How to fall in love

This article has been about 3 years in the making. Japan and Japanese games have always been a bit of a mystery to me. I’ve grown up with western games and western game ideals since I can’t remember when, but never really found what the appeal of Japanese style games were but in doing so they have done something for me I hope they will for you. Let me explain How to fall in love….

If I asked you what do you think of as a Japanese game, you’d probably mention Final Fantasy, Metal Gear Solid, Resident Evil, or fighting games like Mortal Kombat or Tekken, and then throw in the button smashing sword fighting games for good measure. You’d think that’s all they had to offer and carry on. That was myself to be honest, and my way of thinking too. I’m happy with my first person shooters, my Lara Croft and Nathan Drakes, Forza, COD and Battlefield so leave me alone!  

But like a nagging feeling, a pulling wonder, I always yearned to find out if there was surely more depth to Japanese games than this. I mean, to us westerner for example, the Vita system is a luxury peripheral, certainly not a go to console, yet in Japan, believe it or not, there are months where the Vita, even now, outsells the PS4 in units sold per month! If you asked a Japanese gamer is the Vita dead, they’d laugh in your face. How can that be ?

Well, I’m going to now sell you why, if you’ve not played many Japanese games, you need to be.

Let’s start with where it all started with me, Muramasa Rebirth on the Vita being a free PS Plus game. Muramasa Rebirth is made by Vanillaware, who if you don’t know also made Dragon Crown, and the very recent Odin Sphere Leifthrasir which you can check our review out for to see just how much I love it. On the surface, Muramasa Rebirth is a simple 2D hack and slash game, that has some fairly deep RPG elements, mixed in with some fun and exciting mechanics. What you won’t know is just how wonderful the story is, how stunningly beautiful the artwork is, and how well balanced the games systems are. The game itself revolves around 2 characters whose stories are played separately but at times overlap. They then come together at the end, and to play them both takes around 30 glorious hours. But it doesn’t end there as there are multiple endings to the fantastic stories.

Then Muramasa brought out 4 sets of DLC add on’s each again set in the same world but with more fantastic stories, new equally different but still balanced gameplay mechanics, and more utterly brilliant artwork. It’s a masterpiece of gaming excellence the whole package.

Again then on the Vita ( don’t worry the PS3 and PS4 get in on the act too ) came Gravity Rush, again free via PS Plus. Although the story of this game wasn’t it’s best point, the superb game mechanics and the originality of the game itself won me over hand and fist.

I then took a punt on a game i’d never heard of but was in the “big in Japan” sale on PS Store called  Steins Gate, on the PS3. All this game is on the surface is a visual novel book, and admittedly after wading through the first 6 to 7 hours was getting bored, but stuck with it, and so glad i did. The game sucked me in on such a deep emotional level i don’t mind saying by the game’s end, ( well one of the 6 endings anyway ) i had lump in my throat and a bit of dust in my eye making it water. The story of the game is the ultimate star here that even David Cage of Heavy Rain would admire, not the gameplay. I’d go as so far to say, the emotion this game brought out of me, was by far more compelling, convincing, heart wrenching and moving, that what i felt about the Last of Us story paled into insignificance. ( YES really ) I’d put 40 hours into Steins gate, and invested so much into it, it was hard to put down, and sad to finish and what a great few finishes i had though!  In my humble opinion, Steins Gate’s is gamings best ever story telling game.

Then, I wondered about the sword fighting games like Dynasty Warriors, Samurai Warriors, and the such. Now i am a huge hack and slash fan, but the thought of mashing my thumbs to complete a game bored me to tears. On a whim and a prayer i bought Samurai Warriors 4 Special edition for the PS4. The special edition came with a complete Manga series of Samurai Warriors and a soundtrack CD too. (This is important part i’ll get back to. )

Again on the surface this was nothing more than a mind numbing mash mash mash for a while, but then i had a bit of a epiphony. With our FPS games, all we do is moronically slaughter NPCs or online players in the same way, on the same maps over and over. Driving gamers keep driving around and around on the same tracks. Is Samurai Warriors just the sort of game that appeals to the Japanese gamer and is part of the Japanese culture? Shouldn’t i just open my mind a bit and be, well a bit more Japanese, less western, as this is what they like to do?  Once i got my head around that i started to enjoy the game much more. It wasn’t just slaughter the hoards of enemies it was slaughter them in as much style in as big a combo and flashiest way possible, that only Bulletstorm could be of comparison to, of a western version for western style game. Also, again mostly lacking in western games, the story lines of Samurai Warriors 4 felt deep, interesting and compelling and i actually felt like i learned something about Japan’s warring states history to finish it, that so much so, 30 hours gaming later I did.

Then we move on to the next series i took an interest in that i’d never tried before, Hatsune Miku. Who i hear you ask ? Goodness me, where have you been! Hatsune Miku, is a series of rhythm games, set to some great music performed on screen by the character Hatsune Miku. These games are now so big, that Hatsune herself is a bonafide Japanese Pop star who, i kid you not has her own 2 hour stadium filled live concerts. Check the link, this is really something to behold.

These Hatsune Miku games are fun, vibrant, colourful, tuneful, easy to pick up, hard to master type games. Have the western markets got anything like it with a pop star from a game you’d pay to go watch? Nope!

Persona 4 golden, Hyperdimension Neptunia games, Akiba’s Trip, Tale of Graces, i could go on and on!

The point is, where i’m going with this, is that there is a gold mine of games out there from Japan, that us westerners rarely hear or get to read about due to our media being so focused on our narrow little worlds, with their FPS’s and Fifa! We’re amazed at the graphics of games like Ori and the Blind forest, but companies like Vanillaware and Japan studio have been making equally stunning visuals for years!

Japanese games have great artwork, but tend not to have uber detailed graphics like you would find in an Uncharted, so because of which they rely on the things that matter to proper gamers, like fun gameplay, superb stories, and awesome game mechanics to make the gaming experience engrossing and entertaining.  The latest game i’ve bought is the embodiment of those sentiments. Odin Sphere Leifthrasir.

I also feel that the medium of gaming especially the western games, miss out on telling great and interesting stories. Stories, if good, pull the gamer through to complete games, even if the game mechanics are boring. I feel this is such an overlooked part of gaming in the western produced market. Maybe we feel The Last of Us and Uncharted stories are so good because us westerners are generally so starved of a good in game yarn that when a good one comes along, like the Last of Us, it sticks out like a sore thumb above the sea of mediocrity we are so used to? Not so with Japanese games where engrossing stories, however silly, are par for the course.

What each Japanese game also does in abundance is they are chocked full of energy, style, excitement, thrills, artwork, breathtaking music, and superb charitcisations, to develop rich worlds on our screens. Many games have also spawned from or are part of a Manga style cartoon series, that just adds to the whole experience. Senguko Basara – Samurai Heroes, both series and game are fantastic fun. 

I’ve just completed watching the cartoon series Psycho – Pass, and have been blown away by the quality of the story telling, narrative and voice acting. I’m not shocked at how well it’s written as like everything coming out of Japan that I’ve tried lately, it’s all the same quality stuff. I’m even more excited to see Psycho – Pass has a game coming out later this year so Pre order is on the way now!

End of the day isn’t gaming something to have fun with, connect with, be entertained with? Can you truly say that western style games give you that sense over and over again or that they are not now stuck in a bit of a rut ? I can’t say that of Japanese games. Yes this next statement is a huge general sweeping generalization, but the fact of the matter is, the more Japanese games I try the more I feel that they seem to have better quality genres, higher production levels, more style and energy, more options, more quality experiences, more choice as a culture, than the western market does.

How does all this relate to the title, well I have to now say, when I turn my consoles on, be it PS4, Xbox1, PS3, Vita or 360, my go to titles now, are not the shooter, or driving games it once was. My go to games are now Japanese ones. I’ve fallen in love with gaming all over again, thanks to those masters from the east. Open your mind, give them a chance, and they may do the same for you too.