Guild Wars 2

Hello!

I’m not sure if this has been asked before or not, in my brief search I did not find anything useful but,

I come from Europe and due to an Exchange Course from my school I am now in Japan for some months. I heard some stories about downloading and such being illegal here, and since Guild Wars 2 sometimes needs to download new content, I wonder if I can still play GW2 here.

Many thanks!

This page may be helpful to you: https://en.support.guildwars2.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/9184/kw/region. I do not know the laws of Japan about downloading things, but there should not be a problem on ArenaNet’s end.

The law the OP is referring to is a law that it is punishable with jailtime to download content without permission from the owner of the legal rights to that content.

To answer that question. You have the permission from Arenanet (the legal owner of the content) to download the content.

Due to the way Japanese culture handles internet it might be that your ISP (internet provider) has restricted regulations. To be 100% on the safe side I would ask their customer support (or if it is a company owned netwerk like a campusnetwork the it-dept)

Thank you for your replies!

Just to be on the safe side I think I’ll refrain from playing for these months because I’m not sure how to deal with the internet company here.

You’ll be fine downloading the new content and playing in Japan. I just recently returned from Japan after being there for work for 6 months. You won’t have any restricted regulations from your ISP. You’ll only have restricted regulations from your school, but you should still be fine playing the game. The new downloading law in Japan is just for illegal downloads.

Ah okay! Thank you so much!

For the record. Downloading copyrighted material without permission is illegal in almost every country in the world. Downloading copyleft or material for which you have the permission is legal in every country in the world (except some dictatorships which japan is not, and some extreme material which GW2 is not).

You have the permission from a.net to download updates. That’s actually one of the rights granted to you by the EULA and ToA so you actually have it written in legalese.

^ As stated above. I’ll just throw in that I’ve been in Japan on and off for the past year. Never had an issue aside from the usual authentication for access to the game from a new location. My ISPs in Japan have never mentioned anything either.

Yay! I’m so happy to know that I can play GW2! Thank you all for your help!