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Forums - Gaming Discussion - Japanese devs/publishers. What's up with them?

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Since the transition of gaming industry from SD to HD (Sony and MS) I noticed that the presence of Japanese devs/pubs have been dwindling steadily.

I never was a fan of JRPG or anime type of games (Manga etc...), anything that fell into the archetype of anime I swayed from it. But, I like games like Tekken, Virtua Fighter, Ace Combat, Pro Evo, Street Fighter pre-cartoonization, Pokémon etc... besides Pokémon every one of the aforementioned franchises have been in a slump which characterizes the state of Japanese gaming state.

I tried to come up with answers to the cause of their exclusion from the gaming boom after 2005, I came up with: Bad Marketing, Lack of communication with the fan base and shortage of ideas to create games outside of the Japanese spectrum.

Bad marketing in my opinion is one of the biggest of their issues. Games land in US without the fanfares of their Western counterparts. There are no posters at retail stores or TV ads to alert gamers of the game existence. Take for example Vanquish that I knew about it only after I watched a Gamespot episode of best games you never played.

Lack of communication is absurd between Japanese devs/publishers and gamers, especially Western gamers. Xenoblade sequel or remake has been requested by gamers for ages but no one ever stood up take care of gamers but Gamestop, out of everybody. Now Gamestop is showing them how’s done. Xenoblade is not the only game, some of Nintendo games, Capcom games, Namco, Konami, Square Enix, etc… they’re lost. Not even a poor localization is attempted.

Lastly, there is shortage of ideas… nowadays if a Japanese game is not a date sim or JRPG is not even relevant in the market. There is no big hits in the horror genre (not even West), not in sports, not in FPS/TPS, Platformer, not in Open World games, not in Racing/Flying etc… what happened to the geniuses of last 2 decades? Why do they ditch Xbox if they need to make money and exposure in the West? Why don’t they experiment with Arcade games (low risk investment) on XBLA where there’s constant hit gems season in and out with million sellers?

This is just a piece of my mind and the picture that I have about Japanese game developers and publishers.I’d like to know what you guys think and in your perspective how does it look like for you?

 

      

 

 



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My opinion is that the high development costs on the HD consoles made the quality of their games suffer. Japanese games never sold that much outside some big franchises like Final Fantasy, and the development costs brought by the 7th generation made it necessary for them to sell good numbers, otherwise it wouldn't be even near profitable to make a game. That's, IMO, why there is a "westernization" of japanese franchises on home consoles, because those western franchises actually survived the high rise in development costs. On portables, for example, japanese games still have that "japanese feel" to them, and they also were like that on the Wii, which required a much lower budget than making a game on 360/PS3.



Japanese gaming is the same size as it was 10 years ago. It's just more handheld oriented. Plus, the Western part of the industry has grown, so the Japanese part looks smaller in comparison.

I can go into more detail if you want, but I have somewhere to be. So send me a PM or Quote this or something if you want me to go into detail later tonight.



Love and tolerate.

RazorDragon said:

My opinion is that the high development costs on the HD consoles made the quality of their games suffer. Japanese games never sold that much outside some big franchises like Final Fantasy, and the development costs brought by the 7th generation made it necessary for them to sell good numbers, otherwise it wouldn't be even near profitable to make a game. That's, IMO, why there is a "westernization" of japanese franchises on home consoles, because those western franchises actually survived the high rise in development costs. On portables, for example, japanese games still have that "japanese feel" to them, and they also were like that on the Wii, which required a much lower budget than making a game on 360/PS3.

Why doesn't Japanese devs release Arcade games on XBLA then? Why don't they release their past glory as a HD remake on online maketplaces (PSN,XBLA,e-Shop) to fund their future projects?



Salnax said:
Japanese gaming is the same size as it was 10 years ago. It's just more handheld oriented. Plus, the Western part of the industry has grown, so the Japanese part looks smaller in comparison.

I can go into more detail if you want, but I have somewhere to be. So send me a PM or Quote this or something if you want me to go into detail later tonight.

Quoted... whenever you comeback, if you can explain why don't they cater to Western market with their games. Screw Westernization, I'm talking about releasing their original games with English subs.



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Goatseye said:
RazorDragon said:

My opinion is that the high development costs on the HD consoles made the quality of their games suffer. Japanese games never sold that much outside some big franchises like Final Fantasy, and the development costs brought by the 7th generation made it necessary for them to sell good numbers, otherwise it wouldn't be even near profitable to make a game. That's, IMO, why there is a "westernization" of japanese franchises on home consoles, because those western franchises actually survived the high rise in development costs. On portables, for example, japanese games still have that "japanese feel" to them, and they also were like that on the Wii, which required a much lower budget than making a game on 360/PS3.

Why doesn't Japanese devs release Arcade games on XBLA then? Why don't they release their past glory as a HD remake on online maketplaces (PSN,XBLA,e-Shop) to fund their future projects?


Maybe because their market is smaller in consoles when compared to handhelds? Adding to the fact that console development is more costly, I believe that would be the primary reason.



The main reason is the rise of game development in the west. There is much, much more competition in gaming now, especially considering western games are tailored to western tastes.

Another problem is that the old guard is still on top. Because of the lack of PC game development in Japan, we haven't seen smaller developers rise up and push the top dogs. Look at how many western developers started out on the PC and are now big time. I think that's what Keiji Inafune was talking about with Kickstarter, how he'd like to see other options for Japanese developers than going to the same controlling Japanese publishers, who will just take your IP.

The one aspect of Japanese games I really have a problem with personally is the horrible attempts at storytelling that we often end up with. Reading some accounts of how executives will demand changes to the story throughout, I can understand why. They want to add this, take away that, change this to something that will be more popular, until what's left is a total, nonsensical mess.

Ultimately, I think there are just too many old businessmen in control.



We just had a thread about this. Japan has turned their backs on global development and retreated to doing Smart phone/browser/social games and games only Otaku's/Japanese styled gamers can like. They are waving the white flag currently.



Two things I have to say to this:

1. Many larger Japanese companies have completely mismanaged their franchises this generation; either making them more "westernized" in an attempt to get more exposure in the west (i.e. Final Fantasy; Resident Evil) or just simply ran out of ideas/a wall in the genre but continued getting made (i.e. Tekken; Devil May Cry). Rather ironically, it happened at a time when many of them actually went multi-platform with Xbox after years of PlayStation exclusivity. So I think to say "Why do they ditch Xbox if they need to make money and exposure in the West?" is pretty short sighted, when many of the bigger devs did the opposite and managed to completely balls it up, with a few exceptions.

2. Smaller Japanese devs know how to manage their budgets, and there is nothing wrong with that. Targeting a game for their home country will see bigger returns. Take my oft-quoted example, Compile Heart. They seem to need to sell ~ 45k copies to be profitable. The easiest way for them to do that is simply target a niche audience in Japan, and sell to them. Those niche audiences tend to flock to certain consoles, and this generation it's been the PS3 (which is the same reason why Falcom; Nippon Ichi; Gust etc. all develop there too).

If they want to sell a game abroad, they'll have to licence it to an overseas publisher, as they're nowhere near big enough as companies to be able to localize & distribute a game overseas (nor do they tend to have the local knowledge of how to go about that). This means that the aim shouldn't be to make a title to appeal to the west; as it's simply hit or miss whether any western-capable publisher will show any interest (and they'll receive less money for licencing the game than they would for publishing it themselves).

So you've got a divide between the bigger Japanese devs/publishers who are trying to make inroads in the west yet failing to understand the basics of what made their games sell in the first place; and the smaller devs who stick to an audience they know and understand and if they can go further than that - a bonus. If not - they won't go out of business.

(Besides, I always find it absurd that it's possible to criticize small Japanese devs. After the generation we've had in the west of company after company shutting their doors for making too ambitious projects which bombed; we should be looking to Japanese teams who are still chugging along to see what they're doing differently. The answer? Identify your market and sell the game to them and KEEP_WITHIN_A_BUDGET).

There was a third point I wanted to make, but I've forgotten it. May reply again later.

edit: Just remembered it.  Nothing too important though:

3.  As Salnax says, Japanese gaming habits have shifted to handhelds/phones; and that's why we're seeing a much, much smaller output on home consoles.  



I want to point out something really good that Sony has done recently with Playstation CAMP. They're bringing an indie feel to console development by bringing in people with new ideas for games. Tokyo Jungle and Rain are two examples.