Japan honors NES, PS2, Mario

The Media Arts Plaza, a project of the Japanese government's Agency for Cultural Affairs, has announced a list of "100 examples of media that represents Japan."

The list was compiled based on questionnaire results to commemorate the 10th anniversary of the Japan Media Arts Festival, a yearly event that recognizes creative and technically excellent media. List candidates were selected based on Web-based polls--some 33,884 people responded--and mailed-in surveys from artists, editors, and critics.

The list is broken into four categories--art, entertainment, animation, and manga--of 25 items each. Over half the entertainment category was composed of game hardware and software: Nintendo's Game Boy, DS, and Famicom (aka the NES), were chosen, along with Sony's PlayStation and PlayStation 2. The games selected were Super Mario Bros., Space Invaders, Final Fantasy VII, Puyo Puyo, Pokémon, Metal Gear Solid, and Dragon Quest I, III, and V.

From January 21, 2007, a special exhibition at the National Art Center Tokyo will showcase the chosen works.