This unfortunately and same situation with me.Its because Japanese games aren't as good anymore and this is coming from a guy who grew up with NES, SNES and Genesis where we didn't have labels like Japanese games. It was just understood that most good games came from Japan. The fact that we even have to quanitify it or mention it shows how far they've fallen.
Blackbond
Why are western reviewers xenophobic?
This topic is locked from further discussion.
I hate most japenesee games that aren't made by nintendo for the most part. THeir stories are stupid and dumb see final fantasy/kingdom hearts/metal gear
inb4uall
It's called a style.
MGS' story is nonsense, that's why I love it.
Give me parody, nonsense, meta, anything, just not 'serious' cutscenes/narrative like in 99% of western games, that puts me off.
Give me Portal, MGS, Kid Icarus: Uprising. Over the top stuff.
Mass Effect's cutscenes have no style. No charm. It's realistic, straight forward, logical and serious, hence boring.
I agree with you on that in some ways. Many Western reviewers are easily more swayed by Western style games. Any weird Japanese games many not be to their liking. Still, we have been playing Japanese style games for many years. Every since the NES hit US shores and Westerners loved it. So it really depends on the game and the journalist taste. Most journalist who have been playing games since the beginning will have a better understanding of Eastern style games. Also want to say, I love your avatar and sig. Attack the Block is a great movie http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1478964/ Did they make a game for it? You sig looks like it's from a the game.Because Western audiences judge games based on Western attitudes. Western games also have a notoriously bad time in Japan, each culture tends to like certain things and anything that doesn't follow their design philosophy is deemed "bad."
metroidfood
There's a lot of truth in what the tc says, but Western game lovers will deny it until death. A LOT of Japanese games get unfair treatment and reviews, or lack there of because of cultural bias.
I think most of these reviewers are heavily influenced by big business companies who have a vested interest in making Western games appear better than some foreign game company.
I'm not saying every single Japanes game gets a raw deal, but it cannot be denied that a lot of them do, simply because the reviewer does not like or understand what they're reviewing out of bias, ignorance or influence.
There's a lot of truth in what the tc says, but Western game lovers will deny it until death. A LOT of Japanese games get unfair treatment and reviews, or lack there of because of cultural bias.
I think most of these reviewers are heavily influenced by big business companies who have a vested interest in making Western games appear better than some foreign game company.
I'm not saying every single Japanes game gets a raw deal, but it cannot be denied that a lot of them do, simply because the reviewer does not like or understand what they're reviewing out of bias, ignorance or influence.
Bigboi500
Example?
The Japanese market is just as xenophobic if not more so than the Western one. I love Japan. But one thing I do dislike about it is how Japan treats non-Japanese people. I mean if you wanted to move to Japan and become a Japanese citizen, you would also have to change your last name by law to a Japanese surname. That's how far they go in Japan to keep Japan, Japanese. I mean Microsoft didn't even have a chance to win over the Japanese market, the Japanese don't like Western style games. It's sad but true. At least the West embraces Japanese games unlike how the Japanese try to get away from Western games as much as possible. I am just glad to see that many Japanese companies see how profitiable it can be to have a game that appeals to both cultures, and therefore choose to let Western developers make games that were made by Japanese companies. Such as Naruto: Rise of a Ninja, Naruto: The Broken Bond, Dead Rising 2, Lost Planet 3, Devil May Cry, Silent Hill: Downpour, etc.
ElectronicMagic
Actually if I remember correctly that's only "highly recommended", you would still need to give up your citizenship of whatever country you lived in before.
There's a lot of truth in what the tc says, but Western game lovers will deny it until death. A LOT of Japanese games get unfair treatment and reviews, or lack there of because of cultural bias.Bigboi500
Please explain to me what exactly you mean by this cultural bias. It's a term that gets thrown around a lot, but I've never really heard anyone go into depth about it.
Really?!?!?! You're blaming the current state of Japanese gaming in the west on racism. Why don't you go to Japan and ask them how they feel about western games if you want to experience real xenophobia?
I personally find it refreshing that the Japanese d*ck-riding has stopped for the most part among western reviewers. They're calling it like it really is, and guess what, Japanese games have archaic gameplay with nonsensical/laughable/WTF/pedo narratives.
I'm so sick of you anime/JRPG "forever alone" types I could puke!!!!!! :x
The Japanese are just as xenophobic, if not moreso.ispeakfact
This.
[QUOTE="Blackbond"]
Its because Japanese games aren't as good anymore and this is coming from a guy who grew up with NES, SNES and Genesis where we didn't have labels like Japanese games. It was just understood that most good games came from Japan. The fact that we even have to quanitify it or mention it shows how far they've fallen.
HalcyonScarlet
Is that the case, or is it western games for western tastes? We never had that in those days, we were only fed what the Japanese would hand out. I don't think the Japanese games have lost quality, but they have lost a bit of their appeal.
To paraphrase, back in the 8bit and 16bit days, most (if not all) games were Japanese products and they were enjoyable for their time with nothing else to compare them to. And the success of the gaming industry Nintendo and Sega fostered in that era gave rise to developers cropping up from North America and Europe. So now with a broader selection of creative teams, it's been shown that lately the Japanese games aren't as appealing when held up against the NA and EU competition.
Like Halcyon said, it's not that Japanese games lost quality, but rather the quality stayed where it always was for 30 years while the NA and EU teams have shown us progress that more gamers have grown accustomed to. And this in turn has shown how it's the western and european devs that are influencing the east, Dark Souls being such example. And we can probably expect to see more Japanese devs taking notes from the west.
Its because Japanese games aren't as good anymore and this is coming from a guy who grew up with NES, SNES and Genesis where we didn't have labels like Japanese games. It was just understood that most good games came from Japan. The fact that we even have to quanitify it or mention it shows how far they've fallen.
Blackbond
Also this.
I've said it once and I'll say it again. Western developers have outstripped their Japanese counterparts by a massive margin. Japanese games just plain aren't as good anymore.
You know those are different genres and target @ different audience right? One is Shounen aka for young male people, other is Seinen aka older people. Of course Seinen manga have much deeper and better story. Shounen just more accessible > more sales. Just because Shounen doesn't target at your taste or your taste and people like it, doesn't make it bad & it's not people fault to support the thing they like lol.[QUOTE="rjdofu"]
[QUOTE="RyviusARC"]
One Piece, Naruto, Bleach, Soul Eater, Hunter x Hunter etc. etc. are what is wrong with the anime and manga industry.
But it's more of the peoples' fault for buying and supporting such dribble.
If you want good manga then read Vinland Saga and Historie and if you want good anime then look no further than Monster, Legend of the Galactic Heroes and Master Keaton.
Also Japan is just as Xenophobic if not more.
RyviusARC
Btw, remove one piece from that list, it doesn't even belong in the same rank as trash like Naruto or bleach. Most people grow up with it & still buying it, that's why one piece audience is mostly adult.
OT: Japanese are also xenophobic as hell, look at western games & consoles sales over there.
I known those anime and manga target a different person but it doesn't mean they weren't poorly written.
The Power Rangers was made for kids and is poorly written but it doesn't matter because the audience it is intended for doesn't know any better.
One Piece belongs with all that dribble.
It's not well made and is over drawn.
The problem with those shows is that they start out with a good premise but the author forgets to actually add any depth and the plot and characters get stretched thin.
One of the biggest flaws of such manga and anime is the need for the author to spell everything out for you which is especially annoying when used in dialogue.
The author is just treating their audience like a bunch of idiots.
Non verbal cues are more commonly used in well written plots.
After all, teenagers are idiots :P, that why sh!t music always sell, same goes with sh!t games like COD. I don't agree with you about One Piece as I grew up with it, so i'm probably biased :P.[QUOTE="Blackbond"]
Its because Japanese games aren't as good anymore and this is coming from a guy who grew up with NES, SNES and Genesis where we didn't have labels like Japanese games. It was just understood that most good games came from Japan. The fact that we even have to quanitify it or mention it shows how far they've fallen.
Wiimotefan
Pretty much. They dominated the market for a long time, but they fell this gen and fell fast. Some of the best games still come out of Japan, but they are so few and far between relative to what they used to be.
Dd you too just say that in the past japan dominated the....... Yeah, sure, there were no good western games at all back then, sure :roll: The only thing they dominated in was consoles. By number.[QUOTE="HalcyonScarlet"]
[QUOTE="Blackbond"]
Its because Japanese games aren't as good anymore and this is coming from a guy who grew up with NES, SNES and Genesis where we didn't have labels like Japanese games. It was just understood that most good games came from Japan. The fact that we even have to quanitify it or mention it shows how far they've fallen.
AdobeArtist
Is that the case, or is it western games for western tastes? We never had that in those days, we were only fed what the Japanese would hand out. I don't think the Japanese games have lost quality, but they have lost a bit of their appeal.
To paraphrase, back in the 8bit and 16bit days, most (if not all) games were Japanese products and they were enjoyable for their time with nothing else to compare them to. And the success of the gaming industry Nintendo and Sega fostered in that era gave rise to developers cropping up from North America and Europe. So now with a broader selection of creative teams, it's been shown that lately the Japanese games aren't as appealing when held up against the NA and EU competition.
Like Halcyon said, it's not that Japanese games lost quality, but rather the quality stayed where it always was for 30 years while the NA and EU teams have shown us progress that more gamers have grown accustomed to. And this in turn has shown how it's the western and european devs that are influencing the east, Dark Souls being such example. And we can probably expect to see more Japanese devs taking notes from the west.
You know the site is doomed when the mods are stupid.[QUOTE="Blackbond"]
Its because Japanese games aren't as good anymore and this is coming from a guy who grew up with NES, SNES and Genesis where we didn't have labels like Japanese games. It was just understood that most good games came from Japan. The fact that we even have to quanitify it or mention it shows how far they've fallen.
The_Game21x
Also this.
I've said it once and I'll say it again. Western developers have outstripped their Japanese counterparts by a massive margin. Japanese games just plain aren't as good anymore.
Opinionated, right now I'm looking forward to 1 western game (Dishonored), and 16 Japanese games (2nd SRW OG, Inazuma Eleven Chrono Stone, Danball Senki W, Inazuma Eleven 1-2-3, Metal Gear Solid Rising, Anarchy Regins, Project X Zone, Medarot 7, Bravely Default, E.X Troopers, Digimon Adventure, Shiren the Wanderer 4 Plus, DoDonPachi Saidaioujou. Jojo's Bizarre Adventure All Star Battle, Gyrozetter, and GGXXAC+R). I didn't count indie games because of time, a bit unfair since that's where my favorite western games are these days.
[QUOTE="The_Game21x"]
[QUOTE="Blackbond"]
Its because Japanese games aren't as good anymore and this is coming from a guy who grew up with NES, SNES and Genesis where we didn't have labels like Japanese games. It was just understood that most good games came from Japan. The fact that we even have to quanitify it or mention it shows how far they've fallen.
Yangire
Also this.
I've said it once and I'll say it again. Western developers have outstripped their Japanese counterparts by a massive margin. Japanese games just plain aren't as good anymore.
Opinionated, right now I'm looking forward to 1 western game (Dishonored), and 16 Japanese games (2nd SRW OG, Inazuma Eleven Chrono Stone, Danball Senki W, Inazuma Eleven 1-2-3, Metal Gear Solid Rising, Anarchy Regins, Project X Zone, Medarot 7, Bravely Default, E.X Troopers, Digimon Adventure, Shiren the Wanderer 4 Plus, DoDonPachi Saidaioujou. Jojo's Bizarre Adventure All Star Battle, Gyrozetter, and GGXXAC+R). I didn't count indie games because of time, a bit unfair since that's where my favorite western games are these days.
Of course it's opinionated. :?
[QUOTE="Yangire"]
[QUOTE="The_Game21x"]
Also this.
I've said it once and I'll say it again. Western developers have outstripped their Japanese counterparts by a massive margin. Japanese games just plain aren't as good anymore.
The_Game21x
Opinionated, right now I'm looking forward to 1 western game (Dishonored), and 16 Japanese games (2nd SRW OG, Inazuma Eleven Chrono Stone, Danball Senki W, Inazuma Eleven 1-2-3, Metal Gear Solid Rising, Anarchy Regins, Project X Zone, Medarot 7, Bravely Default, E.X Troopers, Digimon Adventure, Shiren the Wanderer 4 Plus, DoDonPachi Saidaioujou. Jojo's Bizarre Adventure All Star Battle, Gyrozetter, and GGXXAC+R). I didn't count indie games because of time, a bit unfair since that's where my favorite western games are these days.
Of course it's opinionated. :?
Eh, I have a hard time reading things like that as opinions rather than statements. Maybe I have been on system wars for too long, but unless someone says "I think" or something along those lines I read as what they're saying as them believing that what they typed was a fact. Didn't mean to come off as unnecessarily defensive or anything.
People praised japanese games all over the place in the 90's and the early 00's but now recently the japanese games aren't as good as they used to be because the western developers have gotten really good at developing their games so now there's more to choose from. Besides they really have gone down on quality...
and last but not least the only biased ones are them if anything..... biggest evidence is Final Fantasy 13 - 2 i think one of the japanese sites gave it a 10/10.
OP, you realize that Japanese games aren't nearly as prominent as before right? They don't stack up in sales or reviews like they used to, and they were frequently super popular so its not xenophobia, its the decline in quality. Hell look at FFXIII, can you argue its as good as the previous games? Can you say anyone really cared about it like they did with previous FF games?
Here's a hint, if everyone agrees on something (even many Japanese developers themselves), then you are the wrong one, and incredibly wrong at that.
[QUOTE="The_Game21x"]
[QUOTE="Yangire"]
Opinionated, right now I'm looking forward to 1 western game (Dishonored), and 16 Japanese games (2nd SRW OG, Inazuma Eleven Chrono Stone, Danball Senki W, Inazuma Eleven 1-2-3, Metal Gear Solid Rising, Anarchy Regins, Project X Zone, Medarot 7, Bravely Default, E.X Troopers, Digimon Adventure, Shiren the Wanderer 4 Plus, DoDonPachi Saidaioujou. Jojo's Bizarre Adventure All Star Battle, Gyrozetter, and GGXXAC+R). I didn't count indie games because of time, a bit unfair since that's where my favorite western games are these days.
Yangire
Of course it's opinionated. :?
Eh, I have a hard time reading things like that as opinions rather than statements. Maybe I have been on system wars for too long, but unless someone says "I think" or something along those lines I read as what they're saying as them believing that what they typed was a fact. Didn't mean to come off as unnecessarily defensive or anything.
Don't worry, what he said represents reality.
I bet reviewers in Japan are completely unbiased and played The Witcher 2 at least a couple times.Grawse
They also buy tons of 360's cuz they love da HALOZ! & GEARZ!
:P
Perhaps if our games had more 13 year old protagonists, whose village was destroyed... and they met their best friend prior to having just left before the chaos had occured... perhaps they would enjoy our games more... also, they'd have to start with a wooden sword... or in Gears case... a wooden lanser.
I do not see any alleged "xenophobia" among Western reviewers, but what I see is how Japanese games are not as prominent today as they were in previous generations.
If there was actual xenophobia among Western reviewers, why there is no backlash among Japanese game creators or publishers on this? They would have spoken out against it instead of being quiet about it.
You know the site is doomed when the mods are stupid.[QUOTE="StatusShuffle"][QUOTE="AdobeArtist"]
To paraphrase, back in the 8bit and 16bit days, most (if not all) games were Japanese products and they were enjoyable for their time with nothing else to compare them to. And the success of the gaming industry Nintendo and Sega fostered in that era gave rise to developers cropping up from North America and Europe. So now with a broader selection of creative teams, it's been shown that lately the Japanese games aren't as appealing when held up against the NA and EU competition.
Like Halcyon said, it's not that Japanese games lost quality, but rather the quality stayed where it always was for 30 years while the NA and EU teams have shown us progress that more gamers have grown accustomed to. And this in turn has shown how it's the western and european devs that are influencing the east, Dark Souls being such example. And we can probably expect to see more Japanese devs taking notes from the west.
Gue1
I don't know from what planet or dimension you come from but that statement is a fact.
can you prove it's a fact then?
You know the site is doomed when the mods are stupid.[QUOTE="StatusShuffle"][QUOTE="AdobeArtist"]
To paraphrase, back in the 8bit and 16bit days, most (if not all) games were Japanese products and they were enjoyable for their time with nothing else to compare them to. And the success of the gaming industry Nintendo and Sega fostered in that era gave rise to developers cropping up from North America and Europe. So now with a broader selection of creative teams, it's been shown that lately the Japanese games aren't as appealing when held up against the NA and EU competition.
Like Halcyon said, it's not that Japanese games lost quality, but rather the quality stayed where it always was for 30 years while the NA and EU teams have shown us progress that more gamers have grown accustomed to. And this in turn has shown how it's the western and european devs that are influencing the east, Dark Souls being such example. And we can probably expect to see more Japanese devs taking notes from the west.
Gue1
I don't know from what planet or dimension you come from but that statement is a fact.
Hmmm? Really? What about PCs, that were pretty much exclusively western games? Also the Atari empire, and EA and Activision were around back then too.You mean Famitsu? Those guys' reviews are jokes, they gave away too many perfect & near perfect score (39/40) to nearly every hyped game out there, especially games for Nintendo systems.People praised japanese games all over the place in the 90's and the early 00's but now recently the japanese games aren't as good as they used to be because the western developers have gotten really good at developing their games so now there's more to choose from. Besides they really have gone down on quality...
and last but not least the only biased ones are them if anything..... biggest evidence is Final Fantasy 13 - 2 i think one of the japanese sites gave it a 10/10.
Joedgabe
[QUOTE="Gue1"][QUOTE="StatusShuffle"] You know the site is doomed when the mods are stupid.locopatho
I don't know from what planet or dimension you come from but that statement is a fact.
Hmmm? Really? What about PCs, that were pretty much exclusively western games? Also the Atari empire, and EA and Activision were around back then too.indeed and that's not even mentioning studios like RARE who have been around way before the 8 bit consoles
Hmmm? Really? What about PCs, that were pretty much exclusively western games? Also the Atari empire, and EA and Activision were around back then too.[QUOTE="locopatho"][QUOTE="Gue1"]
I don't know from what planet or dimension you come from but that statement is a fact.
rilpas
indeed and that's not even mentioning studios like RARE who have been around way before the 8 bit consoles
I'm sorry, I read it wrong, that's why I deleted my comment. These mistakes happens very often since the only place where I talk/write in English is on gaming forums.
But I deleted my comment really fast, I don't even know how you were able to see it!
[QUOTE="Bigboi500"]There's a lot of truth in what the tc says, but Western game lovers will deny it until death. A LOT of Japanese games get unfair treatment and reviews, or lack there of because of cultural bias.DraugenCP
Please explain to me what exactly you mean by this cultural bias. It's a term that gets thrown around a lot, but I've never really heard anyone go into depth about it.Sexualization of girls under 18 for example. Over there it's common-place for younger girls to be seen as more adult, while over here it's 18 and up. Japanese people seem to be much more liberal when talking and joking about sex, yet in 'murica it's always serious business. Reviewers give free passes for popular Japanese titles when the topic is underaged girls but scrutinize less popular ones. Examples of this would be Persona 4 and Final Fantasy vs Hyperdimension Neptunia and Record of Agarest War games. I'm not saying the latter game series' are great, but they are scored much lower than they should be, and they receive penalties for doing the exact same thing the more popular ones do, but they get away with them.
Examples for the other poster looking for some from me would be Rune Factory games. They either flat-out don't review them, or when they do, they score them well below what they should. Read the Rune Factory: Tides of Destiny review, the dialog is almost totally positive, yet the accompanying score is a 6.0 or 6.5, and the game is deeper than any WRPG ever made on a console. They don't even bother reviewing tons of good Japanese games yet they always review every annual CoD rehash.
Other reviewers like the Gamestop mag gave Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door an abysmal score, yet it's acclaimed across the board by fans of the series. X Play was very harsh on Tales of the Abyss, yet that's almost universally acclaimed by JRPG fans.
You simply can't trust Western reviewers to be fair and balanced when it comes to stuff like that.
utter nonsenseBigboi500its the sexualisation of girls under 14 or 15 which is the far bigger problem.
As for being liberal and talking about sex why are you being america specific? Growing up in the UK we had page 3 on the most popular tabloids every day! You're lumping everyone in the west together, a popular weeaboo mistake.
As for games that don't get reviewed, what % of PC games do you think GS reviews? :lol:
[QUOTE="blue_hazy_basic"]
[QUOTE="Bigboi500"]utter nonsenseBigboi500
false assumptions
If you think I'm a weaboo you're sorely mistaken. Just because I enjoy niche Japanese titles, I get labeled that way? Brilliant! That was a jokey troll moment :D I like how you picked that bit out rather than addressing the serious points though[QUOTE="Bigboi500"]
Read the Rune Factory: Tides of Destiny review, the dialog is almost totally positive, yet the accompanying score is a 6.0 or 6.5, and the game is deeper than any WRPG ever made on a console.
Yangire
In what aspects?
The amount of depth in the dungeons, social aspects, farming, crafting, family raising. I've never seen that kind of depth in a console WRPG before.[QUOTE="Bigboi500"]If you think I'm a weaboo you're sorely mistaken. Just because I enjoy niche Japanese titles, I get labeled that way? Brilliant! That was a jokey troll moment :D I like how you picked that bit out rather than addressing the serious points thoughWell as far as other Western countries, I don't have any experience with them to know they are different. And about the sexualization of girls under 18, it's not reality, just like the glorification of violence of the Western media.[QUOTE="blue_hazy_basic"]
false assumptions
blue_hazy_basic
[QUOTE="nhh18"]And yet Japan won't purchase microsoft consoles because they aren't made in Japan... who's xenophobic? Perhaps you're just blind to the fact that everyone is and you are only seeing one side of the problem.I always found it odd some of the game journalist attitudes but the three worst aspects are their sanctimony, weird blowhard attitudes towards big western developers and their xenophobia directed at japanese games. Every so often, we read articles as if japanese can't make games. They discuss how certain japanese developers struggle with management (which also represents some western developers), dand how their games aren't directed toward western audience (this one is by far the worst since it is narcissistic world revolves me type argument). Why do gamespot/ign/destructoid/1up/other sites write such idiotic articles and opinion pieces. We had people defending what phil fish said. This is outrageous that a community could have an opinion that is so far off on what reality is. There is a reason why people believe video gamers are immature socially akward idiots when you act in that manner
My main problem though is this cycle persists on forums. People actually believe this nonsense. People actually don't understand that these comments are stupid. I've seen this all the time on every board yet, when people talk about underrated games they immediatly announce japanese games. Gravity Rush, Binary Domain, and Dragon Dogma. 3 japanese games.
Phazevariance
Sexualization of girls under 18 for example. Over there it's common-place for younger girls to be seen as more adult, while over here it's 18 and up. Japanese people seem to be much more liberal when talking and joking about sex, yet in 'murica it's always serious business. Reviewers give free passes for popular Japanese titles when the topic is underaged girls but scrutinize less popular ones. Examples of this would be Persona 4 and Final Fantasy vs Hyperdimension Neptunia and Record of Agarest War games. I'm not saying the latter game series' are great, but they are scored much lower than they should be, and they receive penalties for doing the exact same thing the more popular ones do, but they get away with them.Examples for the other poster looking for some from me would be Rune Factory games. They either flat-out don't review them, or when they do, they score them well below what they should. Read the Rune Factory: Tides of Destiny review, the dialog is almost totally positive, yet the accompanying score is a 6.0 or 6.5, and the game is deeper than any WRPG ever made on a console. They don't even bother reviewing tons of good Japanese games yet they always review every annual CoD rehash.
Other reviewers like the Gamestop mag gave Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door an abysmal score, yet it's acclaimed across the board by fans of the series. X Play was very harsh on Tales of the Abyss, yet that's almost universally acclaimed by JRPG fans.
You simply can't trust Western reviewers to be fair and balanced when it comes to stuff like that.Bigboi500
I don't think that the underage girls theme gets a lot of attention among professional reviews in the West. It's more of a cliché that gets brought up in JRPG vs. WRPG debates. Either way, I don't think that things such as this have any significant impact on the way Western reviewers judge Japanese video game. It has much more to do with certain design choices that we perceive as archaic.
As for your examples: you name 2 games and for each of them 2 individual outlets that were critical of them. You ignore the fact that Paper Mario: TTYD was not just praised by fans of the series, but also by a vast majority of the professional reviewers, including Western ones. I don't see how you can point towards some big Western bias against Japanese games when TTYD got a very respectable 87 score on Metacritic. You can find a less enthusiastic score for just about any game. The same goes for Tales of the Abyss. Granted, its 78 average score is not too high, but we've seen in the past that universal acclaim from fans of a genre/series does not guarantee a same amount of praise by professional reviewers. For example, compare the popularity of games like Stalker, Arma 2 or Mirror's Edge here at SW to the scores they got from some reviewers.
I agree with you that you can't trust reviewers to be fair, but why single out Western reviewers? You can look for reviews of just about any universally praised Western game and find at least one review that is very critical of it (which, by the way, does not have to mean it's unfair). Besides, Japanese publications such as Famitsu have often been criticised for being biased towards Japanese games, which is understandable when you look at their 'perfect games' list. So this at least means that Western reviewers wouldn't be unique in favouring games from their own region.
I honestly think it's not just Japanese games that have been receiving a decline in quality, but genre's as a whole.
dumbed down rpgs, check.
subpar action games, survival horror on the way out with practically only the Amnesia devs holding it's hand.
Cover shooters have become the norm, a dreadfully boring tragedy.
As a whole difficulty in games has decreased substantially. You might ask what difficulty has to do with a game being a "Good game," well to me Risk / Reward plays a strong part.
Despite the bad port, this is one of the reasons why From Software has been one of my favorite devs this gen. Infact the only one I really wait with baited breath on for a new release.
I think it has more to do with incompetent devs and nothing to do with Geological and racial selection.
Indie has done a good job breathing new breath into the rotting corpse, but it's time we have studio's take more notice.
[QUOTE="nhh18"]And yet Japan won't purchase microsoft consoles because they aren't made in Japan... who's xenophobic? Perhaps you're just blind to the fact that everyone is and you are only seeing one side of the problem.I always found it odd some of the game journalist attitudes but the three worst aspects are their sanctimony, weird blowhard attitudes towards big western developers and their xenophobia directed at japanese games. Every so often, we read articles as if japanese can't make games. They discuss how certain japanese developers struggle with management (which also represents some western developers), dand how their games aren't directed toward western audience (this one is by far the worst since it is narcissistic world revolves me type argument). Why do gamespot/ign/destructoid/1up/other sites write such idiotic articles and opinion pieces. We had people defending what phil fish said. This is outrageous that a community could have an opinion that is so far off on what reality is. There is a reason why people believe video gamers are immature socially akward idiots when you act in that manner
My main problem though is this cycle persists on forums. People actually believe this nonsense. People actually don't understand that these comments are stupid. I've seen this all the time on every board yet, when people talk about underrated games they immediatly announce japanese games. Gravity Rush, Binary Domain, and Dragon Dogma. 3 japanese games.
Phazevariance
This.
If there's any market that's xenophobic, it's Japan.
[QUOTE="Bigboi500"]Sexualization of girls under 18 for example. Over there it's common-place for younger girls to be seen as more adult, while over here it's 18 and up. Japanese people seem to be much more liberal when talking and joking about sex, yet in 'murica it's always serious business. Reviewers give free passes for popular Japanese titles when the topic is underaged girls but scrutinize less popular ones. Examples of this would be Persona 4 and Final Fantasy vs Hyperdimension Neptunia and Record of Agarest War games. I'm not saying the latter game series' are great, but they are scored much lower than they should be, and they receive penalties for doing the exact same thing the more popular ones do, but they get away with them.
Examples for the other poster looking for some from me would be Rune Factory games. They either flat-out don't review them, or when they do, they score them well below what they should. Read the Rune Factory: Tides of Destiny review, the dialog is almost totally positive, yet the accompanying score is a 6.0 or 6.5, and the game is deeper than any WRPG ever made on a console. They don't even bother reviewing tons of good Japanese games yet they always review every annual CoD rehash.
Other reviewers like the Gamestop mag gave Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door an abysmal score, yet it's acclaimed across the board by fans of the series. X Play was very harsh on Tales of the Abyss, yet that's almost universally acclaimed by JRPG fans.
You simply can't trust Western reviewers to be fair and balanced when it comes to stuff like that.DraugenCP
I don't think that the underage girls theme gets a lot of attention among professional reviews in the West. It's more of a cliché that gets brought up in JRPG vs. WRPG debates. Either way, I don't think that things such as this have any significant impact on the way Western reviewers judge Japanese video game. It has much more to do with certain design choices that we perceive as archaic.
As for your examples: you name 2 games and for each of them 2 individual outlets that were critical of them. You ignore the fact that Paper Mario: TTYD was not just praised by fans of the series, but also by a vast majority of the professional reviewers, including Western ones. I don't see how you can point towards some big Western bias against Japanese games when TTYD got a very respectable 87 score on Metacritic. You can find a less enthusiastic score for just about any game. The same goes for Tales of the Abyss. Granted, its 78 average score is not too high, but we've seen in the past that universal acclaim from fans of a genre/series does not guarantee a same amount of praise by professional reviewers. For example, compare the popularity of games like Stalker, Arma 2 or Mirror's Edge here at SW to the scores they got from some reviewers.
I agree with you that you can't trust reviewers to be fair, but why single out Western reviewers? You can look for reviews of just about any universally praised Western game and find at least one review that is very critical of it (which, by the way, does not have to mean it's unfair). Besides, Japanese publications such as Famitsu have often been criticised for being biased towards Japanese games, which is understandable when you look at their 'perfect games' list. So this at least means that Western reviewers wouldn't be unique in favouring games from their own region.I didn't mean to single them out, if I did. You're right, reviews of all games aren't to be trusted, especially the needless scores attached to them.
I was thinking about this thread while going about my day and I realised TC is totally in the wrong. Why should reviewer try to accept that japanesee games are different and all the crap he whined about in the OP. The reviews are aimed at people who are from the west. If western people aren't going to like the game that's waht their audeince wants to know. Looks like TC is the one with the outrageous thinking. He obviously think the world revolves around japan.
I don't think it's the reviewers, I think it's just a certain handful of people that prefer Western RPGs to Japanese RPGs. I like to think that I'm pretty unbiased towards them, but truth be told I play and enjoy Western RPGs a lot more these days, but some of my favorite games of all time are JRPGs.
[QUOTE="nhh18"]And yet Japan won't purchase microsoft consoles because they aren't made in Japan... who's xenophobic? Perhaps you're just blind to the fact that everyone is and you are only seeing one side of the problem. Ditto.I always found it odd some of the game journalist attitudes but the three worst aspects are their sanctimony, weird blowhard attitudes towards big western developers and their xenophobia directed at japanese games. Every so often, we read articles as if japanese can't make games. They discuss how certain japanese developers struggle with management (which also represents some western developers), dand how their games aren't directed toward western audience (this one is by far the worst since it is narcissistic world revolves me type argument). Why do gamespot/ign/destructoid/1up/other sites write such idiotic articles and opinion pieces. We had people defending what phil fish said. This is outrageous that a community could have an opinion that is so far off on what reality is. There is a reason why people believe video gamers are immature socially akward idiots when you act in that manner
My main problem though is this cycle persists on forums. People actually believe this nonsense. People actually don't understand that these comments are stupid. I've seen this all the time on every board yet, when people talk about underrated games they immediatly announce japanese games. Gravity Rush, Binary Domain, and Dragon Dogma. 3 japanese games.
Phazevariance
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