As I mentioned in the last of my Famitsu write-ups, the Japanese gaming audience has become increasingly intrigued with Western games. While still far from a dominant force a number of these games have been taken to heart. Even in the relatively short time I have lived in Osaka the game stores and magazines have slowly begun to place European and American games more prominently.

In truth some of this maybe simply down to the advert driven nature of the game press, regularly previews are sandwiched between adverts for their respective games. This occasionally makes me wonder if my assumptions are mistaken, that increases I have perceived in the popularity of western games is driven by western developers pushing to make headway in a conservative market. But sales figure don’t lie and while they still have a long was to go to catch up with titles developed in eastern markets, American and European games are starting to gain more acceptance.

It is hard to tell this week if the heavy reliance on western developed games is based on interest or a lack of alternatives. Famitsu has spent the last year talking about the same three games but with no new Final Fantasy XIII details and Dragon Quest 9 and Monster Hunter 3 Tri already out, some space seems to have freed up for other games.

Modern Warfare 2 manages to occupy a full eight pages, four of preview, four of advertising. Much of this coverage is generated by the games popularity in the West (and the fact Activision bought the advertising space) as opposed to local audience interest. As FPSs tend to not a popular genre in Japan (COD4 sold only twenty eight thousand in its first week here) I will be intrigued to see if its sequel fares any better this year.

While Modern Warfare occupied a weighty portion of this week’s volume there were a number of other Western developed titles backing it up. All of these were housed in the Sony special that makes up 32 pages of this weeks magazine. The first section of this special focused on the rebranding of the Playstation 3 and the new hardware (plus all the accessories you will be wanting to buy) this was followed by a section given to the systems past exclusives and up coming releases. The vast majority of these games received a fraction of a page, but three Western games managed to muster a total of eight pages between them. God of War 3 occupies four of these pages, and is made up primarily of screen shots that most interested parties will have already seen online, but for the teenage boys who make up the majority of the magazines readership will no doubt prove to be a tantalizing first look.

Equally image heavy was the coverage of the other two games, each of which takes up two pages piece. Socom for PSP was something I personally hadn’t looked into before, but the promise of 1–16 player support probably does carry more weight in a country where there are designate areas for people to play local coop together. The headline for the game also mentions one other interesting feature of the title, the download price. While the retail price of the game is near 5000 yen if you choose to download it will only be 3800 yen (a saving of 1200 yen). As a country in which online purchasing if less common I look forward to seeing which distribution method proves the most successful for Sony. The other Western game nestling in this section is InFamous as it nears it Japanese release. As a game which has already been out for some four months in western territories the only news of note for InFamous is that it will be continuing Sony’s pricing policy for first party developed games developed in the west, releasing at around 6000 yen (about 2000 yen less than most top tier titles).

Every week at least one section makes me curse my laziness in not having studies Japanese language enough in my time here. This week there are two. The first is a section called Games Start Here, Games End Here (at least I think that’s the translation even my girlfriend is a little hazy on exact meaning – Gamu Kore Kara no, Gamu Kore Made no). This section centers on the past and future of gaming. Initially it looks at a number of landmark titles, starting with Donkey Kong and moving through to Monster Hunter Tri. This is followed by interviews with a number of prominent Japanese gaming personalities talking about the future of games (Toshihiro Nagoshi: voice actor from Yakuza 3. Jun Takeushi: director at Capcom – Lost Planet, Resident Evil and Street Fighter. Masahiro Sakurai: Hal Labs – Kirby and Smash Bros. Hideki Kamiya: Clover Studio/Platinum – Okami, Viewtiful Joe and Bayonetta. Hisashi Koinuma: Koei – Dynasty Warriors. Cliff Bleszinski: Epic – Gears of War. Kaname Fujioka: Capcom – Monster Hunter). It is something I intend to look up a full translation of in the coming weeks and would encourage you to also.

The other segment that interested me was the announcement of Okamiden (Wolf Legend). Fortunately this was leaked online earlier in the week, and while it isn’t what I expected or hoped for it has none the less got me excited for this DS sequel to Clover’s original PS2 and Wii game Okami. Though Clover isn’t involved the game looks interesting and the DS offers a perfect interface for the games painting mechanic. Currently my main worry is the fact the graphics will have to take a hit on the handheld system. Graphics usually take second seat to gameplay but much of Okami’s appeal lay in it gorgeously stylized graphics that their loss will be more evident. Also worrying me is the cuteness. The original wasn’t ‘gritty’ but it did nothing with the lead characters to deliberately pander to a younger audience. In this game Amaterasu the wolf of the original has been replaced a creature named Chibiterasu, who looks like a cute wolf cub. This change in style maybe to make the game more accessible to kids, which I worry will result in a simplification of some of the environmental subtexts to the game, making them more explicit. Either way I am eager to see how the game turns out but with the graphical changes and the change in developer I am keeping my enthusiasm in check.

Beside the pile of winter previews there are also reviews! Or this week to be more accurate, review! Technically it isn’t even a new game but the remake of Pokémon Gold and Silver (renamed Heart Gold and Soul Silver) for DS. A reimagining of what people tell me is the best Pokémon game (I have only played blue, sapphire and pearl). It uses the same game engine as the previous DS Pokémon games and received a platinum award from the magazine with a score of 37 (9-10-9-9). Admittedly for those who lived through the games the first time it feels like a slight cash-in from Nintendo who had to produce (relatively) little content for this rerelease, but I always happy to see classic games being made available to a new audience.

Sales this week are back to normal though with Dragon Quest 9 back on top, taking the tie rate ever closer to 3% of the ENTIRE population, if it hits 6% I have decided to go back to the UK. At 2 is the Mii DS game Tomodachi Kore Kesyon followed by the 2D fighter Melty Blood on PS2. After that the Wii is back in with Monster Hunter 3 Tri and Wii Sports Resort respectively giving Nintendo consoles four games in the top five.

Sales remain low for consoles with no big titles out to push sales. PS3 remains the hardest hit as people wait for the remolded unit, and also with many stores sold out of the old unit as Sony hasn’t been resupplying them prior to the ’slim’ release. DSi remains secure at the top. Very secure, if you combine every other systems sales they only manage to beat the DS line (DS Lite and DSi) by about 2000 units.

That is far from all, but a healthy chunk of this weeks coverage. I expect the next few weeks will be a bit quieter in the build up to TGS at the end of the month, so hopefully the next write up won’t have to be quite as long.