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The Xbox 360 and Japanese Nationalism
Ant writes "4 Color Rebellion has a transcript of a segment included with its recent Podcast. The piece concerns the launch of the Xbox 360 in Japan, a launch that's amounting to one of the weakest in Japanese gaming history. The authors look into the reasons behind the failure, and try to dissuade gamers from some poorly thought-out rationalizations for the console's lack of success." From the article: "McDonalds knew that some of its tastes would not appeal to the Japanese so they changed their menus. Along with the standard Big Macs and fries they also have Teriyaki burgers, fried shrimp burgers, and other things for the Japanese pallet. They didn't force the American tastes on the Japanese and thus, they thrived. Now look at the Japanese Xbox 360 launch lineup. First person Shooters, sports and car games. Games that sell really well in America but other than the car games are not to the Japanese taste. Had they launched with RPGs, simulation games, party games, gambling games and fighters, they might have done a whole lot better. McDonalds changed their company for the Japanese taste. Microsoft tried to change the Japanese taste for their company."
I'm also disappointed with xbox360's launch titles being mostly FPS, sports, and racing.
Microsoft has released a bunch of games that appeal to the "frat boy culture." I don't know the best way to describe Japan, but I don't think they're real heavy on that.
Why yes. Yes, there would be...
x box_dc)
TOKYO/LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Microsoft Corp. (Nasdaq:MSFT - news) sold less than half of the estimated 159,000 Xbox 360 video game consoles that were available in stores in Japan in its first weekend of sales, a survey showed on Tuesday. (http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20051213/tc_nm/japan_
They should have used better Japanese advertising, such as: "XBOX 360 - Beautiful Happy Exuberance Maker!!"
Teriyaki and Fried Shrimp face plates for XBOX 360. Thanks for making me hungry with your analogy, jackass.
FTS/A: "[McDonalds sells] other things for the Japanese pallet"
The Japanese pallet? Stuff for Japanese straw beds? Huh. I knew the Japanese have some strange boudoir practices (to my sensibilities, anyway), but McD's?
Oh, wait... palate misspelled... I see.
"Trolls they were, but filled with the evil will of their master: a fell race..." -- J.R.R. Tolkien on Olog-hai
And all that without even going on about the badly chosen name. To someone in Japan, "X" means failure, and is pronounced "batsu", which is a penalty you have to take after a failure. And the kanji for bad luck (kyou) is an "X" in a box. Yeah, let's slap a 360 on it, to make it sound like "failure comes around again". And release it with weak software support so that it really is the "penalty box".
Hell, if no other reason, they should have delayed the Japanese release to make sure there weren't any hardware problems, like, say, overheating? Hardware problems with the initial run of Xbox systems, and Microsoft's failure to respond properly, was one reason the main reasons behind the Xbox failure.
--
"Open source is good." - Steve Jobs
"Open source is evil." - Microsoft
This also isn't a strictly-Japanese thing. In the early 2000's (from the Super NES onwards), there was this perceived slight in the U.S. over Nintendo, before Sony and Microsoft took over the game console market. Nintendo of America was, functionally, a branch office of Nintendo of Japan (where the translators worked). Sony and Microsoft read more correctly what American gamers wanted — and Sony is a Japanese company. I believe NOA has more input into the process now. Not that this stopped them; NOA still successfully brought over Mario Party, Pokémon, and Harvest Moon --> Animal Crossing.
It's interesting to note that "The Last Samurai" wasn't received well in theatres on this side of the pond. It did well because it had Tom Cruise in it, before he went psycho.
Kudos on the "Japans can be racist too" comment. Japanese have a low level of memory and anger about Hiroshima. There's magnitudes more anger at Chinese. See this article for more insight.
-Rob
Biblical fiscal responsibility
There must be some reason why koreans love Starcraft while the west liked and moved on.
The article does however make a couple of mistakes. It somehow credits McDonalds and Apple with getting it right. Sorry but McD learned the hardway and Apples success with the iPod is just lucky that western tastes and japanese tastes happen to match up in this instance. If Apple really had a clue they would have insisted on all their content deals for iTunes to be international. Selling song X to a world audience must generate larger sales then just to a fraction considering there is no extra cost.
One thing however that most people forget is how that the japanese in general SUCK at english. Yeah yeah and americans suck at japanese BUT the americans have the advantage of their main language being THE international language. Americans can afford to be lazy.
I am currently watching far to much japanse idol tv (Morning Musume) and while teenage girls are never a good indication of a country's education it becomes pretty clear that there english skill are very poor if compared to the english skill of mainland europeans. If you don't believe me use google. http://video.google.com/videosearch?q=ayaka/ should give you a bunch of short clips showing a member of the group who was born and raised in hawaii giving english lessons to the japanese members.
Considering they are around the age of 16 on average it is nothing their english teacher should be proud of.
Learning a new language, especially one that has no common root, is hard. The hardest part is getting the basics, if you do not understand a simple sentence you do not use the language so you never get experience so you never learn to understand a simple sentence so you do not use it. ETC ETC. Japan probably isn't like holland were people of my generation had a choice, you watch american tv shows or you go play outside. If you didn't like the american show on then that was though, we had 1 tv station.
I think the problem is two-fold, MS being a bit of the typical arrogant american, and the japanese being just a little to snobbish to learn the international language of the world. Oh well at least this might mean Europe becomes a less neglected market.
Oh and if anyone wishes to point out that chinese is spoken by more people then english, I didn't say that. I said english is the international language. More people speak english as their 2nd or 3rd language then any other language. It is the language two people with different mother languages are most likely to have in common. Yes even the french. They all speak perfect english, they just enjoy being rude to americans. Who doesn't.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
I generally agree with the article. I, myself, am disappointed by the crap available for the Xbox360, which really reflects the American gaming market in general. On the otherhand, it's not like Japan is the pinnacle of gaming variety. They've got their own generic crap, it just so happens that what is overdone there is in a different genre than what we have here. We normally get the best the Japanese market has to offer.
As for the failure of the Xbox360 in Japan, I agree that it's due to Microsoft's complete lack of understanding of that market. I really don't understand how they didn't see this coming. That said, if the Xbox360 and PS3 were released on the same day, with identical line-ups and at the same price the Xbox360 still would sell badly. Unlike Americans who generally would choose the foreign product, Japanese would overwhelmingly gravitate towards the Japanese product.
I wouldn't say it's xenophobic, necessarily. That's just how they are. They still have nationalistic pride I suppose, something Americans are sorely lacking. The foreign products that do well are generally fashionable or luxury items. European luxury cars are always popular, as are european fashions in general. Hip hop culture has certainly had a big impact, although it's been diluted and changed in a way that renders it unrecognizable.
Apple products have been successful for a few reasons. First of all, Macs have always been popular because of their ease of us. Japanese consumers are generally not inclined to deal with anything complicated. This is different from elsewhere in Asia, like Taiwan and Korea where PCs dominate the market. In those nations they want something that does it all that they can tinker with. It's why consoles are still so important in Japan and virtually no existant elsewhere in Asia.
iPods have the advantage of being easy to use and very fashionable. And given how much disposable income Japanese have, buying an iPod is nothing to them. That, however, doesn't stop Japanese companies from trying to make an iPod rival, or a rival for anything foreign. And they often try to prove that their products are superior, whether they are or not.
Again, I'm not saying this is a bad thing. It just shows that they've got pride in what they do. Not just the manager, or the engineer, but the guy working on the factory floor, when it isn't a robot doing the job also cares about his job. It isn't like the US, and most western nations where workers are out for themselves and could care less what happens to the company.
And it's not Japanese corporations that foster this attitude, it's the culture itself, because managment generally treat their workers like crap. They do so in ways that would be considered illegal in the US. Japanese managers are known to be abusive with employees. It doesn't happen everywhere, but it's common enough.
Japanese generally don't treat foreigners well. They avoid sitting next to foreigners on trains, I think mainly to avoid being stuck in some potential uncomfortable situation. For a society who's young people have been drawn to hip hop they still manage to gawk at black guys. I've had numerous friends who've been rejected apartments for no reason other than being a foreigner, and the landlord was very direct about the reason. It's common to walk into a store and have the employees stare at you. Some Japanese just think foreigners buy weird stuff and are compelled to follow them around the store. They also like making sweeping generalizations about foreigners, usually based on what they see in movies.
Then there are all the laws that generally give foreigners a hard time. And unlike the US where the government is excessively easy, even on illegal immigrants, in Japan even a minor infraction can be enough to get a foreigner deported.
It's true, you encounter this sort of thing all over the world. But the reality is that Japan is especially bad. In Taiwan, by contrast, they're far more comfortable with foreigners, being very open towards them. It may
If all you need to do to appeal to the Japanese consumer is throw some teriyaki on it and fry some shrimp. I think McDonald's is a little patronizing or stereotypical to offer those choices on the menu.
But true, Microsoft has failed again to wow the Japanese market which continues the entire lackluster roll out of the Xbox360. They aren't wowing North American audiences with their overheating and locking up problems either.
The question is, why is this Microsoft's fault? Where are the Japanese game developers and why aren't they developing more Japan specific titles? Microsoft is releasing the hardware, they have offered an Xbox360 development kit for over a year now, so why can't the dedicated game houses in Japan pick up the ball and start making the Xbox360 an attractive game console for their own markets? Do they have to wait for Microsoft to ask them to make a game?
Anyways, I think Xbox360 failures is just because MS rushed it out the door. Both Quality Control and title support were lacking in all markets, MS could have waited for a few more months for more RPG's to hit the market and they really should have beta tested the platform better. But I mean, MS isn't the only software vendor for the Xbox platform, so the lack of interest in Japan isn't entirely all their fault.
I haven't thought of anything clever to put here, but then again most of you haven't either.
Right. That explains why the Japanese hate the iPod and are buying Sony Walkmen.. wait, they don't hate the iPod.
Or why they hate McDonalds... wait, they don't hate McDonalds.
Or why they hate the US... no wait, they don't hate the US.
Call it for what it is, Microsoft mis-stepped. They didn't have any compelling games for the Japanese market. Japanese games like Katmari Damacy, DDR, Lumines, DOA, Final Fantasy, Dragon Quest, etc.
You've proved nothing because Nintendo or Sony DIDN'T release a console with the same launch titles and do better. When the DS was launched, there was the Mario games, there was the quirking date-sim games, there was the Meteos puzzle game, etc. When the PSP was launched there was the Metal Gear Acid rpg game, there was the Lumines puzzle game, etc. Where are the puzzle games for XBox 360? Where are the dating sim games for the XBox 360? Where are the RPGs for the XBox 360?
GPL Deconstructed
No, clearly they are referring to a base for a shipping containers. See, Japanese pallets are smaller than American ones, and the XBox boxes don't fit on them quite right, so the Japanese, looking at how that would mess up their JIT delivery systems, said, quite rightly, "it isn't worth the hassle".
You could've hired me.
There are! Want pictures? http://www.kotaku.com/gaming/xbox-360-japan-launch -guide/xbox-360-sellout-is-impossible-142359.php
Uh.... how is that different from Metal Gear Solid or Final Fantasy or many other Japanese game series? In fact Japanese games tend to be "interactive movies" much moreso than American games.
That was is SO ironic considering teriyaki is something that Japanese resturants, almost exclusively, do not serve. It exists, it's a real Japanese word, but you won't find Teriyaki ANYTHING *except* at McDonalds.
Obviously, you're not a McDonald's shareholder who would be familiar with these problems.
No, but I have been a McDonald's assistant manager signifigantly longer than a few years ago. What every your friend's managers were doing wasn't something McDonald's was doing, or needed to "figure out". For decades, the policy was after 20 minutes it gets marked on the 'waste' form and thrown out. Recently even 20 minutes was too long.
As sombody who ate plane McDonald's cheeseburgers as a small child, and catered to customers who ordered "Cheese Delights" (a "secret" McDonalds menu item which is a bun with cheese only stuck in the BigMac bun toaster for 30 seconds) even when they technically weren't on the menu, I'm seriously surprised at your pickle problem. Forgetful line cooks, I can see, but cashiers that refuse to do it is at best uncommon, and something they should and could easily be fired for. There's even a button on the cash register for it... Even the old school registers with the printed on buttons.
Starbucks. It does very well in Japan (every location I've seen in Tokyo is equally busy as locations in the U.S. and Canada). And Starbucks did not alter its menu.
Starbucks Japan doesn't have a dramatically different menu than SB USA, but they've clearly changed it over time to better suit Japanese tastes. This is especially true of food; e.g. sandwiches 5 years ago were more "US style" and they have slowly become um, more "Japanese style" (i.e., they now suck; Japanese are not good at sandwiches), and the biscotti were changed from SB's half-way decent biscotti to some sort of bizarre biscotti-shaped butter cookie.
[and of course there's the size issue: SB Japan actually offers small drinks that are somewhat small; ordering a small in the US gets you puzzled looks and the smallest available size is roughly the size of a 55-gallon drum.]
This isn't surprising of course, if something doesn't sell well you'd be nuts to keep selling it unchanged...
We live, as we dream -- alone....
Meanwhile you still can't find a 360 in America after over a million have been sold. PS2 sold 200,000 in the first 3 months as a comparison.
Please, stop making up statistics - it sounds like you're even starting to believe them and that will really fuck up your perception of reality. The PS2 sold nearly 1.5 million units combined between the Japanese launch weekend (980k) and the first 24 hours of sales in the US (510k). I have no idea which launch you were referring to when you said 200k in 3 months, but as you can see you are wrong either way - and I would imagine the European launch numbers for the PS2 exceeded your stat handily as well, but can't find a good source for that info.
The FACT that XBOX 360 with the SAME launch titles would have done much better if it simply had a Nintendo or Sony stamp on it PROVES that the Japanese are closed-minded when it comes to the video game market.
Unfortunately, your fact relies on counterfactual history (the XBOX was not released with the same launch titles but branded by Nintendo) makes your whole chain of reasoning very shaky.
When the policeman of the tie, rule you violate, hello punishment of the kitty?