence for video games or authorised disributors.

hence you get the same kind of con-men/con-women selling games with prices varying from shop to shop.

the 1st actual official console to be brought to Malaysia using the 'official/authorised ditributor' model was iinm Sega Megadrive.

the company appointed by sega of japan to be the authorised distributor in Malaysia (and Singapore along with several asean countries) was WYWY...

1st megadrive console (basically Japanese megadrive but pal output)



2nd megadrive console (now in English)



and the wywy company still exists until today (though merged with another company), but no longer distributes sega or any video games for that matter...

http://servtouch-wywy.my/

they had a decent marketing campaign and actually bought full page ads in the English/Chinese papers in Malaysia/Singapore to announce the arrival of officially licensed megadrive consoles/games.

when street fighter II champion edition was released for megadrive, they also put out ads on papers again...

the sony playstation (psone) was the 1st official video game console to be brought in officially by the principal companies themselves (sony Malaysia sdn. bhd.) although it suffered from piracy issues.

but sony did try and their flagship store in KLCC even had a dedicated sony psone section (I used to drool at the display and games back when I was still studying, dreaming of the day when I can own original games)

in fact, I recall that sony had to dispose a lot of original PS1 games for dirt cheap when the ps2 was in full swing and luckily enough I got to buy a few of them at the ampang cash converters shop...



and until now sony has always brought in all of their consoles to Malaysia officially and luckily enough, ever since the ps3 days, the piracy problem has largely been avoided by sony due to their stronger copyright protection.

and iinm the sony PlayStation segment brings a significant amount of money to their sales, probably just behind their dslr/camera segment.

This post has been edited by Faidzal: Dec 21 2015, 11:32 PM

1. malaysia used to have a huge arcade scene. unfortunately due to our malaysian laws, arcade game machines are licensed the same way as gambling outlets (meaning only 18 and above can enter etc.). this changed around the last decade, but by that time arcade scene almost died bcos the ps2 basically is an arcade machine that connects to your tv.

2. yes, we were very quick with game releases wheter for home or arcade. sometimes we got the newest street fighter/king of foghters game within weeks of japanese/worldwide release...

3. pirated/bootleg cartridges came from china/hongkong/taiwan.

4. all disc based games and even PSP games were heavily pirated, the only console that managed to survive mass piracy was ps3 bcos of their hard-to-beat copyright protection...

and now ps4 seems to be heading the same direction along with xbox one.

nintendo64 ddnn't catch on in malaysia bcos of the expensive console and hard-to-replicate cartridge system. besides, too few games were relased and that time psone and sega saturn had way more awesome games than nintendo 64.

5. last time we had LAN parties...

actually before 1996, you cannot enter arcade centres if you are under 18, and this was before mesin kuda became widespread.

I should know bcos I curi-curi masuk into arcades since 1990 despite being only 12 that time all bcos I wanna play double dragon...

damn this game was hard.

I remember playing the famicom version, the only way you stand a chance is if you used the cheat codes.

(same like contra)

and recently Capcom rereleased it for ps2/psp (Capcom classics collection), but that one has unlimited continues...

obviously wearing school uniforms will get you kicked out.

there was aloophole though, in that you can legally eneter if you came with a guardian of legal age.

but like you said, the jaga tiada kesah diberikan, the more you spend at the arcades, the better.

I spent minimum rm2-rm3 per visit at least (rm1 per game).

usually playing street fighter/king of fighters/dungeons & dragons etc...

oh yeah, I forgot I mainly played in JB arcades (holiday plaza/komtar/city square etc.).

I know KL had awesome arcades in sungei wang, sogo top floor, even mid valley had a decent arcade as late as 8 years ago...

what was that official Capcom Malaysia authorised distributor? alpha something?

they had an arcade in sungei wang plaza 3 floor iinm, always had the latest street fighter game on one 50" screen arcade machine...

iinm the rule about 18 and above only has been there since the beginning.

they only changed the rules around 10-15 years ago, and with that they also mandated that amusement machine centres (aka arcades) must be well lit, no smoking, no drinking and must be family friendly.

pro: now going to arcade is not considered 'bad'.

cons: most arcades now only have family-friendly games like taiko no tatsujin, para para/dance games, those card battle games like dbz/love and berry/mushi king etc., racing games etc. but strangely gun games are still there...

but occasionally there will be a USFIV/Tekken cabinet...

and one time I think I saw a KOF XIII game in one of those cabinets as well, but no one was playing...

sega handheld was called game gear...



This post has been edited by Faidzal: Jan 3 2016, 11:41 AM

hhhmm, seem to recall this as well.

but their prices were really outrageous, almost as expensive as those cheater game shops.

iinm toys r us sold those wywy-distributed sega consoles such as the megadrive2 and sega Saturn.

oh, and around 10 years ago (2006, wow time flies) iinm Nintendo appointed an official distributor for Malaysia/Singapore (maxsoft/m.m soft) and started officially selling Nintendo consoles, and toys r us was one of the official sellers.

they sold Gameboy advance, Nintendo ds (the 1st model) and also eventually the Wii.

and I seem to recall certain Carrefour/Tesco/Jusco also selling NDS/Wii games with the m.msoft official product stickers.

(jusco/Aeon was the one in midvalley, they had a dedicated section for Nintendo games, I keep passing that booth but their prices were too high...)

yup, this was it.

but funnily enough everytime i went pass the counter, there was no salesperson attending them...

but this was in 2007 - 2008 though...