Japanese DVD playback issues

[remdale]

Hi everybody!
I've got some Japanese video DVDs, but the playback is distorted in MPC-HC. VLC plays some of them fine though.
Both media players are the latest versions.
But I have 2 DVDs produced in 2016, but they don't play well in both VLC and MPC-HC. There are image and sound distortions.
All the DVDs are region 2 locked, so I changed the region in my DVD drive to 2 before playing them.
What is special in the Japanese DVDs? How could I play the DVDs?
Thanks in advance.

[jagabo]

There's probably something wrong with the DVDs. Are you in the USA? Other than the region code there's no difference between Japanese and USA DVDs. There's no reason to change the drive's region code when using VLC. It ignores region codes.

[october262]

Hi everybody!
I've got some Japanese video DVDs, but the playback is distorted in MPC-HC. VLC plays some of them fine though.
Both media players are the latest versions.
But I have 2 DVDs produced in 2016, but they don't play well in both VLC and MPC-HC. There are image and sound distortions.
All the DVDs are region 2 locked, so I changed the region in my DVD drive to 2 before playing them.
What is special in the Japanese DVDs? How could I play the DVDs?
Thanks in advance.

change the region back of your dvd drive, because after you use up the remaining
region changes the drive will become permanently locked to the region after you use
the last region change.

[jagabo]

It's possible there's some structural protection (obfuscation) on the DVDs that prevents VLC from playing it correctly. If that's the case ripping the DVDs to VIDEO_TS folders with DVDFab might work (then play the folders, not the original DVDs).

[remdale]

There's probably something wrong with the DVDs. Are you in the USA? Other than the region code there's no difference between Japanese and USA DVDs. There's no reason to change the drive's region code when using VLC. It ignores region codes.

I'm based in Russia. I just copied (drag&drop) the movies to my PC and then played them.

change the region back of your dvd drive, because after you use up the remaining
region changes the drive will become permanently locked to the region after you use
the last region change.

Sure, I will do so as soon as I resolve the issue. Should I change the region to 0?

It's possible there's some structural protection (obfuscation) on the DVDs that prevents VLC from playing it correctly. If that's the case ripping the DVDs to VIDEO_TS folders with DVDFab might work (then play the folders, not the original DVDs).

Thanks, will do so. What if I make an .iso image, wouldn't it be better and quicker to work so?

[jagabo]

I'm based in Russia. I just copied (drag&drop) the movies to my PC and then played them.

If they are commercial discs they're probably encrypted. You can't just drag/drop from explorer because the video needs to be decypted. Try playing the DVD directly from the disc with VLC (Media -> Open Disc). VLC will use its built in decrypter with the decryption key supplied by the disc. If that works you can use DVDFab (or maybe the old DVD Decrypter) to decrypt the disc and produce an unencrypted VIDEO_TS folder or ISO image which any player can play.

[remdale]

It worked out! I used DVDFab to copy DVDs and it seems like they all were encrypted. Now both VLC and MPC-HC can play the movies well. Thank you so much!!