Pre-Orders For Xbox One In Japan Pretty Much Nonexistant

The Xbox One is launching in Japan today, but it doesn't sound like the Japanese are very excited about it...

Microsoft and Xbox have never had much success in the Japanese market. That’s just a sad fact of life, and how things have been. You sort of come to accept that, in spite of some concerted efforts made by Microsoft to push the Xbox in Japan (particularly with the Xbox 360 in its early years), the Japanese people don’t seem to, well, give a **** about Xbox.

Sad, isn’t it?

If you were one of those people who was actually expecting that to change with the Xbox One- and honestly, there was a more real chance of that happening than you’d think- well, it doesn’t seem like the Japanese are interested in Microsoft’s offering this time around, as an industry insider has confirmed that pre-orders for the Xbox One are minimal, and that Microsoft will almost certainly have a minimal presence at the Tokyo Game Show.

That, right there, is pretty telling (and if Microsoft's presence at the Tokyo Game Show is indeed minimal, it will basically seal the fate of the Xbox One from the get go).

Unfortunately, Microsoft itself has high hopes from the Xbox One, even though it seems pretty obvious that the console won't exactly set the charts on fire there.

“I want a better performance than our past consoles. With a generational change between game consoles there’s a possibility that the market share could shift as well. We have set big goals,” said head of Xbox in Japan, Takashi Sensui.

It’s an admirable goal, and really, I wish them all the best- I want the Xbox to do well in Japan, the more consoles that do well there, the better it is for me as a gamer in the end- but I simply don’t think it’s going to happen. Outside of a few odd games like Persona, Final Fantasy, and some of Nintendo’s stuff, I’m not sure the Japanese care anymore.

I hope the Xbox One does well, because, well, I want a thriving console market, but it seems less and less likely...

Lies Amazon Japan had high pre-orders.

They shouldnt even waste their time with that market. MS doesnt need Japan to be successful.

Apparently the PS4 is doing abysmal in Japan as well. Like everyone said, Japan lost interest in console gaming.

its going to be more like this picture

PS4 is doing abysmal now, but it has a chance to have a legitimate resurgence in the market. Where is the Xbox One's chance to do that?

the lines are pretty empty

http://www.dualshockers.com/2014/09/03/as-xbox-one-launches-in-japan-akihabara-gamers-really-arent-standing-in-line/

MS should pay up for Monster Hunter again.

But Amazon of Japan sold all 5 preorders.

Japanese Team, Xbox Division

What legitimate resurgence does the PS4 have a chance of fulfilling? If Japan has moved onto handhelds and mobile gaming, then both the PS4 and Xbox One will probably do poorly through the whole generation. I don't really see a resurgence occurring.

@Basinboy said:

Japanese Team, Xbox Division

Looks like Sony Vita Division in North America.

And where does this idea that Japan moved towards handheld and mobile gaming come from? The last generation, most of the games Japan wanted came from handhelds, so they moved to handhelds. Are you telling me that if consoles get legitimately good games, the Japanese market will continue to ignore them?

All the TC needed was a William Usher from CinemaBlend article for the trifecta of heavily biased fanboy websites masquerading as legit gaming news sources.

@charizard1605:

Once Nintendo starts to put Mario games on phones it's over!!!!

If i had to take a guess, I'd say yes, they'd continue to ignore them. It's a trend they're setting. I just think the country as a whole has lost interest in console gaming, and not just because the consoles are lacking games they'd like. I think the Wii-U selling poorly over there is a good indication.

People said that Japan moved towards handhelds last generation, and yet the PS3 still sold around 10 mil, around 1/8th the total PS3 sales. Mario Kart seems to have given the Wii U a solid boost, and when there is more software that a Japanese audience will prefer, the PS4 will get a boost. IF, after there is a solid amount of software released, and the consoles sales don't improve, then yes, we can say that console gaming is on a downward spiral for Japan.

look, all fanboyish hate aside, bottomline is the xbox sucks period. sony are just the best japanese ppl are one ppl out of many that knows sony makes the best products. japan is traditional and knows royalty and playstation is king. Sony Wins Another Generation

lol coming from probably the worst cow on the forum

once the jrpgs that they are planning hit ps4 it will resurface on japan, i don't see this happening with xbone.

@xhawk27 said:

@Basinboy said:

Japanese Team, Xbox Division

Looks like Sony Vita Division in North America.

They share the same office space. Cheaper that way.

only people buying it are westerners living in japan i bet

Eh, I just get the feeling that the Japanese are prejudiced against the West.

@Basinboy said:

@xhawk27 said:

@Basinboy said:

Japanese Team, Xbox Division

Looks like Sony Vita Division in North America.

They share the same office space. Cheaper that way.

This either implies that Sony's American Vita office is in Japan, or Xbox's Japanese office. Either way, that makes sense.

One of your better threads :p

Its because of the trains. Lived there a couple years, if you take the train you have gobs of down time. Its perfect for grinding levels in rpg's.

I'm not surprised honestly. I don't think the Xbox ever appealed to the Japanese market.

Xbox in Japan is about as popular as hitler was in the war.....Xbox One is junk across the board and world, let alone Japan.

@xhawk27: Never going to happen and can't happen currently. Nintendo and Capcom have a contract that gives Nintendo Monster Hunter as an exclusive till 2015, and with the 3DS being Capcom's best friend it wont leave the 3DS to go on the horrible and lame Xbox One where nobody on Xbox likes Japanese games anyway lol.

Japan has never bought Xbox. So why is this news?!

Only people in the U.S. buy Xbox.

I am still like 90% certain that he is a troll account.

you got a link to support your argument

No one gives a flying F about the Xbone in NA and some were expecting it to do well where MS never did half decently? Okay...

Wonder if MS are on full damage control yet?

Nobody on here is even talking about they have pretty much abandoned the Kinect in the Netherlands by not localising the speech recognition, even though the reason they gave for delaying the launch was to do that.

That comes next.

@clyde46 said:

@resevl4rlz said:

@xhawk27 said:

Lies Amazon Japan had high pre-orders.

you got a link to support your argument

damn my joke radar sucks

Good job creating a cow circle jerk thread mod.

I mean seriously, is this really news and post worthy? Who here actually thought Xbox anything was going to sell in Japan? Hell, not even the PS4 is selling in Japan.

Bad thread is bad

The Persona 5 announcement kinda killed the Xbone launch. The guys at Sony are geniuses for a having a great conference prior to the competitor's debut in the east.

@resevl4rlz said:

its going to be more like this picture

and yet 360 won last gen. had the best games and best looking multi plats.

Meh. An American console will never do well in Japan. Most of Europe and Japan will always belong to Sony no matter what MS does.

@ps4hasnogames said:

@resevl4rlz said:

its going to be more like this picture

and yet 360 won last gen. had the best games and best looking multi plats.

oh please the wii won last gen, nice try

MS is doing it all wrong. Remember Milo, that little boy you could talk to through Kinect and ask him "how was school" and shit. Well, MS needed to make one for the Japanese, but instead of a little boy make a tarted up underage schoolgirl. "Senpai, I bought some new cloths today would you like me to try them on? Oh Senpai, I showed you mine now show me yours. Oh Senpai, it's so big I'm gonna need two hands!" Japanese would so buy that shit.

@Basinboy said:

@xhawk27 said:

@Basinboy said:

Japanese Team, Xbox Division

Looks like Sony Vita Division in North America.

They share the same office space. Cheaper that way.

Nah if it were a sony building it would have been sold by now :P

This is a lazy argument. Why are Apple iPhones the most popular in the Japanese market? Maybe they just know a shitty product when they see one.

I think the xbox one will sell about 20%-25% of what the 360 sold by the end of the gen. I do not think MS cares that much about that market.

@resevl4rlz said:

@ps4hasnogames said:

@resevl4rlz said:

its going to be more like this picture

and yet 360 won last gen. had the best games and best looking multi plats.

oh please the wii won last gen, nice try

nice try? lol the wii was a paper weight. all hype. the system that grandmas and soccer moms bought on home shopping network. alan wake, gears of war, halo 3-4 and the gorgeous xbox 360 version of red dead redemption (best game last gen). was enough to seal the deal. left 4 dead 1 and 2 were the icing on the cake.

Xbone won't even bother to get region appropriate games if it does badly. They might just give up on the region entirely.

@ps4hasnogames said:

@resevl4rlz said:

@ps4hasnogames said:

@resevl4rlz said:

its going to be more like this picture

and yet 360 won last gen. had the best games and best looking multi plats.

oh please the wii won last gen, nice try

nice try? lol the wii was a paper weight. all hype. the system that grandmas and soccer moms bought on home shopping network. alan wake, gears of war, halo 3-4 and the gorgeous xbox 360 version of red dead redemption (best game last gen). was enough to seal the deal. left 4 dead 1 and 2 were the icing on the cake.

wii won sales. thats one proof.

judging game library is sooo subjective...there is soo many ways to look at quality of games.

you can judge through metacritic but therre are detractors of that because not every website is trusted

you can judge through one websites scores but theres also detractors saying its just one sites opinion

you can judge quality of library through sheer number, but detractors have said that it should be % of library

the old sw only counted AAA scores, while some people count AA and AAA, and other people count A / AA / AAA. and all of those people cant even agree weather to put only exclusives, console exclusives (as if pc isnt another platform. some of you lemmings need to stop thinking hermits are lemmings) or like in your case, MULTI PLATS.

and even then now both sides have flip flopped...SW and fanboys will always change the rules as long as it favors your favorite console.

lets just keep it at sales is what i say...wii won last gen

You should ask MS that, why are they even trying?