I have the solution. Better marketing and localization.
Japanese companies use to do well with sales in America. Heck, they use to dominate consoles in terms of sales. But now they don't. Why? Because they have major competition from western developers who are not afraid to pump out a ton of marketing to make sure their product is noticed. And in the last 5 years or so, Japanese developers have skimped out on the marketing of all but the biggest titles.
But alongside this problem is the problem of localization. In the past, Japanese developers felt all they needed to do was release a game with the most substandard localization, full of spelling errors, altered or removed cutscenes and weak voice overs that you would make fun of if they weren't characters you were trying to play as. But now, these pathetic attempts to pump out games as quick and cheap as possible aren't cutting it when they're having to compete with western developed games which are of high quality and don't have a similar low quality localization.
So if these companies really want to fix the problem, they'll stop trying to find a 'killer app' or 'make a game for Americans' and just fix what needs to be fixed. Heck, other companies have, like Atlus or Namco, and its worked well in their favor.
Six upcoming games you should look into:
