why Japanese not support xbox? but US has a lot ps fans

[huaxiong90]

loves2splooge said:

huaxiong90 said:

Hence why I said "some". Aside from Lost Odyssey, all these JRPG's didn't do great sales numbers or critic scores. Not that I'm taking a jab at these games, but that's the truth of it. The Japanese aren't going to trust Xbox 360 JRPG exclusives anymore.

Third-party Xbox 360 jrpg exclusives, I can understand. But the first-party exclusives aren't going anywhere so there's absolutely zero risk in buying Blue Dragon, Lost Odyssey, Infinite Undiscovery (owned by MS), etc. Also contrary to popular perception, the majority of Japanese third-party Xbox 360 exclusives stayed exclusive.

The problem is, these games don't have big names like Final Fantasy, Gran Turismo, MGS or Hot Shots Golf (big in Japan). The Japanese gamer may look at the Xbox 360 and think it has merit because of all the jrpgs, quirkly Japanese games (Idolmaster), visual novels, dating sims and shmups it has but if they are only going to choose one console, they are going to go with the console that has the name brands they are used to. It's as simple as that. To ask Japanese gamers to pay $300 more for an extra piece of hardware when they can invest that money in games for consoles they already have, not every gamer is going to be up for that. Especially when the home console market in Japan has shrunk so much.

At the end of the day, M$ succeeded in building a hardcore following in Japan that accounts for 8.5% of current gen hardware and 10.6% of current gen software. That is a big moral victory for the Xbox division. The Xbox 360 has a very strong niche appeal: a mix of western games with niche Japanese games. And the hardcore fanatics are crazy enough to buy timed exclusives first on the 360 because they can't wait.

The Last Remnant sold 180k in Japan even though it was already announced before release that TLR would later on be released to Windows and PS3 (at the time we didn't know the PS3 version would be cancelled). And considering that The Last Remnant was one of the top selling 360 games (sold a little less than ToV on 360), even though the Japanese expected the PC and PS3 versions to come out later, that shows that timed exclusivity actually works. Obviously ideally first-party exclusives are better but third-party timed exclusivity can win over a lot of hardcore Japanese gamers.

Also while the Tales and Star Ocean moneyhatting pissed off a lot of Tales and Star Ocean fans that went out and bought a 360 for just these games, I think this scenario also influenced some 360 buyers to give the more niche Japanese games (that have remained exclusive) and western games a try. Think about it. Say you already own a PS3 and now a 360 because you bought it for Tales and SO. Are you just going to sell off your 360 because Tales and SO jumped ship later on? You might as well make the most of your purchase and try the niche Japanese games and western games that have remained exclusive. You already paid for the console, might as well use it right?

Trust me, I know that, and I never implied all of them jumped ship. As for Lost Odyssey and Blue Dragon, I wasn't including them in the whole 1 year timed exclusivity deals. I was just talking about their quality and sales, and neither one did great numbers in Japan than they normally would (meaning if it was on the PS3 instead, or even the Wii) or with critics, unfortunately... LO did much better than expected in the west, though.

 

As for the blue, I sure do hope you're right. I do feel the Japanese should be giving more console games a try, instead of limiting themselves to handhelds.