Gaming
The Decline and Revival of Japanese Video Games in the West
Over the last handful of years, some of the biggest and most original highlights in the video gaming world have been Japanese. Huge hits like FFXV, Nier Automata, Persona V, Gravity Rush 2, The Last Guardian, Zelda Breath of the Wild, BloodBorne and the Dark Souls series, which are all uniquely and unequivocally Japanese, have enjoyed great success both critically and financially .Previous to this, our PCs and consoles were starting to suffer from a Groundhog Day levels of repetitive open-world GTA clones, Gears of War-esque third person shooters, countless FPS and an untold number of sequels, prequels, and even pre-sequels. I think everyone would agree that, although Japanese games have always been present, this strong resurgence is a much welcome breath of fresh air.
Looking through a list of the best selling video games from the seventh generation of consoles, if you remove Nintendo, many would notice a distinct lack of Japanese games. This void in the games industry seemed to span throughout the ten-year lifecycle of the PS3, Xbox 360 and the then current generation of PCs. This sudden lack seemed odd, after all, the 5th and 6th generations (not including the Xbox), contained a healthy mix of both Japanese and Western developed games. So why did the West lose interest in Japanese games? Furthermore, why did Japanese developers struggle to make games that would sell well in the West?
As pointed out back in 2014, by a former game dev and journalist James Mielke, one of the reasons why Nippon games struggled so much, was due to the appearance and ensuing success of the Xbox. Microsoft, who already had an entire wealth of PC technology on their side, were able to integrate it into their console. Although Sony’s PSone and PS2 already had much support from Western developers, their technology was more arcade based. This meant that many new Western development teams chose to cast their lot with the Xbox, being already more familiar and comfortable with developing games on PC technology.
With the Xbox, gamers started discovering different kinds of video games. Popularity for games by Bethesda, for example, who dazzled players with their huge, realistic and immersive worlds, really caught on. Microsoft themselves started publishing their own games such as the action packed third person shooter game Gears of War. The Xbox also became the number one choice for players of Activision’s first-person shooter series, Call of Duty. Due to the popularity and sudden demand for these types of games, Sony couldn’t help but provide PlayStation owners with these same Western developed games. Call of Duty and the smash hit series Halo, in particular, offered a more gritty, realistic experience. It stood in stark contrast with the more fantasy-esque take many Japanese games offered. To quote Mark McDonald, executive director at a Tokyo localization company, in an article from 2014: ‘ First-person shooters rely on realism, but a lot of Japanese game design comes from an imaginative aesthetic where it’s not just going for straight realism. But that [realism] was kind of what people started to want.’ The gaming landscape had suddenly shifted and it only continued to do so as the next generation of consoles came along.
Japanese developers seemed at a loss, preferring to concentrate on releasing Japanese games for handheld consoles, many of which were aimed purely at the Japanese consumer market. Meanwhile, in the West, even popular, well established, Japanese franchises were struggling to find their footing. Resident Evil 5 and 6 disappointed players. Final Fantasy XIII and it’s ensuing sequels didn’t quite manage to captivate people as much as the previous games in the franchise had. It probably didn’t help that Team Ico, the Japanese team behind some of the most critically acclaimed games of the past decade, never actually managed to release their much anticipated game, The Last Guardian, on the PS3.
Of course, that’s not to say that Japanese video games had completely fallen off the radar. Many in the West still enjoyed them, they were just getting harder to find and didn’t often make an appearance on the AAA charts list, preferring to be more commonly found on Nintendo Ds, 3Ds, Sony’s PSP and PSP Vita. Interestingly so, the most successful Japanese titles released on the 7th generation often contained more of a Westernised theme. Games such as From Software’s hugely popular Demon Souls and Dark Souls, managed to captivate players, with it’s brutal, medieval world of knights and dragons. The same could be said for Dragon’s Dogma, which was like Capcom’s answer to The Elder Scrolls series. It impressed players with its gritty, fantasy world and its thrilling fights against titan-esque monsters from Western folklore. It could be believed that the success of these games helped certain Japanese developers get a clear idea of what Western gamers liked, adapting their games to follow suit but with their own unique twist.
Now Japanese games are back and they’re stronger than ever. Could this be a direct result of an overabundance of realistic and gritty games, perhaps? While, simultaneously, leading consumers back to the surreal and unique worlds offered by Japanese titles. Overall, it’s great to see Japanese titles doing so well again. Whether it be on PC, PS4, Xbox One or Switch, Japanese games will no doubt still manage to intrigue and entice Western gamers for many years to come.
Gaming
Ubisoft says that future Assassin’s Creed games will need more time to be made
As Assassin’s Creed Shadows is about to sneak up on people in November, Ubisoft says that the time between developing games needs to be longer to find the “right balance.” Shadows has been in development for four years, longer than any other game in the series up to this point. That includes the huge open-world epics Assassin’s Creed Odyssey and Assassin’s Creed Valhalla.
Shadows lead producer Karl Onnée (thanks, GamesIndustry.biz) says that the latest AC game took 25% longer to make than Valhalla. He says this is necessary to keep the quality of the series that it is known for: “It’s always a balance between time and costs, but the more time you have, the more you can iterate.” You can speed up a project by adding more people to it, but that doesn’t give you more time to make changes.
Onnée says this has as much to do with immersion and aesthetics as it does with fixing bugs and smoothing out pixels. This is because the development team needs time to learn about each new historical setting: “We are trying to make a game that is as real as possible.” We’re proud of it, and the process took a long time. In feudal Japan, building a house is very different from building a house in France or England in the Middle Ages. As an artist, you need to learn where to put things in a feudal Japanese home. For example, food might not belong there. Get all the information you need and learn it. That process takes a long time.”
You’ll have to wait a little longer for Ubisoft to work on each game. Are you okay with that? In what part of Shadows are you now? Is it interesting to you? Leave a comment below and let us know.
Gaming
You can now pre-order Lollipop Chainsaw RePOP on PS5
You can now pre-order Lollipop Chainsaw RePOP, a remaster that Dragami Games and Capcom both created. You can now pre-order the PS5 game on the PS Store for $44.99 or £39.99. If you have PS Plus, you can get an extra 10% off the price.
The company put out a new trailer with about three minutes of gameplay to mark the start of the pre-order period. Lollipop Chainsaw RePOP is a remaster of Grasshopper Manufacture’s crazy action game from 2012. You play as Juliet, a high school student who fights off waves of zombies.
The remaster adds RePOP mode, an alternative mode that swaps out the blood and gore for fun visual effects. It also adds a bunch of other features and improvements that make the game better overall. You can expect the graphics and sound to be better as well.
The game will now come out on September 12, 2024, instead of September 12, 2024. Are you excited to get back to this? Please cheer us on in the section below.
Gaming
This Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 zombies trailer is way too expensive
Is there really anyone who is following the story of Call of Duty’s zombie mode? We’ve known about the story in a vague way for a while, but we couldn’t tell you anything about it. It looks like the “Dark Aether” story will continue in Black Ops 6, but we don’t really know what that means.
For those of you who care, here is the official blurb with some background: “Requiem, led by the CIA, finally closed the last-dimensional portal, sending its inhabitants back to the nightmare world known as the Dark Aether, after two years of fighting zombie outbreaks around the world during the Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War timeline.”
Wait, there’s more! “Agent Samantha Maxis gave her life to seal this weird dimension from the inside out.” Even worse things were to come: senior staff members of Requiem were arrested without a reason by the Project Director, who turned out to be Edward Richtofen.
Black Ops 6 will take place about five years later, and it looks like it will show more about Richtofen’s goals and motivations. The most important thing is that you will probably be shooting an unimaginable number of zombies in the head. This week, on August 8, there will be a full reveal of the gameplay, so keep an eye out for that.
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