C-suites in Japan and even intermediate level managers are flabbergasted when people tell them that this generation of gamers no longer knows or cares for their once famous IPs that made Japan great. To them this is a shock, but for everyone else, it’s nothing new. Japanese games are not selling since 2007, simply because this new generation of kids is mostly unaware of them. And they are unaware because of the reasons we mention on this website.
As we have seen, Japan lost massive amounts of market share due to their loss of customers over these last years. This loss occurred because a new generation different from those who knew and loved Japanese games since their childhood has come along. As a result, even the fanbase on which most publishers and developers rely on has at best stagnated and at worse decreased.
Most teenagers in Europe and the US have never heard about Onimusha, Ninja Gaiden, Ryu Ga Gotoku (Yakuza), Tenchu, Bayonetta, Dragon Quest, Tales Of, Metal Gear Solid, or any other game franchise that once made Japan famous. Believe it or not, all these games need to be marketed to them as if they were a novelty. If lucky, they have maybe heard of Pokémon, Zelda, Final Fantasy and Sonic.
Bar only the biggest Japanese IPs, European and NA gamers of today between the ages of 5-18 only know the likes of Assassin’s Creed and Call of Duty (to generalize as much as possible). The only people who are aware of most Japanese franchises are the people aged 25 and above. And even then, publishers would need to remind them of their existence and tell them what’s new.
Large publishers can no longer expect to make a fortune out of the previous generation of gamers who experienced the 1990’s. As for small publishers, the few remaining die-hard fans that hang around websites the likes of ricedigital.fr (which is the localized site of its UK brother), Nin-Nin-Game.Com, Kanpai.fr, NCSX, Play-Asia, are few and far between. As such, small Japanese publishers cannot base their sales forecast simply on the number of visitors those websites get.
The age group Japanese games used to cater to is no longer the same. The Japanese IPs from the late 1990s and early 2000s are only remembered by the now 25+ year old group. So, we’ve essentially lost the kids, teenagers, and young adults of today. And since these comprise the most profitable and largest console game buyers’ group of all, Japan is essentially missing out on the most important demographic.
As for the 35+ Western gamers, many of them have lost patience or interest and long forgotten the magic and “epicness” of Japanese games. And those that haven’t, are frustrated because the Japanese games that come out today are not giving them any reasons to join the white and red team again.