Why Japan doesn't have a bright future in video games

Here's a list of reasons why.

1. Population decrease and a shift to mobile/handheld

PC gaming is invisible in Japan and console gaming is becoming less lucrative for profits. Couple this with a shrinking population and the future isn't going to be a thriving one. PS4 releasing all around the world before Japan is already a very big sign.

2. Insularity

It is not a stereotype but is a fact that a lot of the Japanese (how much percentage I don't know but it's big) can't read English. Western games aside from blockbusters like BF, CoD, and AC aren't big in Japan. The likes of Ori and The Blind Forest, Batman Arkham series, The Witcher series, and many more aren't in the radar of most Japanese gamers. Just look at Famitsu. The RTS and MOBA genre are nonexistent in Japan. All these lead to an ignorance to things outside of their country. What is an RTS? What does it need to be successful as a game dev in the West? Why do you think SquareEnix bought a lot of Western studios in recent years?

3. Lack of structure for a thriving indie scene

Since PC gaming isn't big in Japan, the indie scene isn't too. DD still isn't that prevalent. Steam isn't that popular. There's lack of incentives and ways for indie devs to thrive and deliver their game. The governments of Canada, Scandinavia, and other organizations for indie devs exist in the West for a thriving indie scene while in Japan there's only been summits that have occurred just recently and are in no way comparable like say to Indiecade.

4. Slow adoption to technology

It's Japan it's got to be high tech. I know but that stereotype is dead wrong. While they may be advanced in some things there are also a lot where they are very behind. Since they can't read English, they have to wait for Japanese translations of new things to come out from the West like a new version of the C++ language, DirectX 12, game engines, etc. It's no wonder why the Japanese suck at using Western game engines because they don't have much experience with them (The Evil Within using idTech 5 and other games using UE). Game schools in Japan to this day are still teaching DirectX9 (freaking old), Maya 2014 (no 2015), Wii/PS3/Xbox360 (last gen consoles), etc.

I heard it was b/c they're market moved away from consoles.

Also...they like crazy noody games.

You forget 5... a good chunk of them sold out to the west (Capcom and Konami are especially guilty of this).

It is interesting regarding that most Japanese do not understand English even though it is a mandatory course in schools. However, I am told many years ago that the way they learned English is quite bad.

@onesiphorus: Most places that teach a second or third language do it badly. In Ontario, which is directly beside Quebec, and still the majority of people leaving public and private schools here can't speak fluent french, or even a variety that would be considered the ability to speak it in any fashion beyond a a 4-5 yr olds ability.

Japan is just a different nation then it was a few years ago. Also it has a very low birth rate and has for years making for the lowest amount of people under the age of 15 in relation to their population in the whole entire world. The generations that make it such a large thing in the states just literally don't exist here. And social norms and expectations are far different then others around the world.

@lordlors: couple of stuff

1. We talking in general population decrease? Because if you are going for that route, you need a lot more than just simple population decrease, and will require a hefty amount of research.
2. Yes and no. Most Japanese can't read English well enough to play games in English, but they get A LOT of Western games fully localised. They are as popular as JRPGs are in Western countries, in fact, I think if you consider the percentage, it might be even more popular. Ghost got 200,000 sold in its first week in Japan, while Tales of Xillia sold about 230,000 in NA+Europe. Yes, a fair comparison would be CoD against FF, but you get the idea. The biggest reason SE bought Western companies is because they had money and wanted to expand. The "world" is obviously a bigger market than just Japan.
3. Also yes and no. Japanese equivalent of indies (doujin) have more or less table market offline. DD not being huge certainly isn't that great, but who knows, they might catch up sooner than you think. That's what happened with Steam.
4. No argument there. Nintendo is still in the process of discovering internet, so yeah.

@ribstaylor1: Ontario should teach Mandarin instead.

Montrealers (i.e. one of two cities that matters in the prov, and I like Quebec City being mostly French because it feels like you are in Europe without having to spend thousands of dollars to actually get there) speak fluent English, and it's a lot more beneficial to learn Mandarin in Toronto.

@funsohng: See I would agree if every damn job that is in the medical field or government will 100% hire the french fluent guy over the English only speaking. I don't know it and it's cost me many a good job with benefits because I don't speak a language that a single province uses. It's odd that even though the capital speaks almost all English, french is still so damn dominant in how people are hired even though all Quebecker's speak English.

Hell I still don't get why I have to sit through french instructions on a 1-800 number before ever hearing the English. version. Not a fan of the language, the whole putting gender definitions on objects is just mind boggling to me.

http://www.worldometers.info/world-population/japan-population/

The population decrease in Japan is insignificant, what is true is that their population is not growing but what it is doing is aging. This is causing them far more problems than their gaming interests being popular in other countries.

Your other points are relevant, especially the lack of support for PC and independent developers, when in the rest of the world they are on the rise.

On your point 2, Ghost selling 200,000 units in Japan (a single country of 127 million people) would make is massively more popular than Xilla selling 230,000 units across NA + Europe (2 entire continents of over 1.2 Billion people) How did Xilla sell in UK and France (combined population of 128 million and both big into gaming)? That would give a closer representation of uptake.

The western world (which also has an aging population) just isn't into sexualising children and girlfriend simulators, this is why the Japanese games industry is becoming more and more irrelevant.

I know, and with it went the identity of console gaming.

Instead they feel like gimped up PC's getting consolized takes on what were primarily PC genres. That said I am grateful that guys like Kamiya, Mikami, Nagoshi, Miyazaki, and all those cats are still making some kick ass games. Nintendo should be around for awhile in all their creatively deprived, but extremely talented glory. Atlus, etc. It's just a matter of Japanese developers/publishers coming to terms with a lot of their work being niche stuff, and they should be fine.

Because home consoles sales are declining, ALOT. The ps4 is trailing behind the ps3 and freaking DC. Nevermind the wii u.

Handhelds are getting eating by mobile, everywhere. LEVEL 5 just announced some time ago a shift to mobile. The major JP publishers like SEGA, Square, etc are doing the same.

While some are finding homes in the west, it's not exactly easy to do all the porting and translation.

Unless you strike well, like From's Souls series, in both japan and the west, your prospects aren't looking all that great. Japanese games need to sell to japanese gamers, but the audiance, has i said, is going mobile.

Well written OP and I agree with it for the most part, howeve there's a one minor caveat: The Evil Within was build on idtech 5 not Unreal Engine.

How exactly does a population decrease have a negative effect on the future of videos games? Seems like a benefit over overpopulation if you ask me. More job opportunities for everyone, unlike this country where unemployment is reaching massive levels.

Meh..... I don't think they care.....

This is not like in China were gaming consoles were actually banned.

Because Chinese gaming laws have SO much relevance in a thread about JAPANESE games, right?

Generalization much.

@nintendoboy16:

Well they didn't have a bright gaming future either..... atleast they had a legal reason for it..... if Japan doesn't have a bright gaming future then maybe they just don't want one...... or maybe their idea of a bright future is different from ours....... perhaps mobile gaming is a better future.

It's population aging. A lot worse.

As long a Japanese devs keep putting out good stuff and localizing over here where there is a large game market, they can still make money.

I'm not sure why you think a language barrier isn't a two way streak. While many Japanese people probably don't know English, I'm sure a larger proportion of native English speakers do not know Japanese. There are tons of Japanese games that are no ported over to the english market which includes the Japanese Indie games (there is definitely a deeply rooted Japanese indie community) which have almost no exposure in the west because, like Western Indie Games, the funds are not there for translation.

The market landscape is changing in Japan (and in the west) to favor Mobile game development, but that doesn't mean Japan doesn't have a bright future in video games; it's just a different future than what you want.

Yeah those sellouts. I know in my business I will stay working for a dying market so my company dies as well. That makes a lot of fuckin sense

So, games like Lords of Shadow and DmC we're received SO well by their fandoms right?

That terrible Metroid Prime grrrr.........

I know things aren't as good as they could be with Japanese game development, but I guess I'm still optimistic that a newer generation of developers could turn things around and improve the industry there.

I think a large part of the solution would be a shift to focus on the Japanese indie scene. That could do quite a bit for the future of the Japanese game industry, and help in continuing to make more original and unrestricted kinds of games.

For now all you can really do is keep one eye on the East, and wait to see what they've been working on lately.

Japanese language is a language mostly used only in Japan. English is an international language used in more than one country. It is the language of science and technology. So it isn't really a two way streak because English is far more important than the Japanese language in terms of size, influence, and relevance. Knowing English would open your eyes to a very big world/network. Knowing Japanese will just open your eyes to the world of the Japanese. The Japanese are at a severe disadvantage by not knowing English rather than Westerners not knowing Japanese.

I live in Tokyo. I studied Japanese for two years and am now currently enrolled in a 4 year game dev course. I can speak, read, and write in the language. And i would say you guys aren't missing out much. If you love anime games, then sure but I would say those Japanese games translated to English are already enough. The issue is you guys need patience since you need to wait for English translations but that's no biggie. As for the Japanese indie, I admit I haven't discovered them and played them much. I haven't been to events and conventions where dojin games are being sold. But I get the feeling they're mostly anime and shoot em up games. Not as diverse as the Western indie scene.

As for Japan not having a bright future in video games, I'm not so sure a market where there are so few youngsters and full of grandmas and grandpas will be a thriving one for video games. Products for old people, maybe.

I don't know that many of those groups of people to make a statement that encapsulates them all. One thing I have learned in life is the negative people speak louder and more often than the positive ones. And the above mentioned games have great Metacritic scores.

Surely, game devs and pubs don't have their attention of the vocals, right? Because great critic scores represent the opinions of the consumer right?

Looks at:

Star Fox Adventures (one of two black sheep of Rare's when they were with Ninty, the other being DK64)

Metroid Prime 3 and Other M ( the latter being the Sonic 06 of the Metroid franchise to the Metroid fandom)

Donkey Kong Country Returns

Super Smash Bros. Brawl

Mortal Kombat Deadly Alliance and Deception

Assassin's Creed III (which was regarded as a mess even by it's own devs, despite it's MC rankings)

Tekken 4 and 6

Halo 4

Almost any James Bond game that's not Goldeneye on N64

Oh, wait...

You do know the Japanese people don't have to play games as long as the money comes in Japanese companies can make games. Poor thesis.

PC gaming however is on the rise. I don't care about consoles. Japan while having more old people will surely decline. I'm pretty sure it's going to be hard for old people to play games on smartphones especially those that require reflexes.

Japanese companies looking to continue making console games will no longer find a profitable market locally so they turn to the Western market of which they aren't very knowledgeable. It's why SE bought Western studios. Nintendo only has a few Western studios (aside from Retro are there any?) and aren't really good at communicating to Western developers. It goes to show the lack of third party support for their console and its lackluster performance economically. Japanese companies moving to mobile game development for the local market have to face the shrinking population of youngsters in the future which will have an effect on their future profits. This however is a very slow process but it will indeed come.

The video game industry is just beginning to evolve rapidly. Everyone will be effected by this dramatic shift, not just Japanese developers.

They have a second party relationship with Next Level Games (a Canadian developer). Other than that... I can't think of too many.

English is basically like Spanish to them in how its taught in schools. I think I've had like 5 years of Spanish and I still can't really speak it. I do have some optimism though with groups like Level 5, Atlas, and From putting out games that seem to be getting good sales worldwide.

5th gen console sales:
PS1 - 100 mil
N64 - 30 mil
Dreamcast - 8 mil
Total = 138 mil

6th gen console sales:
PS2 - 150 mil
Xbox - 24 mil
Gamecube - 21 mil
Total = 195 mil

7th gen console sales:
PS3 - 80 mil
Xbox - 80 mil
Wii - 100 mil
Total = 260 mil

8th gen console sales after just 1 year:
PS4 - 20 mil
Xbox - 11 mil
Wii U - 9 mil
Total = 40 mil

Yes, consoles are dying in the western world. *rolls eyes*

And I think your theory is unfounded. IMO, Japanese gaming is indeed in decline. The Japanese gaming industry used to have their own ecosystem. Japanese held the console market, while westerners held the PC market. Ever since the 6th gen, and more apparent during the 7th gen, western developers have started infiltrating into the console space. No longer is the console ecosystem specific to Japanese devs. Naturally, western games, having higher budgets and bigger teams, started to outclass their Japanese counterparts. Gamers started comparing the more technically impressive and creative western games with more stagnant Japanese games, resulting in their decline.

I think we are just seeing the start of a big change up for Japanese developers with a bigger focus on releasing in the west and even on PC. It will probably be a bit slow because of the cultural differences which are more of an issue now games are getting more complex but it's slowly going to happen I'm sure.

Japanese games sucks apart from two genres Hack n Slash and Fighting

And platformers.

You guys forgot SHMUPS. They have the most crazy bullet hell shoot em up games.

They are also home to fighting games.

It's because outside of horny teens nobody cares about japanese made games. and the people in japan are more into mobile and F2P games then consoles.

They think it's a good idea to withhold certain games on PC and expect us to like products that are clearly inferior to what console gamers will get.

And yet, they've made a majority of the best and highest rated games this generation, therefore, your thread is stupid.

SMH, looking at the pic of current gen killer instinct in your user Id tells me you are a clueless xbox drone.

You probably worship MS as an american company and have silly bias/racist mentality to boot but your claims are easily knocked down by 2 things...yep just 2.

1. The highest rated non-remastered current gen exclusives are JAPANESE games

• Bloodborne 93 (MC)
• Super Smash Bros. for Wii U 92 (MC)
• Bayonetta 2 91 (MC)

2. Of the most anticipated games this year a Japanese game is still ranked no 1.

• Legend of Zelda

Then there is bloodborne which is out and is called the first must have game this gen and then there is MGS5 which everyone is expecting to be incredible.

I don't know what level of delusion or stupidity you are working on but you need to come back to reality. As for your ridiculous notion that Japan will fall behind on tech with video games because of your wild fapping to MS Direct X stuff, THIS is the latest game engine created by a JAPANESE studio for PC and PS4.

Last week I visited Silicon Studio’s headquarters in Tokyo, and I had an extensive chat with the Japanese developer’s Software Engineers about their new rendering engine Mizuchi, which we saw in action a while ago (you can see the original demo running on PC in the video at the bottom of this post).

Software Engineers Sei Imai and Steven Tsang explained that the engine already runs on PS4 at 30 frames per second in 1080p. The original demo on PC ran at 60 frames per second on a system equipped with a Nvidia GTX 780 Ti video card.

http://www.dualshockers.com/2014/12/11/silicon-studios-new-engine-already-runs-on-ps4-at-30-fps-in-1080p-and-it-looks-fantastic/

All real-time! Needless to say, this looks better than any other graphics engine produced by any western company so far or any other for that matter.

"bu but Japan doesn't have a bright future and...MS" lol Get out of here, Japan is the reason many people even still care about gaming at all.

It really doesn't look any better. I prefer to deal with things that have influences. That Japanese game engine isn't going to dethrone UE and Unity. Show me popular games that use that engine and we'll talk again. Until then, it's just a pipe dream. I think you're just a weaboo. And FYI, I'm not an MS fan, never owned a console aside from Wii. I'm a PC gamer. I'm currently studying game dev at a game school at HAL Tokyo in Shinjuku. I can speak, read, and write in Japanese. Can you? I'm well aware Japan is still churning out great and awesome games. Where in my post did it say that Japan has nothing to show? Your being butthurt over Japan just shows your weabooness.

Fact is the Japanese are only good at specific genres. They have nothing to offer for the RTS and MOBA genres. Their FPS and open world games are a joke. At least the West has something to match in action, fighting, and other genres where the Japanese excel.

You say Japanese are only good at specific genres but then go on to list only specific genres western devs are good at...lol way to be a hypocrite and make yourself sound desperate to downplay the vast area of games japanese are at the top of.

Open world Japanese games are a joke?

Have you seen MGS5, Final Fantasy VX, Zelda U, Xeno blade Chronicles?????

Did you know (opne world) Zelda U ranked as the most anticipated game of 2015 on both Gamespot and Gametrailers? No buddy, you are a joke.

LMAO such epic stupid fail in light of the upcoming game I mentioned exposes your desperate agenda to push this "japan doesn't havea bright future" idea.

Being a PC gamer seems to go hand and hand with the ignorant western is superor non-sense I see you pushing here. Using the word "weaboo" to berate me because of the facts I presented only exposes your bigot mentality against things coming from Japan, there was nothing "weaboo" about anything I said in my post...just facts.

I can give you my personal opinion about what I think about Japan vs Western made games but I don't need to do that prove your thread is idiotic and based on simple minded non-sense because the facts I just gave you.

Facts

1. The highest rated non-remastered current gen exclusives are JAPANESE games

• Bloodborne 93 (MC)
• Super Smash Bros. for Wii U 92 (MC)
• Bayonetta 2 91 (MC)

2. Of the most anticipated games this year a Japanese game is still ranked no 1.

• Legend of Zelda

And....Fail

Why are you even talking now?

You presented an argument and I destroyed it with facts! If you believed the non-sense you said before I posted then you should have adjusted your stance after being informed of your ignorance, but you still insist on trying to push your argument after your biggest points were crushed.

This can only mean your argument wasn't based on facts or an honest belief that what you were saying was true but only a fanboyish/bigot agenda to say those things because....murica. LMAO Get out.

On the note of Japan's attitude towards the PC, I've started to notice some improvements. It was cool that Capcom collaborated with Valve for a L4D crossover on the PC version of RE6. They've come a long way since the RE 4 PC port, which is the worst port in the history of video games, but they've still got a long way to go before I start to care about any other company besides Capcom.

Someone needs to get the Japanese kids having unprotected sex.

Because consoles aren't shit without a strong Japanese backing, gimped pc's that specialize in ports just suck.

Luckily From software is still doing it's thing along with platinum, Nintendo, atlus but that's not enough. Hopefully more and more indy developers migrate to steam or any other online distribution network.

hoping the new ff is good, but let's be real it'll most likely be just passable enough or total garbage.

1. This is the only point of your argument that actually makes some sense. But even with a slightly declining population, Japan still has a large enough population as it is. It's the ageing population that would present more of a problem. Since it has the highest life expectancy, along with low birth rates, it has the highest percentage of old-age people, which is putting an increasing burden on the working-age population. The only solutions right now appears to be that Japanese people either start having more kids, or they open up their borders to mass immigration (like many Western countries, or neighbouring South Korea).

2. Interestingly, many non-English speakers often complain about English speakers being ignorant about the non-English-speaking world (i.e. the majority of the world population). Either way, last I checked, Japanese people are generally more familiar with Western (and Asian) popular culture than most Americans are with Asian popular culture. Foreign movies or music rarely ever do well in America the way they do in Japan. At least foreign movies with subtitles, and music in multiple languages, frequently chart highly in Japan. How often do you see non-English movies or songs charting highly in America? Very rarely. According to your logic, wouldn't that make America relatively more "insular"?

3. Ever heard of the "doujin" indie scene before? You claim to live in Japan, yet you've never heard of it? And what about all those countless mobile games being released in Japan? Aren't a lot of those indie?

4. Like kinectthedots pointed out above, the Mizuchi engine is graphically superior to any Western game engine, better than the likes of UE4 or Unity. And even besides that, Japanese engines like Luminous Studio and Fox Engine are easily comparable to the most cutting-edge of Western game engines. All you're doing is comparing low-end Japanese tech to high-end Western tech, which is a nonsensical comparison.