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AtomEast versus West: Has the game industry shifted to the west?
GoNintendo pointed out a fairly balanced article that is bound to spark debate (possibly hate) on GameDaily about whether or not we need Japan in the video game industry anymore. On one side of the coin Chris Buffa says, “The game industry has shifted and the West leads the charge. Cut scenes, voice acting, music and game play will demolish anything that comes from the East, especially if it involves spiky haired adolescents and talking wood. Japan is stuck in this time warp in which it still thinks gamers love its antics.” Robert Workman counters with, “Even with the rise of internal U.S. developers and independent game makers, Japan will continue to play a huge part in the video game industry. Miyamoto is overseeing the production of Super Mario Galaxy, which should serve as a great one-two punch with The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess. Mizuguchi seems unable to do wrong, what with Every Extend Extra Extreme on the way and a rumored Rez sequel in the works. I know Square Enix’s teams will have a few great RPG’s on the horizon, including a possible return of the Chrono franchise and more Final Fantasy goodness.”
There is truth about the J-RPGs having too many carbon cutout archetypical heroes as protagonists and there are some great Western developed games on the shelves (God of War II comes immediately to mind). But is that enough reason to say Japan is going the way of the dinosaur? The industry needs as many developers with different ideas as it can get to make original games like Ouendan / Elite Beat Agents or more of the same if that is what consumers want. And while we’re at debating Japan versus the West bring on more developers from around the world like Nibris from Poland and Nexon from Korea. Each nation has different cultural ideas they infuse in their games and end up creating their own style of art we call video games.
9 Responses to “East versus West: Has the game industry shifted to the west?”
March 16th, 2007 at 6:12 pm
It’s not that Japan is no longer needed, it’s just that the west can survive without Japan now. That’s never really been true before. So in that sense some balance has in fact shifted
But that doesn’t mean Jpn games are useless. Scraping by and living in the lap of luxury aren’t the same thing. The more games are out there, the better off we all are.
choice is a beautiful thing, and I for one don’t want to see games from any region disappear.
March 16th, 2007 at 6:58 pm
when was the last truly inventive game? Or Artistic one? Japan gave us Pikmin and Okami. The western companies has what? God of War? Which is just a refined version of Devil May Cry. What else? I mean truly artistic or inventive console games? Market and genre leaders? Guitar Hero’s the only thing i can think of.
The only good thing to come out from the West is the procedural stuff. And those games aren’t even out yet.
How bout the handheld space? I mean, Japan totally owns handheld game software. Their the only ones who can make dS games worth a damn.
But let’s not get pedantic. Let’s look at sales numbers for 2005, 2006. If you look at NPD, the top annual sales for American companies are Shooters and Sports.
While Japan has Platformers, sports, rpg, a plethora of variety.
While American companies are getting healthier, games like God Of War and Guitar Hero are still very rare.
March 16th, 2007 at 8:01 pm
The difference with today and yesterday is that game consoles have attracted the none gamers as well. Today, we have people buying a PS2 just to be cool and play some Yo-Yo-Yo Grand Theft Auto, to play a couple of sports games and to shoot each other on XBOX Live with HALO.
Although it may be good for the game economy, can we really call these people gamers? I man if I go and buy a basketball and shorts with the NBA logo, will that make me a basketball player of any sort (amateur, professional)? No, that will simply make me a guy who owns a basketball, NBA shorts and that happens to play B-Ball.
Japanese might not purchase as many console games as they use to, they are more into Handhelds since they can bring gaming with them, but the Japanese games are and will remain important for the rest of the world (well maybe not for Microsoft).
I personally don’t play many games that weren’t made in Japan, mainly cause I don’t like FPS, Sports Games (minus Wii Sports), Serious Racing Games (not counting games like Mario Kart) or Western RPGs.
March 16th, 2007 at 9:34 pm
Flaw in this article’s logic.
Every genre of every artistic medium ever looks pretty crappy if you only look at the mainstream. While it’s true all those JRPG criticisms apply to Final Fantasy and Kingdom Hearts, they certainly don’t apply to Shin Megami Tensei.
Also, the article comes from a pretty western perspective. It’s totally natural that most of the games Americans play will be made by Americans and most of the games Japanese play will be made by Japanese. It’s a simple matter of everybody making games for the audience that happens to be near them. Japan dominating America’s game market was an aberration.
It’s also a matter of taste. I don’t like MMORPGs, I don’t like FPSes, I don’t like games which pretend to be realistic by showing really superficial television stereotypes of gang mambers going around shooting people, and I don’t like western style RPGs with their lack of direction, need for powerleveling, and tendency to require stumbling around randomly to find anything. That doesn’t mean they aren’t good games — it just means I don’t like them.
Most of the big budget games that pander to mainstream casual gamers will always suck, American or Japanese. But it will also always be possible to find a niche in the gaming industry you like if you look hard enough.
March 16th, 2007 at 10:33 pm
@ rdun
You forget Viva Pinata.
IMO, its always nice to have a variety of game types. I like both Western and Eastern games.
March 17th, 2007 at 1:25 am
@ Rdun
Guitar Hero is no where near the creative/artistic game you thought it to be since it’s a complete rip-off of Guitar Freaks, which came out like 10 yrs ago… IMO anyways. But every so often a concept like Spore pops up. We’ll just have to see how that game turns out.
Back to topic… To say JP games are no longer needed is absolutely ridiculous. Without the variety we would get 1st/3rd person shooter every other week. The rest of the time we would be getting sports/alternative sports/racing games. Once every other year we’ll get a Mass Effect or Oblivion. If anything I would say Western games are no longer needed, but then I would only sink to Buffa’s level of idiocy.
Without JP games the industry will not be at the state it is in now, and it will not move in any positive direction. Anyone disagrees with that I will harshly say you lack vision and imagination, like most western games.
March 17th, 2007 at 11:27 am
The one guy (Buffa) doesn’t seem balanced at all, just some raving lunatic. The other guy seems to be the one who has a balanced look on things. Some of these things are just nonsense though:
“NBA 2K8 and numerous others will make Mario Party 8, Armored Core 4 and other bland, uninspired games look foolish.”
Riiight.
Its strange that Buffa seems to want to diminish freedom by saying that Japan should just quit (rather then merely debating its dominance in the industry.) Frankly, we should be happy that there is choice, not frothing at the mouth about one nation’s (region I guess) superiority (dare I say it, thats foolish!) I think he hates freedom.
Frankly though, you have to be pretty crazy to argue that more innovation and higher quality comes from the West.
A quick cruise to his reviews listed under RottonTomatoes - http://www.rottentomatoes.com/gauthor-10263/ - shows he seems to favour Japanese games more consistanly then Western games. Hmm.
And one more thing, saying that the 360 alone proves that American hardware trumps Japanese hardware is silly. So what about the original Xbox? Or the Philips CD-I? It looks like the West is 1 for 3, which is pretty poor. But then again this guy doesn’t like the Dreamcast either so what are you going to do.
“The 360 also has the most comfortable controller ever designed”
What the hell?
March 18th, 2007 at 9:37 am
Insofar as the article argues that Japanese developers no longer have the huge lead they once did over Westerners, it’s definitely correct… Japanese companies used to drive the entire industry. Now, the playing field is much more level, and I’m pleased that there’s more variety out there now on both sides of the aisle. On the other hand, it would be silly to write off Japanese developers, since there are plenty of examples of strong Japanese contributions to the industry (now, before, and coming up) and I’m sure that will continue.
Gaming Map
March 16th, 2007 at 5:53 pm
Jpn games not needed? Whoever said that is nuts. The same could be said for US games, not everyone likes to play the same EA NBA/NFL, racing, and 1st/3rd person shooting games.
Just different taste and preference for genres in Jpn and the US, that’s all, like the rest of the World likes soccer games (FIFA/Winning Eleven). So that guy thinks games from Jpn like Castlevania, Resident Evil, Shadow of the Colossus, and Nintendo has no place in America, what has he been smoking? I don’t even have a reason to have a 360 if not for all these great Jpn RPGs coming out. Unless the guy has a grudge for Japan for not welcoming the Xbox.
Not to mentoin almost all Eng. voice-acting is a pain to the ears.