Slashdot Mirror
On Selling Western PC Games In Japan
Thanks to GameSpot for their interview with the Japanese PC game publisher Cyberfront, discussing what it takes for a Western PC game to sell in console-dominated Japan. The company's best-sellers are Civilization III, which boasts "good name recognition", and takes advantage of "the... popular simulation genre" in Japan, and interestingly, SWAT III - apparently, "the tactical shooter struck a chord among this particular group: Japan's model firearm subculture." The company's founders argue that the first-person shooter genre can still be popular in Japan, pointing out that "Medal of Honor for PS2 sold 200,000 copies." However, the PC market is still relatively small, so "...a title that sells 10,000 copies in Japan is considered a hit."
It seems that across cultures we have alot of differences (obviously), but despite the reasons for it, no one can resist a good shoot-em-up.
- Code Dark
On a serious note, they say:
but surely there's not much bigger an incentive than 4 or 5 million sales for a port?
In case people are unfamiliar with this "subculture" they are referring to the sport/hobby of Airsoft, which are exact replicas of real firearms, accurate to every detail, including weight. These guns shoot plastic BB's, and are either spring loaded, or, on the more expensive models, gas-powered.
o me p ://www.airsoftelite.com/
Aside from just collecting this guns, there are people that actually play with them ala paintball guns, with teams and everything (think real-life Counterstrike).
When I was a kid, me and brothers would have killed for a good, solid plastic BB gun, so in my quest to relive my childhood days, I bought a few cheap Airsoft Glocks (33 and 17) just for plinking around.
Here are some relevant links:
http://www.redwolfairsoft.com/redwolf/airsoft/H
http://shop.airsoftdynamics.com/home.shtml
htt
Also, these are GREAT for shooting girlfriends/cats!
Cloud City Digital: DVD Production at its cheapest/finest
1) defecate. preferably after eating senna, ex lax, prunes, cabbage and hot sauces.
2) wipe ass with witch hazel, soothes horrific burns
3) prime anus with anal ease.
4) slather richly a considerable amount of vaseline or other anal lubricants into your rectum at least until the bend and also take your yoda doll or yoda soap on a rope and liberally apply it.
5) pucker your ballon knot several times actuating the sphincter muscle in order to work it in
6) slowly rest yourself onto your yoda figurine
7) make sure to have a mechanism by which to fish yoda out of your rectum, the soap on the rope is especially useful because that is built in.
8) gyrate gleefully in your computer chair while your fat sexless geek nerd loser fat shit self enjoys the prostate massage you'll be getting. Read slashdot. Masturbate to anime. Email one of the editors hoping they will honor you with a reply. Join several more dating services - this time, you dont check the (desired - speaks english) and (desired - literate). You figure you might get a chance then. Order some fucking crap from Think Geek. Get Linux to boot on a Black And Decker Appliance. Wish you could afford a new computer. Argue that IDE is better than SCSI because you cant afford SCSI. Make claims about how Linux rules. Compile a kernel on your 486SX. Claim to hate windows but use it for Everquest. Admire Ghyslain's courage in making that wonderful star wars movie. Officially convert to the Jedi religion. Talk about how cool Mega Tokyo is. Try and make sure you do your regular 50 story submissions to Slashdot, all of which get rejected because people who arent fatter than CowboyNeal can't submit. Fondle shrimpy penis while making a yoda voice and saying, feel the force, padawan, feeel the foooorce, hurgm. Yes. Yes. When 900 years you reach, a dick half as big you will not have.
All in a days work with a yoda figurine rammed up your ass.
The Japanese have a very different market to sell for. They like smaller things that are more gadgety, which is why mobile phones and small game consoles are popular, where bulky PC's aren't seen as being as cool as they are in the West.
They also like different kinds of games, the Final Fantasy series is much bigger there than here. Games like Quake and Doom and multiplayer games are much more popular in the west. Multiplayer is a big driver for PC games that the consoles are only just waking up to (They're in "me too!" mode now.)
I am government man, come from the government. The government has sent me. -- G.I.R.
Also, Japan is a country in the Asia and they speak a language called "Japanese."
Umm, why is someone who quotes a known troll site's claims modded interesting?
Come on, do you really belive that Dragon Quest would sell that much on the PC when there are more console owners in Japan then PC owners?
And if this quote was ment for the US (No, I didn't read it since I have no desire to read their flamebate or see their site), from what I can tell that series isn't that popular over here and if they tried selling it to the PC market it probably wouldn't do very well.
they also released the American version translated back into Japanese as "Final Fantasy 7 International Edition". I'm not sure why.
It was rereleased because it had more stuff added to it (not sure what, probably some sidequests, items, monsters, etc. - FFs not really my cup of tea). For some reason the Japanese will actually spend big money on these rereleases. (I suppose some truly obsessive fans combined with lots of disposable income, by American standards, is a good reason for that.) You see the same thing with a lot of Square games especially (Kingdom Hearts did it recently for example), but other companies do it too (Sega rereleased Jet Set Radio in Japan with the two new American levels).
There is no excellent beauty that hath not some strangeness in the proportion. -- Francis Bacon