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Why Are Japanese-Developed Games Less Popular?
Thanks to GameSpy for their 'Sole Food' editorial discussing the decline of the Japanese-developed videogame in the U.S. console charts. The article doesn't deny there are still big Japanese-developed hits in the West, but suggests: "It's not uncommon for there to be only two or three Japanese games among the top 20 sellers each month; this would have been unheard of less than ten years ago." As for explanations, it's argued that "Western developers are doing a better job of servicing core genres that are popular in the U.S.", but a "financial and creative slump" in the Japanese games industry is also blamed - "A quick glance through the games shown at last weekend's Tokyo Game Show reveals little that is truly new."
Perhaps it's for the same reason that US developed consoles aren't popular in Japan:
It's cultural
If you could be anything you want, I'll bet you'd be disappointed.
yep. enough said right there, i suppose. even if they aren't true sequels....course the innovative japanese games don't really do so well in the US anyway...
My own feeling is that Japanese culture is in a depression even deeper than the economic malaise of the past decade. Their political system has moved from crisis to crisis, scandal to scandal. Their mass media has gotten steadily more insane. Their population decline on the demographic front looks grim -- and, as in the West, is accompanied by a collapse in social tradition and in values. There is also a serious bleakness about the future that has infected their society, corrupting an already somewhat apocalyptic-minded high culture, and with obvious impact in art and entertainment.
The real movement to watch out for is the rearmament of Japan which will come sometime in the next decade. This is a logical move for them, and I support it, but it is quite possible that Japan will enter into yet another period of social destabilization and social revolution after it. Which may or may not be so bad. The current mess in unsustainable.
Okay, US and Japanese markets have different tastes, and the game producers from each market cater to their local markets and do better there. Frankly, that's not particularly surprising and in fact I'd think it would be almost expected.
However, blaming it on a lack of variation in Japanese games seems a little unfounded... New and groundbreaking concepts are pretty damn rare in both markets. In fact, I'd wager that US developers focusing on the genres that 'do big' in the US, and pumping out clones and 'nothing new here titles' that are targeted at what has been succesful previously in the US is the number one contributor to the shift that they're noticing...
But, maybe it's just me.
Gamers being U.S. are of not text liking schoolchildren by translated?!
MOVE ZIG!
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RPG's and platform shooter are big in Japan.
FPS is big in US.
MMO's and strategy are big in Korea.
Japan:
Epic RPGs
Music games
Platformers
Fighting games
Wacky/insane games
U.S.:
Sports
Extreme sports
FPS
RTS
Anything online
This is a gross oversimplification, but the fact is different genres have different degrees of success in different territories. Plus, Japanese developers have no concept of how to not offend western media (I'm sorry, SEGA, a game that lets kids join a gang and spray paint anything in sight while running from the law is just not a very good idea, no matter how good it could be if you'd just fixed a few usability issues).
a lot of it, for me at least, is the look of japanese games. Seems like every time I check one out, they look very cartoony/anime looking (especially on the GC). It's not that I value graphics over gameplay, it's just that certain styles of graphics turn me off enough that I don't care if it's a fun game to play because I simply hate looking at it.
Don't leave your mind so open that your brain falls out. Don't close it so much that you cut off the blood.
in which case almost all of the top selling games are by a japanese developer (namely Nintendo themselves). Here's an interesting chart listing the gamecube's best selling games.
... of 15 year old girls in miniskirts casting spells? That's the main reason why I stopped playing Final Fantasy games. Every other Japanese game is about some teenage girl where the camera occasionnaly makes a close-up of her breasts or gives off a camera angle that let's you see under the skirt. Okay, okay, maybe I exagerate, but still, I've found Japanese games more and more about great FMV's and girls in miniskirts and less and less about, well, games. I'm not saying there are no good Japanses games. Of course there are good Japanese games, but the one I always see on TV or people talk to me about seem to be these kind of games. Which makes me wonder if people play anything else on the PS2 in Japan...
That why I couldn't care less if Japan doesn't dig the Xbox or produce game for it.
One reason for this could very well be the funding behind the games. Here in the states, even though our economy isn't exactly doing the best, people still find the time/money for games. It's a huge industry, and is still encroaching on the film business. Because of this, those who fund games are willing to put more money behind them, and thus create better, longer, and more 'American Aimed' games.
Meanwhile, in Japan, their economy is doing much much worse than in USA. Worse to the point that people are buying less games, thus the funding is going down. Obviously, with a drop in cash, you take a hit in one way or another (shorter games, less-pretty graphics, etc.).
The other main reason, and this is totally my opinion, is that american game developers have finally caught on. No longer are we limited to the FPS genre. We have become masters of all genres, from RPGs (KOTOR) to inventing our own (GTA3). In part, we have Japan to thank for this, as they pretty much started the industry. We've just taken their ideas, run with them, and we are now beginning to surpass them. Metroid for the GameCube is a great example. A very terrific game, with a new spin on FPS mechanics, created by an American develompent team. What was once Japanese is now American. Maybe it's time that Japan start 'borrowing' some ideas back from us?
Go here for teh [sic] funny.
His words, not mine:
"I'll always be a Japanophile gamer at heart, though, so I can only hope that Japan's gaming industry figures out a way to escape from its financial and creative slump. Only then I can get back to being an elitist, Japan-loving snob."
Well, I guess if he's happy with his own self-image, then the more power to him. Still seems kinda sad, though.
[PowerPoint] is a tool for capitalist presentation
In the thread about Atari reducing its Gamecube support:
The market is finally going to mature and splinter. Microsoft will be the "other" console in the US and Europe and Nintendo will be the "other" console in Japan. This will allow the companies to taylor their products to the different audiences, which continue to grow more and more different everyday. The niche fanboy crowd can always import of course. This is good news for third party publishers too. With only two consoles to worry about in either market, their development efforts can be more focused on making the best possible end product. So farewell, Big N. I'll always remember the good times we had. IMHO, though, this is a good thing.
Man its painful being on the bleeding edge.
"It's not uncommon for there to be only two or three Japanese games among the top 20 sellers each month; this would have been unheard of less than ten years ago."
I'm not even sure if this is completely true. Maybe we're questioning the fact that more western games are in the charts than before, but the last charts I saw showed more like 9 Japanese games in the top 20 (though 3 were the different versions of Soul Calibur 2, 3 US titles were the different versions of Madden NFL 2004).
As for questioning matters like originality in the titles, there are problems on this front on both sides. After all, 4 of the top 11 games are football games (Madden for GC was #11, NCAA Football was #5), and who would you get to develop an American football game outside of the US? 5 of the top 20 are US-centric sports games (the above 4 and NBA Street), with Mario Golf making 6 sports games in the list (though obviously not in the same realm of sports games as the others). The best selling soccer (football for the non-US people) game in Japan is a game made by a Japanese company, while the best selling soccer game in Europe is an EA title. Would anyone in the US be likely to play a Japanese-developed baseball game today? Well the Japanese certainly are, and it's right up there in the Japanese top 10, too.
Something else to note would be the longevity of titles on the US charts. Games rise and fall on the Japanese charts in a matter of weeks. In the US, we still have Vice City and Halo in the top 20. Pokemon Ruby & Saphire's combined sales keep it in the top 20 in Japan, while in the US they're listed individually and both still on the top 20.
The article's author even takes the time to say that Nintendo's part of the problem, even though Nintendo has 4 games in the US top 20, surpassed only by EA's 5. The only other company with more than 1 is Namco, and that's the 3 listings for SC2 (as EA's listing is for 2 games + 3 listings for Madden).
-PainKilleR-[CE]
i'd have to say, 'fuck final fantasy'. make a shitty game, and then 10 sequels, and i promise you will never see a dime of my money
I think it also has to do with marketing though. In the US the current trend seems to be to make games for non-gamers (ie: sims, madden 2004). By making games that appeal to the general populace they can sell more games. It seems to me that the japanese are still making games for gamers. I could be wrong though, I'm no expert on japanese culture.
"I can not bring myself to believe that if knowledge presents danger, the solution is ignorance" - Isaac Asimov
In America the Japanese games seem to be becoming less popular, but it makes sense. Americans and Japanese are very different from each other. So now that the American game developers are developing better games which "all Americans" seem to like, the Japanese games just kind of seem to fizzle out and die.
Then again from my experience Americans don't seem to like puzzle games, and other such games that merit better game play over graphics. Don't get me wrong people. I know there are plenty of great American games which boast great game play and graphics, but in all honesty it cant be compared to the Japanese games that we will never see on our shores.
Obviously they play to the crowd, and for the most part the Japanese and Americans are two totally different crowds. So if you want to play the good Japanese games you should better learn Japanese, or be content with the violence that most American companies bring to the market.
I personally feel that Japanese games are better, but that just might be because i grow tired of FPS`s, and the stories to games like KOTOR just aren't nearly as good as the crack headed stories of RPGs like the FF series, or even MGSD. Then again I have always been about Japanese culture ever since I can remember, and with it games. So in short I am pretty damn biased.
Now back to FFI on my woderswan color.
With who?
I can certainly see that Japanese-developed games are selling slightly less than usual, but as far as being in a creative slump...are these guys on fucking crack? Have they PLAYED Viewtiful Joe? I can't remember the last time a US developer took a HUGE risk - they're all pretty much sticking to defined genres. At last count the best sellers were still sports games. I don't see too much creativity there.
And yes, I am an import snob.
--Moo.
citizens can't read or speak Japanese!?! Duh!
My mom always said, "Jim, you're 1 in a million." Given the current population, there are 7000 of me. God help us all!
I won't deny that US consoles aren't particularly popular in Japan, XboX proves that. However I disagree with the idea that it is cultural. I would in fact say one of the reasons some US games/consoles do as well as they do is because part of Japanese culture is that they are half-obsessed with US culture. This is why we get Engrish all over the place. If a US console isn't doing a very good job supporting the translation of US titles to Japanese and what have you then why buy the console? Nobody wants to get a foreign based console if half the games won't make it to their country.
DISCLAIMER: This Is Just How I See It, Then Again I'm Dumb. Also Not Japanese.
Trust Your Technolust
because it's quite difficult for an American to get the meaning of "all your base are belong to us" "someone set up us the bomb" or "you have no chance to survive make your time" that's all.
j/k
The IT section color scheme sucks.
1. Complexity. I find Japanese games to be very simplistic and repetitive. If I want to lean back and watch what's happening on the screen I rent a video. If I want to control what's happening on the screen, I play western games.
2. Game style. I prefer either low-action games or full-action, not the combinations with all those minigames that Japanese titles are known for.
3. Graphics. While graphics don't play a major role in my decision-making, I still prefer to control a character that doesn't wield a 8-foot sword and has eyes larger than his hands.
We want to see AMERICAN girls peeing on each other, not Japanese.
the key is to remember that sequels in themself is not a bad thing, as long as they try to improve gameplay to perfection (example: Virtua Fighter) - just like chess the first version is not perfect, and new versions of it will arrive until it reaches that hight. Now the problem with 'perfect' games is that you can make money off the sequel as well, but how do you improve a perfect game? (example: Advance Wars).
- and these improvments are often not for the casual gamer to see - they can even be a problem (again: Virtua Fighter) - and they in the end will stop selling great volumes. Some games do break this, and those are the 'non-hardcore' games like Sims, FF, and Medal of honor (still there must be an end to the insanity). Besides a simple game perfected is often just done for the hardcore masses (shmups anyone?).
so if you look at publishers orginial IPs then the Japanese publishers are not really worse off then for those here in the west; for example Nintendo and MS is among the best in this category. But then you can turn it, and see that Nintendo is pushing a heap of sequels - and Mircosoft is not (due to being new, or just because? - well time will tell).
As for inovation, well it seems western and eastern inovative games often does not strike gold the first time around - but on the 2nd or 3rd installment (inovative?).
The Japanese only manage to squeeze out two or three good games a year. The rest are absolute crap that are usually clones of the crap that managed to eke out some success.
I mostly play platformers. Go ahead and try to list ten good USA platformers.
I posted this months ago, and it still seems relevant to this article:
I pulled up the TRST Data from last year, and I counted how many of the top titles for Xbox, GameCube, and PlayStation 2 were made in Japanese top 10, top 20, top 30.
On PlayStation 2, two of their top 10 were made in Japan, and two of the next 10, and three of the next 10. That's got to be a record for low games from Japan.
On Xbox, there were none in the top 10, two in the next 10, and none in the last 10.
On GameCube it was six, five, and a few more in the last 10. (Almost all of them were Nintendo 1st/2nd party titles as you prolly guessed.)
Nintendo won't die over here. They still have a monopoly on portable systems (for now, at least, Sony could change that, we'll have to see,) and there are enough people who want to play Metroid and Zelda and Mario that they'll still be able to make a good profit here; however, I can see them being the Apple of the console market here.
Japan has a heavy arcade market and multiplayer market.
The US has a heavy console market.
That's all there is to it really.
All Your Base Are Belong To Us
Buy Steampunk Clothing Online!
It's a mad bastard of a shooter, by Treasure.
...about that whole Pearl Harbor thingie.
Way back when I was growing up, being a console gamer, more often than not, meant you were also something of a Nipponophile, either just for the games or anime freaks. All of the games that were worth beans came from Japan, because that's where the consoles came from. People who didn't want to buy a Japanese console had old Ataris or Intellivisions. The market for US developed console games was pretty much limited to sports titles, and crappy comic book/movie/TV licensed crapfests. No one who cast scorn on "cartoony" games bothered much. Now, the console market has evolved and grown WAY beyond the people who used to be the mainstays. We're still a force in the community, but at least in this country, we're getting pushed to more of a niche market.
Also, the people who were playing the Japanese games in the US back then are programming the games of today, and the vast majority of them didn't move to Japan. Hell, even Japanese game giants are making games with an increasing number of non-Japanese companies. Silicon Knights is a Nintendo darling. Sony has a developer studio in San Diego that's produced Mark of Kri, which has some real innovation, and is just a damn great game.
I'm amused when game developers manage to sneak one by the censor.
For example, I'm playing "Golden Sun" on Game Boy Advance, and the teenage female character just got some "armor" which consists of a Geisha-type robe. One of her attacks is to open the robe, reducing the enemy's chance to attack by distracting him. He gets surrounded by little heart symbols. So now I have a teenage girl who distracts giant gorillas by sexually arousing them... Oh yeah, that's an "E for everyone" game all right.
Also, when playing "Ape Escape 2", all the monkeys have names. I laughed when I found one called "Spank"... That was probably the UK translator's doing, though.
GCHQ Quantum Insert installed. If only our tongues were made of glass, how much more careful we would be when we speak
Japan basically "invented" modern videogames, while american computer text adventures and pong were the first videogames ever created it was games like space invaders, pacman and Mario bros the once who defined it as a new way of entertainment. The rest of the world has been trying to keep up with japanese videogame advances since then.
However that situation is beginning to change, over the last 10 years there has been a significant increase in quality in American and European games, while yesteryear a vast majority of american games were clones, quick cash ins on popular franchises of questionable quality and quickie sport games. ( also known in some circles as "crap") Talented developers are changing the tables on that.
While games like EQ, MKDA, TaoFeng, ETM or Tomb Raider just can't compete with their japanese counterparts (although you have to admit they are getting close) games like Halo (1-2), Half Life (1-2), Doom 1,3*, Soul Reaver, Warcraft 3, *The sims and *GTA3 (at least in its technology aspect) are giving (or gave) japanese games a run for their money, they are AAA quality games, some of them using technological advances which are even superior to the ones used in japanese games.
The rest of course comes from cultural rationalization, japanese games have always tried to resemble "anime" and general japanese fantasy (to ridiculous proportions in some cases) American games tend to mimic Hollywood style movies and Comics (to ridiculous proportions in some cases as well) while one is not better than the other, American style is for obvious reasons suited to Americans (duh). The only difference now is that games have (in some cases "slightly") more quality. Because any way you see it, crap is crap here and everywhere. And a good game is a good game just about for everyone.
p.s.
Is also worth mentioning that it helps that there is an American based competetive console out there now (before that it took years for a good american title to leave the PC realm or never did "prince of persia","doom","warcraft"), and that porting to consoles is easier than ever, this helps this titles to reach a broader audience.
Go ahead MOD my day!
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Well, that list was just silly. Japan has not now, or ever had, a monopoly on "Epic RPGs". You need to crack open some PC RPG games there, 'boy.
Also, non-Japanese developers have been making tons of platformers lately. Spyro, Ratchet and Clank, Jak and Daxter, Sly Cooper, etc. etc.
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Probably due to the fact that most Games Consumers are Zombies, and buy whatever the company that owns the console market. The largest userbase being Sony's Playstation 2, and the most marketed game being Britian's GTA shows that. Ditto with EA's sports games, which barly change year-to-year. Most people just can't think for themselves...
While I admit that japanese develpers develop for japanese gamers, the big issue is price. Every game costs $49.99 here, be it Metroid prime or monkey ball. In many asian countries, you can pick up a brand new game at a convenience store for $10 or less. Obviously they arent the best games, but they sell. The US seems to have completely lost touch with the concept of charging less for lower quality products. US gamers value high production value, because games are expensive.
I think a big part of this downturn in Japanese dominance is perhaps because Western gamers are getting sick of bad scripts, dialogue, dubs, and the like. I actually hope this is the case, though some of the article's reasons are probably on the money too (especially Western devs being more innovative lately).
Much of the localization work being done on Western releases of Japanese games is horrendous. Sure, actual script translation are finally getting better, more or less. They still aren't good enough, usually, because it is really hard work to translate the themes of such a foreign art piece, so stories come off as far more hackneyed, cliche, or just plain silly than they should (the fact that a lot of games are all of these on purpose, because they are designed more for non-game merchandice than anything, is another problem that Western games are fairly free of).
But since more games now include voice-work of some kind or another, we have a whole new area for Japanese companies to slack off on. Sure, a little Engrish can be funny from time to time, as can a silly English dub. But I know if I get a domestic release that contains either, it just screams "cheapness", maybe even "we don't care about you stupid gaijin and you have no taste". It is especially bad when companies release a DVD game with no options for the original Japanese dub (Say, SHENMUE II!!!!). Anime companies finally got it, and so should game companies.
A lot of the problems with poor dubbing are simply cultural - the US simply doesn't have the foundation for cheap, excellent voice acting that is possible in Japan. But if you look at lot of the big sellers in the West in the past few years, I think you will find that many of them have ridiculously good English voice acting, like the GTA games. My theory is that gamers find this more important nowadays, and are buying accordingly. (This drive for good voice work is also especially hurting companies like Nintendo, IMO, since I simply think they don't care about quality voice work of any kind in their Japanese developed games - you aren't working with cartridges anymore, guys!)
This may be naive of me - maybe quality of story presentation means nothing to most Western gamers, like it seems to be the case with reviewers ("MGS2 has an amazing, original, unique storyline! I loved it!" Bleh!). But it wouldn't hurt for Westerners to get a little more attention and money devoted to localizing for us.
I won't even start a rant on the amount of censorship some US games get. Okay, I will at least bitch about Boktai - white blood?? In a vampire game? WTF?
(And yes, some games do get excellent translations and dubs, or at least companies do smart stuff like invent a language, a la Panzer Dragoon or ICO. But they are too much a minority.)
There is no excellent beauty that hath not some strangeness in the proportion. -- Francis Bacon
As someone who has lived in Japan for nearly a decade, this doesn't surprise me. If you could see how much repetition goes on in Japan it would make your mind explode (or atleast it did mine a few years back..) In the U.S. most spinoffs and sequels are born in corporations. Companies trying to make money off of a known winner. There is nothing inherently wrong with that unless you're a commie pinko dirtbag hippie freak who hates money. But it does get boring and Americans soon enough tire of the series and something new comes along.
However, in Japan, repetition is not born in corporate board rooms, it is born in school classrooms starting at about age 7. In Japan you are taught the proper way to do something, and then that's it, that's just the way it's done, by everyone, everytime. There are exceptions of course, but the cultural philosophy in Japan emphasizes the correctness of the technique over the originality of the concept. This is a key difference with Americans and will probably not change until the population crisis strikes in about 30-40 years. At that time, Japan will change so drastically it's anyone's guess what will come out the other side.