According to Schneider, said super slow connections are what prompted the region blocking. Using a deterministic (peer-to-peer) network model enables the game's synchronized gameplay animation, but requires parity on both systems. If a slow connection is thrown into the mix, "the person with the worst connection brings down the whole group to his/her worst connection level," explained Schneider. "While not generally a problem for COOP (since most people play coop with friends) when playing in Versus mode 3 people can be highly adversely affected by one player with a bad connection. We use the region lock to minimize the likelihood of this occurring."

The game's Asian version is an entirely different beast. Due to territory requirements, players of that particular version can't shoot the bodies that are inevitably strewn across the battlefield. As was the case with the initial release of Insomniac's Resistance: Fall of Man, us sick and disgusting Westerners weren't deprived of this "feature." Schneider noted that having one version of the game with bullet-proof corpses talking to one that didn't "would result in a de-sync in the simulation and ultimately the game would fail."

We can't say these explanations will come as much as an appeasement to gamers -- especially not with the likes of Halo 3 and Gears of War lodged in the same genre -- but with American foreign policy growing more insular every day, who really wants to game with other countries anyway?