Still no news on Western release?

[blace]

I've seen a few internet cafes in my area. Could just be Colorado though.

[Mike]

I liken it to an arcade; it's about the atmosphere. Plus, there's the much better computer hardware they can play on, since desktop gaming isn't that big over there, giving Japanese people less reason to own a gaming quality PC.

I wouldn't quite say it's the same as an arcade, at least not in Japan. Japanese internet cafes are all about booths so you're pretty much seperated from other humans unless you go in with a friend. Hardware-wise, that depends on the venue. For example: this is a map of a net cafe in Hokkaido and this is a map of one in Osaka. The Hokkaido store only has a handful of high-spec PC while the Osaka store has a fair number of them. Both have general gaming computers though and when it comes to PSO2, the game wouldn't have trouble running at max settings on these. With the settings turned down, most Japanese home PC shouldn't have a problem playing either.

While playing at a net cafe, you get to be a premium member during your time. That means all the "benefits" premium normally provides like trading and access to your room. Of course, it's much more economical to buy premium for a month and play at home. You also earn 1 Cafe Point a minute playing at a cafe and you can exchange those later on for items. Most of the items are the standard trash items you can get from the FUN scratch. There are a few unique items but they require you to play for an hour to a full day to get. So it's not really worth it to play at a cafe if you can play at home.