Mistwalker and devs thank fans for localization campaign, Operation Rainfall

Japanese RPG developer Mistwalker and others have sent a warm "thank you" to their fans today after finding out about Operation Rainfall, a campaign started by American fans looking to convince Nintendo to bring some Europe- and Japan-only games to the States.

The fans are specifically after three titles: Xenoblade, The Last Story, and Pandora's Tower. What began as a small effort on a forum has blossomed into a large, coordinated effort on the part of the fans.

Not only are the fans doing the usual complaining and wishing, but they've also organized a letter writing campaign.

The most interesting segment of their plan involves a dormant Amazon listing. When Nintendo was planning to bring Xenoblade to America in 2009 - when it was still called Monado: Beginning of the World - there was a pre-order page set up on the site which never got taken down. Now the fans are using that page to "pre-order" the game and prove to Nintendo that they're ready to put cash towards the title if it's localized.

The campaign has been so successful that they've bumped Xenoblade to the top spot on the games page at Amazon.com, above even Ocarina of Time 3DS.

Soraya Saga, the writer of Xenoblade, and Mistwalker, the studio behind The Last Story, offered warm thanks to individual members of the movement, and the community at large.