Blue is Me

Tag: genre

  • Which do you find better, Japanese-made video games or Western-made ones, and why?

    Totally depends on the genres. I think Western companies and Japanese companies excel at different genres.

     

    FPS – Western companies own this one. Western companies have made groundbreaking and influential FPS games such as Doom, Quake, Duke Nukem 3D, Goldeneye 007, Battlefield, Far Cry, Crysis,
    Perfect Dark, Halo, Call of Duty, Fortnite, Overwatch, Unreal Tournament, Half-Life 1/2, Bioshock, Borderlands, Deus Ex etc It’s not really even close.

     

    Sports – again, Western companies. NBA 2K, FIFA, NHL, MLB etc EA, Activision and Take Two (all Western) own a significant slice of the sports genre.

     

    Adventure / Open World – This I’d have to give to Western companies too. Zelda and Yakuza notwithstanding, the vast majority of great adventure and open world games are from Western companies. GTA, Red Dead Redemption, Watch Dogs, Assassins Creed, Tomb Raider, Horizon Zero Dawn, Uncharted, Last of Us etc

     

    Action / Hack and Slash – This is an interesting one. There’s both great Japanese games here like Devil May Cry, Dynasty Warriors and Bayonetta and Western ones like God of War. I’d say the advantage still goes to Japanese here though for overall volume of making these types of games. A lot of anime types like Hyperdimension Neptunia, Senran Kagura, Fire Emblem Warriors etc would go into this category as well.

     

    Simulation – Western companies as well. I don’t think Japan even has many games in this genre. Sims, Civilization, Anno, Tropico, Cities Skylines, Sim City etc all Western

     

    Racing – This is another interesting one because both Western and Japanese companies make great racing games. Western companies make Burnout, Forza, Need for Speed, Test Drive, Midnight Club, Wipe Out while Japanese companies make Mario Kart, Sega Rally, Ridge Racer, Gran Turismo, F-Zero. I think it’s totally a wash here as both Japan and Western companies make great racing games.

     

    Fighting – Easily Japan. Japanese companies popularized the genre with Street Fighter II and further made progress with games like Virtua Fighter, Soul Calibur, Tekken, Dead or Alive, Guilty Gear, Blazblue, King of Fighters etc it’s no doubt that fighting games are one of Japanese companies’ strong points. Also beat em ups like Double Dragon, Battletoads, Final Fight, Golden Axe and Streets of Rage would also go here as well

     

    Strategy – We have to make division between strategy and tactics. For tactical video games, I would have to give it to Japan for games like Final Fantasy Tactics, Fire Emblem, Advance Wars, Tactics Ogre, Disgaea etc and for both turn based and real time strategy its easily Western companies with games like Warcraft, Starcraft, Dune, Total Annihilation, Command & Conquer, Red Alert, Age of Empires, Civilization, Tropico, Empire Earth etc Western companies basically own the strategy genre.

     

    Horror – I think although Alone in the Dark was a pioneer in this genre, this has to go to Japan with two of the most influential series in this genre – the Silent Hill and Resident Evil series. Although I like Dead Space and System Shock 2 too.

     

    Platformer – clearly Japan. Japan took Activison’s Pitfall and raised the bar to another level with Super Mario Bros. Super Mario, Contra, Mega Man, Castlevania, Sonic, Metroid, Donkey Kong Country etc all took the platformer to another level.

     

    RPG – This is the most interesting category because JRPGs and Western RPGs are so different. JRPGs have made their mark with games like Final Fantasy 6, Chrono Trigger, Earthbound, Secret of Mana, Terranigma, Super Mario RPG, Phantasy Star 4, Shining Force II, Dragon Quest 11, Persona 5, Chrono Cross, Suikoden II, Panzer Dragoon Saga, Lunar Story, Skies of Arcadia, Kingdom Hearts, Xenogears etc standing as some of the greatest RPGs ever.

    On the other hand you have groundbreaking Western RPGs like Diablo 2, Witcher 3, Fable 2, Elder Scrolls: Oblivion, Mass Effect 2, Dragon Age Origins, Baldur’s Gate 2, Ultima IV, Wizardry 7, Might and Magic 6, Knights of the Old Republic, Fallout New Vegas, Planescape Torment, Neverwinter Nights, Dark Sun etc that are also equally good, but different. I mean how can you compare a game like Oblivion with a game like Chrono Trigger? It’s not comparable, they are totally different games but both RPGs and great in their own ways. So I have to call this category a total wash.

  • Why did Japanese games start declining in innovation and execution compared to Western games starting in the 2000s?

    Complacency and conservatism.

    Mega man developer Keiji Inafune himself remarked upon the decline of the Japanese video game industry a lot beginning in the 2000s and he took a lot of inspiration from Western video game companies who he looked up to, to try and focus Japanese towards doing more risky, innovative things, but that was not the Japanese way and eventually Keiji left Capcom out of dissatisfaction to form his own company.

    Let’s be straightforward with the facts here: Western companies invented the video game industry. Atari kickstarted the industry with Pong, the world’s first arcade game. After that Japanese companies improved upon that with various arcade games in the 1970s. Many companies like Midway, Konami, Namco, Capcom and Taito got their start in the arcade industry.

    Japanese companies took what Western companies built in the 70s and early 80s and evolved + refined it in the late 80s and 90s. This then set a period of Japanese innovation + dominance in the video game industry that lasted until the late 90s I would say.

    (note I am talking home video game market – for the arcade market Japanese basically took over from Atari and dominated from the late 70s with Space Invaders, Pacman, Donkey Kong etc and never looked back)

    Landmark RPGs like Final Fantasy, Phantasy Star and Dragon Quest were built on top of what earlier Western games like Ultima and Wizardry and Zork had started.
    Japanese largely perfected the platformer genre with games like Super Marios Bros, Sonic, Mega Man, Castlevania, Metroid and Contra, taking Activision’s Pitfall as inspiration. Japanese also popularized the fighting game genre with Street Fighter II.
    Legend of Zelda took what Atari’s Adventure built and heavily expanded the adventure genre.

    So yeah I would say during the late 80s and early to mid 90s, Japanese dominated the home video game market, because their games truly expanded the video game industry.

    But sometime during the mid 90s – Japanese management became more complacent, and started becoming focused with just churning out sequels to their well known franchises.
    That’s why the late 90s and 00s what do you see from Japanese companies?
    Another Resident Evil (which was built on top of what Alone in the Dark started). Another Sonic. Another Mega Man. Another Castlevania. Another Super Mario. Another Metal Gear Solid. Another Final Fantasy. Another Tekken. Pokemon and Shenmue were exceptions to the rule and were truly unique experiences, but for the most part, Japanese companies started resting on their laurels. The strict Japanese hierarchy prevented programmers and management from trying something truly unique and different. They were preoccupied with milking their existing franchises.

    Meanwhile from Western companies from the mid 90s to 00s started coming out with new unique ways of developing games. Western developers created their own game engines, thought outside of the box and delivered some truly unique video gaming experiences.
    Diablo. Warcraft. Starcraft. Goldeneye 007. Doom. Quake. Halo. Duke Nukem 3D. The Sims. Myst. Half-Life. Half-Life 2. Mass Effect. Fable. Elder Scrolls. Fallout. Command & Conquer. Sim City. Age of Empires. Civilization. GTA 3.
    Need I go on?

    Now you see the difference? Japanese companies more or less stuck to the same games and same genres while Western companies created games that ran the gamut from FPS to simulation to RTS to totally open world sandbox. And they were well executed. Japanese companies struggled with creating those kinds of games.

    This is what Keiji Inafune saw when he went to the game shows in America.. he saw Japan create an endless stream of the same games over and over while Americans created genre defining games starting in the late 90s. That’s why he left to create his own company. But unfortunately that didn’t do so well (Mighty No 9 for those who have heard of it).

    Right now I’d say Japan is only starting to learn from the West in the past few years. Games like Zelda – Breath of the Wild and some of the new Yakuza and Persona games proves that they are willing to explore with new more expansive games. And some of the indie games and visual novels they come out with are pretty cool

    However, Western companies still have a foothold in the cinematic action genre (God of War, Call of Duty, Last of Us, Uncharted, Tomb Raider, Assassins Creed etc) – as well as providing truly unique experiences amongst indie developed games such as Into the Breach, Cuphead, Journey, and lots of roguelikes and metroidvania style games.

    I’d say it still sort of holds true that Western companies still have the upper hand when it comes to truly diverse, big budget and unique experiences, while Japanese companies stick to what they do well (JRPGs, visual novels, horror, 2D platformers, fighters) – with Nintendo being the only japanese company usually that’s willing to experiment a little bit more with games like Splatoon, Fire Emblem, Pokemon and Animal Crossing.