I always thought if a game was regionally restricted for anything on Steam for your region you simply werent able to purchase the sucker at all ie it will show as not available in your region etc?

That's how it works on Steam Store. Buying Steam-redeemable games elsewhere can get a bit more tricky, only in some cases the retailer blocks certain countries from buying region restricted games (or, in some cases, from viewing the game page at all).

It's not the case for Amazon. But then again, theoretically only residents of the US and Canada should be able to buy those...

There are 2 kinds of steam games. Steam bought ones, and retail bought ones. Steam bought ones will usually not be available in other regions, but retail bought ones (aka codes) may be restricted to specific regions. So while the game is available in your region, the specific code can't be used for it. Since amazon is only selling to the US, it doesn't specify if its codes can be used elsewhere, since been usable in the US is all that matters.
Specific examples I can recall are Civ V, Dead Island, XCOM:EU and Borderlands. The cdr database should have more info I think.

Mafia 2 as well (from experience) ;)

Indiegala is still going. Happy Hour at the moment BTA $6.10..... bit lower than recently...

Here is an opinion from Witcher13:

Anyway it's Erica Reed :)

Main things that get censored:

Decapitations and similar mutilations of "human" characters. A "human" character is a character of humanoid form or which has a "human" name. For example, only non-named mutants in Fallout 3 can have body parts blown apart.

Genitalia - both male and female. Sex is pretty much a no-go on consoles.

Sex toys. The dildo hidden in Human Revolution was removed from console versions. The purple dildo weapon in Saints Row The Third had it's shape changed and physics disabled in the console versions.

Other "graphical" scenes of gore. A few seconds of the operation at the start of Human Revolution are removed from console versions. The manner in which rats eat their victims in Dishonored has been altered in console versions.

References to certain WW2 events, such as names of certain ordinance and their effects. Fallout 3 changed names of some items, removed the ability to detonate the nuke. Again, console versions only. This censoring is more out of goodwill on the publisher's end as opposed to being banned by law.

I think you can see a fairly common pattern here. In most cases, these cuts only affect console versions. But recently Square have started to apply them to the PC versions too.

Other fun facts:

EA once claimed in advertising that Dead Space had been banned in Japan. When in reality, they simply didn't submit it for a console CERO rating. They sell it uncut in English on their Origin Japan store.

References to alcoholic drinks such as wine or sake, while often present in Japanese games aimed at children, are removed from their US releases.

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Back to the subject of deals. Has anyone had any luck buying from GamersGate with PayPal yet? My last order has been processed by PayPal with the money sent to GamersGate, but it's still pending on their end >_<.

If there is a person who wants DOTA or want to get rid of it, there is a bot that can help you:

http://steamcommunity.com/id/dota2bot

There are, last I recall, 4 types of regional restriction on Steam now.

1 - Point of purchase. Most common form. You simply cannot buy it in your region (should be playable in most cases).

2 - At first time activation. Mostly affects retail keys, but can affect Steam gifted/traded copies from certain regions (namely some RU versions). Game cannot be added to an account or undergo first time installation. Can be bypassed with a VPN and won't cause problems during subsequent launches.

3 - At launch. Whenever you go to play the game, your region is checked and if the check fails, you can't launch the game. A VPN is needed every time you want to play the game. Can sometimes by bypassed with the Steam Appid text file trick in conjunction with launching from the exe directly (but must be run once via Steam first - same applies when a patch is released). This mainly affects specific regional retail activated copies.

4 - Full on IP Block. The game is placed in a permanent "pre-load" status without access to pre-load files. Even if you install the game from a valid region, it will not show up in your Steam client as installed when in an affected region. This is the type of block that usually gets applied to Japan (examples: FEAR 3, Kingdoms of Amalur, Mafia 2, etc.) for several months at a time and affects all copies of a game, regardless of where it was purchased. Like No. 3, can be bypassed with a combination of VPN, Appid text file/offline mode.

Also note that, if a game has a staggered regional release, you cannot play the game until the release in your region. So if the game releases in the US first and releases in the UK last, and you get a US copy gifted to you in the UK, you still need to wait for the UK release. Further, if that game isn't being released in your region at all and you get a US copy, you still need to wait until after the UK release before it becomes playable.

Now, it gets even more annoying when Valve only applies one of those blocks and not related blocks. Again taking FEAR 3 as an example; it only had the last block applied to it. That meant you could buy it from a third party site that was selling it in Japan and activate it on Steam without error while connected to Steam with a Japanese IP address. Only then would you find it couldn't be interacted with. Of course, as it activated on Steam without issue, third party sellers couldn't refund it. Valve claimed the keys were for the US only and not for use in Japan. They had no answer as to why they allowed such keys to be activated by Japanese IP addresses, nor could they provide a legitimate reason as to why they felt they were allowed to deny access to a game being sold by third party sites with the permission of the publisher.

So yeah, regional restrictions on Steam are now far more confusing than they used to be. If you trade games via Steam, this is something you should be aware of as Valve will not refund/remove region locked copies of games even when traded to a region it cannot be used in. Further, they don't tend to differentiate the region locked copies from other ones via the trade window.

I know this is a bit off topic, but what came to mind was the rather graphic chainsaw scenes in Resident Evil 4. How did they circumvent that? And I suppose those restrictions are only enforced on the finished product, since that game was developed by a Japanese company, in this case, Capcom...

in between the Regional Hassles Covering Report, a short break with Deals Announcements:

On GamersGate
Mass Effect 3 UK, 7.48GBP, -50%
http://www.gamersgate.co.uk/DD-ME3UK/mass-effect-3-uk?caff=1869351

Mass Effect , UK 4GBP -50%
http://www.gamersgate.co.uk/DD-MASSUK/mass-effect-uk?caff=1869351

Mass Effec 2, UK 10GBP -50% (not much of deal, just add for completion)
http://www.gamersgate.co.uk/DD-ME2UK/mass-effect-2-uk?caff=1869351

Awesomenauts $3, -70%
http://www.gamersgate.com/DD-AWESOME/awesomenauts?caff=1869351

GMG , vouchers appyl
Dead Island (NOT GOTY) $5.09, Steam
http://www.greenmangaming.com/s/jp/en/pc/games/action/dead-island/

Dead Island GOTY $6.79, Steam
http://www.greenmangaming.com/s/jp/en/pc/games/action/dead-island-game-year/

Hard Reset Ext.Ed. $5, Steam
http://www.greenmangaming.com/s/jp/en/pc/games/shooter/hard-reset/

Risen $5, Capsule to download (DRM Free or Dev DRM, only)
http://www.greenmangaming.com/s/jp/en/pc/games/rpgs/risen/

Desura
Cell Emergence, $1, -80%, 8.3 Rating
http://www.desura.com/games/cell-emergence

SpyLeaks $1, -67%, Rating !10!
http://www.desura.com/games/spyleaks

that's from me for today's deals, now to back to our regional restricted feature programm...

Funny bastard :P. Thanks as always. Seems ME3 is 7 pounds 48 pence (sorry too lazy to find the pound symbol!) here. Im amazed EA let it show up to aussies *shock horror*

Never played the game so no idea how it fared here. But yes, it's the final product that's rated, so any changes would be made at that point.

Technically speaking, GamersGate can only advertise EA UK titles in the UK. But they've been selling most of them worldwide. The only condition being that you purchase from the co.uk site and pay in Sterling. As far as I know, there was only 1 game that was restricted to UK only which was one of those spin off Sims games.

The next iteration of The Greenlight Bundle will be released on Feb 1st

8 games for $5, Steam keys will be added if the games are greenlit

http://www.thegreenlightbundle.com/

It's a better deal than Groupees Build a Greenlight bundle, but with no bunus.