I think it's quite interesting to see the difference in what types of games are more popular,and the way people play games in different countries.I live in Australia,and the other countries I've been to most recently are Thailand,U.S,Malaysia and have seen to an extent what types of games are easy to buy in those countries,the types of games that are popular and the different way they play games.I'll also talk about gaming in other countries but I'll just mention things that are common knowledge about gaming in those countries.

In Australia many JRPGs are hard to find.Sure Final Fantasy games are easy to find here because they sell well just about anywhere,but it was very hard to find Star Ocean Till the End of Time,Breath of Fire V and most of the JRPGs I own I bought them in Thailand or from international seller on eBay.Chrono Cross,Suikoden III,Parasite Eve,Super Mario RPG(SNES version),Tales of Vesperia,Star Ocean 4 are some games many Australian gamers won't get to play because they are not for PAL region.

The last time I checked the Australian games sales charts,the top 10 selling games were either Wii or NDS games.

Games are expensive in Australia,anything under 50$ is considered budget priced.Expect to pay 60$-120$ for certain games.If you want a game that comes with an accessory or with some limited edition collectors thing expect to pay even more.

In Thailand,they have just about anything you want as long as you have money.I could go to the big shopping mall refered to as MBK and buy the latest games from Japan,the only problem is I need to be able to read Japanese to play them properly :p At MBK I bought Persona 3 before it was officially released outside of Japan,Rurouni Kenshin: Enjou! Kyoto Rinne(a Samurai X game) for PS2,a Cowboy Bebop game for PS2,(neither Rurouni Kenshin: Enjou! Kyoto Rinne or the PS2 Cowboy Bebop game have been reviewed by Gamespot cuz they're in Japanese but at least you have the option of playing them and learning Japanese and playing them properly,and also found Initial D Special Stage(PS2),and Marvel vs Capcom 1 and 2 and X-Men vs Street Fighter for very cheap.

In Thailand I can buy 25 NDS games for around 50$ AU and I can choose from a selection of the newest releases,and games that are rare and Japanese NDS games that are rare outside of Japan and just about any NDS game I want.

In Thailand there is high speed online gaming cafes everywhere and many Thai people love to play games at those places,in fact the police often have to come and remove school students from those places during school hours.

In Thailand many people still play games at the video arcades(where as in Australia many video arcades I used to go to went out of business)In Thailand there is video arcade machines in many places at shopping malls.And at video arcades and game stores I've even seen things like multiple Playstation 2's connected together on multiple screens and people can play soccer games against eachother and it looks fun to play that way.

In South Korea professional StarCraft players are looked at as national heroes/celebreties and they televise StarCraft tournaments and have commentary.When I was watching a documentary about the Korean pro StarCraft players I saw many pretty Korean girls go crazy and scream when they saw the good male pro Starcraft players get ready for a match.And there's a big screen that they show Starcraft matches in one of the South Korean cities(I think Seoul)

When I watched the Blizzard pay per view,most of the players who were in the StarCraft,Warcraft 3 and WOW tournaments were Koreans and not surprisingly Koreans won all the tournaments.And quite a few Koreans have died from playing WOW and Starcraft for too long without rest.

A StarCraft tournament in South Korea

I've lived in Malaysia for 2 months,went to many shopping malls and most of the games they sold were PC games.I found a few places that sold console games but alot of placesonly sold PC games.Still Malaysia had many rare Japanese Playstation 2 games at some of the stores I went to.Malaysia has the high speed internet/gaming places and like in Thailand school students are not allowed on the premises during school hours.

In Japan,look at these console sales from February 28,2009

Console Total
NDS 26,042,552

Many Japanese games are made to be cute and colorful.But the Japanese can make great horror titles like RE,Silent Hill,Fatal Frame and games with deep stories and many big plot twists and with lots of emotion such as JRPGs and the Metal Gear Solid series and they can do beautiful cinematics such in Final Fantasy VIII and X.

I've heard people in the U.S lined up for hours to buy Halo 2,and many people in America were very excited about Halo 3 but in some other countries not many people care about Halo 3.American game companies make alot more FPS and RTS games than Japanese companies.

I saw on TV that in England they have or had televised Quake 3 or 4 tournaments with commentary and they had teams go against eachother that had their own names and logos.

But finally I'd like to say I found all these differences in different countries on how they play games quite interesting.