Western RPGs in Japan: Popularity question

[kilpatrick]

How popular are most Western RPGs such as Oblivion, KOTOR, & Diablo in Japan?

[Kstyle]

Not so popular I think, as every western game that's sold there.

[kenshinbebop]

Well, I don't think XBOX is that popular in Japan. So those games aren't either.

[Ryosagi]

Just got Playstation numbers for Diablo:
http://www.vgcharts.org/japgamewk.php?name=Diablo

[Suiko Eiji]

How popular are most Western RPGs such as Oblivion, KOTOR, & Diablo in Japan?

Oh, I thought you meant real western roleplaying games like Dungeons and Dragons, Shadowrun, or P.O.D, etc.

I know as the Advanced Dungeons and Dragons (commonly called 2nd Ed) picked up here in the early 1980s, many of these games filtered over to Japan and picked up their own niche popularity there in the mid-1980s. In fact, the anime OAV Record of Lodoss War was based upon a novel that the creator wrote out from a D&D campaign he ran with some friends.

As far as how popular they are now, I cannot imagine them being any more popular than in the US which has a fairly hardcore fanbase. I would think they would be significantly less, especially with the large number of RPGs available on console systems like the Super Famicom, Mega Drive, and PlayStation in perticular.

[windwalker]

Diablo & Everquest are popular in Japan little bit,but other RPG is not.

[hiroaki]

How popular are most Western RPGs such as Oblivion, KOTOR, & Diablo in Japan?

They are very good games but unpopular in Japan.

ドラクエ DQ＞ファイファン FF＞洋ゲー Western

[kilpatrick]

They are very good games but unpopular in Japan.



Any good reason why they're unpopular in Japan despite being good games?

[windwalker]

Any good reason why they're unpopular in Japan despite being good games?
Unacceptable character design

[CrossboneGundam]

Just got Playstation numbers for Diablo:
http://www.vgcharts.org/japgamewk.php?name=Diablo

The PS rendition of Diablo did poorly in the US as well, so that's not a very good indicator.

[ablo]

Not cutesy anime style= Bomb in Japan.

[sfried]

I've seen a translated doujin based off Baulder's Gate posted on 4chan, so I guess some Western RPGs are popular. I'm pretty sure some have heard of Diablo over there...

[rayndeon]

Any good reason why they're unpopular in Japan despite being good games?

Design mechanics tend to conflict with those used to J-RPGs. This can range from complexity, non-linearity, artwork, et cetra.

[windwalker]

Not cutesy anime style= Bomb in Japan.
North American realistic characters are always
1.middle-aged man with dirty face(汚い顔のオッサンしかいない)
2.woman,as a man with handsome face（女が全員オトコマエ）

[kilpatrick]

So basically it's a design issue with Western RPGs, despite being good games.


Care to elaborate more why Japanese gamers could not relate with the design in Western RPGs?

[Kstyle]

But I think one game did good in Japan, GTA III.

[windwalker]

So basically it's a design issue with Western RPGs, despite being good games.


Care to elaborate more why Japanese gamers could not relate with the design in Western RPGs?

I think Western RPGs male characters are too far from ｆeeling of purity.
A woman is not only disillusioned, but a muscular gorilla is existence very unsightly also for a man.

So,I always wondered why you guys buy the MGG(Muscular Gorilla Game)?

[ablo]

I think Western RPGs male characters are too far from ｆeeling of purity.
A woman is not only disillusioned, but a muscular gorilla is existence very unsightly also for a man.

So,I always wondered why you guys buy the MGG(Muscular Gorilla Game)?

Really? I think a lot of Japanese anime males look like girls, and act quite feminine sometimes. Not all anime, but a good number. One complaint I have about anime is WHY DO ALL THE ANIME GIRLS SOUND 5 YEARS OLD WITH A SQUEAKY MOUSE VOICE? :P

[windwalker]

Really? I think a lot of Japanese anime males look like girls, and act quite feminine sometimes. Not all anime, but a good number. One complaint I have about anime is WHY DO ALL THE ANIME GIRLS SOUND 5 YEARS OLD WITH A SQUEAKY MOUSE VOICE? :P
Really? I think a lot of foreign game females look like boys, but act quite feminine sometimes.

Lots of Japanese RPG players are female.And female loves feminine male and male players don't like muscular gorilla too.Only gay male loves it in Japan.

This is the Japanese host club. You can understand what kind guys the Japanese woman wants.
http://www.on-sta.com/index.html

[Burbster]

I remember hearing some Japanese game designer saying that Japanese prefer linearity in their games. Which makes sense as your typical Japanese RPG tends to follow more set paths and objectives.

What is the reason for other genres of non-japanese games also being unpopular in Japan? One reason cited by a japanese member is character design that is unappealing, but what about games where character design is not an issue. Take Counter-strike for instance, which is one of the most popular online games in the world. On a list of thousands of servers, there are many in North America, all of Europe, Russia and a few in Australiasia and in South America, yet for some reason very, very few in Japan. Why is this so? I recently checked a list of the best-selling games ever in Japan, and there were almost no non-japanese games in the top 100. Is this some kind of ethnocentrism - Do Japanese not play foreign games for the fact that they are foreign?

[hiroaki]

Is this some kind of ethnocentrism - Do Japanese not play foreign games for the fact that they are foreign?

No, they are very unique.
they don't know FPS&RTS but they have life simulation game/育ゲー(Princess Maker (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Princess_Maker) is 1st) & Eroge (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eroge)
And anime influenced both.

[ablo]

The majority of Koreans have the same taste in games as Americans and Europeans, namely First-person shooters and Real-time strategy games like Warcraft III and Starcraft.

[NTsan]

The majority of Koreans have the same taste in games as Americans and Europeans, namely First-person shooters and Real-time strategy games like Warcraft III and Starcraft.

Because they are Blizzard maniacs, other than that all their game are based on anime design... (Lineage 2 etc), same for some Taiwanese, Hong Kong, Chinese game studio.

Btw Korean/China/Taiwan only make MMO and very little offline game nowadays, which means more market potiential from Japanese imports (recent game like The Legend of Heros VI sold quite well in Taiwan and China)

[ablo]

Counter-Strike is also pretty big in Korea though.

[Ironfrost]

So,I always wondered why you guys buy the MGG(Muscular Gorilla Game)?

It's mostly a matter of perspective. In Western games, the player is the character, whereas in Japanese games the player only controls the character. This means that the characters in Western games usually have few distinguishing features (think of Halo or Doom, where the PC is 'a man in a suit of armour', or most Western RPGs where the character design is chosen by the player him/herself), while Japanese game characters are much more distinctive.

As the player is the character, that means that the character has to have characteristics that the player wants to posess. The target market for most games is mainly teenage boys, so masculine characteristics like strength and toughness are the most important, and the 'girly men' from Japanese games are avoided.

I think it's definitely a Japanese rather than an Asian thing. Even though Chinese-developed games tend to follow the Japanese style, Western games are much more popular here - the only popular Japanese ones seem to be ero-games.

[kilpatrick]

I think it's definitely a Japanese rather than an Asian thing. Even though Chinese-developed games tend to follow the Japanese style, Western games are much more popular here - the only popular Japanese ones seem to be ero-games.




Heck, even Chinese/Hong Kong/Taiwanese comics have muscular guys kicking butts. And how can explain the popularity of World of Warcraft in China, Taiwan, Hong Kong & Korea rather than Japan? So, yeah, it's a Japanese thing.

Meanwhile, Bioware has come up with an interesting dialog system for Mass Effect which somewhat acts like an interactive in-game cutscene. This is one advantage Western RPGs have, being that character empathising with the NPCs rather than playing him/er. It's too bad Western RPGs don't do melodramatic stories where we cry for a particular girl slain by a pretty-boy demigod :rolleyes:

[Burbster]

Interactive in-game dialogue/cutscene, like in Deus Ex?

[rayndeon]

Personally, I play Western RPGs sometimes simply because of the lack of overbearing melodrama.

[ablo]

Well, the "West" technically created the RPG as we know it today with Dungeons and Dragons.

[rayndeon]

Also, the West created gaming. So, don't bash the West that much when it comes to games. :)

(Yes, I understand I just used a genetic fallacy (http://www.fallacyfiles.org/genefall.html). It was done on purpose.)

[ablo]

(Yes, I understand I just used a genetic fallacy (http://www.fallacyfiles.org/genefall.html). It was done on purpose.)
Genital phallacy? :blink:
(redundant?)