-Microsoft probably. I might be misquoting that. Or they might not have actually said that.
Okay, what they actually said was:
日本はXboxの展開においてTier 2であり，Tier 1にはなっていません。 ですから2番めの“波”がきたときのローンチとなり，ちょっと遅れることになりますね。
But I mean who the hell can read whatever made-up language that is, right?
The guys in the highest offices of Microsoft seemingly want fantastically awful communication to be their legacy. If you want to release a console in one region before the other, especially when you realize that one market is much larger, that's cool. People get that. But what you don't do is go around giving people names like "Tier 1 and Tier 2" or "Group A and Group B" or "Index Finger (1) and Middle Finger (2)." That would be stupid.
Yet that's what happened when 4Gamer interviewed some rambling idiot who they later discovered was the president of Microsoft Japan, Yasuyuki Higuchi. When asked what that meant, in terms us simple Tier 2 folk can understand, Higuchi confirmed that it meant that it would come behind the North American release. This is because, in his words, Japan is Tier 2 and North America is Tier 1. As if realizing the monumental stupidity of what had just toppled out of his mouth, Higuchi pleaded to the media not to report it too negatively.
I'd be sure to honor this request, were it not for Microsoft constantly making it so damn easy.
