Are Xbox One games and/or hardware region locked?

Hello,

I have searched the internet and have gotten a mixed bag of answers. I have dual residency in two different regions and I am thinking about getting an Xbox One. However, because of my experience with the Xbox 360 and a lack of definitive answers regarding the
One, I am hesitant. On the Xbox 360, when I was living in a region other than that where my system was from, buying new games and accessories were a royal pain and often very expensive.

From what the internet tells me, it seems that the Xbox One started off completely region free, but microsoft may have locked some things a bit later. However, I have yet to find any solid yes/no answers on exactly what was locked or if the issues have been
resolved.

If any of you have experience or concrete knowledge about this, I would be grateful if you would answer this question for me. What things for the Xbox One, if anything, are region locked?

Thank you in advance.

:)

 

wrong region error

well thats conflicting information

PAL games will not work in a NTSC xbox the xbox will not recognize them however there are some neutral games

however region free games will

theway you tell is the back of the console and the back of the case of the game

it will state Which regions it supports

US consoles will only play region free or region 1 games

if the game case says region 2 or any other region then its not a region 1 game or region free



your best bet buy stuff from your actual region including hardware and games



and no there is no way to make an xbox console region free

 

I would like to refund a game beacuse,of region lock

The original Xbox as well as the Xbox 360 are region-locked, although it is up to the publisher if a game is region-free or not. A number of games are region-free and will play on a unit from any region. Digital content through Xbox Live are also region-locked,
such as DLC, movies, and apps.

A regional lockout (or region coding) is a class of digital restrictions management preventing the use of a certain product or service, such as multimedia or a hardware device, outside of a certain region or territory. A regional lockout may be enforced
through physical means, through technological means such as detecting the user's IP address or using an identifying code, or through unintentional means introduced by devices only supporting certain regional technologies (such as video formats, i.e. NTSC and
PAL).

 

Hi Der Verteidiger..

As far as I know there are no more region locks on the Xbox One and its games than there was when it launched.. the only one I know abuot is that to use the xbox live store for the region you set, you need a debit creditcard & adress from the region you
set as the locale (although there are unofficisl ways around that)

In my example I'm from Norway but use the US locale as we dont get kinect voice command support here and I prfer my games In english.. I can then either swich back to norway as my locale if i want to use the live stor or as I found out, I can use my smarglass
app set to norwegian local to buy what i want dlc in my case, an it i pay in NOK and it dowloads automaticly to my console set to US locale..

so from my experience I can't se that MS has done anything to reinstate region locks on the Xbox One

Here is a link to more info on locale settings on xbox.com:support.xbox.com/en-US/xbox-one/system/locale-faq

 

support.xbox.com/en-US/xbox-one/system/locale-faq

Posted the link to the locale info on xbox.com again as it got mashed together with the rest of the text, tried to edit it in my original post, the forum locks off the editing function in the blink of an eye.. sorry about the spelling errors that i allso
didnt manage to sort out before time ran out as well, but I hope its understandable anyway

 

Thanks for your answer! But, if the xbox one is like the 360 (my apologies if it is not) then I don't think the locale matters much. I bought my xbox 360 in the US, and when I was in Europe I could change the locale to Germany, but my xbox still could not
play most games bought in Europe. I believe the region lock feature applies to the console and games/accessories rather than the xbox live profile.

 

The only games that are region locked on Xbox One are games from China due to local laws there, but everything else should be fine, as long as you have a valid payment method on file to buy the games in that local currency.

 

Hi again, dug a bit more in the locale faq, and it says clearly in the locale faq that there ar no playback restriction on games bought in an other reagion than the one that the console is set to or bought in, and as far as i know the same applies to disc
versions.. the only thing it seems that if you download game on you console in an other region you wont be able to dowload it on a buddys console that is set to an different region than yours was at the time of purchase/dowload as the locale setting on his
console points to a different xbox live store.. but I had no problems using my xbox one and forza5 imported from amazon.de before the xbox one even was released in scandinavia and was officially unsuported in my country.. even got all the fre dlc from T10..
So the Xbox one is wery different to the 360 in this respect..

What you might run into in the way of a region lock is on dvd & blu-ray video discs.. as theese ar still region locked on the demand of the movie and tv industries from what I understand..

 

Thank you both! Tronder, just so you know, Europe is it's own region, as is North America I believe. So German and Scandinavian things will normally be compatable if there is a region lock in place.

Nevertheless, both of you helped me out a lot. Thank you again!

 

Der Verteidiger..

I do know Europe is one/its own region and that what Works in Germany will allso normally work in Norway... My point was that Xbox One was not released and therfore not officially supported in my part of the region at the time.... my reasoning is that if
they (MS) where keen on strict enforcement of region Locks then they would most likely have locked out the yet unsupported parts of the region from using the consoles before the official release but no such locks where to be found.. in fact appart from
the Xbox live store they made it very easy for those of us that could not wait until the official release..

I did of course reasearch the subject as well so that I would not end up giving bad advice

Anyway happy I could be of help

 

Hey there, tom cruise2002! While we appreciate your assistance with these guys, this thread is nearly a year old. We suggest finding more recent threads to hop into and help your fellow gamers out. We look forward to seeing more posts from you!