Why Japan can't catch up with the West in indie games

PC gaming being a niche and the market for Western PC games being nonexistent has a big impact on indie games in Japan.

1. Steam is unpopular and the notion of buying games digitally still isn't that prevalent in Japan compared to the West. In every convenience store, there are cards of games where you buy them to get the game instead of buying directly in the digital store. Japanese indie games have no platform to stand on to deliver their games on their local market.

2. The image of indie games in Japan is of a low quality and low budget game (they only got the low budget right). Their notion of indie games is close to doujinshi like those countless dating sims and shooting games and not like Transistor, LIMBO, Braid, etc.

3. Western games aside from mainstream ones like BF and AC are still unpopular in Japan. Braid, FEZ, etc. and other awesome indie games are unknown in Japan.

4. This is related to no. 2. If there is no publisher, chances are it's a low quality game. That is the thinking prevalent in Japan. In fact, Braid had to had a publisher to sell in Japan.

5. Last but not the least, the notion of going independent and not working in a video game company isn't considered highly in Japan. Unless you're a veteran like the Megaman creator, family and friends will most likely shun a person going independent. It's almost the same as being a NEET. So most likely it's going to be doing another job while making the game like the creator of Cave Story and it took him five years to finish it.

There were steps taken in Japan to promote indie games and indie game development like the bit trip summit but it had to be started by a Westerner. And the Japanese agree that indie game developers in Japan have no presence in the country. They don't meet up and gather and share their knowledge and creativity like Indiecade in the West.

Japan is too brand dependent.

because they don't care about making pretentious 8-bit games. They prefer visual novels and dating sims of which most of it could be considered "indie". To them those kind of games are "quality" games.

At least they're still releasing consistently excellent games that interest me, unlike the West. :3

Japanese doujin games are more indie than Western indies, so very few would find success beyond thousand sales. That's not to say that some of these indies are not absolute gems.

Some of these doujin games have met massive successes since reaching the West via Steam, i.e. Recettear, and this has led to a great exodus of Japanese doujin titles showing up on Steam in search of similar successes.

What do you mean by more indie? It's either an indie game or not. Those doujin games have to find their way internationally to meet success. Since Steam isn't popular in Japan, doujinshi have to rely on events and word of mouth to sell their game locally.

Japanese indie...... Reminds me of I am an Air Traffic Controller: Tokyo Big Wing

If this ever comes to Steam (or others), I'd buy it.

The problem is the word "Indies". On the current gen "The indie scene" is a middle class wanker esque term, but I suppose on consoles it's somewhat accurate. But last gen, they were just games, or arcade games or whatever.

On the PC these games are just a natural part of PC gaming. They aren't given any stupid names. In Japan they are just games too.

The reason I'm talking about the word, is because I think that the meaning needs to be established first. Most of the 2D games and a chunk of 3D games from Japan aren't far off what we have annoyingly come to consider Indie games. Nintendo still does them. Most of the DS games could match that description.

The image of Indie games comes from the stupid ass current gen use of the term. The term became popular because PlayStation wanted to differentiate the games from the big retail games or their older games, so their PR started brandishing the term a lot. MS just called them XBLA games.

They aren't given names in PC because PC has always been the home of indie games. Back then there were a lot of Flash games. When you go way back, a lot of PC game companies started indie like Sierra. There is no publisher. Games are self-published. Anybody can make a game on PC and distribute or sell them. On consoles, one wasn't able do that. He/She had to go through the console manufacturer.

It seems that the definition of indie is being muddled because it has the aura that indie has to start from a small company and not just by being self-published. Nintendo is a big company and their games (those made by first party) should be considered indie if we follow the definition of self-publish strictly.

They're probably more prevalent than most think although I'm sure being an independent developer in Japan gives you a very limited amount resources to use in translating the game for a wider western audience to find.

Plenty of good eastern indies. You just haven't been exposed to them.

Japan has tons of indie games via Doujin Soft. It's just that they don't bother letting it reach the west.

Do they need to?

Because Japan is primarily a mobile market, and the console market is a joke in Japan now.

So those 2 factors limit the potential of a Japanese Indie scene. That said the few we do get play extremely well with things like Gunhound and Astebreed.

Indie studios are simply independent studios without the backing of a large publisher. However, most of these guys would still be full-time programmers, designers, some with an office and whatnot.

Doujin games are mostly made by people with other full-time commitments making games part-time for fun.

er have you check out their rpg games?

they make em by the shit load.

We only see a fraction of JRPGS as most don't come overseas........

outside the big publishers, nearly everything else from Japan feels like an indie game

Their market doesn't demand that type of game I suppose. Also Japan only has 40% of the US's population, so you could argue that they produce more for their population than the USA does.