Western games in Japan

Acid King · Post by **Acid King** » Fri Dec 30, 2005 7:53 am

After a comment GaijinPunch made a while ago about the anti western attitude of Japanese gamers, I started wondering about western games in Japan. Does anyone know of any particular American/European developed game or series that is popular in japan? You'd figure that with the amount of games developed in America, there would have to be atleast a handful that do well over there. I know that stuff like Everquest, World of Warcraft and Starcraft have had fairly good receptions in Asia but I'm wondering more about console games.

greg · Post by **greg** » Fri Dec 30, 2005 8:00 am

Yeah, PC gaming is dominated by Western developers in Japan, since most of the domestic PC games in Japan are usually hentai.

When I lived in Japan, I didn't see much interest in any Western games. I think they're treated unfairly, at least for great stuff like the Wipeout series. What's not to like about those?

I would guess that Baseball games may be somewhat popular, since Japanese have a keen interest in baseball since the likes of Ichiro, Sasaki and, to some extent, Nomo have made it big in America. Everyone knows the Seattle Mariners in Japan. Am I wrong?

Specineff · Post by **Specineff** » Fri Dec 30, 2005 8:38 am

Wasn't the first Crash Bandicoot a success in Japan? It was made by an all-western team, IIRC.

Acid King · Post by **Acid King** » Fri Dec 30, 2005 9:05 am

Specineff wrote:Wasn't the first Crash Bandicoot a success in Japan? It was made by an all-western team, IIRC.

Yeah, Naughty Dog is an American company, but I dunno how successful it was in Japan.

Ord · Post by **Ord** » Fri Dec 30, 2005 9:22 am

The GTA series on the PS2 is popular in Japan is it not?

MOSQUITO FIGHTER · Post by **MOSQUITO FIGHTER** » Fri Dec 30, 2005 9:23 am

I seem to remember GTA 3 doing well in Japan.

GaijinPunch · Post by **GaijinPunch** » Fri Dec 30, 2005 10:56 am

One of the GTA's did well in Japan. I can't help but think of something that just reaks of America will sell well on that merit alone. That's how Sega marketed Shenmue US -- English practice (with subtitles).

I think the ones that do the best are western-developed games but that are directed by Japanese. Rare titles come to mind. The others I would say are Ubisoft, and maybe some racing games. I believe Prince of Persia was a hit in Japan. I'm sure someone saves Famitsu stats. I found a site with really old ones (16-bit era) one time, but have not seen any recently. For console games though, I doubt there are any western games in the top 10 for a given year, or even 20.

Yeah, PC gaming is dominated by Western developers in Japan, since most of the domestic PC games in Japan are usually hentai.

I think this is a bit misleading. Western developed PC games dominate the non-hentai market... even that might be a stretch since companies like Sega and even Namco are either licensing or putting out their games on the PC. I'd put any of the Falcom releases up against Quake 4 or Half Life 2 sales in Japan anyday. Anyways, I can't site a statistic, but apparently 80% of PC game sales are the hentai stuff. If that's true, then they go beyond market domination. The sad thing is... I think it is true. I would like to see numbers though if someone wants to go looking.

CIT · Post by **CIT** » Fri Dec 30, 2005 3:13 pm

I believe Western racing games for console usually do the best in Japan. Burnout 3, Need for Speed series, etc.

The Medal of Honor games seem to have sold okay too.

The n00b · Post by **The n00b** » Fri Dec 30, 2005 3:58 pm

Medal of Honor: Rising Sun sold really well over in japan when it first came out. I remember all the editorials because no one could figure out why such an asstastic game(and an fps at that) would sell so well in Japan of all places.

Kiken · Post by **Kiken** » Fri Dec 30, 2005 5:35 pm

Specineff wrote:Wasn't the first Crash Bandicoot a success in Japan? It was made by an all-western team, IIRC.

The first game broke the 1 million units sold barrier in Japan. I'm not sure about parts 2 and 3, but I suspect they did comparable sales. The Japanese really latched on to Crash (they altered his character a bit.. not to mention gave him a voice).

Also, I believe the Japanese term for non-Japanese developed games is yoogee.

BrianC · Post by **BrianC** » Fri Dec 30, 2005 7:04 pm

Kiken wrote:
Specineff wrote:Wasn't the first Crash Bandicoot a success in Japan? It was made by an all-western team, IIRC.
The first game broke the 1 million units sold barrier in Japan. I'm not sure about parts 2 and 3, but I suspect they did comparable sales. The Japanese really latched on to Crash (they altered his character a bit.. not to mention gave him a voice).

Apparantly, Spyro was altered in Japan too. http://www.play-asia.com/paOS-13-71-66- ... 0-br1.html

Andi · Post by **Andi** » Fri Dec 30, 2005 7:28 pm

Diablo, Starcraft, Counter-Strike, etc. were huge in Korea. Anybody know if they had a big following in other parts of Asia too?

Ganelon · Post by **Ganelon** » Fri Dec 30, 2005 7:30 pm

And just for trivia, the subtitle "Ripto's Rage" for Spyro 2 came from the fact that the JP kana for "Spyro" in that weird Spyro font looks like the English word "Ripto."

CIT · Post by **CIT** » Fri Dec 30, 2005 7:57 pm

Andi wrote:Diablo, Starcraft, Counter-Strike, etc. were huge in Korea. Anybody know if they had a big following in other parts of Asia too?

Gaming in Korea can absolutely not be compared with gaming in Japan. Apart from the popularity of SNK they're worlds apart. Instead of arcades, gaming culture now centers around the "PC-ban", internet cafes in which people play online games. Also, it can sometimes be hard for an overly "Japanese-style" game to be accepted by Korean gamers, due to the lingering cultural animosity.

Having said that, Diablo was pretty popular in Japan, though SC and CS are niche games.

Turrican · Post by **Turrican** » Fri Dec 30, 2005 8:08 pm

BrianC wrote:
Kiken wrote:
Specineff wrote:Wasn't the first Crash Bandicoot a success in Japan? It was made by an all-western team, IIRC.
The first game broke the 1 million units sold barrier in Japan. I'm not sure about parts 2 and 3, but I suspect they did comparable sales. The Japanese really latched on to Crash (they altered his character a bit.. not to mention gave him a voice).
Apparantly, Spyro was altered in Japan too. http://www.play-asia.com/paOS-13-71-66- ... 0-br1.html

Not just them: Lara Croft and Ratchet had a facelift too. Pandemonium! too iirc, it's quite a common marketing strategy.

Vexorg · Post by **Vexorg** » Fri Dec 30, 2005 8:23 pm

Starcraft is a niche game in Korea? Last I heard they were still selling over 100,000 copies a year there.

CIT · Post by **CIT** » Fri Dec 30, 2005 8:28 pm

Vexorg wrote:Starcraft is a niche game in Korea? Last I heard they were still selling over 100,000 copies a year there.

Not in Korea, in Japan.

sethsez · Post by **sethsez** » Fri Dec 30, 2005 9:20 pm

Wizardry is extremely successful in Japan if I remember correctly (to the point that they'd make their own Wizardry games in addition to the official ones).

CIT · Post by **CIT** » Fri Dec 30, 2005 9:24 pm

sethsez wrote:Wizardry is extremely successful in Japan if I remember correctly (to the point that they'd make their own Wizardry games in addition to the official ones).

Yeah, good you mention it. In fact it was Wizardry that started the whole "Japanese RPG" style of gameplay, with exploring dungeons, random battles, etc, even though it is not Japanese at all.

GaijinPunch · Post by **GaijinPunch** » Fri Dec 30, 2005 9:31 pm

I think Quake was the most popular FPS (other than perhaps some of the war ones). Half Life went relatively unnoticed. I assume something similar for HL2. As Seven Force said, Diablo did pretty well, although I'm not so sure about Diablo 2. I knew some guys I worked with that played it.