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Top-Selling Japanese Games In 2003 Reveal Trends
Thanks to The Magic Box for their chart showing the top-selling videogames in Japan during 2003. Square Enix's Final Fantasy X-2 for PS2 tops the chart, selling a little less than 2 million copies, despite Japanese consumer discontent with the title, and Nintendo's Pokemon Ruby/Sapphire for GBA places second, with almost 1.5 million copies sold in 2003, and nearly 5 million in total. A surprise hit in third place is the PlayStation 2 action title Dynasty Warriors 4 from Koei, and further down the chart, Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles for GameCube can only manage a disappointing 26th place, with 310,000 copies sold, and an Xbox title of any kind is, sadly, nowhere to be seen in the Top 30.
But I guess it makes sense.. they all love the sport, but so little space to play it.. years-long waiting lists makes PS2 golf look much better.
And speaking of the PS2, 18 games are PS2, 7 GBA and 5 GC.. wow.. that's some PS2 lovin'...
--Less Thinkin', More Drinkin'...
nice list and all but that site tried to install so much junk on my computer, does slashdot really need to link to sites like these? surely the top 30 list exists on a site that does'nt try to pull these tricks.
but onto my point, I though grand theft auto sold over 230,000 copies in japan so how come it is'nt on the list?
an Xbox title of any kind is, sadly, nowhere to be seen in the Top 30.
Who cares?
The Everybody's Golf series is called Hot Shots Golf over here. It's similar to Mario Golf, it's fast, simple and not very realistic. Camelot, the developers of the first Everybody''s Golf game, developed the two Mario Golf games.
I'll ignore making the comparison to GTA sales and asking you whether all Americans love stealing cars and shooting people, although I could make that argument against your subtle racism, since many people play golf video games who do not enjoy playing real golf and vice versa.
I hate liberals. If you are a liberal, do not reply.
My apologies... instead, I should have said that "while I lived in Japan for 2 and a half years, every driving range I ever went to, day or night was completely full, and every golf course I ever inquired about had a waiting list of several months at least", thereby making me believe that "there are a good many citizens of Japan who enjoy the game of golf" and perhaps "they play video-game golf in order to get at least some sort of golf-experience that they otherwise could not afford the time or money to have".
And while I know that RPG games sell VERY well in Japan, I do not believe that everyone there wishes to go out with a sword on the street, slaying first rats and small animals and then moving on to larger things, ever-searching for that eventual girl to rescue.
not every simple mis-speaking/mis-typing is racist, and I hate it when it is viewed as such.
For someone with a sig line of "I hate liberals, if you are a liberal do not reply" your PC flag flies very quickly, it seems
--Less Thinkin', More Drinkin'...
So what were those trends hinted at by the headline? Mind filling the rest of us in on your interpretation of the chart? Or were you planning to "reveal" them with your next story?
Which game are you most contented with in 2003 (Readers)?
1. Tales of Symphonia (GC, Namco)
2. Mario Kart: Double Dash!! (GC, Nintendo)
3. Final Fantasy X-2 (PS2, Square)
I think this suggests that people buy games just to buy them like everyone else does.
not every simple mis-speaking/mis-typing is racist, and I hate it when it is viewed as such.
Agreed.
Combined with the number of flamebaiters and trolls on here, the ability to quickly respond to things well before actually thinking through what someone wrote just promotes a lot of the bashing that goes on here nowadays, particularly with game articles.
I got slammed as a racist because I didn't like the aggressive music on the Madden 2004 soundtrack.
I would be interested in knowing why there is a large interest in golf in Japan, if you have any ideas.
Linux - because it doesn't leave that Steve Ballmer aftertaste.
It's great to see that one of its games is a bestseller in Japan. I remember the days when Koei only made turn-based strategy games, and could only satisfy a niche market. Hopefully this recent success will allow them to make even more excellent games.
Rob
They got another Dragon Quest (Warrior) Monsters Game? Dragon Quest Monsters: Caravan Heart for the GBA was 7th place. Does anybody know if that's just another name for one we have over here or an entirely different game? I've actually never played one, but I've recently become enamored with the Dragon Warrior series, having played the rereleass of 2 and 3 on the GBC, and DW7 on Playstation.
At any rate, it's a little OT, but, do any other single-player RPG fans out there besides me find the Dragon Warrior games to be a whole lot more satisfying than the Final Fantasy series? Sure, the graphics on DW7 are pretty subpar for the Playstation, but the games seem to be a whole lot more challenging, with less cheesy diolouge, cooler spells and attacks, dungeons with more than one direction to go in, and things like that.
They get plenty of respect in Japan, as Dragon Quest 7 was the greatest selling playstation game ever over there, or something like that. But they really don't get props over in the States. Nobody payed much attention to the GBC rereleases of of Dragon Warrior 1, 2, and 3, even though they were marvelous remakes, and it's been near impossible to find DW7 in a store for a long time now. [sigh]
Insightful: 76, Off-Topic: 379, Flamebait: 24, Funny: 152, Interesting: 201, Underrated: 55, Troll: 9, Total: 896
You don't have to take every thing so damn literally around here. And, no, you didn't ignore the GTA comparison because you use it in your argument. To ignore the comparison you would have had to delete most of the second paragraph of your post.
And please tell me how using 'they' to describe the people of a country is 'subtle racism'.
So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.
I'm not sure why this described as sad - I would characterize it as entirely predictable. We have all read about the many struggles that Microsoft has had in gaining acceptance in the Japanese market. Despite its best efforts, Microsoft's console has remained in last place, embarrassingly outsold even by the rebranded original PlayStation, the PSOne.
Part of the problem is the physically large design of the Xbox hardware itself, in a country where space in the typical home is at a premium and a small PS2 or GameCube is far preferable to the bulky Xbox.
Part of the problem is undoubtedly related to an allegiance to the domestic console manufacturers - Sony and Nintendo - over the foreign Microsoft.
But the biggest problem may be a cultural one. If the Xbox provided titles that appeal to the Japanese market, the Xbox would have better sales and better game sales. But it doesn't. Without the titles to back up the platform, there isn't - and the shouldn't be - any expectation of strong sales.
Splashy marketing and hype only buy you the attention of Japanese gamers (or any gamers for that matter). The question is: Can the Xbox deliver on the content?
So far - in Japan - the answer to that question is a resounding NO.
There is interest in golf in Japan, but it's primarily among older males (40's and up). Women and young men generally have little interest. However, from what I understand from coworkers, Everybody's Golf (minna no gorufu) is a pretty fun game, regardless of whether you like or dislike golf, hence its universal popularity.
Uhm, Crystal Chronicles came out in August in Japan, so considering how popular Final Fantasy is over there, I think that's definitely a little disappointing, although understandable considering the smaller install-base of the GameCube compared to PS2.
:)
How did you think FF:CC sold 300,000 or more without having come out, anyhow?
This is ./ afterall.
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and an Xbox title of any kind is, sadly, nowhere to be seen in the Top 30.
Yeah, it's pretty unfortunate that Microsoft is having a hard time making a profit in Japan, because you know... hey wait a minute, am I still on slashdot?
American cars don't sell well here because they (historically) are huge, have bad mileage, and break down a lot.
The Xbox is huge, and from my personal experience breaks down a lot. As far as mileage goes, my Gamecube travels with me to my casual gaming friends because it is smaller with a handle, and it has better multi player games.
I checked on Gamefaqs for Japanese release dates and found nearly all of my favorite Xbox games have been released in Japan. Unfortunately, most of them didn't sell well in the US either.
You may be referring to Gamespot's Xbox game of the year Star Wars: KOTOR which hasn't been released there, but this topic is about top selling games of 2003 and both of Gamespot's GC and PS2 games of the year came out in Japan in 2002.
The one Glaring Error in the title is that, unlike most if not all the games in this list, Dynasty Warriors 4 is a multi-console game so X-Box is included in this list.
The trend noted is not wether or not the article is an anti-microsoft statement but it's a trend noting that game makers are making Games exclusively for specific platforms.
Kingdom Hearts, Final Fantasy (for the most part), Grand Turismo, and SOCOM have always been known for being Playstation 1 and/or 2 games.
Secondly, the next trend should note that Sony has such a foothold in the Japaneese market that it will take sometime for other console makers, including Xbox, to even make a dent in the Japaneese markets.
If any other console makers are to even try to make a dent in the Japaneese console markets, then these console companies are going to have to go to the Developers of the Games I mentioned above or games mentioned in the top Japaneese Game lies and either port or create new games for non-Sony consoles.
Dolemite
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Japanese gamers aren't stupid like we tend to be. They can see a non-FF game (in this case, a "Seiken Densetsu"-style game) with a Final Fantasy title from a mile away, while we, with our "Final Fantasy Adventure" and "Final Fantasy Legend" heritage are quite easily duped. That's why it WILL sell better here than it did in Japan, and that's not wishful thinking.
Honestly, any gamer expecting a traditional FF game simply because of FFCC's title is going to be disappointed. Enjoy it on its own merits, not as part of something "bigger."
Lastly, install base has less to do with hit Japanese game sales than you might think. In Japan, much more so than elsewhere, hit games push system sales. Witness Tales of Symphonia. If FFCC were all that great, more gamers would have bought GCNs to play it (some did, just not many at all compared to those who did for Symphonia). The Cube's smaller install base in Japan relative to the PS2 was likely not a causative factor for FFCC's relatively poor performance. Given the fact that it's not a game in the "true" FF lineage, if it was the same game, only available for the PS2, it would still probably have pulled very similar sales numbers. Look at the performance of Star Ocean - 500 thou for a PS2 RPG from a very respected game series vs. 300 thou for FFCC on the GCN. That's probably the maximum kind of difference you could have expected.
First, there's no indication that the Xbox version's sales were included in the tally, and there is no way to verify the-magicbox's numbers without knowing their sources (which they all-too-often fail to cite). For that matter, it is impossible to know whether the GameCube verison of DBZ Budokai was tallied, either, so perhaps the GameCube was represented once more as well, although I get the feeling that all numbers were system-specific.
Second, historically-speaking, there is no stigma with moving game series across game systems. Look at how many systems the Resident Evil series has been on (Playstation, Saturn, N64, Windows, GameBoy, Game.com (hehe), Dreamcast, Playstation 2, GameCube). To use your examples, Kingdom Hearts is too new and too small a series (one PS2 game, one upcoming PS2 sequel, and a GBA sequel) to use as an ecample, Final Fantasy games are across two different companies's platforms spanning multiple generations, Gran Tursimo is a SONY game, and so is SOCOM. It makes almost no difference on which company's platform your next game in a line of sequels is released, except in cases where the sequel is part of a first-party-developed game series.
The reason why I mentioned your fist point is that all of the other games noted in the list (except for Dynasty Warriors 4) are not available on the X-Box.
I guess my main point is that X-Box is too new of a Kid on the proverbial block to be included into 'the Cool Kids Club'.
Dolemite
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Of the top 20 XBox games on Gamerankings.com, at least 12 have not been released in Japan. Admittedly, a good chunk of that is made of sports games, which wouldn't sell even if released, but the point is that there are no equivalent high-rating Japan-only XBox games. The situation is getting a lot, lot better, but then again, Microsoft is going to some desperate measures: releasing Morrowind untranslated for the Japanese market?
Final Fantasy X-2 can't be that bad. It's the only game that CmdrTaco is playing according to the What We're Playing tab on the right side of Slashdot Games page. And Yuna's damn sexy.
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Whomever made this post certainly hasn't at all glanced at the gaming markets outside of North America. X-Box is a flop everywhere else, so don't cry about not having X-Box exclusive games on that list. And while we are at it, what the Americans called "football" is not appreciated nor known outside of North America, but what is known outside as "football" is almost globally loved. Hence no one plays Madden Football 2004 in Japan or wherever, but they play Winning Eleven 7, which (or its ancestor?) I believed made it to the all-time greatest game list among British gamers.
As for Shin Sangoku Mosou 3 (aka Dynasty Warrior 4), Koei has built a popular, gigantic franchise out of the people and events of the Chinese historical period for over 15 years by now, so anything in that setting from Koei automatically sells, just like Final Fantasy series. Not to mention the game itself is actually very much fun for those who love hack-and-slash, which explains why it and its expansion (you don't need the original game to play it) combined for over 1.5 million copies.
You really have to understand the Japanese popular culture for the list to make sense. For example,
- The Japanese loves certain sports, such as baseball, soccer, golf, wrestling
- they prefer made-in-Japan goods and Japanese brands even if more expensive
- they love certain franchises, such as Dragon Ball Z, Final Fantasy, Zelda, Mario, Hello Kitty
- they love "cute" and "fun" things, which usually translates to the preference of bright, cheerful settings over dark, gothic ones
- they are much closer in terms of language, culture, religion and history with Chinese than with Western world, which results in many "weird" Western things including mixed up interpretations of Christianity and/or with various mythologies, supposedly Western characters doing things the Japanese way (e.g., bowing in greetings), and many more
Once you look at things this way, the list makes a lot more sense. In fact, I got at least half the games on the list right, before even laying my eyes on it.Almost all of those games are sequels or offshoots of previously-released games. Part of the reason I rarely reach for the consoles anymore is because pretty much everything that's coming out is a rehash of something I've already played.
Enough with the console bias already. Remorse at an underperforming GCN title and mock sympathy for the Japanese Xbox failure is getting ridiculous. Everybody who reads this site regularly has seen it in the story comments a million times. Lets try to keep it off the front page, Simoniker.
If you could be anything you want, I'll bet you'd be disappointed.