West vs. East!



I personally prefer Japanese games due to their creative story telling, beautiful art design, and their games must be fun approach which many western developers abandon in favor of looking realistic. Sure some of those games are fun, but the fact that the industry indicates that Japanese games aren't fresh and reuse gameplay elements yet western games release many of the same games with nothing new other than a new story and new characters. Sure Japanese games can have some cliché riddled stories and whatnot, but most of the freshest most unique games I've played this generation have been Japanese games, so is Japan really less relevant?



Take Xenoblade Chronicles for example. Xenoblade Chronicles has infused Adventure, JRPG, WRPG, and MMO gameplay into one very fresh and unique package and though there have been some unique western games I can't think of a single one that even comes close to being as unique as Xenoblade Chronicles. That's not saying that western games are bad, but just that Japanese games tend to have fresh gameplay whereas western games feel more stale. At least that's my opinion what's yours?



Viewtiful_Joe's response:

I'd have to say that without Japanese publishers, the video game industry wouldn't be the same. The excellence provided to us every year from companies such as Capcom, Konami and, of course, Nintendo, cannot be found in any other form of entertainment in the world. Anyone can pick up and play a video game and find something great within them, which is why they're all so popular.

Though, relying on just Western developers and indy devs would be a nightmare. Games like Skyrim, Bioshock, Medal of Honor and Batman Arkham City all boost popularity among the media and public receiving praise all over the West but these games cannot hold the game industry up for too long.

People will lose attention and soon realize that there are better things in life than a dull first person RPG simulation. Relying solely on the Western developers would result in a huge gaming flop.



SKTTR's response:

I´m a gamer that needs a balanced support of different games from different countries.

Most of my favourite games come from Japan, but I would be missing something if there weren´t games like Anno/Dawn of Discovery, Broken Sword, Bully: Scholarship Edition, Cursed Mountain, Dead Space Extraction, Donkey Kong Country Returns, Driver, Excite Truck, GoldenEye, Manhunt 2, Metroid Prime Trilogy, Mushroom Men: The Spore Wars, Overlord: Dark Legend, Sam & Max, Scarface: The World Is Yours, Sid Meier´s Pirates!, Silent Hill: Shattered Memories, The Godfather: Blackhand Edition, The House of the Dead Overkill or Worms: Battle Islands in my Wii collection, not to mention the Virtual Console and especially WiiWare games.

However, the list above is tiny compared to the list of good Wii games I have that were made in Japan. I just hope Nintendo can attract some good 3rd party companies from the west with the WiiU, so we don´t miss out on the really great high-end western games that are rarely available on Nintendo consoles (like GTA).

On the other hand, Nintendo consoles are getting so much exclusive quality content that you won´t have time to be sad for too long about what other consoles get.

Still, fact is, there are billions of gamers and people in general who don´t like Japanese games, billions who don´t like RPGs, billions who don´t dig anime style. But most of the Wii library is.

To expand the audience, and to make gamers happier, Nintendo has to find a way to bring more diversity to the market.

And 3rd parties have to learn to make something great as well. The flood of mediocre dance games, minigame collections, and party and sports mixes gets annoying.